A Time for Change (17 page)

Chelsea and her mates could see their challengers standing in the middle of the arena waiting for them. For some reason the female shifter kept looking around as if she was waiting or looking for something.

James grabbed Chelsea, picked her up, and carried her to one of the sitting areas until the battle started. He saw her eyes begin to glow and noticed she was making her way to their challengers.

“Chelsea, I know you are pissed and want to get it over with, but we have to wait,” James said as he ran his hands through her hair. Ace came into the box and sat on the other side of Chelsea, whose eyes were still glowing.

“The announcer said the fight will start in just a few minutes instead of a half an hour,” Ace said as he rubbed Chelsea’s back.

The announcer walked into the middle of the arena.

“I would like to welcome all of you to the first challenge battle in Isle history. Silver, Chance, and Peter have challenged our newly First Beta’s Chelsea, Ace, and James for their title. We will have three battles and all three of those battles will be fought as couples. The winner of two out of three battles or a fight to the death will be our First Betas. Either of those two will result in a win of the title.

“Chelsea, James, Ace, Silver, Chance, and Peter, I need all of you to the center of the arena now,” the announcer said.

Chelsea noticed Silver looking at her watch every few steps she took, which caused her to wonder what the hell was going on?

The bell rang as soon as they got to the middle of the arena and the announcer stepped into his booth. Chelsea and her mates immediately took their fighting stances and waited for the other tri-mate couple to make the first move. After all, they were the ones who called this battle.

James noticed Silver looking at her watch before she nodded at her mates and they started to act like they were going to rush them. James didn’t like this, it was like they had a time when they needed to start and finish the battle or like they were waiting for something.

‘Something is going on. Silver keeps looking at her watch instead of battling against us.
We need to finish this battle before three rounds,’
James said as he noticed Chance was now looking around the arena instead of continuing to rush at them. James and his mates could tell they were up to something and it had nothing to do with the challenge.

‘What if the challenge battle is a decoy for something else?’
Ace asked when he noticed what they were doing as well.

‘I am starting to think the same thing so let’s stop waiting for them to rush us and finish them off so we can figure out what the hell is going on,’
Chelsea said.

Her mates agreed with her, and all rushed the three shifters in front of them when Chelsea gave the signal. It was like Silver was in shock when Chelsea punched her in the face, making Chelsea think that maybe Silver and her mates didn’t think Chelsea and her mates would become aggressive when they didn’t come after them.
Maybe they never planned to fight us, but oh well, they are going to get what they deserve for challenging us,
Chelsea thought when she noticed the shocked looks on Silver and her mates after all three of them took a hard blow to their jaws from Chelsea and her mates.

Chelsea quickly followed up her punch with a kick, causing Silver to stumble backwards. She didn’t wait for Silver to regain her balance to return before she kicked her again in the face this time and hard enough to knock Silver to the ground. When Silver stood, Chelsea swung her rear leg around in an arc, crashing into the shinbone in Silver’s right leg. Chelsea had generated more power in her kick by stepping forward turning her foot outward before rotating her hip to provide more power in her kick. Silver stumbled backwards and this time she wasn’t able to gain her balance quickly, the kick was so powerful.

James grabbed Chance’s fist when he tried to punch him in the face and flipped around in a circle. As James flipped him over, Chance’s arm twisted in a circle, causing it to break. Chance howled out in pain when he felt his arm breaking.

Ace jabbed Peter in the face hard enough to knock him off balance and set him up for his next move. He waited until the right moment before he kicked Peter with force in the knees, his knees buckling underneath him and Peter groaned before dropping to the ground hard. Ace performed the same kick Chelsea had performed moments ago, but he hit his opponent in the jaw with his power strike. When Ace’s foot connected to Peter’s jaw, his head flew to the right as blood splattered out of his mouth.

The bell swiftly rang letting them know it was time to shift.

‘Let’s kill them now so we can prevent whatever their partners are doing,’
James said when he saw both Chance and Silver looking at their watches then looking around before shifting.

James shifted into his wolf this time instead of his lion, shocking the whole audience. They had never seen James in wolf form and standing before them was a huge light-brown wolf with burgundy patches and yellow glowing eyes.

Chelsea circled around Silver as if she was prey and the last meal she would receive for days. She could feel the fear seeping from Silver and her mates. Chelsea stopped in front of Silver with her canines showing and began to nip at her neck as she growled. Chelsea pawed the left side of Silver’s face with so much power behind it that Silver collapsed to the ground with a low growl. Silver raised her paw off the ground just enough to smack Chelsea in the side. Chelsea growled when she felt the contact on her left side and it pissed her off more. Before Silver could fully rise, Chelsea smacked her again, hard enough for the sound to echo throughout the arena. Chelsea leaned down and captured Silver’s neck into her mouth. Chelsea stood on top of Silver for leverage as she ripped piece after piece of Silver’s neck apart until she severed her neck completely. Chelsea let out a howl over Silver’s corpse before turning her attention toward her mates, watching James as he went for Chance. She could tell James had let some of his lion abilities come forward as well, since his eyes had changed from yellow to burgundy, and his pupils had elongated.

James advanced toward his opponent with a fierce look in his eyes. Chance tried to take out James first by extending his neck and snapping at James’s legs with his canines. James used this to his advantage. While Chance had his neck extended, James lifted his paw high into the air and let his wolf and lion power flow to his paw before striking Chance hard enough to snap his neck.

Chelsea turned her head and hid her eyes under her paw when she saw some of Chance’s bones flying out the side of his neck.

Chelsea watched as Ace extended his claws, leaped into the air and landed on top of Peter. Ace pushed his claws into Peter’s side when Peter began to thrash so he wouldn’t fall off. Ace leaned down, captured the back of Peter’s neck into his mouth, and dropped to the ground. He began a death roll similar to what alligators did in the water until Peter’s neck snapped, causing him to die instantly.

Chelsea and her mates immediately shifted back as the announcer called them the winners of the battle by death. Eli, Jadelyn, Greg, Treasure, and all their fathers circled around them within seconds.

“Where is Charity and Trevor?” James asked when he noticed his little sister wasn’t in the circle.

“During the battle, Trevor and Charity got a call from Aishe and they went outside to meet her in the parking lot,” Jadelyn answered.

“I did not call them,” Aishe said as she stepped into the crowd with a concerned look on her face.

James turned and ran for the door, all the while thinking this could not be happening again. During the battle, he didn’t feel it since all his concentration was on the battle, but now that it was over, he felt as though Charity was in danger. He ran out the door and into the parking lot the whole time yelling Charity’s name. Someone else would have thought she just wanted to be alone with her mate and left early, but he knew different. Charity wouldn’t have made up a lie just to leave the battle early. James knew she wouldn’t have left before seeing if he had won the battle or not either.

“What is going on?” Baron asked as he watched James running out the door of the arena screaming his sister’s name.

“The battle was just a decoy for something else, but we don’t know what for yet,” Chelsea called out over her shoulder as she and Ace ran after their mate. Now that the battle was over, Chelsea and Ace had the same feeling the night the shifters broke into Charity’s room. They knew she was in danger and hoped like hell they made it to her before anything bad happened to her.

Everyone who was in the circle congratulating them a few moments ago were now in the parking lot with them, trying to help find Charity or some evidence that she was okay and safe.

Five minutes later, Chelsea could have sworn she heard something but couldn’t be sure with all the noise everyone was making.

“Shush,” she screamed as she made her way toward the sound she had just heard. Everyone around her became quiet and followed her to the sound of the moans they all could hear now. What Chelsea saw laying on the ground made her scream in alarm causing them all to run toward her at a fast pace.

Laying on the ground in front of them was a badly beaten Trevor. Everything around Chelsea disappeared, her only purpose at this moment was figuring out what happened to her cousin. Chelsea and Trevor grew up as brother and sister not cousins. She picked up his head and placed it on her lap as she sat on the ground.

James couldn’t believe what was going on. All he kept thinking was ‘not again’ as he smelled some of the shifters scents who were by his parents home that night. He had to find his sister and fast.

“Trevor, where is Charity?” James roared out.

Jadelyn knelt in front of Trevor’s body and placed her hand on his shoulder. After Aishe gave her the potion to reverse the latent spell, Jadelyn found out she had her grandfather Mase’s power of having visions of what someone else saw simply by touch.

Aishe walked over and placed purple crystals around Jadelyn so her vision of what happened would be projected into the air so everyone around them could see what Jadelyn saw.

Trevor and Charity were watching her brother and his mates battle their challengers. When a voice in their heads, which sounded an awful lot like Aishe’s, told them to meet her in the parking lot, it was important. Charity turned to Jadelyn and told her where they were going before they made their way through the bleachers and out the door.

They had to shield their eyes from the sun as their eyes adjusted to the brightness, when they stepped into the parking lot entrance. Charity and Trevor could see Aishe at the end of the parking lot and hastily made their way toward her. Aishe’s features suddenly morphed into someone else’s when Charity and Trevor were just a few feet away from her.

From the pictures Ben gave them after the Alpha Battle, Trevor knew it was Ursula’s sister, Vanity, standing in front of them. Vanity was next in line to be the Lady of the witch side of the Isle. She was what the shifters referred to as a future Alpha.

“Run!” Trevor turned toward Charity and yelled when he saw Vanity and some of the shifters trying to surround them.

Charity shifted into a huge white lion with black stripes down her back, and baby-blue eyes that sparkled in the sunlight. She wasn’t going to leave her mate to fight this battle alone, no matter what he said.

Charity turned to Trevor, who had just shifted into a huge black wolf with white stripes across his hind and face.

Trevor pushed Charity behind him as Vanity threw electric orbs toward them and the shifters tried to surround them.

Trevor and Charity ducked and dodged Vanity’s electric orbs as they charged at her. They knew they had to take her out first before she electrocuted one of them. Trevor waited until the time was right and leaped into the air, with his mouth wide open, diving for Vanity’s left hand. Trevor captured Vanity’s left hand in his mouth while Charity attacked her right hand. They ripped her hands off before the shifters surrounding them could attack.

Vanity screamed from the excruciating pain of having her hands ripped off and dropped to the ground on her knees. Trevor turned his attention to the wolves surrounding them while Charity ripped Vanity’s body apart piece by piece. They were going to make sure no one could get back up and go after them.

Trevor and Charity stood hind to hind as they bit, clawed, and ripped apart every shifter who got too close to them.

Charity could sense the two shifters closing in on either side of her and the one charging toward her from the front. She quickly tapped into her wolf abilities as well, making everything around her slow down. When the wolf from her right leaped toward her, Charity lifted her paw and smacked the shifter with all her strength. The shifter flew back, crashing into one of the trees behind Charity. She did the same thing to the shifter on her left. Charity waited for the shifter charging in the front of her to get close enough before she ripped its neck apart.

Trevor turned toward Charity once more and told her to run while there was a break in the shifters in front of them. He wanted her somewhere safe before any more shifters came. Trevor could see more shifters in the distance coming at a fast clip toward them. He pushed Charity behind him and got ready for battle. They were coming one by one and he was killing them as fast as they approached.

When Charity turned her head, she could see a few shifters in human form standing a few feet away. They had something in their hands that she couldn’t make out so she scented air trying to determine what it was.

‘Trevor, they have animal tranquilizers in their hand,’ Charity said to Trevor.

‘What are animal tranquilizers?’ Trevor asked Charity.

‘It is something the humans use on animals to make them sleep. Whatever you do, do not let them shoot you with one of them. Avoid as many as you can and fight the effects of the medicine,’ Charity said right before the tranquilizers started flying toward them.