My Hockey Alpha novel Chapter 144

Enzo

“Go, Nina,” I said. “ I promise I'll meet you at the cabins.”

Nina shot me a pained, exasperated look. I knew that she didn't want me to stay and she wanted me to go with her. I wanted to go with her, too. But, I had to stay because I knew that if I didn't do something and stop the rogues, then they would only keep chasing us and eventually corner us. There were only a few and I knew I could take them.

I swallowed the fear in my stomach and gave Nina one last shove up the ladder. She was reluctant at first, but she gave in when she realized the true urgency of the situation and that she would only put everyone in more danger if she kept hesitating. Once she was safely out of the tunnels, I slammed the hatch shut, turned around, and faced the group of rogues that were coming for me. I pushed the sounds of her sobbing and pleading out of my mind and shifted, feeling my wolf's power surge through me, and lowered my stance to prepare to attack.

The first Rogue ran at me. it leaped at me, snarling and spitting, and as it flew through the air I came up beneath it and brought my paw up to slash under its belly. It fell behind me, whimpering.

I knew that these were our classmates. It pained me to hurt them, but what could I do? If I could at least injure them and force them to shift back, then they wouldn’t be able to hurt anyone else. With Tiffany’s medical skills and Nina’s healing abilities, I knew that no one would die today. One rogue had already been killed in the hockey arena by my own doing, and I was determined not to let that happen.

Another rogue leaped at me. I dodged, sliding out of the way as best as I could in the narrow tunnel, just barely managing to get out from under it before it slammed into me. As it landed behind me, I bolted forward and burst through one of the doors into a nearby room to give myself some more space.

The rogue scrambled to follow me. I watched as it skittered in through the open doorway, drooling all over the floor and growling at me with its sickly yellow eyes focused on me.

“Go on,” I thought. “Attack me.”

And it did. It lunged at me again, but I was prepared, and I leaped over it. As I did, I swung myself around and clamped my jaws around the scruff of its neck. When I bit down, hard, blood splattering everywhere, I heard it whimper and felt it become weak underneath me, almost as though it was cowering.

Then, it began to shift. It slowly turned back into a human, and as it did, I released my grip and stepped away.

My eyes widened as the girl who was revealed was someone who I knew very well.

Lori.

At least we knew where they were now. I was certain that Nina would be overjoyed to find her friends, although I still didn’t know where Luke had gotten off to, and I was also certain that she would no doubt be asking about that little weasel, James. I hadn’t seen him since we found his letter from his father that day; maybe he was too busy now having a field day killing werewolves, since the campus was crawling with them. Or maybe, just maybe, he also wound up getting turned into a rogue in some sort of twisted, Kafkaesque way.

I gently moved Jessica out of the way, setting her down next to Lori, then climbed up the ladder and pushed the hatch open.

But as I did, the smell of something all too familiar came to my senses.

Blood.

I frowned, pulling myself out the rest of the way and looked around. Nina, Tiffany, and the students were nowhere to be found. Perhaps they made it to the cabins, after all. I sighed, standing and dusting myself off, before heading toward the cabins to meet them and get the antidote from Tiffany to cure the sleeping students below…

Until I realized where the smell of blood was coming from: the fresh blood trail that was leading in the opposite direction.