Shadows of the Past

Seventeen

"Huh!" Air surged into my lungs and I sprang straight as a pin. My head swam and my ears roared, like I was underwater. Shaking my head fiercely, I tried to clear the feeling so I could get a better bearing of where I was.

"Just in time." Someone said from in front of me.

My eyes jolted to the left until they focused on the source. It was the guy that had been in the hallway, and now he was sitting in front of—and facing away from—me, his posture relaxed and with one hand on the top of the steering wheel. His caramel eyes met mine briefly in the rear view mirror. I glared at him.

Movement to the right redirected my focus, and I realized Scarlet was the in passenger seat. Her dark hair tossed over her shoulder as she twisted her body to look back at me. "Sorry about the punch to the face. Honestly I was surprised it took you all weekend to even feel the effects. But you fought it, so hitting you became necessary."

"Effects of what?" I shook my head. "Never mind. Why did you kidnap me?"

"We didn't kidnap you." The driver said.

I attempted to lean forward in my seat, until I was restricted by the seatbelt that firmly strapped me in. I could barely move, and my hands were pinched behind my back. "I'm not sure what your definition of kidnapping is, but this is surely mine!"

"Shut up." Scarlet snarled. "We didn't even hurt you."

"I beg to differ." I said, my cheek aching where her knuckles broke the skin.

The car slowed down, and we turned left onto a dirt drive, closed in on both sides by massive pine trees that stretched to the sky. The iron gate at the entrance closed behind us with a clang. The road was slightly winding as it flowed through the trees, but it wasn't very long, and soon we broke into a clearing that held an enormous house. Exceeding the "mansion" label many humans placed on regular Pack Houses, this was a castle.

While it was bigger than many pack houses I had seen, it wasn't fantasy-large. However, the castle feel came from the five turrets attached to and standing at different heights around the building. It was built raised up on a strong foundation of dark stones, a wall that went deeper the farther back the castle extended from us—due to the apparent hill it sat on that sloped out of view. The outer walls of the building were created with bricks and stones in a variety of lighter colors like grey and cream and white. The conical roofs of each turret were made of some sort of grey metal sheeting.

We pulled to a stop in front of the massive structure, right at the bottom of some fancy stairs. The first seven steps—which the driver guy needed to help me with until I wasn't so dizzy anymore—led to a square platform. On either side of us was a set of five more steps. We took the right side, and at the top we circled back to the left where a massive door stood in the middle of the giant platform between the staircases. It was slightly blended in to the wood around it, and two more giant wood paneling was on either side of the middle one that contained the door. But up close, the door was obvious with its dark handle and an engraving of a howling wolf carved into the front of it.

Scarlet knocked right on the middle of the engraving and almost immediately the massive door was pulled open. Scarlet entered first and her counterpart wrapped calloused fingers around my elbow to pull me in after her. Scarlet dismissed the Omega who had let us in and the girl slunk against a wall. The door swung shut behind us, echoing in the grand hall.

"This is downright kidnapping me." I repeated gruffly. "Yet, you brought me to the Menai Moon Pack?"

It had clicked in my brain once the car had come to a stop at the bottom of the steps. I could smell the wolf on the driver, its aura telling me probably an enforcer, but not a general or anything of authority. Scarlet continued to be a mystery, but obviously she was connected, or she wouldn't be here.