101

101

DARIAN

The black, swirling mist died around my fingertips along with my rage. I turned around, my eyes sweeping through the chaos that was left in my wake. A wall was broken, a gaping hole in the middle which I had portaled through.

Everything was upturned. Some men were dead at my feet. Tables were broken in half, chandeliers were on the ground, smashed to pieces. I could glimpse the outside. The war had died down. Fallen soldiers staggered to their knees. It was the silence that fascinated me the most—that kind of telltale silence that told a full story of the destruction that had taken place.

I dusted off my red coat and stepped through the hall, making my way across the corridors.

I stopped in front of a broken door. To the side, crumpled and discarded, was the reason I was here.

Dominic Mallory.

I wouldn't lie, I was a bit disappointed to see him lying there, unmoving and bleeding. He sent a help signal to the Order, and Viper had me run all the way here, not that I was very pleased about that either.

I knelt next to him, feeling for a pulse.

He was still alive. "Bother," I grunted.

Why couldn't things be easier for once? It was way easier to report a dead body back to the Order than transport a bleeding, bloody one.

Dominic stirred, his eyes opening weakly.

His hair was matted with blood, his crisp blue tuxedo dyed red. He was bleeding from at least three different places.

But when he looked up at me, his eyes shone. "You're here. You're actually here," he struggled to sit up but fell back down, coughing violently.

"I didn't know I had so many fans," I chuckled, a bit amused.

"Alpha..."

I turned around swiftly as footsteps drew closer. Funny, I thought. The alpha was supposed to be Michael Mallory. Then, come to think of it, I did see a coffin somewhere...

A man stood in front of us. I gauged his age to be around mid-forties, and, believe it or not, I recognized him as a member of Michael's council. He stood in battle gear now, a rifle cocked to his side. His eyes darted between me and Dominic uncertainly.

"Relax, Klaus," Dominic waved his hand. "He's here to help."

It was my turn to observe "Klaus" closely—the rigid frame, the stiffness in the way he carried himself, the way his shoulders relaxed immediately Dominic said it, every bit of distrust vanishing immediately.

I couldn't help but smirk. "Tell me, young man, does he know his alpha is dead?"

Dominic shook his head. "I managed to recreate the mind control you worked on your subjects in the Cold War. He answers to me."

The Cold War, I thought. So that was what they called it now?

I rose to my feet, staring through the broken walls at the field where the men had begun to gather.

"Aren't you going after them?" Dominic said behind me. He coughed out blood, managing to sit up. His face had lost all its color.

"Not interested," I said without looking at him.

"But that one—Vance—I want him dead! And Eria is mine!"

"Keep that up, and the only dead one I see is you," I spoke sharply, turning swiftly towards him. He shrank back.

"Klaus, organize your men. We'll be gone for some time," I instructed, and then pressed my fingers to Dominic's temples, knocking him unconscious.

I ignored Klaus and drew a portal, stepping inside, carrying Dominic with me.

"You say half of the Mystic Pack warriors were already killed by the time you arrived?" Viper asked for, like, the thousandth time, pacing back and forth.

We were on the fourth floor of an abandoned warehouse. In the room next to ours was an unconscious Dominic, still recovering.

I crossed my legs over the table, leaning back in the chair, and brought a bottle of whiskey to my lips.

"A massacre," I confirmed with a pleasant smile.

There was something oddly satisfying about watching Viper—the person that summoned me back to this world and now had control over me—pacing around like a paranoid rabbit.

"And then what?" she demanded, turning to face me, her shoulders shaking with rage. "You should have gone after those fools. The Mystic Pack allied with us. It was our duty to protect them! You could have gone after Kael's men, ended them, or made them pay!"

"I could have," I admitted with a shrug, taking another swig of the liquor, feeling the familiar burning sensation down my throat.

"You! Urgh!" Viper yelled, along with a string of unintelligible words.

I put down the whiskey. It wasn't fun when she began yelling like that. With a sigh, I stood up.

"Look, I'm going to check on the patient. And if you're done playing around with that spell book, you can put away the graffiti from the sky," I said, referring to the green lines of surrender that had been in the sky for more than 12 hours.

"Don't you forget, Darian, that I'm the one who brought you out of your mess. You would still be damned to the demon realm if it wasn't for me, you bastard!"

My fist tightened on the doorknob. "It's the dark prophecy," I said, my voice tight. "Someone would have done it. It's only a matter of time. You brought me here just because you couldn't win a war without me."

Viper threw her head back, laughing hysterically. She walked over, leaning into me, and whispered in a sing-song voice, "Oh, don't overestimate your importance, Darian. You've always been an entitled little bastard, but don't forget that I call the shots now."

My fist clenched around the knob. If I pulled a little more, I was sure it would fly off. I took a deep breath, determined not to give her the satisfaction of seeing me lose control.

I marched out of the room, slamming the door shut behind me.

"Fucking annoying," I spat under my breath. I was the one in charge, the one who the Order trusted with all their experiments, until I made that costly mistake of interpreting a prophecy wrongly.

My fist tightened so hard that my knuckles turned white from anger.

How dare she act like she was the one in charge? It was only a matter of time. And when I gained my freedom, I'd start my new order over her grave.

Monitors beeped. I stepped into Dominic's room. A doctor, dressed in a white lab coat with the word "Order" across the back, was there.

I glanced up at the monitors. They were stable. Dominic was also awake. The doctor had him in drips, although the worst of his injuries were healed, and the rest bandaged. We were werewolves. With our advanced healing abilities, he was bound to be back on his feet within a couple of days.

"Patient is awake and stable," the doctor informed me, tapping on his tablet.

"Leave us," I said.

He bowed and stepped out of the room. I waited until the door shut behind me and walked over, sitting at the edge of the bed.

Dominic was among the few who had seen me in action since I returned. He was young, probably inexperienced, but I knew what he had done—killed, manipulated, and fought for the notion he stood for. Heck, he murdered his own father without regrets.

He would be a great asset, I thought, if I could trust him. I could teach him not to fail in the places I failed. In fact, he could be of great use to me.

"What do you believe in, Dominic?" I asked, staring ahead at the beeping monitors, not looking at him.

"What I believe in?" Dominic repeated slowly. I could hear the confusion in his voice.

I stood up, turning to him with a small smile that didn't reach my eyes. "It's hard to think that a man like you would go through all this stress just because you're afraid of crossing the Order," I said. "They're powerful, but not invincible. You could just as easily have allied yourself with Alpha Kael and Markov, right?"

"No," Dominic shook his head, looking at me with determined eyes. "I knew you were returning, even when no one else wanted to believe it. Fuck the Order, Darian. Everyone knows you're the one with the real power. Kael is scared of you, not the Order."

I raised an eyebrow. "In that case, you believe in me?"

Dominic nodded, no hesitation and with the eagerness of a nine-year-old who met his favorite Marvel hero.

I placed a hand on his shoulder. "Right now, my abilities are limited. The ritual that Viper did is not finished yet. We need the whole of the dark prophecy."

"W... we?" Dominic's eyes widened in surprise.

"Of course," I waved my hand. "I can make you stronger, Dominic, give you powers that you have only dreamt of. You saw what I did at the mansion. But first, I need you to do something for me.

"To complete the ritual, we need to sacrifice Light's child… To banish," my lips curled up into a smirk, "or to free."