Page 18 of Cursed Beasts

Zev growled before he barked loudly making me flinch and they all left the library running.

It definitely felt like I was in the twilight zone. I thought witch-shifters had become extinct?Holy shit they were witch-shifters.

The clock chimed again ominously. I pulled at my restraints again, hoping all this movement would make them come loose or undone. The panic that I had squashed down earlier, now pushed forward, making my movements jerky, adding to my panic.

What if they came back?

I lost it, pulling so hard I was hurting myself while tears fell down my face. I can’t believe they left me here. The sound of a growl made me jump, reinvigorating my need to escape. My mind felt like it was life or death and I knew this feeling too well.

8

LUCIEN

The curse forced us to shift every single night. Once my beast took over at four, I remembered nothing, and I hated it. I was living my life in small increments that felt like fleeting moments.

Doing this for so long was wearing on me. I didn’t know how much longer I could do this before I went crazy. I sat up, realizing I was lying on Aeon, who still looked to be asleep.

It was pretty common that we would end up sleeping together outside. Even in our wolf forms, we were drawn together, and I always loved that. I looked back at him, admiring how gorgeous he was, remembering the first time I laid eyes on him, instantly having a crush on him. I was ten when they finally introduced us, but I had seen him around the pack before, always with our Alpha’s son, Zev.

Aeon was so handsome it hurt to look at him sometimes. Before the curse he was carefree, laughed, joked around and, most of all, he looked at me like I could have been the center of his world, or at least one of them.

We were supposed to be a pack. It wasn’t uncommon in our village for multiple men to be with a woman or multiple women to be with a man. Monogamy was also completely fine, but since we were shifters, we always did better in smaller groups led by our Alpha, who was Zev’s father.

When we all met, it definitely felt like pieces of myself clicked together. Zev and I had more of a brotherly bond, but with Aeon it felt like so much more. Over the years, I’ve grown to love him more and more, but after the curse, Aeon only saw me as someone to lose himself in for a bit. At least that’s what he said to me several times, even though I would still catch him looking at me with something more in his eyes.

It was exhausting being the more emotionally mature of the two of us when he was eight years older than me, but it seemed the damage of this spell had left more of a scar on Zev and Aeon than me.

I was still getting the hang of my position, what my family expected of me when I was told they had decided our fate. I was the last one to know, of course, but that wasn’t surprising because Zev and Aeon had always watched out for me, like a little brother.

This betrayal wasn’t nearly as hard on me, but I blame them for thinking I couldn’t handle the truth. I might be younger, but I wasn’t an idiot and I hated being treated like one.

“You ok, there?” Aeon’s velvet voice dragged me from my thoughts.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” I said, looking over my shoulder to admire him once again. Aeon always made my heart flutter, it was like my heart beat only for him.

“You don’t feel fine.” Aeon sat up with me.

One thing I hated about being in a pack is you could pick up on each other’s emotions if they were strong enough. Apparently, most of my emotions were always heightened because Aeon could always read me like an open book.

“Just thinking,” I shrugged, hoping he would just drop it. I wasn’t in the mood to talk to him about what I was feeling when I knew it was a sore subject for him. My feelings for him just made my mood worse.

“About what?” He pressed.

“Stuff,” I said, getting up.

“Lu seriously? Is it the Belladonna?” He got up with me as we dusted ourselves off. One bad thing about waking up in our human forms, we were always dirty and got dirt in places there should never be any.

“What?” I instantly got defensive. Aeon was a pain in my ass sometimes. We only had a physical relationship because of him, but sometimes he acted like we were so much more.

“Why don’t you want to tell me? Is it because of her? Did you dream of her again?” He fired off these questions quickly.

“Aeon don’t,” I warned him.

“If it’s her, just tell me,” he snapped.

“It’s not,” I exhaled sharply, hoping he could pick up on my irritation. I walked away from him, praying he didn’t follow.

“Then what is it?” He followed me. “Did I do something?”

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