Forty-Eight Cornelius

Cornelius -

"You just wretched over my new shoes. Now I need to buy a new pair. This will come out of my cousin's Hyde. Calm Down "Calm down!"

Ashina -

Cousin? Who is his Cousin? He is not going to trick me; I will kill the blood-sucking Vampire! If he wasn't planning to sink his teeth into me, why is he not letting me go?!

I could hear the rustling of leaves and laughter. Rector is growling, but who would be laughing?

"Cornelius, could you let my mate go? No doubt she thinks you want to drink her blood as a snack. How are you, my cousin? More importantly, why are you in my territory without letting me know first?"

In my anger, I could not recognize the pain caused by Cornelius dropping me like a sack of potatoes. My gaze turned to him, and I snapped and growled at him. As of yet, Kiera was not so sure he was not a danger.

"Kiera, let Ashina take over. There are clothes behind some of the trees around."

Kiera did as Andor instructed and headed behind some trees and got changed. Ashina noticed after walking out from behind a tree in basketball shorts and a t-shirt, that Andor's sister ran and gave the vampire a hug.

"I missed you Cornelius", Rector growled, watching his mate give another male a hug.

"Rector! Calm down! Cornelius is my cousin!"

To say I was confused at the turn of events would be an understatement.

Angrily I ask Cornelius, "Why were your minions drinking of some poor humans earlier? Huh?"

Cornelius ignores me and looks at Andor, "You have such a fiery mate? Good for you!"

Andor laughs, which totally gets the flames of anger even hotter within me.

"Andor! You need to start explaining!" I cross my arms over my chest, tapping my left foot on the ground covered with dirt and leaves.

Whenever Andor or Cornelius chuckle for some reason, I become even more enraged. Clearly, I'm missing something.

Andor walks over and puts his arm around his cousin's shoulder. My aunt is his father's mate; thus, he is my first cousin. He is a hybrid werewolf and vampire. His mother is my mother's sister. He is also the prince to his clan.

"Now tell me cousin, why are you on my land?"

"Despite the training, the newly created vampires hoped to be sneaky and hide in the shadows to drink all the blood from humans. Clan law prohibits such behavior. As I chased them down and disciplined them, your mate panicked, and her panic caused the humans to panic. It was imperative for me to stop her."

Cornelius shrugged.

The fact that Andor and his sister accepted blood suckers feeding on humans left me somewhat confused and angry at the same time.

"May I ask exactly why you are all okay with bloodsuckers snacking on humans?" I glared at Andor.

Cornelius explains with a sigh, "I personally find human blood distasteful. It has to do with my wolf, who convulses when I drink human blood. Therefore, both my wolf and I survive on deer blood. Unlike me, though, most vampires are not hybrids, and without human blood, they would die. Our agreement with some humans is that if they allow us to feed on them, we will take them to our clinic, and they will donate blood like any other human. Upon fulfilling the human's contract, we turn them into vampires. Whether you believe it or not, there are whole groups of vampire groupies out there waiting and craving to be vampires. Any person over the age of eighteen is eligible for the mutual contract, and there is a long waiting list."

But these newly turned vampires broke the rules tonight and will be punished by my father.

Andor pats Cornelius on the back and invites him to the pack house to catch up on old times. My jaws dropped as I saw Cornelius transform into the most gorgeous silverish grey wolf I'd ever seen. In truth, I imagined his wolf to look like a zombie wolf from a horror movie. His wolf was an alpha wolf equal to Andor's wolf in size and strength. His mother wasn't of alpha blood, so odd I thought.

It was a beautiful sight to see all these naked people morphing back into wolves, running between the trees and looking at the pack of wolves. As a kid, I never had the opportunity to experience this, and I never realized how much I had missed out on it until just recently. The pack was a family, and I could see the love between the wolves as they ran together.

In spite of the sight I observed of the vampire fangs piercing the humans' necks in their feeding frenzy, I was still unsatisfied with what I saw. It would have been helpful if Cornelius had answered my questions about possible pain and death to humans. Cornelius still needs to be confronted with these questions.

Shifting and tearing through my spare clothes, I caught up to the pack and passed them up as my wolf wanted to play. She wanted everyone to know who the boss was, so she showed them she was the fastest and strongest. Even so, my wolf was comparable to the other Alphas in speed and endurance. If you asked my wolf, she was at least a nose-length ahead of them, therefore she was superior. Wolf, you're so silly.

After we had made our way near the packhouse, I had shifted back into my human form, having found my clothes in the hollow of a fallen tree branch that I had stashed earlier in the retreat. My clothes were quickly put on as I quickly shook out the leaves. The fact that such large groups of people were able to see me naked was not something I was used to.

Then I felt eyes looking at me. I was so surprised to find Andor in front of me, smiling at me with a wink from his left eye before turning to his cousin while walking towards the pack house. I followed after, as I wanted to know why we let blood suckers stay on pack land whether they are in your family or not.