Chapter 27: Blood Moon Festival

Chapter 27: Blood Moon Festival
Marcus's entire body went rigid beside me the moment the first scream cut through the night air. His hand found mine in the darkness, fingers wrapping tight around my palm before releasing. The warmth of his touch lingered even after he let go.

"Stay close," he said quietly, his grey eyes scanning the tree line around us. His other hand moved to the knife at his belt with practiced ease.

More screams followed. Not just one or two people startled by something minor. These were sounds of genuine terror, of panic spreading through the festival like wildfire. The music that had been playing moments ago cut off abruptly, replaced by shouts and the sound of people running.

Through the trees ahead of us, I could see the glow of festival lanterns swinging wildly. Shadows moved in chaotic patterns as the celebration we'd just left descended into something else entirely.

"We need to get you somewhere safe," Marcus said, already moving to position himself between me and whatever was happening at the festival grounds.

"No." I grabbed his arm, feeling the tension thrumming through his muscles. "We need to find out what's happening. People need help."

"Chloe—"

"My pack is out there, Marcus." I looked up at him, seeing the conflict in his expression. The Alpha in him wanted to charge toward danger, but the part that cared about me wanted to hide me away first. "I'm not hiding while others are in danger."

He stared at me for a long moment, grey eyes searching my face. Then something shifted in his expression, and he nodded once with sharp decisiveness.

"Alright. But you stay behind me, and if I tell you to run, you run. No arguments."

"Deal."

We moved through the trees together, Marcus leading the way while I followed as quietly as my injured ankle would allow. Each step sent a dull throb of pain up my leg, but I gritted my teeth and pushed through it. Whatever was happening at the festival was more important than my discomfort.

The sounds grew louder as we got closer. Screaming. Shouting. The clash of weapons. And underneath it all, a sound that made my blood run cold even though I couldn't quite identify what it was.

Growling. But not like any wolf I'd ever heard before.

We emerged from the tree line onto the edge of the festival grounds, and the scene before us was chaos incarnate. People scattered in every direction, their festival clothes bright splashes of color against the darkness as they fled. Pack warriors were trying to form defensive lines, but whatever they were fighting moved too fast, attacked too aggressively.

From our position, I couldn't see the attackers clearly yet. Just glimpses of movement between the panicking crowd and the warriors trying to protect them.

"What the hell is happening?" I whispered.

Marcus's jaw was tight, his eyes tracking the movement ahead of us with seriousness. "I don't know yet. But we need to—"

A figure burst from the festival chaos directly ahead of us, running straight toward our position with frightening speed. Not fleeing but actually attacking.

Marcus saw it the same moment I did. He cursed under his breath, a sound caught between annoyance and anger.

"Someone just had to spoil things right when I was getting to the good part with my girl," he muttered, already moving forward to intercept the charging attacker.

Despite the fear clawing at my throat, despite the chaos unfolding around us, his words made something warm bloom in my chest. His girl. He'd called me his girl, casual as anything, like it was simply a fact.

But there was no time to process that. The attacker was closing fast, and Marcus met him head-on.

The man swung wild and Marcus dodged with fluid grace, his movements smooth despite the injuries he was still recovering from. In one seamless motion, Marcus got behind the attacker, his forearm locking around the man's throat in a chokehold that should have ended the fight quickly.

But the attacker didn't stop struggling. Didn't seem affected by the lack of air. He thrashed with inhuman strength, and Marcus had to shove him violently aside just to create some distance.

The man stumbled but recovered far too quickly and fast. Too aggressive for someone who should have been gasping for breath.

That's when I saw Marcus's expression change completely. His grey eyes went wide with shock, then narrowed with sudden, terrible understanding.

"Fuck," he spat, circling the attacker warily now. His entire posture had shifted from confident to cautious. "He's feral. Just like that bastard I killed. Just like the one who attacked you."

The words hit me like ice water. Another feral wolf. Just how many more were there?

The feral attacker launched himself at Marcus again with that same terrifying aggression I'd seen in Derek. No strategy, no self-preservation, just pure violent intent.

But Marcus was ready this time. He'd fought a feral wolf before, knew their patterns, understood how they moved without thought or fear.

He caught the man's arm mid-swing, bones creaking under the pressure of his grip. With brutal efficiency, Marcus twisted the arm sharply and drove his knee up into the attacker's gut. Hard enough that I heard the air explode from the man's lungs.

The attacker doubled over, and Marcus brought his elbow down on the back of the man's skull with crushing force.

Any normal person would have dropped. This one staggered but stayed on his feet, barely seeming to register the pain that should have knocked him unconscious.

"Stubborn bastard," Marcus growled, frustration clear in his voice.

He grabbed the man's head with both hands, fingers tangling in hair as he positioned for the finishing moves. Three times in rapid succession, Marcus drove his knee up with devastating precision.

Once into the jaw with a crack that echoed through the trees.

Once into the temple, the man's head snapping sideways from the impact.

Once into the bridge of the nose, and I saw blood spray as cartilage shattered.

The attacker finally collapsed, unconscious at Marcus's feet.

Marcus stood over him, breathing hard. One hand pressed briefly to his wounded side before he caught himself and dropped it, not wanting me to see how much the fight had cost him. But I'd already seen the wince, the slight hitch in his breathing that meant his injuries were bothering him more than he wanted to admit.

"What did you mean by 'your girl'?" The question burst out of me instead before I could stop it. Of all the things to focus on right now, with an unconscious feral wolf at our feet and chaos erupting at the festival, my brain had decided this was the moment to demand clarification about Marcus's casual claim on me.

Marcus turned to face me, and despite everything happening around us, despite the danger and the violence and the fear, that cocky smile curved his lips. The one that made my heart do stupid things in my chest.

"I was going to continue what I was saying to you," he said, taking a step closer. "Before we were so rudely interrupted."

I stared at him like he'd completely lost his mind as I came to my senses first. "Marcus, we're under attack. This isn't the time—"

"This is exactly the time." He moved closer still, until I had to tilt my head back to maintain eye contact. His grey eyes were intense in the dim light filtering through the trees, holding mine with an expression I'd never seen from him before. Vulnerability.

"I need to say this now," he continued, his voice dropping lower. "Because I probably won't feel this bold later. Won't have the courage to just put it out there without overthinking it."

"Marcus—"

"I love you."

The three words hit me like a physical blow, stealing the breath from my lungs and making my heart stutter in my chest.

"I love you, Chloe," Marcus continued, his eyes never leaving mine. "I don't care that you lost your memory. I don't care that you don't remember what we had before. I love you. The you standing in front of me right now. The you who demanded to help instead of hide. The you who's brave and stubborn and absolutely infuriating."

The world had narrowed to just us. Just his grey eyes and the raw honesty in his voice and the way my entire body felt like it was vibrating with the weight of what he'd just said.

"Don't answer yet," he said quickly, before I could even begin to process what response I might give. "I just needed you to know. When you're ready to say something back—anything back—I'll be waiting. But for now, I just needed you to know that I—"

Movement behind him. Too fast and too sudden.

"MARCUS!" The scream ripped from my throat.

The "unconscious" attacker wasn't unconscious anymore. He launched himself at Marcus's unprotected back, apparently three devastating blows to the head weren't enough to keep a feral wolf down for long.

They crashed to the ground in a violent tangle of limbs. The attacker's teeth snapped inches from Marcus's throat, foam gathering at the corners of his mouth as he tried desperately to sink his jaws into flesh. Marcus fought to keep those teeth away from his face, his neck, anywhere vital.

But his injuries were slowing him down. I could see it in the way he moved, just a fraction slower than he should be. The stab wounds from yesterday hadn't fully healed yet despite his claims otherwise, and fighting was taking its toll.

"Marcus, you stupid—" I spun around, looking desperately for anything that could help. A branch, a rock, a weapon, anything at all.

A low growl behind me froze the blood in my veins.

I turned slowly, already knowing what I'd see but hoping I was wrong.

Another feral wolf emerged from the shadows between the trees, its eyes fixed on me with that same empty, predatory hunger I'd seen in Derek's cell. 

Foam gathered at the corners of its mouth. Its movements were wrong somehow, not quite human but not quite wolf either. Something caught horribly between the two.

"MARCUS!" His name exploded from my throat as pure terror before I could stop myself.

"Fuck!" Marcus's curse came from where he wrestled on the ground, still fighting to keep the first attacker's teeth away from his throat. "Chloe, run! Run right now!"

Run. Right. My body finally caught up with my brain's screaming commands, and I bolted.

One step. Two steps. Three—

My injured ankle gave out completely. Pain exploded up my entire leg as my foot rolled sideways, unable to support my weight. I went down hard, barely managing to turn the fall into an awkward roll that sent me tumbling across the rough ground.

I landed on the same ankle. Stars burst across my vision as agony shot through me, so intense I nearly vomited. A scream tried to claw its way out of my throat, but I bit it back, refusing to give the approaching predator the satisfaction of hearing my pain.

The feral wolf stalked closer, taking its time now that its prey was wounded and helpless. Each step deliberate, almost casual, like it knew I had nowhere to run and wanted to savor the moment before the kill.

My hand scrabbled across the ground, fingers closing around something hard and rough. A rock, about the size of my fist. Not much of a weapon against a supernatural creature that felt no pain, but it was all I had.

I forced myself into a low crouch despite my screaming ankle, putting weight on my good leg and keeping the injured one bent beneath me. The rock felt pathetically small in my hand, but I gripped it tight enough that my knuckles went white.

Every survival instinct I had screamed at me to run, to flee, to get away. But my ankle wouldn't support my weight, and even if it could, this thing was faster than me. Fighting was my only option. Maybe if I could land a lucky blow, stun it long enough to—

"Chloe!" Marcus's voice, desperate and furious and afraid in a way I'd never heard from him before. He was still fighting his own battle, unable to help me, forced to listen to me face death alone.

The feral wolf crept closer. Five feet away now. Four. Three.

I could see the emptiness in its eyes. Whatever person this had been before, they were gone now. Just a shell wearing human skin, driven by nothing but the urge to kill.

My muscles coiled tighter, ready to spring. If I was going down, I was going down fighting.

Two feet.

The wolf gathered itself to pounce, and I raised the rock, preparing to swing with everything I had—

Something slammed into the wolf from the side with devastating force. They rolled across the ground in a blur of motion almost too fast to follow, and I caught a flash of brown hair and the glint of silver in the dim light.

Lucian.

But this wasn't the gentle healer I'd spent hours talking about herbs with. This was someone else entirely. 

His knife found the wolf's throat in one smooth, practiced movement. Blood sprayed hot across the grass as the blade severed something vital, and the creature went limp in his arms.

Lucian was on his feet before the body even finished falling, already running toward where Marcus still struggled with his own attacker. I pushed myself up on shaking legs, putting all my weight on my good ankle, and hobbled after him as fast as I could manage.

Lucian grabbed the feral wolf from behind, arms locking around its torso and yanking it off Marcus. In the same instant, Marcus rolled to his feet and drove his fist into the creature's chest with bone-crushing force.

The wolf went down hard, and Marcus didn't give it a chance to recover. His knife flashed once, twice, and the thrashing stopped.

Silence fell over our small clearing, broken only by our harsh breathing and the distant sounds of chaos still erupting at the festival.

Marcus pushed himself to his feet slowly, one hand pressed tight against his side. Even in the dim light, I could see blood seeping between his fingers where his wounds had reopened during the fight.

"More coming," Lucian said, his voice tight and urgent. His eyes scanned the trees around us. "The whole pack is under attack. These feral wolves are everywhere."

Everywhere. The word hit me like a hammer.

Marcus's grey eyes found mine and I noticed guilt in its depths. "Can you walk?"

"I can manage," I lied, putting weight on my injured ankle and immediately regretting it as fresh pain lanced up my leg.

We rushed through the trees, following the sounds of screaming and fighting that grew louder with each step. When we finally broke through the tree line into the festival grounds, I stopped dead.

The devastation spread out before us was unlike anything I'd ever seen and just one word escaped my mouth.

Fuck.