They're Here

Layleen

I blink my eyes open, but the thick film of blur refuses to leave them. My head is heavy as if it's filled with lead, and even the slightest movement sends tingly waves of pain through my sore muscles. 

What happened? 

I finally manage to sit up and rub my stinging eyes with both hands, putting an end to the annoying blurriness that clouds my vision. As soon as the image gets clear, I wince and widen my eyes––I am in an unfamiliar dark room, a few dimmed lightbulbs hanging from the ceiling are the only source of light that barely covers everything. 

But the biggest shock is the tall, thick silver bars surrounding me as they go almost all the way to the ceiling. The cage's roof is also made of silver, and, despite my modest height, the cage itself is not tall enough for me to stand up in. 

I lower my eyes and realize that the only thing that separates me from the cage's silver floor is a thin quilt––old and dirty, it smells like wet wood bark and earth. 

The room itself is spacious yet somewhat stiff, as if it hasn't been ventilated in months. The moment I become aware of my breathing, I realize how heavy the air actually is and that my lungs are struggling to adjust to it. 

A slight rustle of clothes brings my attention to the opposite side of the cage, and I see Sheryl curled up dangerously close to the opposite edge of the cage, her long, lean arms wrapped around her knees, bringing them closer to her chest. 

She doesn't look hurt, and apart from the stiffness in my own body, I don't seem hurt either. 

"Sheryl?" I ask carefully, not really expecting her to answer me, but to my surprise, she does. 

"What?"

"Were you awake this whole time? What happened to us? Are you hurt?"

She scowls, her forced grin mocking my genuine concern, then shakes her head and moves her eyes away from me, focusing them blankly on the emptiness in front of her. "We were abducted by the Diamond Claw. No one has touched us––yet––but they did inject something in our necks before they tossed us here."

"Inject..?" I repeat that word quietly, and the realization dawns on me almost right away. "Poison," Sheryl says as if reading my mind. "To prevent us from shifting. Although it's useless to you anyway, you're wolfless."

I chew on my lower lip but leave her words hanging in the air without replying. 

It's weird. I try to think as I scan the empty, dark room with my silver eyes. I fit perfectly in this cage–there is so much silver in me too, but that gives me little comfort. If they are really the Diamond Claw, why didn't they kill us too? 

My train of thought is interrupted as the door at the end of the room creaks open, and the two of us dart our eyes in that direction. A tall, rather muscular man walks in, his heavy footsteps ring through the stillness of the room especially loudly. Right after that, another man follows in, but unlike the first one, he is shorter and of somewhat wider proportions. 

The first man holds authority, I can tell that by how Sheryl suddenly shrinks down, her instincts urging her to submit. Every molecule of my being is screaming at me to follow her example, but something stops me from doing so. Thus, I fix my eyes on the tall man and follow his every move. 

He accepts my challenge. His narrow, black eyes never leave mine, and I can see that he is actually enjoying my sudden fit of courage. 

As he pauses right in front of the cage, the man crouches and grins. 

"Good evening, ladies," his voice is surprisingly smooth and higher than I expected. It doesn't suit his gruff appearance. "How are you feeling?"

Neither of us speaks, and the man decides to bare his fangs as if that was supposed to threaten us. "A ghoul got your tongues? Well, quiet women is what we like, isn't that right, Jack?"

Jack, the short, broad man with a round face and bushy black eyebrows, smirks and crouches right next to his companion, his meaty fingers reaching through the bars, nearly touching Sheryl's skin. 

She shivers and recoils, and both men burst into laughter. "Don't you like these omega whores, chief?" He muses, his mouth almost salivating as he scans Sheryl's body. "They practically lick their alphas' cocks, but when it comes to strangers... suddenly, they become all shy!"

The first man nods, though he does not find Jack's words all that amusing. Locking his narrow eyes on me, he scrutinizes me silently for quite a long time before he frowns and almost hisses.

"We will fuck that shyness right out of them. I wonder what Alpha Dion will say when he learns that his favorite fucktoy has been passed around the Diamond Claw pack."

Now, it's my turn to shiver. He knows?

The first man seems to know what I'm thinking, so his smirk widens. Slowly, he pulls a small key out of the breast pocket of his leather jacket and inserts it into the cage's lock, his dark eyes still firmly glued to mine. 

"Don't worry, sweetheart," I cringe again––people have got to stop calling me by that pet name. "Once I stretch you out, you won't even notice that other cocks are inside you."

They laugh again, and I feel my skin crawl in disgust. Why does it always have to be like this? 

The cage is now open, and only when the first man drags me outside do I realize how big he actually is. My head barely reaches his chest, and that realization alone makes me wonder how I will ever survive him. 

I hear Sheryl groan as Jack secures her hands behind her back. She is used to being manhandled, Dion has never been gentle with her, but I get it––it's one thing to be fucked by higher wolves, and another––to be fucked by some rogues. 

Although she is an omega just like me, she still has her pride. 

"Lead her to my room," the tall man growls at his companion. "I will be the first one to break them in."

Jack frowns, but the dangerous glint in the first man's eyes quickly forces him to submit, so he nods, and answers through his gritted teeth. "Of course, Alpha Storm."

Storm?

I cringe at that obnoxious name but try to hide it behind a worried expression on my pale face. Truthfully, I'm scared. I wasn't raped by Alpha Robert, so Alpha Storm came into play instead. Just my luck. Or rather the absence of one. 

Dion. I wonder if he already knows. 

The four of us are almost out of the door when suddenly, another man barges in, his face red while his eyes are horrifyingly wide. He takes a few seconds to run his big eyes over our faces until he finally pauses on Storm's and barks, "Alpha Storm, they're here! The Blood Moon warriors! Alpha Ragnar!"

"What the fuck did you just say?!"

Ragnar..? There is no way..!