Grace of a Wolf by Lenaleia

Chapter 77: Caine: Unnatural Silence (I)

CAINE

I stalk through the banquet hall, my vision tinged with crimson rage. The Fiddleback wolves cower against the floor tiles, submission rippling through their bodies as my dominance rolls over them. But I don’t care about their fear.

I need answers.

"Halloway!" My roar shakes the crystal chandeliers. "Face me, you coward!"

Jack-Eye’s voice cuts through the mess in my head. Hospital says there’s no patient registered under Grace’s name. No blonde human female admitted in the last 48 hours. She’s gone.

The world stops.

Everything narrows to a pinpoint of blinding rage. My chest constricts. My skin burns.

Grace. My Grace. Gone.

Where is she?

"Halloway!"

Movement flickers at the edge of my vision. The wolves on the floor—supposedly flattened by my dominance—spring to their feet with impossible speed. Eyes gleam with malice, not fear.

Chaos erupts.

Bodies twist and contort. Bones snap and reform at unnatural speed—alpha speed, and yet too many. Their shifts should take longer. They don’t.

I barely dodge the first attack, and claws graze my shoulder. The wound burns like silver, hindering my natural healing.

As expected, something’s deeply wrong with this pack.

Fenris appears beside me, a colossus of midnight fur and crackling blue energy. This was a trap.

The blessings of the Lycan Throne are manifold; my tattoos allow Fenris a body of his own, but they also give me control of mine.

Lycan. Wolf and human. I can use either form at will.

is black, I am white. Where he

the gods. Marked to

the shift take me, welcome the split of bone, the

ripping through

charge and

he snaps a spine in his jaws and crushes another underfoot as

he keeps this up, he’ll burn out

power to get through

coming. Ten. Twenty. Too

out, a tidal wave of power capable

voice eerily calm in the havoc. Only graves

lances up my leg. I grab her by the scruff and slam her into the marble floor. Her skull cracks, broken

Jack-Eye’s arrival as he tears through the back ranks, but there’s something

the hospital, I

I can’t leave you—

him with dominance, but there’s no time for hesitation. Grace is in

then vanishes in

clear his path, Fenris snarls, leaping over the pack. He crushes wolves like ants under his paws, drawing attention

with strange markings circles me, too calm. I feint right, then drive forward. He pivots fast—but

More come.

in my jaws—bone splinters. But the wolf

feel it? I ask

Indeed.

no yelps. No howls of pain. Only the mechanical rhythm

like wolves. They fight like machines. Like puppets with

another throat. Blood mats my white fur crimson. My wounds throb, but adrenaline overrides pain. How many left? I demand; he

Less than half.

four wolves drags me down, their jaws locked deep. Blood

russet she-wolf gnaws into my shoulder. Her teeth

above, a mountain of snarling

He barrels toward me.

his paw, he flings the wolves off me. One slams into

is taking too long. My breath is