Edith was walking in the yard with Seth. Edith looked like she was talking to herself because Seth was just staring at her, but every nod and shake of the head from Seth meant every question Edith asked her.
“To be honest, I’m happier to see you as a wolf than your human form. I’m sorry to trouble you; I don’t know why I asked you to turn into a wolf.”
A new confession from his mouth made Seth walk around Edith. After turning around, the wolf approached Edith and put his head close to Edith’s shoulder. Edith rubbed the fur on the nape of the brown wolf, who was now sitting on her hind legs.
Edith suddenly felt the look in Seth’s eyes change. His gaze looked blank for a moment before returning to the initial mode with a look full of vigilance.
Seth shifted into a human and spoke, “Go inside. I have to go. There’s something to take care of.”
Edith covered her face. She didn’t want to see Seth, who wasn’t wearing a single piece of clothing to cover his body at this time. She widened her eyes and then exclaimed, “Seth, put your clothes on!”
“I’m going to change back. Sorry, I’m in a hurry. Promise me that you won’t get out of this house, okay?”
“What’s the matter?”
“Just follow my words. I’ll explain it later. Promise me!”
“Okay, I promise you.”
Seth returns to his wolf form and runs away from Edith. He ran through the hedgerows and disappeared into the darkness as Edith was still looking at Seth’s wolf form. Their moment together earlier made Seth feel relieved.
*
“Are you sure?”
Seth asked a grey wolf beside him. Seth circulated his gaze around. In his wolf form, he examined every inch of the bush where he and several wolves stood. He inspected the ground below and relied on his sense of smell to sniff out any foreign scent that might still linger.
He also inspected every tree trunk that was on the outermost side of the vast bushfield. On one of the trunks of a large tree, Seth found an unfamiliar scent piercing his sense of smell. He smelled the scent of a vampire on the trunk of the tree. He looked at the ground below and found a few drops of blood still visible.
“It’s true that vampires are what you say, but there’s something weird.”
Seth looked at a wolf lying motionless in the middle of a bushfield. His wolf body had already hardened when Seth examined it earlier. Several pairs of ribs were broken, and some protruded out through his skin.
“Strange, how?” It was the dark brown wolf who now asked him.
“There was a trace of blood under the trunk of that tree. We know that vampire blood is not like this. I smelled the same scent of that blood and the traces it left on the trunk of the tree just now. It comes from the same creature.”
Seth’s narration made the wolves who were in that place become restless. A snorting sound faintly sounded between them. To overcome this, Seth must be able to act in situations like this. Werewolves and vampires have been enemies for centuries. But it has been three generations since this area was safe from these blood-sucking creatures.
“Has my father figured out this matter, Will?”
“Yes, I contacted him just now.”
‘Does this creature know that Alpha is not here?’
The question crossed Seth’s mind. If Seth’s guess is correct, then the culprit must have observed this herd and understood the hierarchy within his herd. They missed! Seth was so hard-headed that his head became sore. Not to mention when he saw that there was a dead wolf in front of him.
“Have you told Mike’s family?”
Seth knows Mike, the dead wolf. He is a year younger than Seth. Mike was known as a cheerful werewolf, so Seth felt that his death was so sad.
“His father is heading here, Seth,” replied the grey wolf again.
“I’m going to talk to Mike’s dad to represent my dad.”
Seth is still a betabeta in his pack. The Alpha was travelling to France. To help other wolf packs that are going through a war with the new vampires. When Alpha is not there, Seth is faced with an attack from a vampire, which causes a wolf in his pack to die.
Either it was all a mere coincidence or it was planned. Seth can’t confirm it yet. “Jadden, you traced the blood trail from that tree trunk.”
Seth orders a dark brown wolf to investigate the traces of blood he saw earlier. The wolf walked towards the tree trunk and was lost in the darkness of the forest behind it.
*
A man entered a house staggeredly. One of his hands held his abdomen, which was injured from the battle he had just experienced. He walked over to the sofa and sat it down. The man took off his T-shirt and looked at the wound on his stomach.
The laceration on his abdomen was only half closed. He hates this kind of situation. If he were a pure werewolf, his healing process would have been shorter than it is now, but that was not the case for him.
“Damn it! Where should I look for that girl?”
His current body condition also resulted in him being unable to change his form to his wolf form. He had to rely on the light of the full moon to be able to change shape, just like yesterday when he met the girl.
“If only the brown wolf hadn’t appeared, I would have gotten the girl.”
The man could only close his eyes to be able to endure an injured belly. He lay down on the couch and felt that his eyes were already hard to reopen.
*
Edith sensed that the female students at this school began to look at her sarcastically as she walked to the library. At first, she didn’t care, but over time, their scathing comments began to disturb her eardrums. Somehow, the rumours circulated. Edith and Seth just set off together to school. That’s because she had to clean up the administration to change her learning method to online because of the request of Seth’s parents.
The rest of her days at school had only two days left, but she had to hear bad rumours about her. Surely, those two days would be long and hard for Edith.
“Look at her; I thought she was different. But she is no different from another who gave up her body to satisfy Seth.”
“Hey, what’s your problem?” Edith turned around and raised her tone. Edith saw a female student staring fiercely at her.
“Nothing; it’s just that you are too hypocritical to regard yourself as a saint and run for student president. It’s a good thing that I didn’t choose you; otherwise, I would already feel regretful,” the girl replied sarcastically.
“I’m not hypocritical!”
“Go ahead and refute, but it won’t have any effect. All the students here already know your disgrace, bitch.”
Seth walked with his two friends in the opposite direction from Edith. Seth could clearly hear the bullying that had just happened, and the one who was bullied this time was Edith. He snatched the whipped milk held by one of the female students who was standing in the corridor. Seth walked up to the student who bullied Edith and stood behind her.
Seth poured whipped milk on the girl’s head. His act caught the attention of everyone in the corridor. The screams of the girl broke the laughter in the corridor.
The girl ran away from the scene, sobbing. Before leaving the place, she said, “You’re going to have to pay for this!”
“Watch your step, Vixen!” Seth exclaimed with a mischievous grin.
Edith’s tears were already welling up in her eyes. She had never been insulted like this before. Edith never looked for trouble with others, but this time the trouble that came to her and slapped her was so right in her heart.
Seeing Edith in such a state, Seth’s anger was ignited. He stared intently at all the students who were within his line of sight.
“What are you guys looking at?? Disperse!”
Seth shouted in an echoing voice. All the students who were on the scene-no one dared to refute them-dispersed directly.
It felt like Seth wanted to hug Edith just to appease the girl, but he remembered his promise. He just silently looked at Edith, who was covering his face. But her feelings were reciprocated. Edith leaned her head on Seth’s shoulder, and without hesitation, Seth took Edith into his arms.
“Is the girl’s father in our pack, Will?”
“No.”
“Ah, it’s a pity. Even though I’m in the mood to beat someone up right now,”