Chapter 47

[ 1,342 words ]

Human weapons

47: 47.

Human weapons Aria

The world narrows to the road, the engine, and the sound of my own heartbeat trying to claw its way out of my chest.

The smell of the Chinese I picked up fills the car, and for a moment, my mind narrows in on the smell.

Great.

Now shrimp and broccoli are going to be ruined for me, too.

“What the fuck, Liam! When you said Hunters, I was thinking more thief in the night?”

My brother risked a glance toward me before narrowing his eyes back on the road.

“What? Not exciting enough for you?”

There he is.

If there is anything that could have calmed me down, it’s his morbid sense of humor.

I grin despite my panic.

“Oh, I’m having the time of my life.

Alway wanted to go drifting.”

“I figured I’d give you the once-in-a-lifetime experience.”

Gravel spits from beneath the tires as Liam jerks the wheel, the truck fishtailing before he wrestles it back under control.

My shoulder slams into the door hard enough to make stars burst behind my eyes.

“Bastards,” he snaps.

“Hold on!”

“I am holding on!” I shout back, my fingers digging into the cracked leather of the seat like it might anchor me to something real.

Behind us—headlights.

Too many.

They slice through the darkness, relentless, gaining.

They’re not stopping, my wolf growls, low and furious beneath my skin.

They want us.

Yeah, I think I got that.

Gunshots crack through the night.

The back window explodes inward.

Glass rains over us in a sharp, glittering storm.

I duck instinctively, throwing my arms over my head.

Liam’s arm covers mine guiding me closer to the ground.

The sound is deafening—metal, engine, gunfire,

“Fucking guns!” Liam curses.

“They’re, human.”

“What?

How the hell do you know that?”

“No self-respecting shifter would use human weapons,” he grinds out

He jerks the truck to the left and presses harder on the gas, narrowly avoiding another attempt to slam into us.

“Stay down!” he barks.

“You don’t have to tell me twice. I’m not dying in this truck!” I snap, lifting my head just enough to look back.

Bad idea.

Three black SUVs, close—too close.

One swerves, slamming into our rear quarter panel.

The impact jerks the truck sideways.

“Liam—!”

“I’ve got it!” he grits out, but I can hear the strain in his voice, feel the loss of control in the way the truck shudders beneath us.

Another hit.

Harder.

Metal screams.

The world tilts.

And then—

We’re airborne.

Time fractures.

My stomach lurches into my throat as the truck lifts, weightless for one impossible second before gravity rips us back down.

The ground slams into us with bone-jarring force.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

Everything is noise and motion—crushing, spinning, breaking.

Then—

Stillness.

Silence.

Upside down.

A high-pitched ringing fills my ears, drowning out everything else.

My vision swims, dark at the edges.

The world feels wrong—tilted, heavy, pressing in.

I blink slowly.

Blood drips upward—no, downward, but I’m inverted—past my forehead, into my eyes.

“Aria.”

Liam’s voice cuts through the ringing, distant but urgent.

“Aria, hey—hey, look at me.”

I try to focus.

My head throbs like it’s splitting open.

“I’m… here,” I manage, though it comes out slurred.

We’re alive, my wolf says, surprised and sharp.

Get up.

“I’m okay,” I say, louder this time, forcing the words out.

Relief flashes across Liam’s face, even upside down.

There’s blood at his temple, a deep cut along his jaw, but his eyes are clear.

Alert.

Alive.

“Good,” he says quickly.

“Good. Listen to me.”

The ringing is fading now, replaced by something worse.

Voices.

Distant.

Moving closer.

Boots crunching over gravel.

“They’re coming,” I whisper.

“I know.”

His gaze flicks toward the shattered windshield, then back to me.

Calculating.

Fast.

“On three,” he says.

“We unbuckle. You brace yourself with your arms so you don’t smash your head again.”

A weak laugh escapes me.

“Again?”

His mouth twitches.

“You’re talking. That’s a good sign. I need you to focus, okay. As soon as you right yourself, run into the woods. Shift, let your wolf take you back towards the pack.”

He reaches over and unbuckles my seatbelt and hands block my fall.

Glass, rock, and dirt bite into my hands, and as soon as my knees hit the ground, I scramble out of the window.

Liam is right behind me.

“Go. Go. Go.”

My chest tightens.

“What about you?”

“I’ll be right behind you.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

His eyes harden, something unspoken passing through them.

“Aria.”

He’s lying, my wolf snarls.

He’s planning something.

“No,” I whisper, shaking my head slightly.

“I’m not leaving you—”

“You are,” he cuts in, voice low but sharp enough to slice through my fear.

“You run. Don’t look back. Don’t stop.”

Footsteps.

Closer now.

A voice calls out, muffled but clear enough.

“They went off here!”

My heart slams harder.

“Liam—”

“Aria.” His voice softens just for a second.

“Trust me.”

I hate that word.

Trust.

It feels like something fragile.

Something that breaks.

But he’s my brother.

And right now, he’s all I’ve got.

“Fine,” I breathe.

He nods once.

“On three.”

I confirm with a nod of my head.

“One.”

The crunch of leaves get louder.

“Two.”

“Shit. I think the hut might have killed them, Ray,” one of the hunters says to the other.

“Nah, it takes more than a crash to break those cursed things,” a harder voice says.

“Three!” Liam shouts behind me.

I push myself up, legs unsteady but holding.

Then I run.

“Hey!” One of the men shouts.

“Nab the bitch before she warns the others!”

Branches whip against my face as I sprint blindly into the woods.

My lungs burn, my body screams, but I don’t slow.

I can hear them behind me now.

Shouting, but they were cut short by a growl.

“What the fuck is that thing?”

“God damn beasts are evolving,” someone shouts before more gunfire rings out.

Don’t look back.

A horrendous scream.

The crunch of bones.

Don’t look back.

The sickly thud of a body.

A pained howl.

Don’t look back.

A gunshot cracks the bark of a tree to my left.

Wood splinters, and I close my eyes to avoid getting debris in them.

Shit, it’s too close.

I duck instinctively, veering left.

“Aria!”

Liam’s voice.

Behind me.

Relief surges—

He’s with me.

He’s following behind me.

Then more voices.

More scents.

Several new humans joined the group of assholes.

Fuck.

They were leading us here.

Surrounding us.

“No,” I whisper.

I risk a glance back.

Liam bursts through the trees, right behind me—

It happened all at once, Liam shifted but her didn’t drop down into a wolf form, his beast was bipedal, haunting.

A creature made from myths and legends.

I’ve seen Liam shift before.

I know what it looks like—the tearing, the bones breaking and reforming, the surge of fur and muscle.

This—

This is different.

His body twists, but it doesn’t settle into a wolf.

It stretches, expands—something larger, something wrong and right all at once.

Half-man.

Half-wolf.

Neither.

Both.

His spine arches, muscles bulging beneath skin that flickers between human and fur.

Claws rip free from his fingers, elongated, deadly.

His face—God—his face is a nightmare of shifting features, eyes glowing with something wild and ancient.

The hunters lifted guns.

And then they open fire.

Pop.

Pop.

Pop.

“No, I scream,” but the bullets don’t leave a spray of blood in their wake.

Not bullets.

Darts.

They thud into him, one after another.

He roars, the sound shaking the trees, vibrating through my bones.

His passive limbs, he knocks the hunter to the ground, fighting his way through as more darts are blasted into him.

For a heartbeat, I think he’ll tear them apart.

He lunges, slamming one of them into the ground with brutal force.

Another rushes him.

Another dart hits.

Then another.

And another.

My stomach drops.

Tranquilizers, my wolf realizes.

“They’re trying to take him,” I whisper, horror flooding my veins.

Liam stumbles.

Just slightly.

But I see it.

They see it too.

“Keep firing!” one of them shouts.

“No,” I breathe.

My chest tightens, panic clawing its way up my throat.

He’s slowing.

Fighting it, but—

There are too many.

Too many darts.

Too many hunters.

I should run.

That’s what he told me to do.

That’s what I agreed to do.

But I can’t.

Because that’s my brother.

And they’re taking him.

Something inside me snaps.

I turn.

And I run back.

Liam roars, his voice already thick, already slipping as his eyes snap to mine.

“Get away from my brother!” I scream.

Heat floods my veins.

Not warmth.

Fire.

It builds, fast and violent, roaring through me like it’s been waiting—wanting—to be unleashed.

I vaguely recognize my name being called, but the worry, the rage, the fire won’t let me stop.

Now, my wolf snarls.

Pain explodes across my body.

I gasp, stumbling—

And then I’m not stumbling.

I’m changing.

It’s not like before.

Not like last time.

This is faster.

Stronger.

Consuming.

Fire licks across my skin, curling around my limbs as my body breaks and reforms.

I feel it—every snap, every shift—but it doesn’t hurt.

It burns.

But it’s a good burn.

Power surges through me, wild and uncontrollable.

I hit the ground on four legs—

And the world sharpens.

I see everything.

Smell everything.

Hear everything.

The hunters.

Their fear.

Liam.

Fading.

I’ll make them pay, my wolf growls, flames curling around us, dancing along our fur.

I don’t hesitate.

I launch myself at them.

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