A few hours later, I got curious if the body was still there. Remus Lupin and the American Werewolf gang hadn’t come around to eat me yet, so I figured there had to be no more wolves left in the area. They would’ve been able to track my scent back to the house, right? If there were any nearby, I would’ve been found by now.
I weighed the pros and cons of returning back to bury the body for hours. I worried someone would find it and somehow trace it back to me. It was a paranoid thought, and it wasn’t like I’d left a weapon behind— but still. I’d committed a murder. I needed to hide the evidence, before someone… either the police or the wolf’s friends… discovered the remains and came after me.
Criminals always return to the scene of the crime, I guess. It was dark by this time, but that didn’t deter me. I headed into the woods with ovaries made of steel, along with a shovel, and decided that if there were any more wolves, hopefully my hand would do that freaky shit again and I’d be fine.
While I was walking, I got the notion that I couldn’t see. At the thought, my fingertips started glowing again... like they had when I’d killed the wolf. They served as a flashlight as I continued forward, lighting the path with a shining light.
I held my hand in front of my face with a pounding heartbeat. “Holy crap.”
Was I an alien or something? None of this shit had ever happened to me in my life!
I held my breath as I returned to the clearing where I’d been attacked. I knew this was the one, because the tree I’d hit with my blast still had a hole in it.
But there was no body, only traces of blood left behind— like someone had been dragging a body along in the dirt.
The man had disappeared. Okay, maybe I hadn’t killed him. Which was even worse, because that meant he was out there looking for me.
If the body was gone, either he was still walking around with a hole in his chest, or somebody had moved it. I didn’t care which. Either meant that I was still in trouble. I needed to get the heck out of here.
I headed back to my house. As I did, I felt a strange sensation spread over my palm. It was an uncomfortable itching, like I’d had an allergic reaction or something.
I raised my palm in front of my face to observe it. I watched, transfixed, as a black mark in the resemblance of a paw print took shape on my right hand— the same hand I’d used to kill the wolf.
Chapter Three
Ethan
That cursed day in the forest changed my life forever. The leshane was killed, but his slaying came at a terrible price. I lost my right leg in the process of killing him.
Even worse, I lost my father.
I couldn’t bear that the King of the Arcanea was dead. My dad was gone. I wouldn’t see him again until the Father Stag of the Hunt came to take me onward to the Great Hunting Fields, where my dad and I would finally be reunited.
I’d been lost in grief for weeks. Worse still, my mother was inconsolable. The Queen of the Arcanea had locked herself in her room and refused to come out since she’d been told the news. When they’d said the king had sacrificed himself for me, the wailing began.
She hadn’t been able to look me in the eye since. I knew I’d never be able to fix what I did. I’d put myself in a vulnerable position, and my father had paid the price.
Three months passed in a blur. I wasn’t ready to face what I knew had to be done. I wanted to curl up in a ball somewhere and hide.
But the throne was on the line. Now that my father was dead, my place in the King’s Contest was being questioned. People were wondering if they should deny me my right to compete for the monarchy. Since I was born, I’d always been expected to win the King’s Contest, and take over ruling Malovia in my father’s footsteps.
Now I was a cripple who wasn’t considered worthy. A boy who’d caused the death of one of the greatest kings in Malovia’s history. A son that had killed his own father due to a silly mistake. People were whispering that the kinghood belonged to someone else.
I refused to let my crown fall to anyone who wasn’t me. So I was attending the Gathering of the Arcanea tonight, to make my intent to compete in the King’s Contest, and make sure the royal court knew where I stood.
Around midnight, I started getting ready. It took me fifteen minutes to put on my prosthetic leg. I still wasn’t used to it. Lord Lucien wanted me to work on my timing, as there would probably come a day when I would need to get it on in an emergency, to be ready to fight.
The things regular people took for granted.
When my leg was taken from me, I’d been made a prosthetic from the best medical companies that money could buy. It was high-tech, and expensive. I had to learn to walk again. I had to learn to doeverythingagain.
The prosthetic didn’t transfer when I shifted into my wolven form. My back right leg was missing when I became the wolf— an empty gap showing where a limb once stood.
I’d become known among the Arcanea as the three-legged White Wolf. It was humiliating.
I put on the black pants and black hussar’s jacket, fitted with gold trimmings, before I looped the black velvet cloak around my shoulders. I was still in the required mourning period, so I donned the black clothes without complaint, though I much preferred navy… the wolven Faction colors. I slipped on my boots and looked in the mirror. I very much looked like a prince.
Good. Perhaps it would remind the Circle to know their place.
