28. Payment

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Wednesday, September 23rd
Waxing Gibbous Moon (One Night to Full Moon)

The night before the full moon, Lilith and I made our final preparations. She would have preferred to do it on the night of the full moon, but I would already be with the other wolves and wouldn’t be able to meet with her come nightfall without raising suspicion.

“How messy will this be?” I asked her on the way.

“Depends on how much you struggle,” She looked over and grinned at me while driving.

I ignored her joke, “And you’re sure it’ll heal by tomorrow night?”

“Of course,” She said matter-of-factly. “Your powers of regeneration are stronger closer to the full moon, as well as all of your other powers.”

“Just as long as they won’t be able to tell,” I told her as I leaned back into the chair.

“They won’t,” She assured me.

We drove to our now-familiar pasture for what would be the last time before the full moon. When we got out of the car and hopped the fence, I began to take off my clothes. No sense in wasting money by shredding clothes. I already knew what we were going to do and I just wanted to get it over with.

Lilith watched hungrily as I began to change into my werewolf form. Over the past few weeks, we’d practiced everything from changing my human body into a completely different person to changing partially into wolf form even when the moon was only a sliver in the sky. We practiced only using Tala’s powers as well as my own to change. I learned ways to use the powers of others, mainly Lilith as my test dummy, to change, but also how to keep myself from using their powers on accident. Lilith taught me how to keep my power from leaking out so I didn’t force others to change or make them uneasy. I could finally change like any other werewolf, without hurting or scaring anyone else, without forcing them to do anything they didn’t want to. In fact, Lilith taught me how to conceal my signature as an Alpha so wolves I met wouldn’t even be able to tell what I was unless I told them or showed them myself. Pretty much the only thing impossible to change or hide was the color of my fur. I asked Lilith if it was even possible and she just replied with a flat no. Some things just can’t be changed, and she told me that I shouldn’t even want to change it, that it made me special.

Lilith wanted to give me more lessons after the full moon. She said now that I was beginning to take control, she wanted to take our training to the next level. She wanted to teach me more ways to use the power inside me; she wanted to teach me things that some pack leaders didn’t even know. When she mentioned more lessons, I was actually kind of relieved. I had begun to bond with Lilith in a strange way. She was no longer the enemy bloodsucker, but my friend and partner. Too bad she was a vampire and not a fellow werewolf. The thing I dreaded most about the night before the full moon was that it meant she wasn’t helping me just out kindness, but we had a deal, which meant there were strings attached.

The night before the full moon was her payment. I was changing into a full wolf so she could get it. It was something she hadn’t let me forget.

“Good,” She told me as I continued to change, “There’s no power leaking out or being taken in. As long as you contain it within yourself, there will be no problems tomorrow.”

I nodded, already almost fully changed. Tala knew what was coming and she was sulking. Over the past few weeks, Tala had tried to rebel against Lilith and me, and each time, Lilith had pushed her back down with displays of sheer power alone. Tala knew that she was fighting a losing battle. Every day, I had a little more control over her, and she had less power to use against me.

Once I was finished, I sat on the ground and Lilith came over to me. She ran her fingers through the snowy fur on my head and pulled out a battery-operated electric razor, shaving off a patch of the thick fur around my neck. She assured me that the fur would be grown back the next time I changed; she just didn’t like getting so much hair in her mouth.

“It’ll only hurt for a few seconds,” She said. Right after I comprehended her words, I felt a sharp pain as she sunk her teeth into my neck. I couldn’t stop Tala from uttering a low growl, but I could keep her still, something I wouldn’t have been able to do a few weeks earlier. I kept her from turning around and trying to bite Lilith back.

You don’t know what you’re doing, She whined in my head. I ignored it as the initial pain began to disappear and it was replaced with a dull throb. It wasn’t pleasurable, but it also wasn’t excruciating. When she stopped, I looked at her. She met my wolf eyes with black ones. There was blood, my blood on her mouth, her teeth stained with it. I could feel her power like never before, since it was now mixed with and amplified by mine.

“It’s been so long since I felt this good,” She grinned, her fangs glittering in the moonlight. She stretched and ran, easily jumping over the entire stock pond. She giggled, though it seemed more like a cackle, and ran around the pasture, full of energy. I could feel it humming against my fur, a slight vibration of power making my hair stand on end.

I wanted to follow her, but I felt exhausted. All my body wanted to do was sleep. I lay down and slowly changed back to my human form. I laid there in the field, naked, my throat sore. I felt it with my hand and came away with a small bit of blood, but the wound was already healing. I could feel the puncture marks closing. My entire body ached and I was woozy.

Lilith ran to her car and got a blanket, a bottle of orange juice, and a box of crackers. I sat up and she wrapped the blanket around me as I ate and drank, trying to regain a little bit of energy.

“Maybe I took a little too much,” She said. All I could do was look at her, my throat too sore to speak.

“You’ll be okay. I know blood. Your vitals are fine. Just eat, drink, take some iron, and rest. You’ll be fine by tomorrow.” She helped me get dressed and carried me to the car. We rode back to the dorm and I concentrated on not throwing up. She helped me up to the room and gave me some more juice and a vitamin supplement.

Sore and exhausted, with Tala angry inside me, I went to sleep.

Next Chapter
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A/N: I thought this chapter was longer when I looked over what I had written, but it's actually fairly short. I'll be posting another chapter before Monday, so be on the lookout for that. I'm sorry for the lateness! School started Monday and I'm still getting into the schedule.

We're entering a bit of a transition here in the story. Selene is going from completely clueless to Lilith's pet and big changes are ahead. This is the part of the book that I'm really excited about.

I've also noticed that most of the chapters cover entire days, often ending with Selene going to bed. I'm going to go back and do a bit of cleanup, combining chapters and adding days of the week, dates, moon phases, etc. Hopefully this will help with continuity as things begin to speed up a bit.