My Hybrid Mate (Book II)

One: The Offering

42 / Alessia ^

The Offering

There's not a single memory I could relay that doesn't take place in this mansion. I've lived here my whole life and so has everyone else who resides here.

There are a couple hundred of us living here, boys and girls alike. We're like one massive fucked up family.

This isn't an orphanage, no, it's a machine making factory. We're brought in from age three and raised until twenty-one, at twenty-one you aren't free to leave The Offering, oh no, no one leaves here.

You're just assigned your assignment or left to scour the field. If you have an assignment it's either as a hunter or assassin depending on your skill set. Once they discover your skill that is what they mould you into. Nobody chooses if they want to be a hunter or assassin, for crying out loud I don't think a soul chooses to even be here.

I cannot imagine how anyone would willingly want to come here, I'm not a soon to be traitor nor do I hate The Offering – I just would have never chosen to come here.

Either way, this is my life – I'm both a huntress and assassin. It's not as exciting as one would assume, people with both are celebrated within the organisation. It's some kind of accomplishment for anyone but us, we have to train much more than the others and the pressure to be perfect in both, not good in one great in the other.

You must be the perfect assassin, the perfect hunter.

An assassin is skilled in combat and weaponry and machinery, they can assassinate someone with their bare hands or with their knives or gun. They are called when a job needs to be swift and executed with immediate precision.

A hunter is skilled in combat and stealth, they are light on their feet and can go undetected by their assignment. They watch their assignment for days, weeks, months or even years as long as it takes for The Offering to gather the information they need on that target.

Our target? Werewolves.

These don't shift at every full moon, no they aren't controlled in that way by the moon. They shift when they want, usually staying in their human form. They live in packs that are usually large but secluded from humanity. Some live within the humans but you won't find too many, especially not now after the bar attack.

Everyone in this mansion has one thing in common, the one thing The Offering didn't drill into our minds to make it something we have in common. Our parents were killed by werewolves. Sure, now you could say 'oh it is an orphanage,' however, I'd still disagree.

We're practically robots now, fully built and equipped with all we need to be able to kill without feeling an ounce of remorse. We are trained and beat and starved into obedience, our humanity being completely erased – leaving just a human shell.

A shell that can withstand so much 'pain' by the time it reaches twenty-one. I personally don't even remember what it feels like to feel hurt. I don't remember what a lot of things feel like because I don't know what it's like to feel anymore.

However, I must admit my biggest shame – every year I fail the same task no matter how hard I try, no matter how many inhumane acts I try to accomplish the same thing is scribbled at the bottom of my sheet:

Failed to cast out love. Therefore fails Emotions.

How damn embarrassing – love out of all the emotions a human possesses. Love is a gateway to every other emotion, it is such a dangerous and vital thing to feel. What is it that I love so much? I've repeated the question year in and year out, my Leader has repeated that question year in and year out. I haven't the slightest damn clue what it is.