The Mate's Curse

Chapter 1

The prophecy

There is a child, born of Alpha Werewolf and Priestess Witch,  the first of its kind that is both wolf and witch, a true hybrid.

For this child is the direct descendant of Diana the hybrid goddess herself, as Goddess of the Moon and wild beasts and Queen of the witches.

When the child comes of age and completes the mate bond, only then will the essence of true power be unleashed, spreading power to those who swear loyalty. And a new species of hybrid and the true Royal Bloodline be born.

***

(Cassie POV age 6)

It was the screams that woke me. There were so many, and they were close. Even though my bedroom curtains were closed I could see a strange orange glow shining through.

I was scared and called for my mummy but she didn’t come. Slowly, I crept out of bed and walked to my window and peaked through the curtain. I gasped at what I saw. 

Everything was on fire and there were wolves everywhere, some I recognised, some I didn’t. And there were people laying very still on the ground. I recognised one as Miss Lochan, my school teacher, but she didn’t have her usual smile. She didn’t have any smile. 

Some fighting caught my attention and I saw my daddy in his wolf form fighting another wolf and my mummy behind him waving her arms around. 

“Mummy,” I screamed, banging on the window and she looked up at me. She looked very sad, scared even. That wasn’t right, mummy didn’t get scared. She was mummy. Something caused her to look away and I looked in the direction she was looking and saw the wolf that had been fighting my daddy staring up at me. Even though we were not close, I felt like I could see his eyes so clearly. His teeth were bared. I tried to pull my eyes away from him but I couldn’t, I felt so scared  that I couldn’t move. 

“CASSIE RUN!” I could now hear my mummy screaming but I still couldn’t move. I was stuck in the eyes of this awful creature. 

Suddenly my bedroom door slammed open and the loud bang pulled me back to myself. I started screaming,  tears streaming down my face  “Cassie, quick.” The shadow in the doorway revealed herself to be my Aunt Sarah. She held out her hand to me and we ran out of my room and down the stairs,  past the front door which was wide open so the screaming was so much louder. She pulled me and I tripped over something, but before I could get up, someone grabbed me and lifted me into the air. I screamed and started kicking, trying to get away.

“Cassie, stop, it’s me.” I immediately stopped at the familiar voice of David, the Alpha's son and future Alpha to our pack.

“David, now!” Sarah shouted at him and they moved towards the basement, rushing down the stairs. 

Sarah pressed something on the wall and part of the wall moved, revealing a long room that I had never seen before. Then I could hear crashing above us in the house along with shouting. “Find the child!” I heard the unmistakable power of an Alpha voice, but it wasn’t Alpha Stephen. Whoever it was, it wasn’t our Alpha. 

“Get her safe.” Sarah pushed David into the room and went to the wall. Suddenly a wolf lunged at her and I heard her screaming.

I screamed at the sight as I saw the wolf target Sarah’s neck and sink his teeth in. Before he could do anything else Sarah reached up to the wall and it started to slide closed, but not before I saw the wolf pull on her neck and her eyes go blank. 

“SARAH!” I screamed as the wall slid closed and David started running down the hall. I sobbed on his shoulder, knowing that my Aunt Sarah had just been killed before my eyes.

David ran into a room at the end of the long room and put me in the corner before running to the doorway and slamming shut a big, heavy-looking door. It had a wheel on it and I heard noises as he turned it. 

I was crying uncontrollably, unable to stop. “David,” I whispered between sobs. 

David ran over to me hugging me. “It’s ok, Cassie, I’m here to protect you.”

We heard banging on the other side of the door and I screamed again. David turned around to face the door in a battle stance. “No one will get to you, they will have to go through me first. I will protect you with my last breath.” 

He said the words like they meant something deeper, like a responsibility, but he was the future Alpha and there should be people protecting him. He stood ready in a battle stance. I knew it because I watched the training of the pups, and you trained early even before you got your wolf. David was 15 and wasn’t due his wolf for another two years, but he was one of the best pup fighters.

I was pulled out of my thoughts by a crashing sound and suddenly the room was full of dust and I saw two wolves advance into the room followed by a man. He was completely naked but I was drawn to his eyes as he stared at me. I instantly recognised them as the eyes from the wolf from my window. 

I could hear David screaming my name and some part of me could see that he was pinned to the floor by one of the wolves. He was struggling even though the wolf had his teeth around David’s throat. 

But those eyes kept pulling me back. The man knelt down in front of me and his face was inches from my face. I could feel his hot breath. From this close I could see the detail in his eyes, the colour that had  first looked like black was actually a very dark green, with what looked like copper flecks in them. 

“What do we have here?” he asked. His voice was mean and scary, and I shrunk back and whimpered as he reached out with his hand towards me. His hand stopped really close to my face and he c****d his head to one side. “Oh my dear,” he said. “You are just as I imagined.” He sneered and stood up. “You will make my son very happy.” 

What? I didn’t understand, what did he mean by his son? 

I looked up at him and the look on his face was so scary. “Very happy indeed.” 

I heard a shout from the side of the room and David started struggling more against the wolf who was holding him. “Leave her alone, you bastard!” he shouted. 

The mean alpha glanced at David briefly. “Put that mutt down,” he said without a second glance. I screamed as I watched David and saw the look of fear that crossed his face before the wolf bit down and ripped out his throat and his eyes went blank. 

I screamed again and tried to run to him but the mean alpha grabbed me like I weighed nothing and started walking out of the room. I screamed and kicked and hit him but it was like he didn’t even notice. He came to the end of the long room and walked out into the basement of my house before going up the stairs. I screamed even more, crying, begging him to let me go. I barely even noticed as he walked through the house and outside, I was screaming for my mummy and daddy. But then I looked around and the ground was covered in the still bodies of people I knew. I searched, panicked, for my parents but I couldn't see them anywhere. 

Suddenly I heard a growl and a snarl and I was flying  through the air. I hit a tree at the opposite end of the yard and banged my head against it. Everything started fading to black, but just before I was swallowed into darkness I saw my father’s wolf pinning the mean alpha to the ground while the mean alpha was fighting him off. Then everything went black.

***

Fragments invaded my sleep 

“Got away” …. “Have to disappear”..... “Need to protect her” …..

“Mummy,“ I called out, and I felt the familiar presence of my mummy seconds before her hands held mine. 

“It’s ok, baby,” she said. “Go back to sleep, you’re safe now.” That was all I heard before blackness surrounded me again.