CHAPTER 4: A New Creature

The dark wasn't peaceful. It wasn't a quiet sleep or a white light. It was a thick, oily blackness that felt like it was trying to swallow me whole.

I was running.

My legs felt heavy, like I was moving through very deep water. I couldn't see my hands in front of my face, but I could hear it. Thump. Thump. Thump. Something was behind me. Something huge. Each of its footsteps shook the ground, vibrating through the soles of my feet.

"Go away!" I screamed. My voice didn't sound like mine. It sounded hollow, echoing off walls I couldn't see.

I tripped over nothing and slid across the cold floor. I scrambled up, my breath coming in slow gasps. The thing was closer now. I could smell it now; it was more frightening than I expected. I swallowed hard, standing my ground.

I couldn't run anymore. My lungs were burning. My heart, the heart that had just stopped beating in that ditch, was racing very fast now.

"Fine!" I yelled, spinning around. I clenched my bleeding fists. "Come on then! Finish it! Kill me again!"

The darkness shifted. Two eyes, massive and glowing like violet flames, opened in the air in front of me. Then came the teeth, rows of white jagged teeth that seemed to catch a light that wasn't there. It wasn't just a massive wolf, something I've never seen before.

"You are a loud one," the voice boomed. It didn't come from a mouth; it echoed inside my skull, making my teeth ache.

"What are you?" I whispered, my knees shaking. "Am I in hell?"

"I am the hunger that the city forgot," the shadow rumbled. It lowered its massive head until those violet eyes were level with mine. "And you? You are a girl who died in the mud while your mate watched."

"Don't talk about him," I snapped, the pain of the rejection flaring up even in death. "Why are you chasing me? Just let me go. I want to be done. I want the hurting to stop."

"The hurting never stops, Aurelia Viremont. It molts…and grows teeth." The creature circled me, its body flowing like ink. "I have been trapped under these mines for a thousand years. I was waiting for a soul that tasted just like yours."

"Like mine? I'm nothing. I'm a low-blood omega. Everyone told me that since the day I was born. I’m a mistake."

"The moon makes mistakes," the wolf hissed, its fur bristling like needles. "But the shadow does not. I chose you because you have been hollowed out. There is nothing left in you but the scream for justice. You aren't a 'low-blood.' You are the vessel I have been waiting for."

"I don't want to be a vessel. I just want to rest."

"Rest? While they laugh?" The wolf leaned in, its hot breath hitting my face. "While that King sleeps in his high tower? While the man who framed you drinks champagne? They are calling you a child-killer, Aurelia. They are cheering for your death."

I closed my eyes, seeing Kaelen’s cold face as he turned his back on me. I felt the slap from the Luna again. I felt the silver chain hitting my chest. The sadness started to drain away, replaced by a heat so intense it felt like my blood was turning into lava.

"They think I'm a monster," I whispered.

"So be the monster they fear," the wolf tempted. “Give me your soul. Let me into the cracks they broke in you. I will give you the strength to tear their world apart. I will give you the power to make them crawl."

I looked into those violet eyes. I thought about the little girl, Maya, who had been murdered. I thought about the people who used me as a tray. I thought about the man who was supposed to love me, who instead watched me get beaten to death.

"Why me, though?" I asked. "There are stronger wolves. Better warriors."

"Because they have something to lose," the shadow replied. "You have nothing. And a woman with nothing is the most dangerous thing in this world."

I reached out my hand. My fingers trembled, but I didn't pull back.

"I don't care about my soul," I said, my voice growing cold and steady. "It’s already broken. If you give me the strength to make them pay... if you help me find the truth and make them bleed for every tear I cried tonight... then take it."

The wolf let out a howl that sounded like a thousand souls screaming at once. It lunged, not at me, but into me immediately. I held my ground.

The feeling of her moving and merging with my soul was painful, but I let the pain sink in. My insides were twisted to accommodate her, I swallowed my screams, looking up.

“Just a little more, Aurelia, and the world will be yours,” I whispered before the world turned black.

Back in the ditch, reality slammed into me.

CRACK.

My ribs snapped back into place. The sound was loud and echoing off the walls of the mine.

THUD.

My heart kicked once. Twice. It felt like it was being jump-started by a bolt of lightning.

I gasped, my mouth filling with mud. I choked, coughing it all up as my lungs expanded with a force that felt like it would burst my chest. My bones were clicking and shifting, lengthening, hardening. The pain was worse than the beating, but I didn't scream. I welcomed it.

I felt the silver in the mud. Usually, it would be killing me. Now, it just felt like a tickle. The shadow inside me was eating the poison, turning it into fuel.

My eyes snapped open.

The world wasn't dark anymore. I could see everything: the individual drops of rain falling from the sky, the tiny scurrying insects in the rocks, the distant glow of the city lights miles away. And my vision wasn't normal. Everything was tinted in a glowing violet.

I reached up and grabbed the edge of the ditch. I pulled myself up, my muscles rippling with a power I had never known. I wasn't the girl who had been tossed down here. I wasn't a "timid omega."

I stood up at the edge of the pit, the rain washing the mud from my skin. My rags clung to me, but I didn't feel the cold anymore. I felt hot like a sun about to explode.

I looked toward the Spire, the tallest building in Nocturna, where Kaelen Thorne lived his perfect, lie-filled life. The violet in my eyes flared bright, reflecting in the puddles at my feet.

"You should have made sure I stayed dead, Kaelen," I whispered. My voice was different now, deeper, with an edge that could cut steel.

I took a step forward, the ground cracking under my bare foot.

"Nocturna will not survive the monster they have created.” I laughed darkly.