Chapter 3

I walked into school on Monday feeling a little worn out. It had been four days since the forest incident, I had not seen Sean since that day at school when he almost broke my wrist. I had seen Cole though, my father wouldn't let him be alone fearing that he would hurt himself since Cole tried to have his heart ripped out by another pack member. When an Alpha or Beta commanded someone in their pack to do something, the person could not disobey. The guy had been so traumatised but luckily my Dad reached them before anything had happened. I did not ever want a mate if losing them hurt that much.

I slowed my pace when I spotted Sean standing at his locker alone. He showed no emotion as he stared at the wall across him. His locker was a few feet from mine. I quietly retrieved my things from my locker before I turned to leave but I stopped. Just because he was not showing it did not mean he was not hurt... I bit my lip as I turned back and walked over to him slowly.

"Um... Sean?" I cleared my throat when my voice came out in little more than a whisper.

"What do you want?" He spat. I bit my lip as I began to play with my fingers nervously. Just by the way he had said that I was a thousand percent sure that if I said the wrong words he was going to kill me.

"I... I wanted to say sorry... About... about your mom..." I said slowly, carefully. I was shocked when he let out a dry chuckle.

"You're sorry?" He said lowly. I stepped back cautiously because of the tone in his voice. It had me thinking I should leave, but I didn't. I don't know why.

"I am..." I whispered.

"Well, Izabella," I cried out when he turned and in a split second my back smashed against the wall painfully hard, I was sure the steel bent at the impact. He glared at me, "You're not sorry. This is your fault. This is all your fucking fault." He hissed gripping my shoulders painfully tight, his eyes blackening so that even the white was completely black. For once in my life I was very scared. I had never seen a werewolf so angry their entire eyes turned black and not just the irises. I had never seen Sean so angry. I was terrified, I completely regretted walking up to him. I should have known he would not want me talking to him, especially now. I lifted my hands to his arms to try and pry them off me but his grip was too tight.

"I-I don't - I'm sor - W-what –?" I stuttered confused. My fault?

"This. Is. Your. Fault." He said through grit teeth, "And trust, you'll pay, Izabella. I will fucking make you pay, you Freak." He said, I felt blood begin to trickle down my skin as his fingers dug into it.

"Y-you're hurting me. S-stop –” I stuttered having no idea what he was talking about, it did not matter, I just wanted to get away from him.

"You'll pay. They should never have brought scum like you into our pack." He muttered letting me go. I fell onto my knees mostly because I wouldn't have been able to stand on my trembling legs. I had blood seeping through my white shirt where he had held me.

"W-what?" I asked confused as I looked up at him. Shouldn't have brought me into the pack? He just kept glaring at me.

"Watch yourself." Was all he said before he left, his speed making him disappear within a split second.

I pushed myself off the floor stunned as I stared at the place he had just stood. My fault? How? I had not done anything. I could not have done that to those people.

"Uh... Izabella?" I looked to see a human boy from one of my classes, Maxwell.

"Uh, yeah. Hey." I said straightening up.

"I didn't see that, right? I mean, Sean didn't just shove you and then disappear, right? Or... That's impossible. He isn't supposed to be able to move that fast." I was stunned. Sean mustn't have noticed Maxwell in the hall, neither had I. We were screwed if I could not get him to shut up.

"What are you talking about?" I asked looking at him as if I was confused about what he was talking about.

"Nah, don't play that on me. I know that I saw what I saw, I know you know I did too. What was that? His eyes –” he was saying.

"You saw nothing." I said looking directly in his eyes. I saw my eyes glow topaz in his and cursed looking away, "You saw nothing." I repeated shutting my eyes.

"What?" I looked at him. He looked confused.

"You... You said you... Wait, what did you see?" I asked slowly.

"I... Uh... What do you mean? I just got here... I think..." He said looking around confused. I was shocked. How had he just forgotten? “What – blood –”

“Oh, this? It’s just paint. I was pranking some people.” He chuckled as I motioned to the blood on my sleeves. I quickly pulled my jacket on to hide it, "Uhm... Okay... Later, Max." I grabbed my bag and jogged down the hall. Had I made him forget? No. Werewolves could not do that and I did not have my mother's witch powers like my brothers did. I could not have made him forget. But then what happened? He definitely forgot, I had no doubt of that. It wasn't possible for someone to just forget something like that, right?

"Well, you look like you've had a busy morning." I looked up at my favourite teacher and one of my favourite pack members, Mr Taylor. He was a few years younger than my dad, and he was our pack history teacher, he had read every history book in our library, though he taught English at school.

"No... Just weird. See... Uh... You won't tell my dad, right?" I mumbled.

"Well," he crossed his arms over his chest, "It depends what it is I’m not supposed to tell your dad." He said.

I sighed. He motioned for me to follow him into his classroom as we had just been standing in the hall and I did. He shut the door behind us once we were inside.

"So, what is it?" He asked turning to me.

"This morning, I... Uh... kinda got into an argument with Sean –” I was saying.

"Again, Izabella? Really?" He frowned.

"It's not my fault! I tried to tell him I was sorry about his mom, and he practically attacked me -" I froze after the words left my mouth. Crap. "I-I mean, he didn't – he didn't attack me I –” I tried.

"He did what?” He asked shocked, “Wait until your father hears about this. That boy is going to be in so much trouble –” he was saying.

"Kevin." I whined his first name, it's what everyone in our pack called him when we were not in school. He looked at me, "That's not the point. See, Maxwell had seen it and questioned me about Sean's speed, and then I told him he saw nothing and just like that he forgot. I don't know how he just forgot, but I know he doesn't remember what he saw." I said. He looked out of the window shaking his head thoughtfully.

"Well, that's impossible, Izzy. The only wolves that can do that are –” he stopped as he looked at me.

"What?" I asked. His face turned shocked before he shook his head.

"No one. Your father just linked me so I was replying to him, I have to go. Tell Arthur to make an excuse for my absence. We'll talk later." He threw his class keys into my hand and left. I stared at the door confused as I wondered what was up with Dad... Sometimes he would link to random pack members when he needed them, especially when it was an emergency. Only the wolf he linked to could hear him in their mind. I couldn't link to him. For some reason I had never been able to link with anyone in my pack. It was weird but Mom said it was okay and some wolves couldn't and since I was already so different, it could be expected. It was rare, yes, very. But it was okay.

I looked on Mr Taylor's desk and grabbed one of the worksheets he was probably going to give us when we came to his class later. Might as well skip ahead. I locked his class and went looking for Arthur, or Mr Williams as known by the school.

-----

I walked into my house only to get shoved out of the way as someone came in behind me.

"If I'm called here for trouble, you're fucking dead." Sean hissed walking by me before he disappeared in the hall, going towards my father’s office. I groaned.

"KEVIN!" I yelled wanting to ask him about why Dad had linked him at school, he had not been at his house so I assumed he was at ours.

"My God Damn ears!" I heard Sean shout.

"Maybe you would shut up if your ears really mattered." I said.

"Don't fucking mess with me, Freak." He walked back into the living room. Had my dad not been in his office?

"What did you say?" I shut my eyes and groaned internally when I heard Cohen.

"You heard me, stay out of it." Sean glared at him.

"Do not disrespect me by acting like I couldn't take you right here, Sean. You might be on your way to become Alpha but make no mistake about it; I can and will hurt you if you push me." My brother said calmly, but his the tone was terrifying.

"What the hell is going on here?" My eyes opened and I smiled hearing Dad as he came into the house.

"Nothing, Alpha." Both guys said at the same time.

"It didn't seem that way when I walked in." Our father pushed,

"We were just playing around, right, Sean?" My brother said with a smile. Sean nodded while still glaring at him.

"Oh, and I –” my dad was cut off when I cried out grabbing my wrist when a sheering pain suddenly struck through it.

"What's wrong?" Dad asked.

"My wrist hurts –” I was saying, I couldn’t brush it off like I had the other few times because it felt like my wrist was literally on fire.

"Izzy, you're bleeding –” Cohen grabbed my arm to look at it. He was right. I stared at the bright red blood on the fingers of my right hand terrified while the blood from my left wrist dripped onto the floor. What was happening?!

"What the hell?" I heard Sean mutter.

"Hillary!" Dad called as he tried to put some tissue on the bleeding. “What happened?” Dad asked.

"N-nothing, it just hurts –” I said trying to pull my wrist from Dad's hand so I could try to cool my wrist down or something. The tissues were soaked in blood. Why wasn't it stopping? Why wasn't I healing?

"What's going on in here?" I heard Mom.

"Her wrist, it hurt and then it just began bleeding and it's not healing." Cohen said.

"Let me try, all of you can calm down and go away." Mom took my arm.

"But –” Dad began.

"I've got this, go away, Ian. Don’t you have work?" Mom said. Dad frowned but listened as he muttered for Sean and Cohen to follow him.

When Mom and I were alone she made me take a seat in the dining room as she took the tissue away and covered my wrist with her hand. Her hand glowed and I watched feeling the burn subside slowly. She frowned as she drew her hand back, her covered in blood now as my wrist still dripped.

"What?" I asked softly.

"It's not healing. I'll be right back," I felt wind and she was gone and back in seconds. She had an emergency kit in her hand when she got back.

"Always keep some bandages around, even in a pack of self-healing werewolves." She said smiling.

"Why isn't it healing?" I asked. She looked at it and furrowed her brows.

"Wait," she took some disinfectant and some wipes and wiped my blood away, I looked at my wrist surprised when I saw that it had healed in the past few seconds, but my skin was not clear. There was something that looked like a tattoo on my skin. It looked like words, symbols, but not in English or any other language I could read. I had other tattoos, my pack tattoo – a tattoo that all werewolves were born with as it indicated their pack and ranking within that pack – was on my back. What was weird about this new tattoo was that they were not supposed to appear out of nowhere. I looked at Mom's face as she covered her mouth looking stunned.

"What?" I asked. She looked at me and smiled.

"Your birthday's next week." She said. What…? Why was she randomly bringing that up? "And so is your mate." I rolled my eyes. My brothers had all already found their mates, but none of them were married yet. Cohen's mate, Emily, joked saying they were waiting to see if either of them found better but in a world of 'destined' and sometimes forced love where you had a single person you were meant to be with and you would know once you saw them, there was no such thing as ‘better’. We could only spot our mates once we turned 18.

"What is this?" I mumbled looking at my wrist.

"Oh, nothing. It's just to show that you're almost a mature wolf." Mom said.

"But no one else has it." I said.

"Yes, but you're Alpha's daughter and I’m a witch, it’s a special symbols for Alpha's daughters." Mom said. I frowned slightly. What if I didn't want the stupid symbols? I did not need anything making me more different than everyone else. How come I had never heard of it before? I was sure I read all of the Alpha-related books in the library, guess I was wrong. I already had the pack tattoo, why did I need another mark?

"I don't want a mate." I mumbled. Especially if he was part of our pack.

"No mate? Why the heck not?" I looked up smiling at Adan's mate Riley and Gray's mate Bianca. I shrugged.

"They're too clingy." I smirked at the women around me.

"We are not clingy!" Riley said outraged.

"Yeah, right." I laughed as she glared at Adan when he walked in he smiled at her kissing her cheek, "Only joking, Love. You know I'm the clingy one." He said slipping his arms around her waist.

"Must run in the family then." Gray said making Bianca smile as he walked in. I shut my eyes when they kissed.

"No! My eyes!" I yelled. I still was not used to seeing my brothers kiss people. I kept my eyes hidden as I walked out of the room and heard everyone laughing behind me.

"Grow up!" That was Sean from my father's office.

"Sean! Ears!" I heard Dad hiss.

"Right after you do!” I yelled back as I made my way upstairs.

"Both of you stop yelling!" I heard Cole. He was beginning to heal. Well, publicly at least, though we all knew he still hurt badly. I made my way to my room and sat on my bed examining the mark on my wrist. I trusted Mom, but I felt like there was more to it than she thought.

I had to find out more about it. Like why it hurt? Why it bled? Why it burnt? Why… only I had it… I frowned. Werewolf information was kept off the internet to keep us hidden from the humans. I was going to have to go to the library until I found out about the new mark.