THE AWAKENING

Noooo! Her heartbeat thundered so hard against her chest bone she thought she might die.

The heat was almost consuming her and as much as she needed sex, she couldn’t allow Ulster to plant his seed in her belly! His son — their son — would bring about the end of the world as they knew it.

She couldn’t allow that to happen! With the last bit of herself clinging to reason, she reared back and punched Ulster in the face with every ounce of strength she had.

A soft crack from a broken nose sounded in the still room and she sprang from his hold.

He roared as blood streamed down his face and she ran blindly down the dim hallway, trying to recall where she saw the door.

The adrenalin pumping through her body was spreading the Phase through her blood like poison.

Her temperature was dangerously high. She might die if she didn’t get what her body needed, but she couldn’t allow Ulster to impregnate her.

She felt a prickling across her nerve endings and her bones started to scream in protest as something horrifying began to happen within her body.

“You’re changing,” Arja’s awed voice cut through the red haze beginning to permeate her vision.

“What’s wrong with me?” Cassandra cried, but her voice was rapidly cut off by the elongating of her canines as they ripped through the gums.

but it sounded more like a wild growl. She dropped to all fours and her bones cracked and splintered as they grew and reformed. She howled

don’t change,” male and female voices whispered in fear. “What’s

The rough fibers of the worn fabric beneath her sensitive paws made her lift her right

the night air and taste the moonlight cascading through the dirty windows. The compulsion to run made her whine and

minds. Her wolf senses were alive and vibrant and she saw things in variations of color and texture but her human senses remained present even if she couldn’t

apprehension at her sudden transformation while Ulster simply stared with a heat in his eyes

a red haze encased his body, ebbing and flowing

like the

moonlight…” Ulster intoned, his eyes glowing. Cassandra caught her reflection

wolf with startling blue eyes stared back at her. She yipped and backed

the women scattering in fear. Ulster’s skin split and his bones shattered and knit back

what he had planned — she could guess — and

eating up the ground with ease but Ulster had quickly followed her out the window. She could sense his urgency, his lust for power,

at being chased so ardently. She could only imagine it was the influence of the Phase racing through her blood

something seductive about evil, a voice whispered, urging her to

a panic, don’t do this! Ulster was everything she hated — malicious, abusive, and power hungry — why in God’s