Chapter 3 Syra

The alpha named Anton still has my spear. With an angry snarl, he charges toward the monster in the doorway, but the monster is too quick for him. Smooth as water, it rolls out of the way of the gleaming speartip, and with a blade of its own, it opens a deep gash along the alpha's arm.

Anton stumbles back with a pained grunt.

The spear drops from his hand.

The monster rises to its feet and turns to face the other two alphas. It is shaped like an alpha, but it doesn't have an alpha's scent, and its weird, sallow hide is bumpy and cracked, almost like the skin of a reptile. Long hair hangs down from its head in matted locks. An obsidian-bladed knife gleams in its right hand.

The other two alphas roar and charge.

One of them is sent flying with a kick to the solar plexus. The other one—the one I stabbed with my spear—manages to catch the monster's knife arm before the obsidian blade can plunge into his chest. The monster lashes out his other hand, striking the alpha in his wounded shoulder. The alpha falls back, shrieking in pain.

By then, Anton is back on his feet again.

As the monster turns to face him, Delphine slips a stiletto from a sheath on her hip and lunges toward the creature's back. Even in my weakened state, I am able to hook one of her ankles, sending her sprawling.

The candle drops from her other hand and tumbles to the floor of the barn, igniting a tuft of dried grass by the wall. The light inside the barn doubles.

"You bitch!" Delphine hisses.

As quick as a snake, she regains her feet and whirls to face me. Her smile is gone, replaced by a look of pure rage.

The stiletto winks in her hand.

She pounces, and I raise my hands to protect myself, but I know my current strength is not going to be enough to fight her off.

She's going to kill me.

She is almost upon me when a scaly hand catches her hair and yanks her backward. Her body smashes through the wall of the barn, which is now rapidly catching fire. She falls to the ground, limp and unconscious.

"Delphine!" Anton growls.

The alpha scoops up the omega with his good arm. He glares at the monster, then at me.

"This isn't over," he says. "We'll meet again, and when we do, you'll be sorry."

He wheels around and races out of the barn, and his two wounded pack brothers follow after him.

Leaving me alone with the monster.

As the creature turns to face me, I summon what little strength I have and lunge for my spear where Anton dropped it. I manage to pull off a halfway decent somersault, and I come up holding the spear with the tip aimed at the monster's broad chest.

Just because it fought off Delphine and her alphas, that doesn't mean it's friendly. I also know I'm in no condition to fight such a formidable creature, but I'm willing to try.

"Stay right there," I say. "Don't come any closer."

A surprisingly white smile spreads across the creature's mottled face.

"You haven't changed one bit," it says. The growl is gone from his voice, but it is still deep, and decidedly masculine.

Already, one entire side of the barn is engulfed in orange flames, shedding even more light on the figure standing before me. Now I can see that what I took to be rough, scaly skin is not really skin at all, but merely some sort of mud-like substance that has been daubed all over his body, probably to mask his scent. This is no monster. This is an alpha.

"Who are you?" I ask, struggling to hide the tremor in my voice.

"You don't recognize me, Syra?"

I start to say no. Then the fire glows brighter, showing me his beautiful, forest-green eyes.

My heart skips.

"Markus?"