Book 1 – The Lycan’s Curse The war has began

“Giuseppe,” Alastair called out. Giuseppe walked towards him.

“What?” Giuseppe asked.

“Deliver this to my abominable mate. Tell Gelle that I challenge him to a battle,” Alastair said, a smirk creeping onto his face as Giuseppe vanished quickly.

Giuseppe made his way to Brenth’s house. As soon as he entered, the lycans guarding outside fell unconscious to the ground. The others who recognized him fled in fear, including the new Beta. Giuseppe furrowed his brows. Brenth stepped outside with Claire, and Giuseppe quickly appeared in front of them.

“Listen here, you big, giant, weird Dalmatian dog,” Giuseppe said to Brenth.

“What do you want?” Brenth replied hoarsely, as if he felt weak and fatigued just by Giuseppe’s abrupt tap. Claire collapsed to the ground, unconscious, as Giuseppe tapped her arm as well. Fear crept through Brenth’s veins.

“Tell your papa Gelle to be prepared. We will come to his territory and fight him, Giuseppe muttered. Brenth swallowed hard.

“He is not my father!…You don’t know what you’re talking about. Opilia is there, the ancient witch, and that place is inhabited by hybrids and tribrids,” Brenth said hoarsely. “Leave me alone now.”

Giuseppe stepped back.

“You look like hell,” he muttered.

“Because I came from hell,” Brenth replied before retreating inside his house. Giuseppe followed him and rummaged through his fridge for a beer.

“You’re not as bad as I thought,” Giuseppe said. Brenth’s heart skipped a beat, and he scoffed.

Giuseppe sat across from Brenth, sipping his beer.

“I just can’t understand it, the mating thing is absurd. After rejecting your imprint, they still bothering your mind and make you suffer and feel vulnerable,” Giuseppe chimed in, while Brenth averted his gaze.

“And I don’t understand why I am mated to a—”

“Does it happen often?” Giuseppe interrupted. Brenth shook his head.

“Never heard of such a thing,” Brenth retorted. Giuseppe slid another bottle across the table to him.

“I don’t want to experience it either,” Giuseppe said, rolling his eyes playfully. Brenth raised an eyebrow in response. “I know you’re one of the adopted sons of Gelle. He just loved collecting Alpha’s babies. For a second, we thought you and Alastair were brothers. That would be so messed up. But when Aliyah and I dug into the past, we found out your real mother was killed by Gelle and he raised you as his own.”

Brenth’s eyes widened in shock. “You’re lying!” he yelled in disbelief.

“Why not see it for yourself?”

Aliyah projected her vision to Giuseppe, revealing Brenth’s past when he was still a child. Memories flooded back to him—his mother was killed right before his eyes. He had been tortured by his so called father for speaking out about it. He had been made to believe his mother died because she was weak, losing a fight to her opponent, while Claire’s mother erased that part of his memory. She wiped his clear judgment of right and wrong, leaving him devoid of remorse for killing innocent young supernatural creatures since then. Brenth screamed in pain as the horrifying memory of his father murdering his mother returned to him. Aliyah cut off her vision. Brenth gasped, tears streaming down his face for the first time in his life, yet his expression remained hollow and stoic.

Giuseppe finished the last drop of his beer and left.

At noon, Marco and Aliyah’s mother returned home. Blaze looked at the familiar woman standing before him, with the same smile and the same dark red hair. Without hesitation, Blaze rushed toward Kassandra, and they embraced tightly. She exactly looks like Aliyah when she was younger.

“I missed you,” Kassandra said, caressing his hair. Blaze didn’t want to let go, holding her close. A group of men and women appeared, marching toward them, stopping at the edge of the territory.

“I brought a coven,” Kassandra muttered, gently pushing Blaze away and laughing. Blaze, for a brief moment, wondered if he was dreaming. He trailed his fingers along Kassandra’s face. She was real. They all greeted Kassandra and bowed their heads.

“You really don’t need to do that,” she said, grinning widely.

Kassandra was Aliyah’s mother’s great-great-great-grandmother.

“You haven’t changed, not a bit,” Blaze said, looking at her in disbelief.

“Neither have you, my dear Evander,” she replied, her eyes now on Eddie. Eddie ran toward her for a hug.

“My long-lost children,” she said, ruffling their hair.

Aliyah hugged her as well.

“You looks like me when I was younger.” Kassandra muttered, and Aliyah smiled.

Kassandra stood in the center of the group. “I’ve come for Ophelia. I will be the one to end her madness,” she said softly, as though she had emerged from another dimension or time. “For centuries, she has violated the principles of witchcraft and magic, consumed by pride and greed. The darkness took over her heart. Tonight, I will cast her to hell where she belongs.”

“Now we’re even,” Blaze muttered. But Kassandra shook her head.

“They don’t have the Phoenix, hon,” Kassandra replied. “You already had possibility to  defeat her, but I altered the course of fate because… I wanted to be the one to deal with her.”

“How did you manage to change the course of fate?” Alastair asked.

“Ophelia created a spell that allowed her to remain alive by using her descendants as vessels. Her granddaughter and future generations carried Ophelia’s essence or consciousness, enabling her to stay connected to the living world. It passed down through the bloodline. Ophelia herself is dead—I killed her. Only her consciousness remains, not her spirit,” Kassandra explained.

Alastair and Giuseppe exchanged shocked glances. Aliyah’s eyes widened in sudden realization, as did Rio’s. Anthony stood confused.

“Wait, how did that even possible?!” Alastair asked in disbelief.

“She stole a phoenix’s feather again, but I stopped her. She was planning to grant herself immortality. I cursed her to death, leaving her no choice but to use an incantation that linked her consciousness to a living body so it could remain in this world,” Kassandra explained further.

“Silly, why didn’t she give herself immortality first before anything else?” Anthony blurted out, and Kassandra smiled.

“Stupidity,” she replied simply. “After she returned to life, she tried performing the ritual again with the phoenix feather, but it no longer worked,” Kassandra said with a wide smile.

“Claire… we need to kill Claire,” Alastair prompted, but Kassandra shook her head.

“Live the innocent alone. I’ll give her a fair fight for a bit, I miss tormenting her as she tormented me, she said calmly. “Do you know why the ritual didn’t work on her? It’s because… you can only use the phoenix feather once for the rest of enternity,”

“But you can use blood instead,” Aliyah whispered, and Kassandra nodded.

“Yes, but once again, Ophelia was foolish,” Kassandra scoffed. “She used the phoenix’s blood to create the Draconians. The blood of the phoenix can only be used once for all eternity as well.”

“But the hair?” Anthony asked.

“Or their pubes,” Kassandra added, laughing abruptly. “But no, Ophelia tried everything and failed over and over again,” she continued, her laughter fading into a confident grin.