Fate Mate

Chapter 30

Sophia sat on the living room couch, eyes perpetually glazed over as she connected with her pack mates via their mindlink. I paced back and forth, physically unable to sit still while my friends fought against the two trespassing hybrids. A mated pair, apparently. I couldn't fathom how two werewolves could find themselves in such a position-- betraying the natural order of the world by becoming a vampire-werewolf hybrid...

"Dylan just reached the fight," Sophia murmured, and my heartbeat quickened. If Dylan just arrived, Nolan would reach the fight in a matter of minutes. "Ginny and Tyler are injured, but Dylan relieved them just in time."

I swallowed, suddenly frozen in place, waiting for the next update to leave Sophia's lips. Apparently, Ginny and Tyler had been the ones to discover the hybrids while on patrol, so they had been fighting the creatures for several minutes before help arrived. Sophia frowned.

"What's happening?" I demanded, hands nervously clenching and unclenching into fists.

"The hybrids..." Sophia's frown deepened, "They fight well."

That wasn't what I wanted to hear. I wanted to hear that Dylan had already snapped the neck of one of the hybrids, and the other would fall soon after. And yet, I shouldn't have been surprised. These creatures-- these abominations-- were a combination of two powerful creatures. Of course they were difficult to kill...

"Nolan made it," Sophia visibly flinched. "He and Raegan took care of the male."

Took care of the male? I wondered what that could have meant. Judging by the lusty smirk that now painted itself across Sophia's lips, I guessed that the massacre hadn't been pretty. Nonetheless, I let out a long breath and wiped the sweat of my palms on my shorts. Nolan, Dylan, and Raegan were the best fighters I'd ever seen... If anyone could kill this last hybrid, they could.

Sophia's dark, perfectly-manicured brows furrowed as she deciphered the flashes of battle that appeared through her mindlink. "The female is stronger..."

"How much stronger?" I pressed. Stronger than who?

Sophia ignored my question, eyes widening at whatever appeared in her mind, "No!"

My heart stopped beating all together, and dread seeped into my veins like poison. I couldn't breathe, completely paralyzed by fear. Seconds felt like hours as I waited for Sophia to continue, reading her every expression. Blood pounded in my ears, and I detected the strangest pulsing in my neck, beneath the surface of my bandage. What is happening?

My fingers subconsciously reached up to touch the spot just above my clavicle: Dominic's mark. As soon as my digits made contact with the scar, my own vision slipped away until I no longer stood in the living room of the pack house.

Suddenly, I was running through darkness, dodging branches and tree-trunks before they even appeared in my vision. And yet... I had no control over these actions. I could only watch. I am seeing someone else's thoughts...

The sound of a battle echoed in my ears, faint as a phantom whisper in the back of my mind. Seconds later, I burst through a thicket of undergrowth and into a wooded clearing. Four massive werewolves circled around a single creature: the female hybrid.

She was unlike anything I'd ever seen. Upon first glance, the hybrid looked like an abnormally tall human, with long limbs like a spider's legs and a woman's face, but the similarities ended there. A thin layer of dark hair covered the hybrid's grey skin, and her eyes flashed an ominous shade of red as she turned to face every one of her enemies. Despite her gangly appearance, she moved with surprising grace and stealth.