Trinity (A Werewolf Novel) ✔

Chapter Three

I woke slowly with confusion. I wasn't sure what had happened to me, if I had a nightmare or if I had actually died. I could feel the fabric of sheets around me as my eyes tried to adjust to the bright light of the day. Beside me, a hand drew a warm, wet cloth over my forearm carefully.

The events of the Wolf Moon flooded back to me and I gasped, sitting up quickly in panic. I expected immense pain around my abdomen, but instead was greeted with a small ache.

"Don't worry. Calm down," A voice appealed to me pleadingly. I looked to my left, finding a woman sitting by my bedside with the wet cloth still in her hand. She looked surprised to see me awake.

I looked from her to my body, taking in my appearance. Someone had changed my clothes. I now wore loose pants and a plain white shirt. When I pulled my shirt up, my stomach was wrapped with bandages. My leg was bare of my knife, but then I recalled the weapon had been left in the skull of a she-wolf.

I leapt from the bed quickly, inhaling sharply at the cold of the floor against my bare feet. The woman beside my bed stood as well, lifting her hands as if this would prove her to be safe. I knew those hands could shift into deadly claws.

"Where am I?" I asked her accusingly, looking around wildly. The room was mostly bare besides a lot of bandages and medicine. It looked too clean. It looked too strange. Like maybe I was going to be split apart by curious werewolves with their dissective knives.

"You're in our clinic," The woman said carefully. I peered at her suspiciously. She was frail looking for a werewolf. She was petite. I would have considered her malnourished if it wasn't for the fact that she looked rather healthy. Her hair was brown and to her shoulders in curls. Her eyes were a darker brown, but soft. The look in them reminded me of my mother. The thought struck me momentarily. This was a vicious lycan.

"Why am I here? I was... I was..." I recalled being in my own village. I recalled my brother running for me and my mother crying out in hysterics. I could still feel the floor of the forest under me as I ran into the night, the moon high in the sky and the howls deafening.

"The hunt was called off. You were brought here," The woman explained softly, moving to the end of the bed slowly. I held my hand out and she stopped, backing away uncertainly. "You were hurt pretty badly. You've been recovering here for a few days now."

"I don't feel hurt," I responded with distrust. I touched my stomach again, feeling only the ache of superficial cuts. I remembered the shocking pain that had come with the impact of those claws against my flesh and the blood that had leaked over my legs.

"You've been healing quickly. Maybe not as much as an adult lycan, but a child pre-shift..." The insinuation the woman was making was enough to make me stare at her in disbelief.

"I'm not a lycan," I told her firmly.

"You smell like one," She answered, lowering her head carefully, "Sometimes."

"I'm not a lycan," I repeated and then I turned away. I rummaged through a nearby cupboard, quickly picking out something sharp before moving towards the door.

"You shouldn't leave. Alpha Roman demanded you stay here," The woman told me, twisting her hands together nervously.

I hesitated, hearing his words echoing in my mind. Mate. I didn't know what he was talking about. I didn't know then and I didn't care to know now. If it was enough for him to call off the hunt, maybe it just meant there was a mistake. Maybe it meant I could go back home to my family. Or maybe there was something worse waiting for me than a hunt. I couldn't sit here and wait to find out.