The sudden onslaught

Ana recognized it to be Oliver's voice immediately but didn't understand why he was attacking her instead of finding out whatever was happening outside. Before she could protest or voice out any concern, Oliver was slowly pulling them back still resting his hand over her mouth.

They were gradually moving away from the darkness almost like a practised choreography when suddenly Oliver yanked her back violently at once. She registered a glimpse of a silvery knife swish past her face seconds before completely collapsing into Oliver. She was panting against his hand, clutched him tightly in fear.

That was when she suddenly recognised his grip. The same one she felt when she thought she was about to die. It all felt like it happened just yesterday. 

She felt his grip loosen and uttered, "Did you….", but he closed her mouth more tightly again. She desperately wanted to know if he tried to kill her, but the situation in front of them demanded her immediate attention.

She understood that maybe he was trying to be stealthy so that the intruders might not be able to track them. She gave in to him and became extremely quiet trying to observe the events unfold in front of her.

Before Ana could fathom it, Oliver ducked along with her minutely missing a golden glow of light directly aimed at their head. Ana saw the flashing light cut the beam behind Oliver in half. If he had missed a second, it would've been her instead of the beam.

Ana's whole body was shaking violently when she finally understood that someone was trying to kill them and Oliver was saving her from getting cut in half.

She felt something against her feet and extended a leg to touch it to find that they were hiding behind the couch in his living room.

There was an absolute silence, almost like whoever was attacking them awhile back had already given up and left, but the terror caused by them still looming, the danger precipitated in the air.

Oliver was very still behind her and she felt the warmth radiating from his body against her back, his hot breath tickling her ear. One of his hands was still covering her mouth and the other crushing her against him in a very tight hug. She inhaled a deep scent of lavender, the same one she felt while regaining consciousness, dissipating from Oliver. 

Ana blushed after realizing how close they were and tried to scootch a little away from him. But that only made Oliver tighten his grip on her and pull her even closer to him than before. They sat there in absolute silence for what felt like an eternity.

Ana could only hear Oliver's rhythmic breathing and her own rapid heartbeat thundering against her ribs.

He suddenly yanked her to his left throwing her off all the while making sure not to remove his hand, and another golden beam of light sliced the couch in half on his right. Ana yelped, her voice getting muffled under Oliver's hand. Her mind was racing with thoughts of death and she felt as if her nightmare still continued. In fact, the entire surroundings, the chill that she felt in her body and the darkness was very similar to her nightmares.

Since recently, she'd been having trouble discerning the difference between dream to reality.

Her eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness and she saw a mild red glow emanating from her body. She was shocked and looked down in panic but noticed that it was not from her body but from Oliver's. His skin was glowing with a mild red hue from underneath a toffee coloured hand.

She angled her head towards him to see his face and was shocked that the same red glow was all over his face. He had blood red eyes focussed somewhere above Ana's head accessing the danger ahead, his mouth in a vicious snarl, pulled back a little revealing canines and two small horns almost hidden in between his thick black hair.

The exact same eyes she saw before.

She was dumbstruck, surprised and couldn't believe her eyes. It hit her more clearly now that it wasn't a dream at all. He did try to kill her. Her entire body trembled under the overwhelming sensations. Who was him? Was it the same Oliver she knew of? More than the death looming over her, she was now concerned if she was losing her mind and going completely insane.

Oliver paid no attention to Ana's new revelations and keenly paid attention to the small movements, scents and sounds like a predator.

Why were mages in his house trying to kill him?

Ana being there was a big disadvantage as he had to first put her to safety. The constant need to protect her was overwhelming all his other senses.

Nothing made sense to him but right at that moment all that mattered was to keep her safe. Since the day of the ritual, it was messing up his head but right then he tried to ignore everything and focus only on survival.

One of the mages advanced towards the couch behind which Oliver was hiding with Ana.

He didn't think twice and jumped in front of her, instantly pushing her out of harm's way and shooting up demon magic through his veins on the incoming mage.

As soon as Oliver's magic slashed him, he shrieked in pain and everyone around him now knew where he was hiding and advanced on him. He saw a blinding red light from behind the mages at full force making them double down on their knees, sliced in half.

Lucas!

The brightness in the room was coming back slowly and Oliver found Lucas panting at the other end of the room. He was limping towards Oliver clearly hurt and Ana was in a puddle near Oliver's feet.

Oliver bent down immediately to check if she was okay. She seemed to be in a trance staring at him with those big blue eyes completely shocked, her face a chilli red. But other than that she wasn't hurt anywhere.

Oliver was relieved for a moment and suddenly he didn't understand why he was concerned about the human at all. He felt as if he was slowly coming out of a trance.

More than anything, his behaviour disgusted him and he remembered the overwhelming sense of wanting to protect her just moments ago. He fought people and killed them, all for a mere human. He scoffed at how cruel fate was.

"Are you okay?", Lucas's voice brought Oliver back to reality and he saw that his friend was limping.

"I'm fine… But I think they got to you…!", he looked at his leg, taking a step forward to support him.

Oliver made him sit in a chair and looked down at all the mess of bodies in his living room. The rug covering the room was painted red from the blood of the fallen victims and his couch was mangled beyond recognition.

Ana was still looking flabbergasted and breathing heavily, her eyelids following the chaos which just took place in front of her. She was slowly taking in her surroundings and shot a look between Oliver, Lucas, the couch and the bodies sprawled on the floor.

Lucas moved towards Ana despite his pain to help her up but Oliver put a hand on his shoulder, "Sit… I got this…", and was already walking to her.

He extended a hand to her and she was looking at him like she just saw a ghost, still not understanding fully if this was all happening for real.

"Who.....Who are you people?", she finally spoke in between gasps and a new panic came over her.

That everything was happening for real this time and none of it were a nightmare.

The person who stood in front of her was not Oliver, or at least not the person she thought she knew. She felt like she was completely insane.

She looked down to herself and there was a small scratch on her arm from when the couch was destroyed. She touched her blood and it felt more real than ever. She refused to take Oliver's hand and scooted away from him to the far corner of the room.

"No…..No!..... No...!", she kept repeating, her brain trying to make sense and failing at what was happening in front of her. Oliver took back his extended hand and looked back at Lucas who was wrapping his leg with a gauze.

"Ana...", Oliver called out her name but it felt like she was lost far away and his voice was only an echo.

She was definitely losing her mind. She wanted to go home, get away from all this but she also wanted to know what was real.

She dared to take a peek at Oliver again. He was coming towards her, his usual self, face all scrunched up and irritated, like everything around him was just another boring and frustrating event. Although the familiarity of his expression brought some relief to her, it didn't make it a whole lot comfortable of whatever happened before.

He tried to help her stand up but as soon as he touched her shoulder, she swatted his hand away like it burnt her.

"Oh… come on!", he muttered feeling pissed off.

"Go away from me!", she yelled up at him and he shot a look at Lucas again who was coming for his rescue already.

He let out an exasperated sigh and Lucas stood in front of Ana giving a known nod to Oliver that it'll be better if he took care of that.

"Hey…..", he smiled warmly in a hope that it'll soothe her but as soon as she saw Lucas, she started sobbing like a little kid.