Why ishethe first thing I see when I wake up on the other side?
He’s towering over me, knees on either side of me, his hand pressed to my shoulder. I blink in disbelief, wincing from the closeness, from his touch, and that’s when he removes his hand and climbs to his feet.
He holds out a hand toward me, and I’m not sure if I should take it. But lying here on the ground while he stands over me feels pathetic, so I take his hand reluctantly, snatching my hand away as soon as I’m on my feet.
There’s a nagging burning sensation on my knees, which is strange if I’ve woken up in the afterlife after the wolf took mine. I shouldn’t be feeling pain if I’m dead, and that’s when I look around, realizing that I’m still alive—as alive as the forest around us.
“Wh-what’s going on?” I ask, my eyes widening with horror. “Where’s the wolf?”
“You were running away, Annika,” Henry states calmly, arching a brow at me.
“I—That’s not the point!” I argue. “There was a wolf here just now. It was about to kill me.”
“The wolf wasn’t going to kill you, Anni,” Henry chuckles nonchalantly. “It was simply catching up to you when you were running away.”
His nonchalance is infuriating, but maybe it’s mostly because I’m in denial of that little voice in my head trying to make sense of how Henry’s standing in front of me now, in place of a majestic animal that had me pinned down.
The eyes were the same…you recognized them…
No!
“Is that your pet? You have a pet wolf? Could you get any crazier?” I ramble to drown out the sounds of my inner voice.
Henry remains calm, chuckling again as he steps forward and closes a little more distance between us. There’s a mischievous glint in his eyes when he says, “I think I’m about to get a little crazier when I say this, Anni, but Iamthe wolf you just encountered.”
“No…” I shake my head, laughing to express my disbelief. “That’s impossible. You’re just—that’s impossible. How can you think that I’d believe that? I know you’re lying to me.”
Henry’s expression turns flat. “I am Heinrich Rudolph, the Alpha of the Silver Stone Pack of the Bitterroot Valley,” he declares with an air of might and conviction that reeks of authority.
But the only thing believable in his statement is the part where he said “Bitterroot Valley,” and nothing more. Alpha? Silver Stone Pack?
“Heinrich Rudolph? You’re Henry Ralph.”
“Heinrich ‘Henry Ralph’ Rudolph. Ralph was my grandfather’s name, and Henry Ralph was the alias I used in the city to run the company.”
I shake my head slowly, unable to believe what he’s saying, but even his eyes seem to be earnest. They’re still more green than blue; his pupils circled with flecks of gold, like a ring that signifies his sincerity.
But I still can’t believe it. “There’s no way. It’s not possible. You can’t be a man and a wolf. It’s not possible.”
“Actually, it is possible. I am the descendant of very powerful werewolves. Shapeshifters. I can shapeshift at will. Wanna see?”
I’m still shaking my head, unable to believe a word he says. A mythical creature? Is that what he is?
My mind races with many questions, all of which don’t seem to have answers, while Henry—or Heinrich, or whatever his name is—takes a few steps back, then nods.
“It’s time you finally understood why you’re here, Annika. I am no ordinary man. I am a werewolf. And the valley…well, the valley needs you.”
The valley needs me?
I barely have time to process that statement when Henry lowers his head, his shoulders heaving with uncontrollable breaths as a violent crack slices through the air. I gasp when I realize what’s happening, and barely grasp the magnitude of what’s going on when his limbs twist, and the hair on his arms instantly grows. Chestnut brown fur splits from his pores and spreads across his arms and shins, his joints bending and forming the giant limbs of the wolf. His front paws hit theground where his hands should have been, the landing soft, skillful, as his face morphs and his mouth turns into a muzzle.
Shock renders me speechless, and when he takes a step forward as if to confirm that he is the wolf who shapeshifted from a man, my vision blurs, my breath catches in my throat, and my head feels like it’s spinning. The ground underneath my feet feels like it opens up and swallows me. When everything goes black, I fall into some void of disbelief.
Chapter 8 - Heinrich
“I shifted, and then, she passed out,” I sigh, skittishly pacing the floor in Annika’s bedroom back at my cabin, rubbing my chin with my thumb and forefinger.
“She’ll wake up soon, I’m sure of it.” Anastasia, whom I’d called urgently to come to my cabin when Annika passed out in the woods, sits on the bed now, a hand pressed to Annika’s neck, where she checks for a pulse for a third time.
