GODS AND MONSTERS ↝ P. LAHOTE

[24]

For Lark, there was nothing more peaceful than an empty beach on a crisp autumn morning. Now that fall was in the air, and the temperatures were beginning to dip lower and lower, fewer and fewer people were out for a swim, and she'd found herself alone at that end of the beach that morning, able to relish in the fresh air and cool breeze with some peace and quiet to get some reading done.

Since leaving the Cullen house the day before, Lark had spent the rest of the evening poring over the books she had taken from her father's study, praying that she would find something, anything, to help their current situation, though, admittedly, she hadn't had much luck. What little information she could find in books mostly spoke of vampires luring in human lovers only as part of their hunt, rather than any possibilities for those who lived after the fact, leaving Lark remaining at square one.

With the only sounds that morning being that of waves beating against the sand and Lark flipping through the pages of the book sitting in her lap, the roar of a truck's engine was all too powerful as it roared into the parking lot, followed by a slam as its door opened and shut. Lark looked up to see Paul angrily rushing towards her reading spot, face bright red and steam nearly pouring out of the boy's ears.

"What did you do?" Paul nearly roared as he reached Lark, and she jumped up quickly, confusion rushing through her at his anger.

"Paul, what's going on?" Lark asked, crossing her arms over her chest as she studied the boy's face, looking for some sort of indication as to where the emotions had come from. Simply speaking, she'd never seen the boy this angry before, not even the other night in her room when he had told her about...

"I told you to stay away from Bella and that... that thing." Paul seethed. "Not to go running headfirst into a situation that's going to get you killed, Lark."

"I'm helping them look for answers, Paul." Lark explained, nerves catching in the pit of her stomach as she saw how angry he was getting. "There's gotta be something out there that'll tell us what's happening, and I might be the only one who can find it."

"This thing is dangerous, and people could die, why don't you get that?" he asked, his body nearly shuddering in his rage. "And you're putting yourself in the line of fire, so once it kills Bella and turns on you it'll just-"

Paul stopped mid-sentence, his body nearly jerking backwards, his focus shifting from Lark to the ground as a growl escaped his throat. He stepped backwards, and Lark could almost feel the heat radiating off his supernaturally warm body.

"Paul, what..?" she asked as another voice broke into the clearing.

"Lark, run!" Jared's voice rang out as Lark looked back to see the boy running towards her, a massive gray wolf bounding along next to him in their direction, and Lark looked back to see Paul still shaking. "Get away from him!"

Lark ran backwards, desperate to get away from the scene but unable to take her eyes off Paul as the boy finally gave in to the rage overtaking his body, a large, dark silver wolf taking his place only moments later as he, quite literally, exploded.

If she'd thought any of the pack members were tall, it was nothing compared to seeing them in their wolf form. As a beast, Paul was even taller, roughly the size of a bear, the only thing remaining from the boy she knew and loved were a pair of eyes that held the same sheer rage that had overtaken his human form, a pair of eyes that she couldn't quite manage to look away from.

Lark had never seen any of the pack in wolf form, and the sheer magnitude of seeing the massive creature hulking in front of her would have frozen her in place in Paul's path of destruction, if not for the gray wolf leaping forward and pushing him back, widening the distance between Lark and the two beasts. Only when there was a pull at her arm did she see that Jared had finally reached her, pulling her along after him as the two raced to where Leo's car sat in the parking lot, doors open and waiting as the girl anxiously waited in the driver's seat, looking for them.