Cursed with an Alpha Soul | Werewolf Romance

Chapter XI - A New World

The cold, brisk air felt like needles brushing across Ella’s skin leaving tingling goosebumps covering her body. It felt as though Ella had stepped into an industrial freezer, the air temperature continued to stop with every step as she made her way down the basement stairs. Although Ella was not affected by the drop of temperature, she could feel how freezing the air was around her. At the base of the wooden stairs was another door with an ancient looking symbol carved into the wood. Candlelight flickered from beneath the door. Ella had made sure she saw both Ben and Xan asleep on the bean bags before she went down the stairs.

Her hand hesitated to grasp onto the doorknob, unsure of what was going to be behind it. Only a month ago, if Ella had found herself in the same situation, she would have turned away. Upon finding the door open, she would have closed it and gone back to sleep. Ella felt as though she was being pulled into the room. Slowly, her hand clasped around the doorknob and twisted it open.

A faint, black fog roll across the ground, but it was unclear where it was coming from. It was almost as if the fog was seeping up through the ground. Large candles hung from the walls illuminating bright light into the small room. A round, dark oak table sat in the middle of the room. It had roman numerals and other symbols carved into it with a knife along the edge. In the center of the table was pure white sand that looked to be untouched. Bookshelves lined the walls, stacked to the brim with journals of all different sizes. On the far wall was rows of mason jars neatly organized. Each was packed full of, what looked to be, herbs and spices. Each were labelled and some sealed with wax. Slowly Ella made her way around the room, her fingers dancing along the spines of the journals.

In the far corner of the room was a glass case with different objects. Each shelf only held one object. On the top shelf was a single black candle with a red wick. A thin rope was wrapped around the candle in a complicated pattern. Another shelf had a shinning silver dagger which looked to be completely untouched. No fingerprints. Not even a speck of dust. The next shelf was a pair of old wooden dice that sat in a small wooden bowl on top of hay.

The loud slamming of a door echoed through the room, causing some of the candle lights to flicker, but none diminished. Ella spun, startled by the sudden loud noise. Leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed over his chest was Xan. He didn’t look to be surprised or upset that Ella had made her way down.

“You know,” Xan spoke as he walked towards the center of the room, “I never thought I’d meet one of you.”

Ella watched him, confused by his words. She expected him to be upset or even offended that she had walked into his basement. Not even Ben had been allowed down here or knew what was behind the door. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Ella said, standing on the other side of the table from him.

“So, how many of you are there?” He asked, ignoring what she said. Ella did not reply, keeping her eyes glued onto him. She held her guard up high, unsure of where this was going. Ella hardly knew anything about Xan. She had asked Ben about Xan before, but he seemed to know very little about the guy he called his best friend. “You know what? I won’t ask that question until you do.” He said, offering a fake smile.

Xan was quiet for a short moment, twirling his finger through the sand in the table. The dry smile on his lips disappeared, “Does he know?” he asked in a serious tone. His head motioned upwards, which Ella knew he was referring to Ben.

Ella’s lips drew to a thin line, he couldn’t be talking about that. “I should get going.” Ella said. She started to walk towards the door, avoiding eye contact with the tall man. One of the books from the shelf flew across the room, almost hitting Ella if it weren’t for her split-second reaction. The book zoomed past her, landing straight into Xan’s hand. Ella’s head snapped, watching the book fly.

“H-how did you just-“she asked, unable to describe what had happened. The annoyed look on Xan’s face quickly shifted into excitement. His eyes lit up with glee as his brain began to shift and put the pieces together.

“No way.” He chuckled, tossing the book back towards the shelf. The book corrected itself, flying straight back into the slot it had come from. Xan let out a chuckle, “You’re the first, aren’t you?” He asked, still in disbelief himself. Ella only continued to stare in confusion waiting for him to give further details. “You’re a lycanthrope.” He replied, the foreign word rolling off his tongue. When Ella didn’t speak, he rolled his eyes, “A werewolf.” He said as if it was obvious. Ella swallowed the lump in her throat.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he said, picking up a handful of sand then letting it fall back into the pit. Ella turned, slowly approaching the table. “How did you know?” she asked bluntly, keeping her guard up even though she didn’t know what to protect herself from.

“Come on, you really didn’t think you’re the only supernatural creature out there, did you?” He asked with a laugh. Ella hadn’t given it much thought, but it made sense. If werewolves were real, then where did the line between fact and fiction fall? “When I shook your hand, that wasn’t just a static shock. It’s called a sensing. It happens when two different supernatural meets for the first time without being aware of each other first. Some sensing doesn’t require touch though, some can be as simple as eye contact.” He stated with a shrug.

“Well then what are you?” Ella asked, finally relaxing a bit. Xan held his hands up, gesturing to the room around him to give her hints. When realization hit her, Ella gasped, “You’re a wizard!”

“Hell no!” Xan shouted back. “I don’t wave a wand and fly around on a broom.” He said, sounding offended by her remark. Xan shook his head as he took a deep breath to relax himself before giving a soft smile. Xan placed his hand up over the sand table with his palm down. Slowly, all the sand particles began to float up towards his palm and spin in circles. Ella watched in amazement with wide eyes. A smile grew on her lips, astonished by what she was watching. “Wow” she breathed out, “so you’re a witch?” Ella asked cautiously, not wanting to offend the spell caster again. The sand dropped back into the pit below.

Xan rubbed his hands together, “Well I used to be. You see, witches practice ‘good magic’.” His hands gesturing air quotes, “I’m what they call a warlock. I cast what is considered as ‘dark magic’ or ‘no-no spells’ as I was told growing up.” Ella was unsure if that would mean Xan was evil or not, but she had yet to have a reason to be afraid of him.

“So, was I right then? About you being the first one?” he asked curiously.

Ella debated for a moment on how much to let the warlock know. Although he had let her into his home and was yet to do any harm to her, she didn’t know what his true intentions were. “I think so, I haven’t met anyone else like me yet.” She replied, deciding to keep Carlos a secret. She felt as though that was information she shouldn’t give out willingly. “What do you know about me? Or lycan-whatevers.” She asked. Ella was excited to know if Xan could tell her anything she didn’t know about herself. Something new she could tell Carlos and might help explain what happened to them.

Xan looked around the room for a particular book but didn’t move from him spot. When he found it, the book came to him, landing perfectly in his hand. He scrolled through several pages before landing on a drawing of a large wolf compared to a stick figure for size comparison. On the page beside it was scribbled lines with a small amount of information. “There isn’t much.” Xan sighed, handing the green leather journal to her. “Your kind is kind of a mystery.” He shrugged, “That’s why I was surprised to run into one of you.” Xan pushed his hands into his pockets, walking around the room as Ella’s eyes scanned the page. She glanced at other pages in the book to compare. Xan was right. Compared to the other pages that were filled to the brim with information, this section had only had a few notes.

“We do know there’s this plant called Delphinidae, or Wolf’s bane as we named it, that can hurt your kind, but don’t know why. Pure silver is another big one, that’ll kill you.” He nodded to himself as he straightened up some of his candles and books on the shelves. Ella couldn’t read the language the page was written in, but she knew what the small drawings besides the sentences were.

“Kill us?” Ella spoke out, looking up from the journal.

“Being a werewolf, it’s much harder to kill you than humans. For a while, thought almost to be impossible. Magic is all about balance. If a balance isn’t created, magic will make one itself. Because your kind is stronger and faster, magic found weaknesses for you.” He taught her, reaching out and taking the book back from her. He walked over and placed it back on the shelf. As Ella’s lips parted, she stopped herself. She could hear Ben mumbling random noises, which he would normally do this when he was starting to wake up.

“No,” Ella said, answering Xan’s question from earlier, “he doesn’t know and I’m not ready for him to know.” She said honestly. Xan understood. “You don’t have to worry about me telling him anything. These kinds of secrets are life changing and should only be told by the person they belong to.” Ella gave a thankful smile; she knew Xan wouldn’t say anything. She knew if he had managed to keep all of this from Ben for so many years, it wouldn’t be hard for him to keep her secret too. A part of Ella envied him for that. He made it seem so easy to keep such a big part of him in the shadows. Ella could only hope one day it would be that easy for her too.

“Ella.” Xan called out from behind her as the two began making their way upstairs. “You need to understand something.” He said in a quiet, serious tone. “There’s a reason our world is a secret. There’s a reason I’ve never told Ben. Bringing people into our world is like putting them in the middle of a firing range. I say this from experience Ella, they can’t survive like we can. As much as you may want to tell them, you’re only pushing them one step closer to death.”

As blunt as his comment was, Ella was grateful for it. Part of her hoped she would be enough to protect Ben. She didn’t want to lie to him much longer. She wanted to be able to talk to him and learn all of this with him next to her. The other part of her wanted to keep him safe, which meant lying to him again and again. For now, Ella would do whatever she had to in order to keep Ben safe.

Ella winched as a hard object struck the back of her head. Pain radiated through her skull with a sharp sting. Ella’s had rubbed over the spot she had been struck, waiting for the sudden pain to subside. Looking to her feet, Ella saw a bright orange frisbee fall over in the sand. She leaned over picking up the plastic disc that had smacked her in the head. As an attempt to spend family time together, Ella’s parents had brought the family to a small riverbank in town. The locals referred to it as ‘the S curves’ for the shape of the river. A large amount of soft sand lined the river making it their own little beach in town. Throughout the year there were only two months that it would be warm enough to enjoy the water, otherwise the water was ice cold.

“My bad!” A voice yelled from behind her. Ella turned to see a young boy she didn’t recognize running towards her through the crowd of people. He was a few inches taller than her with shaggy, wet brown hair that fell into soft ringlets. His skin was tan, which instantly told Ella he wasn’t from here. Everyone in the town shared the same pale skin from lack of sun. With the clouds blocking the sun almost every day of the year, it was impossible to get the perfect golden-brown without a subscription to Tammy’s Tanning Salon down the road. Without talking to the boy, she knew he played sports by his physical appearance. She could see almost every muscle under his skin. “Sorry about that.” He laughed as he walked up to her.

Ella gave a soft smile as she rubbed the back of her head. “It’s okay.” She nodded, handing him back the frisbee. “You guys just traveling through?” Ella asked, watching as he threw the frisbee back towards other kids his age.

“It’s that obvious?” He asked laughing, running his hands through his hair.

“It is a small town. Everyone pretty much knows everyone around here.” Ella said, glancing around the beach. The town was so small that when new faces passed through, it was impossible not to notice. Most of the time, they would be gone within the next few days. Usually only passing through or in town to visit some old relatives. Hardly any of them ever decided to stay. The boy let out a laugh, crossing his arms over his chest.

“We’re not travelers actually, my parents just bought a place on the edge of town. Had to move out here for work or whatever.” He shrugged. Ella couldn’t help but smile. She couldn’t deny the young boy was attractive and the thought of seeing him more often only made her smile harder.

“Well hopefully our middle of nowhere town isn’t too bad compared to wherever you’re coming from.” Ella replied, attempting to make the boy laugh. The busy crowd moved around them, all enjoying the good weather as they laughed and played. Ella and the boy stood focused on each other, giving no care to those around them.

“I mean so far, I found a pretty good reason to stick around for a while.” He grinned. A warm blush grew onto Ella’s cheeks. She swayed her body back and forth, letting out a shy laugh from the obvious flirt. “I’m Ella Parker.” She said, extending her hand out towards him.

The boy took her hand in his shaking softly, “The names Carlos. Carlos Willis.”