Dead | Jasper Hale | Book 2

2. Werewolves

Jasper and I were running back to the house, and we were in no hurry. It made it a lot easier to look around the forest, look at all the things I've never seen before. The details of the treebark, the lines in the leaves, the soil on the forest floor, the little bugs running around... it was a wonder with this sight, looking at the things I've never knew existed.

But then, in one second, everything changed. A harsh scent caught my nose, reeling me back. Immediately, I stopped and covered my mouth and nose with my hand. It reminded me of a wet dog smell, repelling me instantly. Though it was most certainly animal, that much I could tell, it wasn't... entirely animal. There was an edge to it, the part that repelled me.

"What is that?" I asked with muffled words.

Jasper looked furious. His eyes wide with fury, he took my hand and pulled me forwards toward the scent. He didn't answer me, keeping his fingers locked around mine. So I went with him wordlessly, wondering what in the world could be wrong. But we were close enough to the house to be within hearing distance. A jump over the river, and then...

Wolves.

But not just any wolves, these were wolves the size of humans! And vampires! Large ones that could easily take down any one of us. There was a large black one and another not far behind him, a brown-colored wolf. A dark-silver wolf, a russet-colored wolf, and another wolf that had chocolate brown fur. Five wolves.

I swallowed as their eyes were trained on me, but before any one of them could make a move, Jasper moved in front of me, blocking me from their view.

The tense feelings weren't hard to miss. Everyone was nearly ready to rip each other's heads off. But within seconds, everything began to change. The scene changed. Everyone began to relax. I knew immediately Jasper was using his ability to calm everyone down. For a moment, it was silent.

"See?" Alice said, crossing her arms. "There she is. She was hunting animals, as I've tried telling you. Hollie wasn't going to harm anyone. I would've seen."

A scoff came from one of the wolves.

Edward responded, his voice dull. It took me a moment to realize he was repeating whatever one of the wolves said. A translator. "Her eyes are still red - how do we know she wasn't hunting humans?"

My eyes widened and the words were coming out of me before I could stop myself. "I would never dream of hurting a human! I'd rather throw myself into fire than hurt someone. I couldn't forgive myself if I..."

The black wolf turned his head to narrow his eyes at me, almost as if he questioned my words. Yes, I was a vampire. But I still felt the same way as I did when I was a human. Just because my body lusted after human blood didn't mean I was going to. Did these wolves really think otherwise?

"As newborns, our eyes don't change colors right away. It's the blood in our system left over from being human. It takes a few months to go from red to gold," Carlisle answered the wolves' question.

"Look, as I was saying before, the Volturi - the lawmakers for our kind - don't take kindly to people finding out about vampires. They especially don't like being fooled," Alice spoke to the wolves directly. "So when Hollie found out about the vampires once before and then fooled them into thinking she was dead, it was either death or vampire. Vampirism was chosen and I'm the one that turned her. I am the one that turned her. I had made no promise to the treaty. Technically, it still stands unbroken."

A low growl started and there was a chain reaction throughout the wolves before the black one cut them all off with a growl of his own. It was easy to see that this one, the black wolf, was their leader.