Half-Wolf (The Alpha's Daughter Book 1)

by Nicholas Jordan

  “Are you sure about that? It looks pretty freaking far to me. How long is it going to take?”

  “Depends on how good of time we make. And what the weather permits.”

  Just as he mentioned the weather, Demi caught a glimpse of dark clouds out of the corner of her eye. They were pretty far off, though.

  “What about those clouds over there?” She pointed.

  Tobias looked. “I wouldn’t worry about those. We should avoid them.”

  Demi nodded. I sure hope he’s right about that.

  ***

  Rain showered the forest in an unrelenting downpour, winds rattled the trees, and the torrents of rain turned the forest floor into a slop of slick mud.

  It was difficult to walk without slipping, especially when heading down a steep slope. Demi had to pay attention each time she took a step to avoid falling. She had been cold even before the rain started. Now she was chilled to the bone, hugging her arms around her shivering body.

  But she pressed on.

  She had no choice.

  “I thought you said we would miss the storm.” She looked over her shoulder to shout at Tobias, making her frustration with him very clear.

  “I expected it to pass us by.”

  “Well you were obviously wrong.”

  Demi thought she heard him say something back to her, but it was lost in the howling winds. She continued down the slope, step by step, making sure to place her feet only where the ground was solid enough to avoid slipping. But it was not easy to do with the ground as wet as it was.

  But even being careful, it only took a single misstep.

  And that was exactly what happened.

  The ground gave way beneath Demi just as she was planting her foot down on what she thought to be solid ground. She was wrong, and it all went downhill from there.

  Literally.

  Slipping and falling on her back, she screamed as she went sliding down the hill, desperately trying to grasp anything to slow herself. But every bush, root, or low branch she grabbed was too slick from the rain to get a good grip on.

  So when that failed, she resorted to clawing at the mud.

  Until the slope finally came to an abrupt drop and she fell right into a big mud puddle at the bottom. Her mouth being open, she got a big gulp of filthy water down her throat.

  Emerging from the puddle, she gagged as she expelled the water from her lungs, gasping as she struggled to replace that unwanted water with the air that belonged there.

  When she was finally able to breathe again, Demi took a moment to examine her body for injuries that she might have suffered in the fall. Fortunately, she didn’t find any.

  “Demi.” Tobias appeared beside her. “Are you alright?”

  “I’m fine,” she huffed.

  “Are you sure?” He helped her back to her feet.

  “I said I’m fine.” She pulled away from him. Still annoyed with him for leading her into this storm. She wasn’t on her feet for more than a moment before she noticed something was missing.

  Her necklace.

  It was no longer around her neck.

  She looked down around her feet, but she didn’t see it anywhere.

  “What are you looking for?” Tobias asked.

  “My necklace. I think I lost it when I fell.”

  “I wouldn’t worry about it.”

  “And . . . why not?”

  “It wasn’t even real.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah. I didn’t want to say anything because it was a gift, but I guess it can’t hurt now since it’s gone.”

  “Wow . . . insensitive much?” She fixed him with a hard stare and crossed her arms. “And how would you know whether it’s fake or not anyway?”

  He flashed her a smile. “Call it werewolf intuition.”

  Ignoring a sudden urge to smack that smile right off his face, Demi turned away and rolled her eyes. Then she started walking again. She would just have to accept that the necklace was lost. Finding something so small in all of this rain and mud was an impossible task.

  “Hold up, Demi. We should set up camp,” Tobias said. “It’s too dangerous to keep going while it’s raining like this.”

  “No. We can’t stop now. We haven’t even gone that far today.”

  “And we’re not going any further. Let’s see if we can find somewhere somewhat dry around here to get the tent set up. Then we’ll wait out the storm.”

  “What if it doesn’t stop?”

  “It will.”

  “And how long will we have to wait?”

  “Not long.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  “Just like you were sure that we would avoid the storm to begin with, huh?”

  He opened his mouth to reply but then just sighed and shook his head. “Listen, I insist that we stop. I know you’re eager to meet your father. But it’s not worth getting hurt.”

  “So we just won’t get hurt then.” She started walking again. “But I’m not stopping.”

  He called after her a couple of times, but she ignored him and pressed on through the dense undergrowth. The rain continued to drench her already shivering body, but she didn’t want to stop. She wanted to get to her father as soon as possible. There were so many unanswered questions, and he was the only one who could provide her with answers.

  But that wasn’t the main reason she didn’t want to stop. She was embarrassed. Struggling to keep up with an injured Tobias. It felt like he was only stopping because she fell down.

  I’m not some delicate princess that can’t take care of herself, and I’m going to prove it to him.

  A handful of minutes after leaving her protector behind, Demi picked up the distinct sound of a lot of water moving very quickly. At first, she was afraid there might be a mudslide, but a quick look around brought an end to her concerns.

  She was on flat ground. The only water on the ground was what pooled in small puddles.

  But if it wasn’t a mudslide . . .

  She pushed her way through some tall brush—the sound of the roaring water growing louder every second—and then emerged to find herself standing on the banks of a powerful and fast-moving river.

  Demi swore under her breath and placed her hands on her hips as she watched the raging waters cascade through the forest—winding between the trees like some kind of enormous serpent. It would not be easy to cross, if even possible.

  “Demi.”

  She heard Tobias’s voice behind her. She turned around to see him emerging from the brush.

  “Well, now we definitely have to set up camp,” he said when he got his first look at the river. “We’ll find a way to get across when the rain stops.”

  But Demi shook her head. “No, I think we can cross right now.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Demi. Look at that river. It’s at least twenty feet wide. We try to cross and we’ll be swept away in an instant.”

  “We can make it. We just need to find a safer place to cross. Somewhere narrower.”

  “How do you know there is a safer place to cross?”

  Demi didn’t answer. She took a step forward and scanned the banks to both her left and right.

  He’s probably right, a voice in the back of her head nagged her. We should stop and set up camp.

  But she hated that he was right. She hated that he had to take care of her. It made her feel like a package with fragile written across the side.

  The river wound around a bend to her left, but she couldn’t see much further in that direction. She hiked along the bank to see if there was any safer crossing point around the river bend. She didn’t wait for Tobias.

  He followed anyway.

  As they rounded the bend, Demi saw that the river continued on, not slowing and not narrowing in the slightest. If anything it was the opposite. But she did see one glimmer of hope: a fallen log stretching from one bank to the other.

  That’s it, Demi decided.

  “No way,”
Tobias said as if he could read her mind. “We’re not going to try crossing that log. That’s way too dangerous.”

  “We have to get across, and I seriously doubt we’re going to find any better way.”

  “No, we’re not,” Tobias agreed, “but we’re not going to get across this way either.”

  “Why not?”

  “Look at that thing. It’s soaking wet. If we try to cross, we’re going to slip and fall right into the river.”

  “You don’t know that for sure.”

  “No, but I’m not willing to risk it either.”

  “You don’t get to tell me what to do.” Demi rounded on him and jabbed a finger in his direction. “It’s not your life at stake. It’s not you that Korver wants. So just let me do what I want.”

  She turned to walk away, but was grabbed by Tobias. He spun her around to face him.

  “Don’t go,” he told her in a firm voice. “You’re going to get yourself killed.”

  “Stop pretending.” Demi pulled away from him.

  “What?”

  “Stop pretending to care about me. I know you’re only trying to help me because of my father.”

  Without waiting for a response from him, Demi hurried towards the log, knowing he couldn’t catch up to her with his injured leg.

  When she reached the log, she slowed to a stop and then took a deep breath.

  I can do this, she told herself before taking her first step out on to the fallen tree. Her heart skipped a beat, and she didn’t even need to take a second step to know that walking across was not an option. It was too slippery. So she got down on all fours, deciding to crawl instead.

  It was safer, but that didn’t mean she was safe.

  She had crawled less than halfway across when her confidence started to wane. Her hands and feet were having a hard time getting a good grip on the slippery bark.

  Maybe this wasn’t the best decision.

  Just a little further, she told herself. That’s all I need to do. Just have to go a little further and I’ll be safe. Just a little further . . .

  But a little further was a long way when one slip meant she would fall into a raging river and face almost certain death—either being bashed against the rocks or drowning beneath the icy cold water.

  Demi tried to push thoughts of what could go wrong out of her mind and just focus on making it across. It wasn’t that far.

  She could make it.

  She had to make it.

  Inch by inch, she scooted closer, holding on to the log as if it were the only thing keeping her alive, which was not far from the truth. Crossing the midway point provided her with a small confidence boost. She was even tempted to increase her pace—seeing her objective so close—but she resisted the urge.

  Don’t rush it. Just take your time.

  She squirmed forward a little more, reaching a hand out to grab hold of a branch protruding from the log, which broke away.

  And she slipped.

  She would have fallen had her legs not been wrapped tightly around the log. Now she was dangling from the underside, the water raging just inches from the crown of her head.

  She heard Tobias calling out to her from the shore, but couldn’t make out a word he said with the river so close to her ears.

  She was just holding on for dear life.

  But, despite her best efforts, her grip was slipping. Slipping to the point where it soon dawned on her that she was only prolonging the inevitable.

  And then just like that—in a moment of total helplessness—Demi’s fingers slid off the log and she went plummeting into the river.

  Chapter Ten

  “I HATE THE WOODS,” NATASHA complained. “It’s no place for a werewolf.”

  Korver hardly paid any attention to her whining. They had been trekking through the dense foliage and heavy undergrowth for hours while following the trail left behind by Hugo.

  Every quarter mile or so, they would find another tree etched with an X. Hugo was sure to be hot on the trail of their quarry. The cunning of Tobias could only help him so much. In time, he and the half-breed would be found.

  It was inevitable.

  The rain was unrelenting. Even though the tall evergreen trees all around them soaked up a lot of the falling droplets and redirected them to the ground below after traveling down their long needles, it did little to keep the precipitation off of Korver and the rest of the pack.

  Not that he cared. Rain, wind, hail, or even snow—nothing would keep him from his prize.

  Catching a whiff of a familiar scent, he raised his fist to signal the rest of the pack to stop. He then looked over his shoulder at Natasha and the four others in his small, but loyal band of werewolves.

  The pack used to be much larger when Demi’s father was leading, but those days were gone. That pack splintered into numerous smaller groups the moment that the old wolf decided to vanish without a trace.

  “What is it?” Natasha asked. “Why are we stopping?”

  He ignored her. Breathing in deeply to allow the scent to fill his nostrils. It was blood, and not just any blood. But the blood of a bear.

  “Follow me.” He told the others before he took off running through the trees again.

  The rest of the pack close on his heels, Korver rushed out of the trees and emerged into a clearing where he found the corpse of a large black bear lying on its side with its back to him and the others.

  A moment later, a large gray wolf appeared from behind the bear its muzzle bloody and a chunk of flesh hanging from its jaws.

  Korver crossed his arms. “Is this really the best time for a meal?”

  The gray wolf gulped down the flesh before shifting back to the large brute of a man that had served Korver loyally for more than a decade. Bare-chested and bloody, Hugo wiped the evidence of his meal from his lips with the back of his hand and then grinned.

  “I’m sorry. Did you want some too? There’s enough here for the whole pack.”

  Korver smirked and took a couple of steps closer to the much taller man. Hugo’s jovial demeanor and his remarks earned him a backhand to the face, busting his lip.

  “I’m happy that you think you have the time to terrorize the local wildlife just to feed yourself,” Korver said. “But I hope you remember why you’re here. For your sake.”

  Hugo spit blood on the ground. “I do remember.”

  “Good. Now you want to tell me what the hell you think you’re doing?”

  “The claws.”

  “What?”

  “The bear’s claws. Smell them.”

  Korver eyed the large man curiously for a moment before he wandered over to the bear, knelt down, and then lifted one of the bear’s forepaws to his nose so that he could sniff the bloodstained claws.

  “Tobias . . .” Korver dropped the lifeless paw back to the ground. “You should have known better than to get yourself wounded out here in the wild.”

  He stood up and turned to face the pack. “They’re not far from here. Spread out in three groups of two. Find them and bring them back to me. And remember, I want them alive.”

  The pack all transformed and dispersed. Except for Natasha and Hugo, the latter waiting for the former.

  Korver furrowed his brow. “What are you doing, Natasha?”

  She said nothing. Walked over to the bear carcass. She got down on her knees and stuck her hand into the mangled underbelly where Hugo had been feasting.

  “I gave you an order,” Korver reminded her, growing impatient. “I expect you to follow it.”

  Natasha took her hand out, bringing the heart of the bear with it. She brought the heart to her mouth and her teeth tore a chunk away.

  “Why the rush?” Natasha licked the blood from her lips. “They can’t hide from us, especially if Tobias is hurt.”

  Korver approached. He bent over and grabbed her wrist, squeezing it until she dropped the heart.

  That playful smile that appeared on her lips told him everything he needed to know. She
was testing his patience. She wanted to rile him up—make him get rough with her.

  Bad timing as usual, Natasha. There’s no time for that.

  “Because I never underestimate my enemy,” Korver answered her question. “Tobias is a fool, but he’s not stupid. He knows we’re hunting him, and he’ll take every precaution to try and avoid us. If he’s wounded and vulnerable, there is no better time to double our efforts.”

  “What will you do to Tobias when you find him?” she asked. “Will you kill him?”

  He smiled before he brought her finger to his lips and licked the blood off. “Leave that to me.”

  ***

  A creaking sound signaled the opening of the bedroom door. Demi’s weary eyes slowly opened as she rolled over in bed, expecting to see her aunt’s smiling face, but she didn’t see anyone.

  So she closed her eyes again, snuggled into her blankets, and then hugged one of her stuffed animals tightly. She would happily sleep a little longer.

  It was such a relief to be home in her own bed. The terrible nightmare was over at last. No more werewolves, no more woods, and no more cold. She was warm and safe in her soft covers.

  She was looking forward to seeing Mike and all her friends at school again. And of course she was excited to see her aunt and uncle. If she wasn’t so warm in bed, she would get up and go see them right now.

  It felt like it had been so long.

  I don’t even know what time it is, she thought in a moment of gleeful realization, and I don’t even care.

  She could easily drift off to sleep and remain in a peaceful slumber for as long as it took to rid herself of her weariness. But her eyes were not shut for more than a few short minutes before she heard the sound of feet moving across the floor.

  “Demi . . .” a male voice whispered her name

  She stirred, but did not open her eyes. “Who’s there?”

  “Demi . . .” the voice repeated.

  “Mike? Mike, is that you?”

  “Demi . . .”

  Finally, she did open her eyes. Then she rolled over on her back before sitting up. She didn’t see Mike or anyone else.