I know too well the burning pain that feels as if you have molten lava coursing through your veins when a vampire bites or you're injected with the venom. All of us on Thor's team are all familiar with that horrible pain.
The bad thing about training with vampire venom every time is that we experience the pain each time we inject the venom into ourselves even though not as much as when we first started.
The good thing is that, unlike others who can be killed by this poison, we are immune to it. We'd experimented with the venom over and over again until we were sure the venom could never kill us no matter the quantity we injected.
Even though he's a hybrid, I'm still expecting to feel the now very much familiar pain coursing through the network of veins inside my body but apart from the slight pain I felt when he first bit my neck, no other pain follows. Instead, something far worse happens. I became paralyzed. I can't move any part of my body, well, except my eyeballs and my mind still works perfectly. No wonder he was confident about getting me to his camp.
Now that I'm helpless before my attacker and can't fight him off, what next? Is he going to suck me dry of all my blood? Is he going to forcefully extract my heart from my chest and watch it beat in his hand? I wonder. I know vampires have different sadistic ways of killing and I guess a hybrid will be worse.
While he drinks and I'm helplessly expecting the worst from him, he suddenly retracts his fangs and growls "Mate."
Immediately I heard that single word, my mind started going haywire with torrents of questions that I wouldn't have been able to keep to myself if I had not suddenly gone mute...
I start to panic
'Mate?... Who's his mate?...' I think to myself with my eyes that can't see more than the direction they're facing, rolling round and round inside their sockets.
"Could he by any chance be talking about me?...
Is he fucking crazy?...
Is he gay?...
Well if he's gay, good for him but I'm not!..."
Then I hear him groan out loud in pain. He pushes me away and I land like a rag doll, facing down on the ground with my injured arm trapped underneath me. Now I can't see anything, except for the paved road I'm forced to kiss when I landed. Thank God, I'm only mute, not deaf yet, otherwise, I wouldn't have heard them talk
"You stupid bitch! You stabbed me!? Are you out of your fucking mind! I'm your fucking mate, yet you staked me! What the fuck do you think you're doing?" I hear him thunder furiously.
Even though I'm far from being comfortable with the pain of my injured arm trapped underneath me. The pain I'm feeling doesn't dull my mind to the extent that won't be able to wonder about his newly discovered mate that he's having a conversation with.
"Well, I don't accept you as my mate and you're lucky I didn't drive the stake through your heart!" A female voice replies to him.
'Victoria!?... Thor's concubine is this animal's mate!? Oh, goddess!' I shockingly exclaim in my mind as I listen to her talk.
"You're a despicable rogue! A fucking hybrid for crying out loud! What was the Moon goddess thinking, mating me to someone like you!? If only I didn't need your name and your surname, do you think I wouldn't have rejected you already? Now, I want you to step away from him right now!" She screams.
I hear him give a disapproving growl in response.
"Growl all you want. I stabbed you in the back with a stake but as you can see, this isn't a stake, and in case you're wondering, it has silver bullets in it. Now if you don't get away from him, I'm going to put a bullet in your heart. I want to see how you will survive that!"
I hear him chuckle.
"You're..."
Suddenly the world around me becomes eerily silent. I can't hear anymore. My head feels heavy and I have this horrible feeling of drowning. I begin to gasp for breath as my windpipe constricts. I think about Thor then. I also think about Ash. The last thing on my mind before everywhere is thrown into darkness is...
"I'm dying"
***
Thor's POV
Even though the night is not over yet, I feel relieved somehow. I'm glad everything is falling into place, even if not entirely in place. If anyone had told me the meeting would end with all the members of the patrol teams pledging their allegiance to me, I wouldn't have believed it. After the stunt their superiors pulled on me, all of them pledging their allegiance was the last thing I was expecting.
To be fair, I don't think that would have been possible if Victoria had not intervened. I'm sure none of the patrol members would have had the courage to stand up and pledge their allegiance if she hadn't managed to convince them.
Eric thinks I'm beginning to trust her too much. He thinks I'm letting my guard down. Well, he was not entirely wrong about trusting her. I trust her to some certain degree but about letting my guard down around her? He couldn't have been more wrong. He didn't like me taking a concubine but I already made up my mind about that. Victoria has the kind of qualities I want in a woman and we're going to seal it officially with a blood oath when all these comes to an end.
As soon as Ella returned from the gate, we set out to the border with one of the new guys, where we'll be patrolling alongside the mercenaries. I remember clearly the message she gave Eric. Even though I acted to Eric as if I didn't care about where he was going, the truth is that I was silently dying of curiosity. I want to know and also feel like bullying the answer out of Ella but it won't be fair. I would be putting her in a compromising situation if I did that to her.
We arrived at the border and the mercenary leader looked surprised to see us. He said he didn't believe me when I told him I would patrol the border with them. I'm the Alpha of the pack after all so there's no need for me to do the patrol with them especially when I have professionals on board.
Some few minutes after midnight, everything changes from peaceful to chaos. Chaos not from our side but from one of the gates. I was startled when loud alarms from the three gates suddenly started sounding. I immediately made my way to my car closely followed by Ella and the new guy. I don't know where the breach is coming from exactly but I'm sure it will be between the first and third gate since the second gate had been closed for the night.
I decided we'd go to the third gate first since it's nearest to the border. We're halfway to where I parked my car when Ella's phone starts to ring.
"It's Victoria." She says before placing the phone on her ear
"Hello... Yes... Understood... We're on our way"
The situation is an emergency but Ella's side of the conversation was calm as if Victoria was telling her the alarm was a mistake.
"The rogues are here and Eric is in danger." She says when she lowers the phone from her ear