Curse of the Wolves

Blakely Yarrow has never been your ordinary werewolf. With a family curse hanging over her head, a wolf that refuses to listen to her commands, and an Alpha claiming to be her mate, she already has her hands full. Things take a sharp turn when her twenty-first birthday rolls around and the curse she's spent her entire life fearing finally takes hold. As they had in the past, the beastly Gods of her kind appear, heeding the curses call. Instead of claiming her life, they claim something even more precious. Her soul.

Torn from everything she once knew; Blakely has no choice but to navigate her new life in the godly realm, trapped with her three devastatingly beautiful captors. In this foreign land of magic and danger, she quickly begins to realize that the curse haunting her family was put there for a reason, and that she isn't the only one suffering.

Blakely soon learns that the Moon Goddess is missing, and she just might be the key to finding out the truth.

A truth that puts both her heart and her life at risk.

~A Reverse Harem Novel by Jane Doe~

Prologue

Blakely

A curse so deadly,

bestowed to thee.

Has turned thou into a living key.

Await the gods,

who claim thy soul.

Break the curse & fulfill thy role.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I stared down at the sea of glittering crimson, trying to process the fact that it wasn’t my blood that stained my hands and clothes, but that of my Alpha’s.

My mate.

Its metallic scent permeated the air, mingling with that of vomit. Staring into my eyes, I watched the scene unfold again and again. The events that led to this very moment. The mistakes I’d made that turned me into this.

It had been two weeks since dad helped me move into Alpha Felix Gannon’s flashy, three-story home. The man claiming to be my mate had been thoughtful and kind, catering to every one of my requests despite how odd.

He didn’t question why I wanted my own bedroom, or why I insisted on sleeping in it every night rather than staying at his side.

The entire pack was in a constant state of celebration. There hadn’t been a single pair of mates in almost three hundred years. Everyone was too excited to question how odd the situation was. They even threw a parade in our honor. This was the return of our kind’s good fortune, they claimed. Oh, how wrong they were.

After seven days of love-bombing his true colors began to show, but at that point it was far too late.

We’d just gotten home from Beta Prescott’s wedding. Felix had been drinking more and more over the last week. He said it was to cope with my lack of affection, but that sounded like a load of crap.

Once inside the darkened house, I let him pull me into his arms. I waited for the spark, the mind-numbing rush of euphoria that came when touching your mate, but there was none. His lips claimed mine with a drunken ferocity that bordered on sloppy. Black ice swept across my mind as his hands roamed the bodice of my dress. A gown he claimed made me look like the perfect trophy wife.

I pulled away, fighting a hold that only seemed to tighten. He dug his fingers into my arms hard, only to pull away with a growl building in his chest. The vase of flowers he’d gotten me earlier that day were thrown against the wall, the crystalline pieces raining down over my head.

“Come on, Blakely! All that I’ve done for you and not once have you thought to return the favor.”

His moods had a tendency to shift, which is what happened next when he rushed forward to cradle my face in his hands.

“I shouldn’t have said that. You know I didn’t mean any of it, right? I was just so angry, baby. You have no idea how crazy you make me. Let’s just start tonight over, alright? We’re going to spend the rest of our lives together. I’d do anything to make you happy, and I know you want me happy too. Don’t you?”

Were the lies that once tasted sour on his tongue now sweet as truth, or had he merely gotten used to the taste?

‘Say yes,’ my wolf whispered. This was the first time in months that she had spoken to me.

I gave him the answer he wanted and watched as his emerald eyes lit up. He asked me if I trusted him, and despite the truth hovering on the tip of my tongue, I said yes.

He kissed me harder this time. His hands didn’t wait to wander, picking up where they had left off. Fear soaked me in its icy waters, right down to the bone. Only when his fingers tugged at my zipper did I break free from its hold.

“I’m not ready for this, Felix.”

Those hands moved faster, swatting away my words like meaningless insects. He swallowed my refusals, drowning them in alcohol-tinged breath. Fingers dipped into my dress, and all that fear melted away, boiling into embers of adrenaline.

I growled against his lips, “I said no.”

He caged me against the wall with his arms. Arms that I’d once ogled at, tracing the muscle with wandering eyes. I could feel his hardness pushing into my thigh. The disgust that rolled through me was a tangible thing. A voice whispering in my ear that something about this was so terribly wrong.

“The bond won’t snap into place if you keep refusing to touch me.” I didn’t dare tell him that wasn’t how it worked. “What would our people think if they knew you didn’t want your mate? What would your parents think?”

Venom boiled in his eyes. Eyes that now seemed too bright. Too green.

He smashed his lips against my own in a brutal kiss, using the cage that was his arms to maneuver me further into the kitchen. The sharp edge of the counter dug into my lower back, the sting of pain providing a dose of clarity.

“You’re so beautiful in that dress.” A groan of stale whiskey and lust invaded my mouth. “Can’t wait to put my mark on you.”

Tears burned in my eyes. I wanted to scream, but my voice was a shriveled husk in my throat. I wanted to lash out and fight, but his iron-clad fists held me in place. Something clattered to the floor as he ripped open the back of my dress.

It was the zipper. He’d torn the zipper completely off.

I bucked against him, and he groaned in a way that made my throat constrict as vomit threatened to rise. My mind went blank. I lifted my knee and kicked as hard as I could, crushing his grape-sized balls with grim satisfaction.

He let out a growl, slamming me against the counter as I tried to evade his grasp. The stupid dress he’d forced me into tangled around my legs, making me stumble. Smooth hands that had never seen a day of hard work grabbed me by the hips and spun me around. The counter rose up, crashing against my skull. Pain rushed through my nostrils, becoming the very air I breathed.

“You’re a terrible mate. What did I do to deserve someone like you? Someone who won’t let me love them.”

Numbness crawled through my limbs like brackish ice water. I craned my head, my cheek pressed against the marble, and caught sight of my reflection in the microwave. Hollow eyes of sterling silver stared out at me, begging someone—anyone—to help.

A tug in my chest drew my eyes to the left, to the shiny toaster he’d replaced three days after I moved in. The first one ended up in pieces just like the vase. I inched my fingers closer, praying he didn’t notice. Cold metal bit into my fingertips, and I nearly cried out with relief.

I wrapped my hand around the hunk of metal. With a cry of pure mania, I twisted around and sent my arm flying in an arc.

Crack!

Felix’s weight vanished from my back. His grunt was swallowed by the thud his body made as it hit the tiled floor.

My parents thought he would protect me. They thought that when the curse took hold on my twenty-first birthday, he’d spare no expense to keep me safe. I looked down at Felix’s unconscious body, my hands trembling.

No one would believe me. I had no proof to clear my name and even if I did, this man was beloved by his pack. It was my word against his, and he would win. I didn’t stand a chance. The injustice of it all made me want to scream.

There was one other option, one even a fool would run from. Only someone so desperate for life, so starved of its touch, would even think to take this route.

Someone like me.

I’d live this last month in peace, and when my birthday finally came around, the curse looming over my head would take hold. The same curse that claimed the lives of my ancestors, of every firstborn female in each generation.

On the night of my twenty-first birthday, they would come.

Three Harbingers of Death—the gods of our kind.

Even now, sitting in Alpha Gannon’s once pristine kitchen, I could hear my grandma’s voice as though she loomed over my shoulder. She would’ve scolded me for this. Ushering me inside to pepper me with herbs and anointed oils, anything she could think of that might protect me.

Never make deals with the gods, she’d say with unwavering certainty.

I focused on the blood cooling against the tile floor and stared into the eyes of that little girl. A shudder held me in its iron grasp, tearing through my lungs as I inhaled. My lips began to move, forming the words that would both act as the bars to my prison cell, and the key that could set me free.

“I call out to the ancient ones. To the gods of old. To any that are listening. Let the mist carry my voice on its ashen wings. Let my cries be heard! I don’t care who you are or what you’ll ask of me. I’ll do anything—give you anything you want. I beg of you, help me.” I squeezed my eyes shut, “Please, help me.”

I felt the god that answered my call long before I saw him.

Silence stretched into oblivion, the seconds ticking by until the air itself began to thicken. My nerve endings quivered as a current, wild and untamed, slithered over my flesh. My heart thundered in my ears. A phantom hand coaxed my eyes open, and I knew that I was no longer alone.

The lights overhead flickered and as my head snapped up, there he was. Leaning against the counter with his elbow propped up on the marble, he spun a wickedly sharp blade.

Every inch of him, from his broad shoulders to his tapered waist, dripped with seduction and power. Hair as dark as the inky fog that rolled across the floor, with eyes that felt like a contradiction. A kaleidoscope of color set over iris’s almost as pale as his milky skin.

Beneath his leather jacket and frayed t-shirt were tattoos that trailed up his throat. Mythical beasts, and dancing maidens, creatures I’d never seen before all ending at a jawline sharp enough to break skin.

His pouty lips thinned as I gaped at him, but I couldn’t help it. He was mesmerizing.

Some things in life you could prepare for. A test, getting your driver’s license, losing your virginity. Murdering a narcissistic Alpha and staring down a seven-foot-tall god who could easily crush you beneath his boot was not one of them.

I was reduced to nothing more than a puddle, a thrashing soul trapped in a mortal cage. He broke his stare from my face to scan the kitchen and my shoulders slumped, a weightlifting from them.

“Well, well, well. What a mess you’ve made, rabid little wolf.”

Oh, that voice. Impossibly deep, yet sharp with wit and a touch of cruelty, and was that amusement I detected? Wait a damned second—did he just insinuate I had rabies?

Before I could inform the god that shifters could not get rabies, he moved with an inhuman grace and dropped down to a crouch. With the flick of his wrist he spun the knife on its head, the tip digging into the tile.

“Cat got your tongue?” He purred, lifting his hand. The blade continued to spin, held in place by magic. “You’re the one that called. A very, very foolish thing to do by the way. With the broadcast you made, you’re lucky I showed up and not someone else. That being said, I don’t have all day. I assume you want this mess of yours cleaned up, yes?”

I pushed through his suffocating presence. This was my second chance, and I could not let it go to waste.

“No—I mean, yes, but that’s not all I want.”

One of his arched brows lifted, “Oh, that’s not all you want. By all means state your demands, little wolf.” There was a sharpness to the nickname that told me it was not said out of endearment. It was an insult, a reminder of how powerless I truly was.

I dug my teeth into my lip, barely feeling the sting. “I want out of this place. I want—I want a new life somewhere else…anywhere else.”

He popped up on his feet and walked around the length of the counter. In one swift movement, he pulled himself onto the island. As he sat there, looking like a king of darkness atop a throne of marble, he knocked his combat boots against the drawers.

“What will you offer me?”

“Anything.”

The god tilted his head, then dragged his iridescent eyes down my half-naked form. With impenetrable coldness, he shrugged. “You have nothing I want.” My breath hitched. “But that doesn’t mean I can’t call in a favor later on.”

He slid off the island, returning to a crouch mere feet in front of me. I could only stare as he held out one of his hands palm side up.

“I give you a new life, and you give me one favor of my choice. Do we have a deal?”

My own hand shook as I placed it in his. Skin as soft as velvet and ivory brushed against my own. Crackles of magic danced down my nerve endings.

“We have a deal.”

The god’s rosy lips turned up in a menacing smile. “Wonderful.”

As my vision blurred and the world around me faded to black, I could still hear that voice. I could still feel that gods wicked magic sealing my fate.

Blakely

I awakened to the sound of birds singing in the distance, and to the cool touch of dew on my brow. A chilly breeze raced by, rustling the grass until it tickled my neck and cheeks. The scent of rich earth surrounded me. The events of last night flooded my head in a sea of emotion and color, the current pulling me down under.

When it was all said and done I shot up off the ground, my eyes wide open and adrenaline pumping. I slapped a hand to my chest, right over my thundering heart, and felt the weight of the deal I made.

I was no longer wearing that cursed dress, and I hoped the god had burned it to cinders. The parka, jeans, and hiking boots I now wore all seemed brand new. My body was clean, no longer splattered in Felix’s blood. Even my hair had been brushed.

There was something hard in my pocket, and as I pulled it out I realized the god truly had pulled through on his end. There was a brand-new ID and passport, a photograph of my family, and the compass dad had given me on Christmas a few years ago.

It had belonged to his sister, who succumbed to the curse and vanished on her twenty-first birthday. Supposedly, it had been spelled by a wolf mage to lead its user back home—wherever home may be.

Surrounded by unending forest, with nothing more than the clothes on my back and a curse looming over my head, I followed the rising sun to what I hoped would be a new life. Perhaps it was my imagination, but it seemed to shine just a tad brighter, almost as though it were spurring me on.

The life of Blakely Yarrow didn’t end with a bang, rather the whisper of the wind curling through the trees.

In her place Anna Carson was born.

That was two long weeks ago. Fourteen days since I stumbled into the horrendously small town of Avalon. With a population of four hundred and twenty-six, everybody knew everybody.

If it hadn’t been for Agatha Hart, I would’ve had no choice but to keep on moving. The little old lady with a spirit of pure fire didn’t hesitate to rent out her cabin to me. When I told her I had no money, she all but insisted I work at her little hardware store in town.

The way Aggie looked at me, often with a mixture of sympathy and joy, gave me the feeling that she knew I was running from something, and that she herself could relate. Maybe that’s why she was so nice to me, giving me everything I needed to make a life for myself, or maybe it was simply the compass’s magic at work—leading me to a place I could make my home.

As the days inched closer to my birthday, I found myself thinking of my family.

There was once a time where I was close to my parents and little sister, but the curse quickly ruined that. It poisoned our relationship over the course of a few years. I was no longer their child, but a burden. A ticking time bomb that would someday explode.

Standing in front of the antique mirror in Aggie’s cabin, I could still see traces of them within myself.

Dad’s grey eyes stared out at me; a bit too large for my soft face. Mom’s sharp brows and angular nose gave me a bit of an edge, but not much. The cobalt blue hair that hung down to my breasts in soft waves was entirely my own. It was by far my favorite act of defiance against my parents.

I tried not to smile as I remembered how red mom’s face had turned. She’d demanded I get rid of it, but what did something as silly as hair color matter in the grand scheme of things? Malina, my bratty little sister, called me a blueberry for weeks. Even Felix hated it, which made me want to keep the color even more.

The first couple of days in Avalon I debated on changing it back to my natural chestnut brown. I couldn’t risk someone finding out who I was, and blue hair seemed a pretty good identifier.

I’d almost gone through with it, until I saw the article.

It took me two days to find a computer with a strong enough internet connection to search up my old pack. Once the page loaded, I found myself staring at an article with the headline, “Alpha Felix Gannon and his bride-to-be slain in house fire.”

Felix hadn’t made it, and I had the sinking feeling it wasn’t the toaster that did him in. My family thought I was dead, and there was nothing I could do about it.

Somehow, the god created sufficient evidence of my death because there was no question in the article that Felix and I were deceased. I spent the next week and a half hating myself for making that deal, while also fighting the terror of the curse.

Today was the day I’d been waiting my entire life for.

By midnight tonight, I’d be dead. I wondered how the gods of our kind would do it. Would it be instant, or would they tear me limb from limb? Perhaps they’d scatter my body across the continent. I couldn’t imagine they’d deliver my corpse to my family for a proper burial. More than anything I wondered if I’d get any answers.

Why was my family forced to suffer this curse? Who had placed it on us?

I allowed myself to mull over every question as I cooked a pitiful dinner of boxed macaroni and cheese, only to waste it staring out at the horizon. The sun was quickly traveling below the tree line, leaving a stream of watercolors in its wake. Even the big ball of flame knew what was coming, and it wanted no part of it.

Fear lived in my every breath, coursing through my veins as I stood from the rickety kitchen table and made my way into the living room. The faded plaid couch carried the lingering scent of tobacco. It was a sliver of the life I knew, and I held onto it with every fiber of my being.

Tonight, however, I’d be forced to let go.

I grabbed my journal off the coffee table and plopped down. When I first moved in I found it sitting in one of the drawers in the bedroom. Its empty pages spoke to part of my soul, and I decided then and there that I’d tell it my story. Each day I plied it with my thoughts and memories. All of the wishes and dreams that slipped through my fingers over the years.

As I plucked the pen from between its pages, I realized this would be the last of my entries.

Over the course of an hour I confessed everything. Every second I spent with Felix was written on those pages, along with every bruise to ever kiss my skin at his hands. I even wrote about the god that had come to my aid, and how foolish I’d been to make a deal with him.

I included everything, apologizing for how my very existence plagued them. The only thing I left out was the year I’d spent with the blood mages, the most vicious of our kind. Mom had heard a passing rumor that they might be able to help break the curse and didn’t hesitate to ship me off to their remote village deep within the snow-capped mountains.

Some cruel part of me wanted to reveal the torture I’d endured in hopes it would hurt them, but I promised myself long ago that I’d never, ever speak of that terrible year.

I even wrote a page for Lina, thanking her for those rare moments where we truly were sisters and not bitter rivals. When I was finished pouring myself into the journals weathered pages, I added in the names of my parents and where they could be found. Afterwards, I settled into the couch and watched the sun continue to set through the two windows on either side of the front door.

When the sky darkened with streaks of charcoal, the stars winking into existence, I flicked on the lamp beside the couch and continued to wait.

The grandfather clock against the far wall told me midnight was coming. With each tick of the pendulum, my heart rate increased.

Tick, tick, tick.

11:58…

Tick, tick, tick.

11:59…

I jumped as the clock chimed, the sound reverberating throughout the entire house. There was a thick air of silence before the boom of a fist hammered at the front door. My heart fell to the pits of my stomach. I leapt to my feet, eying the baseball bat propped against the recliner. What would that do against an angry god? Nothing, that’s what.

“…just kick it down, man.” A muffled voice said.

There was some glimmer of recognition fluttering in my chest but the fear of being torn limb from limb kept me from reaching out to grab it. A deafening crack split the air as the door was kicked in. Bits of splintered wood flew in all directions. The wind sent a plume of sawdust unfurling into the house.

Standing in the open doorway wasn’t the three gods of our kind, but a gaggle of human men I recognized all too well. They’d come to the hardware store at least three times a week and never once failed to harass me.

Duncan, the one at the lead, smoothed a hand over his flannel and down his potbelly. His bald head glistened under the moonlight. He whistled, “Well lookie here, boys. The lil’ blue haired witch was up waitin’ on us.”

Baldy, as I called him only in the safety of my own head, was by far the worst. He’d come in the store reeking of deli meat and sweaty socks, hell-bent on getting me to accept a date with him. He and the rest of his buddies were as human as they came, and often made moves on the werewolves and lycans in town.

They didn’t mess with the mages, but that was the usual for most humans. Rather than try to understand our magic wielding cousins they condemned them as witches.

I knew baldy could get nasty, but I had no clue how nasty until this very moment. One of his buddies—Earl, I think—stepped into the house. He spat a wad of tobacco-stained spit onto the floor, and I cringed. Alcohol permeated the air around us, as sharp as their individual body odors.

My disgust quickly morphed into fear when Earl lifted his arm and brandished a shotgun.

“Look, Duncan. She ain’t so snooty now, is she?” He guffawed, his stubble-coated cheeks lifting in a toothy grin. The others snickered, their lewd comments pelting my skin like sharpened stones.

“Cocky witch’s got another thing coming.”

“Ain’t so high and mighty now, are ya?”

I spared another glance at the baseball bat, weighing my options. Shifting was too risky. I’d never been able to control my wolf, and there was always the chance she’d charge into town and attack on sight. Still, I had to do something.

The only thing I’d ever wanted for myself was the chance to live, and I would not let these pathetic human men take that from me.

Within seconds I had made up my mind, but before I could act Earl wheezed. His entire body went rigid as though ice had been injected into his veins. The rosacea across his cheeks and nose lost its coloring as he paled. Unable to breathe, I stared into his bloodshot eyes and knew at my core that something had gone terribly wrong.

In one swift movement he pumped the shotgun, turned to Duncan, and pulled the trigger.

The blast was deafening. My ears rang as chaos descended. Duncan collapsed to the ground clutching his stomach. Two of the others charged Earl, their mouths open in silent screams. A second shot rang out, hitting one of the guys square in the chest. Earl slammed the butt of the gun into the third’s head, and he crumpled like a stack of cards. Crouched behind the recliner, the baseball bat all but forgotten, I watched as Earl cocked the gun a second time and turned it on himself.

I couldn’t look away, and boy did I regret it.

Earl’s body fell forward. The gun slid across the hardwood, slamming right into my kneecap. What pain emerged was short lived. I was speechless, staring down at the carnage when someone stepped through the open doorway.

A God—more specifically, the god I made the deal with.

The fragments of wood littering the ground were crushed beneath the thick sole of his combat boots. With the confidence only an immortal could possess, he stepped over the corpses of the fallen men and entered the house.

Those eyes, like starbursts plucked from the night sky, took in the room. They landed on me and he paused, cocking his head like a predator who found himself cornering a very interesting type of prey.

“Oh, it’s you.” Genuine surprise flickered on his ethereal face before melting into something dark, something that set my insides on fire. “Hello again, rabid little wolf.”