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??The Beast’s Fury

Ember

It was too quiet.

Too still.

The air in Dorian’s mansion had always felt thick, but tonight it was suffocating. The shadows had grown longer, darker, and despite the lavish rooms and luxury, there was no comfort in the stone walls.

His presence haunted every corner. His voice, his touch, his control , I could feel him in every inch of this place, like he was inside my skin.

But I couldn’t stay here. I couldn’t let him break me.

I had to leave.

The door had been locked earlier, I was sure of it. But now, it clicked open on its own.

A chill swept in.

On the floor just outside, a silver key lay where it hadn’t been before. Beside it, a faint trail of wet footprints, bare, child-sized, leading down the hall.

I followed them, heart hammering.

Candle flames flared as I passed, illuminating my path like the house itself was guiding me.

Someone, or something, wanted me to see how to get out of this place, because I was done obeying.

The mansion was like a living, breathing thing. The air itself seemed to shift as if it was aware of me trying to escape. But tonight, something was different. The house, the mansion , felt more alive than it ever had.

I crept through the dim hallways, heart pounding in my chest, until I finally reached the door that lead to my freedom. It was unlocked, just like my room. Almost too easily. As if it wanted me to go.

Once outside, I ran toward the stable.

Inside, the scent of hay and fresh leather hit me, mingling with the faintest trace of something unnatural .

I barely had time to take a breath before a horse, sleek, dark stallion, stirred in his stall. His nostrils flared as he sensed me, and I held my breath.

His eyes locked on mine, glowing with an almost unnatural intelligence. I hesitated, my body tensing, but there was something in his gaze that made me move forward.

The mansion had brought him to me, and the rest of the night had already been written in the shadows.

I saddled him quickly, my hands shaking as I tightened the reins. The horse snorted and stamped his hooves, but when I climbed into the saddle, he immediately calmed. Without a second thought, I urged him forward.

He moved like lightning, faster than any normal horse could, weaving through the mansion grounds, galloping toward the woods that surrounded Dorian’s home like an impenetrable barrier.

I didn’t look back. Not once.

Not until I heard the sound. A low growl, like thunder rippling through the air.

The horse’s ears flicked back, and I knew we weren’t alone.

I didn’t have time to react. From the darkness of the trees came the creatures, three wolves, each of them massive and with eyes that gleamed like molten amber. They circled us, their growls filling the air, and I couldn’t help but tremble, despite my best efforts to stay calm.

The first lunged at the horse’s flank, claws raking at the animal’s sides, and he reared up, throwing me off. I hit the ground hard, gasping, but I didn’t have time to panic. I scrambled to my feet, heart hammering in my chest, adrenaline surging.

But they were too fast.

One of the wolves was already on me, teeth bared.

It lunged, its claws tearing through the fabric of my clothes, and I barely managed to dodge.

I rolled to the side, but another one caught me, its claws scraping down my back.

I cried out as the pain jolted through me, but I couldn’t stop moving, couldn’t stop fighting.

The third wolf circled, its eyes narrowed, its growl vibrating through the air. They were toying with me. Playing with their prey.

And then, I felt my strength waning, as I realized there was no escape, there was a sound. The earth itself seemed to tremble. A rush of power surged through the trees, and suddenly, the wolves were thrown backward, their snarls turning to panicked howls.

I didn’t have to look to know who had arrived.

Dorian.

His voice came low and dark, like a rumble of thunder. “Enough.”

The command was simple.

But the moment it left his mouth, the air thickened like smoke before a firestorm. The ground trembled, not from the wolves, but from something older answering the call of blood.

Even the trees recoiled, their branches creaking like bones in the wind.

The werewolves whimpered, tails tucked, but didn’t flee. Not yet. They knew. Somewhere beneath all that fur and snarling bravado, they knew .

They weren’t just facing death. They were facing Dorian Vale unleashed.

I would finally bear witness to the monster he claimed to be.

He stepped forward, slow and deliberate, as if savoring the inevitability of their end. Moonlight sliced across his face, catching on the twin crescents of fang peeking past his lip. His eyes, no longer human, no longer merciful, burned a deep, ancient red.

A predator’s gaze. A god’s rage.

Then the shadows moved.

They slithered from the cracks in the earth, wrenched themselves from the trees, thick and black like oil given life. They obeyed his will. They were his will.

His shadows stretched and split into antlers and claws. His eyes burned silver. They lashed out, coiling around the first wolf with bone-snapping force. It shrieked, a sound that didn’t belong to a beast but something much more human, and then the flesh tore.

Dorian didn’t blink.

His hand carved through the air, and the shadows obeyed, slicing the creature open from throat to belly in one clean, horrific stroke. Blood sprayed in arcs. Steam rose from the open carcass.

Then it happened.

The fur melted away. Bones cracked and twisted. The creature's body twitched violently, and within seconds, what laid twitching in a puddle of its own blood… was a man.

Naked. Young. Eyes wide. Mouth still caught mid-howl.

The other two hesitated, but it was too late. They lunged in desperation, not strategy. Dorian welcomed them.

The first met his claws, no longer metaphorical. He caught it mid-leap, drove his arm through its ribcage, and ripped out something wet and pulsing.

The wolf crumpled in on itself, convulsing as it began to shrink and shift, snout retracting, limbs curling, fur receding. A boy, barely older than twenty, laid gasping on the forest floor, ribs shattered, heart still clutched in Dorian’s hand.

The third didn’t get far. The shadows caught it by the throat, suspending it in the air like a doll. “Mercy,” it gurgled, words barely human as the change began too early, skin rippling, fur falling out in patches, bones rearranging under its flesh.

Dorian stepped closer, his voice like frost. “You sold your soul the moment you hunted what’s mine.”

He drove his boot into the wolf-man’s chest, pinning him to the earth as the shadows carved the last of the beast from the body. What was left, bare, broken, barely alive, was a man.

All three were.

They hadn’t been just wolves. They were monsters, shifted mid-form, spines snapping, claws still twitching. Werewolves. Real.

And now?

Ravaged. Human. Mortal again. And every last one of them was dead.

Dorian stood over the carnage, slick with blood, heart still pulsing in his palm. There were no more howls. Only silence, and the stench of death reclaiming what never should’ve lived.

Dorian’s gaze turned to me. Cold. Livid. “Do you have any idea what the hell you’ve just done?” His voice was low, a growl that made my skin prickle, but I couldn’t look away. His anger burned through me, but there was something else beneath it. Something darker.

I stood, shakily, watching him with wide eyes. “I had to get out.”

“You don’t get to leave, Ember. Not like this,” he snapped, stepping toward me. “You think this is a game? That you can just run away without consequences?”

He was so close now, the heat of his body making my heart race. I took a step back, but there was no more room to retreat.

“I didn’t ask for this,” I shot back, my voice trembling with defiance, even as my body betrayed me, my pulse quickening, my breath catching. “I didn’t ask for any of it. You think I wanted to be your prisoner?”

His jaw tightened, and I could see the rage burning in his eyes. But there was something else there, something deeper, something that made the air between us crackle with tension.

“No, you didn’t,” he muttered, his voice quiet now, almost gentle . He reached out to grab my arm, pulling me closer, his touch almost possessive, but not rough. “You scared me half to death, Ember. You just don’t understand what’s at stake.”

I shivered, but I didn’t pull away.

He stared down at me, his grip tightening ever so slightly as the tension between us mounted. “But you’ve made your choice.”

I wanted to fight him. I wanted to scream, to push him away, to break free. But in the back of my mind, I knew something that terrified me more than any threat he could make, I wasn’t ready to escape. I wasn’t ready to let him go.

His gaze softened, just slightly, and he ran his thumb over the back of my hand, a movement so intimate that it made my heart stutter. “I’ll make sure you’re okay. But you’re not leaving me again. Not yet.”

I wanted to say something. I wanted to scream at him, to shove him away. But instead, my voice caught in my throat, and I stood there, looking up at him, caught between the violence of the moment and something I couldn’t name.

Dorian might’ve saved me tonight, but I could feel the chains around my heart tightening, and it terrified me just as much as it excited me.