The Vampire's Harvest

152

You struggle to pull the statue out of your pocket and once it is free, the weight causes your arm to make a slow arc in the air. Or at least slow in comparison to the lightning fast reflexes of a werewolf.

You are unable to fend off your sister and she manages to sink her teeth into your arm, forcing you to drop the statue as you cry out in pain. Ell, now recovered from Gianette's blow, leaps up to confront her. They manage to pull her off your arm, but she quickly turns her fangs on them. With their attention concentrated on protecting you, they appear to lack the focus needed to contest your sister. She handles them easily, tearing them to shreds as you feel tears well up in your eyes.

You expect her to turn her anger back on you, but instead she faces any vamp that dares to spring upon her. Though, she has many opportunities to run out and join her pack, where she'd be better protected, she instead hangs close to you. She receives plenty of blows, but your sister is a true prodigy of lycanthropy. Her skill as a huntress is without competitor amongst the vamps that remain in the ballroom. Not that it matters. You feel a dark emptiness pushing in on your vision as your head grows light.

You look to your arm, which lays limp in an ever widening pool of blood. You aren't sure you have much left in you. You look at Ell and wonder if you'll see them in the afterlife, but before you can let that comfort you, you feel a fire burn from somewhere within your gut. It pulls at your muscles, licking at your nerves. You strain and tense, your bones grinding together as your body contorts. With madness around you — and now inside you — you pass out, unable to withstand the chaos.

When you awake, you find yourself lying on the forest floor. You look up to find Gianette, human again. Behind her are several others, none of which look particularly happy to see you.

"She's up, can we go?" snarls someone you can't see.

"I don't see why we're bothering with a vamp lover anyway," groans another.

"Because," snapped a burly man who stood not far from Gianette, "she is one of us now, no matter what her history. The pack never leaves a wolf behind." As grateful as you are to him for supporting you, you can see the disgust in his eyes as he glances back at you. His lips curl and he turns away for good. "Let's go, we're heading out."

The others leave while Gianette stands over you.

"Just go without me," you say.

"Get up," she commands, grabbing your arm and lurching you to your feet. "The pack never leaves a wolf behind."

You discover that that mantra is not what kept you safe that day. Instead, you find it's the alpha's love for Gianette and the pack's belief that she was the hero of that fateful night, that kept you alive. Otherwise they would have torn you to shreds as they did Ell. As you spend your years in the back of the pack, hated and trapped inside your sister's shadow, you wish that maybe they could have done just that.

***

You've found one of the unsuccessful endings for this branch of the story... Why not go back and see what will stop Gianette?