THE LOVE OF A LYCAN

170 THE PAS

-Angel on fire. By: Halsey-

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Raine shifted her eyes from Torak and stared at the stone. It still glowed in golden color, but then the rich color lost its glimmer and turned gloomy.

That affected Raine's surrounding, as she found herself no longer looking from behind the soft white mist, but it almost like murky water.

Raine doubted her vision when it suddenly turned dark just like someone was shutting down the lamp inside this spacious room and close all its windows. She was confused whether she was closing her eyes or the darkness engulfed her body.

She stared at Torak and was about to reach him when suddenly the darkness consumed her and she left with nothing.

It happened only less than a second, as if she was just blinking her eyes, because the moment her vision returned, she was outside the building.

She was in a vast land, another deserted place.

Raine gasped because she thought she was traveling back to different era, yet there was something more terrifying than that.

When Raine looked up the sky, it wasn't a bright blue sky that she saw, it was a different sky.

The sky was red. As if someone painted it with the color of blood. Even the sun was glaring with crimson color, as if it was angry.

Raine's heartbeat quickened and her body trembled violently. She averted her gaze and looked down on her shoes to avoid the angry sky.

But, she screamed on the top of her lungs when she watched was what beneath her… this was the most horrible thing that she had ever seen.

This was worse than her worse nightmare.

Raine screamed and screamed until she felt her voice hurt her throat, but she didn't stop. This was too much for her and she couldn't handle this.

She barely notice when someone touched her and rubbed her back anxiously.

"Raine… Raine… what happens? Tell me, this is me…"

That was Torak's voice, but Raine was too afraid to open her eyes and Torak kept repeating the same words again and again.

Beside Torak's voice there was another voice, it was screaming in agony like a wounded animal.

It took Raine some moment to realize that the sound was coming from her. But she couldn't stop. The thing that she had seen was simply too gruesome, and for the worst part, it would engrave in her mind forever, haunting her sleep.

"Raine… please, stop it… you scare me…" Torak pleaded when he wasn't able to make her stop screaming, in Torak's panic state, he called out her name. Raine's voice had started to turn rough, if this continued, she would hurt herself and wouldn't be able to talk for days.

Torak tightened his arms around Raine's body and buried her head on his chest.

Because it was barely two seconds since Raine put her palms on the surface of the rough stone before she screamed hysterically.

What terrifying image that she was witnessing? Wasn't she going to ask about the prophecy and herself?

There wouldn't be something that could make her was having a mental breakdown like this, right?

Torak didn't have the answer for that. But, he was sure Raine was seeing something that she shouldn't see. But again, what was that?

When Raine's cry had ceased down a little bit, he carried her to the sofa nearby and poured a glass of water to moisten her dry throat.

"It's over now…" Torak put her in his laps and cradled her in his arms. Though her cry had ceased down, she still looked so distress and was trembling.

She saw something that even scarier than when Torak killed the Lycan by crushing his head right before her eyes, because her reaction at that time wasn't like this.

She was shock, but not to this extent. This time, what she was seeing when she touched the stone? What would be a gruesome scene that possibly happened in less than two seconds?

They stayed in that position for long time as Torak kept the question for himself.

When the bright sunlight turned into a soft golden ray and illuminated the room, only then Raine was able to open her eyes, tears still fell on her cheeks as she wiped them harshly with shaking hands.

Torak caressed her back and brushed strands of hair from her face.

"Are you feeling better now?" Torak looked at her right in the eyes worriedly, Raine's eyes were so red from crying.

"I don't want…" Raine sniffled and wiped the tears from her eyes before it could fall.

"Yes?" Torak prodded softly.

"I don't want… I don't want to see that… stone again…" Raine bit her lips and shut her eyes tightly. "That stone is scary… it showed me…" She stuttered again when she tried to relive the memory.

"What it showed you?" Torak tried to ask, he really wanted to know what she had seen.

"It showed me…" Raine gulped down the fear that crept on her throat as she tried to speak again. "It showed me a red sky… so red that I thought it was blood…" She shivered involuntarily. "And then…"

"And then…?" Torak held her tightly, reassuring her that everything was all right now.

"And when I looked down… when I looked down…" Raine buried her face on Torak's chest as she talked in muffled voice. "I saw thousand of dead body beneath me, dismembered, blood. I was standing on dead bodies." She tried to make her explanation short and said it in one breath.

The images of that were so livid. She wouldn't be a mistake, even though it was only last for a few seconds, but Raine knew what she was seeing.

"What did you ask?" Torak asked again after he had given another cap of water for Raine to drink.

Red sky and dead body? Torak felt he was familiar with that condition, but shouldn't Raine get the answer instead of seeing things from the past? Or could it be the future? And that was the answer?

"The prophecy…" Raine answered between her soft sobs, she grabbed onto Torak's front sweater tightly, out of fear. "What was that mean?"

If it was the prophecy that Raine had asked for an answer, than most likely those scenes were from the future.

"Will that be the war that… Serefina had mentioned…?" Raine remembered Serefina had mentioned something about war in one of her outburst.

Raine hugged Torak, she had an urge to hold him tightly as she was afraid there was unknown power that would force her back to that situation.

The image of the dead people beneath her feet, the eyes that stared right back at her lifelessly and the voice… there was this voice… it called for help… what was that people? Human? Lycan? Witch?

Raine wished none from above, but then, what were they? And the more important question was, what they were fighting against? Devil? Monster?

As if someone reminded her, there was the most important question for her to know…"What this war has to do with me…?" Raine gulped and wiped her eyes to have a better view of Torak's expression. "What should I do with this war? Serefina said…" She stopped and took a deep breath. "… Serefina said, this is my purpose for being resurrected… what is it?"

Torak gritted his teeth as he clenched his jaw, suppressing the emotion that ran through his veins. "You don't have to worry about this. This will not happen soon." He tried to reassure her, but the look in Raine's eyes told him that he failed. "If the war happens..." He corrected himself. "When the war happen, I will make sure your safety."

Torak would do everything in his power to ensure her safety, whatever happened, he would never involve her in any of this.

But, how he could prevent that? When the purpose of the resurrection of the guardian angels were for this?

When the war was happening, the most important thing wouldn't be to ensure her safety…

"Who are we fighting?" Raine asked Torak. She felt every follicle of her skin was tingling with anticipation.

"The devil." Torak replied. "You have one from the seven of them."

Raine's eyebrows creased as she tried to remember. "The man… inside the hotel room?" She remembered his golden eyes and how he hurt himself by touching her blood.

"Yes, he is the Sloth. Belphegor." Torak let her knew. "Jenedieth has become part of them now." He added this information for Raine to be more cautious if in the future if she crossed path with her.

"Did you fight against the devil also centuries ago? When you took all the guardian angel from the village?" Raine asked, she didn't mean to remind Torak about that, she just want to know.

Torak grimaced when he heard that topic was brought up, but since he knew Raine didn't mean that way, he focused his concern on her question instead. "Yes, that was a few weeks before the great war happened between the lycantrhopes and the devil."

"All the guardian angel went to the war? That was why they were extinct…" Raine's voice trailed off. "No one from them could survive in the war."

"Yes." Torak admitted curtly. "They don't have the ability to go to the war."

Guardian angel's nature didn't even suit for a small violence, not to mention to go to a battlefield, Raine had seen that first hand when she was in the village of angel. "But, why did you bring them in the first place?"

This question just came out from her mouth without a second thought, but now when she heard her own question, that was make senses.

Violence wasn't running in the blood of the guardian angel, but why the lycanthropes brought them?

Raine could understand if the Moon Goddess wanted the lycanthropes to take the guardian angel away from the shadow warrior because she didn't agree with the rule that was set by the later.

And the fight between the two creatures couldn't be avoided that cost the life of the entire shadow warrior.

But, since the lycanthropes had managed to separate the guardian angel from their so called protector, there was no use to bring them to the battlefield, especially when they didn't have any ability to help.

"Why did you bring them to the battlefield" Raine repeated her question because Torak kept silence.

At this point, Raine felt there was something fishy. Torak wouldn't lie to her, but he didn't want to let her learned about the truth.

Torak sighed deeply before he said. "It was a mistake. We didn't protect them properly…" Because they were not worthy of their protection and they would be die anyway even if that wasn't for the war. But, he didn't say the last sentence out loud.

It was a fact that except from The Shadow Warrior, there was no other creatures were willing to look after them.

The only reason for them to come for the guardian angel was to sap their pure energy and made themselves stronger.

"What was the war about?" Raine rested her head on Torak's shoulder.

"The war was about…" Torak halted, and after giving some thought, he continued. "The reason was so simple, you would have guessed it…"

Raine bit down her lower lips and mumbled her replied. "Power and authority?"

"Yes." Torak nodded to emphasize his answer, yet in actuality, the reason wasn't that simple. There was more to explain.

"Will the world turn like the images that I saw?" Raine gulped hard, she felt her stomach did somersault.

"Maybe." Torak replied. "It can be."

In the ensuing silence, both of them were busy with their own thought until Raine broke it with a question. "You said, you will let me know about you." She reminded Torak about his words this early morning.

Through the window Raine could see the sun had long been set and the lamps from the street had been turned on, but from this position she couldn't see whether the moon was shining or not.

"Do you still have another question?" Torak hinted to the stone. He could feel Raine's body tense when he said that and she shook her head vigorously.

Raine chose to ask Serefina and endure her worst temper rather than to see such images again, while what she had seen might be true, but the vivid images were not something so please to witness. She didn't know what she would see next, if she was going to post another question.

She knew about it enough and for the rest, Raine would ask Serefina when she had been calm enough and came to look for her.

For some reason that she couldn't explain, Raine knew that the witch would come to look for her again.

"In that case, shall we go now?" Torak asked in understanding tone.

==============

The trip to the Rieka Country ended up with Torak told her with long story that worth of thousands of years of his life.

What he did, which place that he had visited, a bit story about his older brother and his younger brother and also why Rieka Country, even though the meaning behind the name was; the power of wolf, has not a single shifter there.

That country was the place where the war between the Lycanthropes and devil occurred. Many creatures died and half of them were Lycanthropes and werewolves.

Since the werewolves and lycanthropes have a long span of life and staying there only reminded them about the gruesome battle and the agony that came after that.

Because many of them lost their mate and for them, it was the worst thing compared to the death itself.

Torak and his brothers brought them out from that country and split the Lycanthropes and werewolves to live in different realm. One thing that Torak told her was the fact there was more than one realm in this world.

The world that they lived now was human realm that put Torak as the Alpha, while the Astral realm was led by his older brother and his younger brother, who currently went missing.

Torak said, it had been around five decades since the last times he talked with his other brothers.

And then the story about the Lycanthropes that defeated the devil became a myth, thus in order to respect their spirit, the statue of the wolf was built in the most busies street of that country.

As for the statue in front of their houses, they were belief with that, a bad spirit wouldn't come into their houses.

Of course that was only a hereditary belief.

Last night, because Raine was so tired, the moment the plane landed and she got in the car, she fell asleep directly and didn't even notice when Torak carried her into their bedroom.

She was too tired physically and mentally.

In spite of Torak's story helped her to distract the gruesome images that she saw, but it still engraved deeply in her memories.

The first night, Raine was having a nightmare with those dead bodies beneath her feet, asking for help and accusing her for not capable and strong enough to protect them since she was the guardian angel.

Raine couldn't sleep after that, and only fell asleep when the sun had risen and Torak had told her half of the story of his life to help her to forget.

Probably because this time she was too tired and didn't have enough energy for the nightmare, she slept soundly without the interruption of those dead bodies.

With that, time passed uneventful, exclude to her occasional nightmare, everything seemed all right, though Serefina had not yet appeared ever since.

And today was the day Raine would go to take her exam entrance.

She had woken up early in the morning and reviewed everything that she had learnt with Mrs. Martha. She felt a little bit nervous, but at the same time also excited to enroll in her new environment.

"I am so nervous…" Raine said when she entered the car with Torak. He said he would go with her until the entrance gates.

Inside the car, there was Calleb, who was driving and next to him was Raphael, who was busy with his laptop like usual.

"You don't need to worry, even if you failed the exam, the Alpha will make sure you can enroll in that university if you really want to." Calleb said carelessly like usual.

That comment regarded with a slap from Raphael on the back of his head, Raine hit his shoulder with the book in her hand as well, now she had grown closer to both of them. They were like older brother that she had never had.

"So, what the meaning of my effort to study? And big amount of money that Torak had paid for Mrs. Martha to teach me?" Raine chuckled when Calleb rubbed the place where Raphael had slapped him.

"Don't worry, you can make one of his companies go bankrupt and he still will not angry even a bit to you." Calleb grinned through his rearview mirror to Raine.

The gamma hinted the collaboration with de Medici family. Torak lost a huge amount of money for that project, but still insisted to go just like what they had planned in the beginning. The Alpha didn't come to this city to make money after all, he came because his mate was here.

At that time Torak's name once again made a headline in business news.

While for the de Medici, they had pointed someone as the representative of the family. After a long fight within the family, finally they came up with someone and Torak would meet this person today.