Chapter 325: _Run, Marcellus
Caroline’s POV
*****
"Get up!" Marcellus snarled, sending a kick straight at her already bleeding stomach.
Caroline gasped, groaning with pain as tears blurred her eyes. Her right hand clutched her stomach but she refused to die.
She refused to go down... Without a fight.
"That’s right." Caroline chuckled dryly, raising her body until she was on her knees, staring at the bastard’s face. "As always, you want to prove that you have power. Control."
"Shut up." Marcellus shook his head, his jaw clenching as he held the dagger tighter. "You don’t know what you’re talking about."
Caroline laughed even more but then coughed, eyeing him with pure disgust. "Don’t I? First your father, the former Beta. Then your siblings who could’ve done a much better job than you."
Marcellus’ green eyes glinted with a cold light the more she spoke but Caroline wasn’t backing down.
"Since you were little, you’ve always been about having power over others. Killing people just because you could. Sexually assaulting women and men just for the fun of it. You’re depraved and you love it."
Marcellus blinked, his eyes still glinting with a murderous light... But then his expression became stoic. Unreadable.
"Are you finished with whatever that was?" He asked, sniggering. "What did you expect? That I’ll think about all I’ve done? That your words will somehow make me snap?"
Caroline’s expression tightened as she slowly rose to her feet, her right hand still clutching the wound on her stomach.
Her eyes flicked to a corner where she saw Marcellus’ assistant, Cullen, lying on his side close to a sofa, groaning as he raised his head from the cold marble floor.
"No. Of course, I never expected you to have a sudden epiphany." Caroline said with a wry smile... Until her smile disappeared faster than it came. "I just wanted you distracted enough to do this!"
Under the same breath, she swiped her left hand forward, sending a sharp wave of silver energy meant to cut. It headed straight at Marcellus, who was standing right in front of Cullen.
The beta dodged, but Cullen wasn’t so lucky.
Cullen didn’t even have time to scream.
The silver arc carved through him like a hot blade through wax, splitting chest from shoulder in a vicious diagonal slash.
His body spasmed, eyes going wide before he collapsed in a heap, the smell of burned flesh rising into the smoky air. Blood gushed across the marble, pooling beneath him, steaming faintly from the purity of her moon-forged energy.
Marcellus froze for a heartbeat—just long enough for Caroline to register the flicker of rage in his eyes—not because she had killed Cullen, but because she’d dared to touch what was his.
"You!" His voice broke into a snarl, and the air between them ignited with a sudden rush of dark green magic. It pulsed from his hands in thick, smoky tendrils, each one writhing like a serpent.
Caroline braced herself, her silver aura flaring to life in answer. The moon goddess’s gift burned inside her veins, and Vilda snarled in her mind.
’Now!’
She didn’t hesitate.
Her claws burst from her fingertips, her muscles tightening with supernatural strength.
She lunged, her left hand cutting upward toward his face in a deadly arc. Marcellus twisted, his dagger flashing, but silver met steel and the dagger hissed like it had touched acid, a thin line of smoke curling from the blade.
He growled, shoving her back with a blast of his magic that smashed into her ribs. Pain flared white-hot, and she slid across the marble, her shoes scraping until she dug her claws in and stopped herself.
"You think you can match me?" Marcellus’s voice was cold, almost bored now, but there was a tightness in his jaw. He was feeling it—her strikes, her speed, her refusal to die quietly.
"I don’t need to match you." Caroline’s voice was raw, but her smirk was sharp. "I just need to leave a scar."
And then they collided again.
His dagger slashed for her throat, but she ducked, her claws raking across his side. Flesh tore, and dark green sparks burst from the wound as if his blood itself was magic.
He roared, grabbing her by the neck and slamming her into the nearest wall so hard that the stone cracked.
Her silver energy flared instinctively, forcing him to drop her as the divine energy burned into his hand.
She staggered forward, spitting blood, and Vilda surged forward in her mind:
’Let me out. Let me finish him.’
Her bones cracked and shifted, muscles stretching, fur bursting through her skin as her transformation overtook her. One moment, she was human; the next, a towering white wolf with glowing silver eyes and claws like molten blades.
Marcellus’s magic whipped around him like a storm, but Caroline was faster.
She darted low, slashing his leg open, then spun, claws raking up toward his ribs. He snarled, his dagger plunging downward, grazing her shoulder, burning her with magic so dark it felt like poison.
Pain wracked her body, but she ignored it, sinking her teeth into his forearm. His blood was bitter, burning her tongue, but she bit harder until she felt bone crunch. He ripped free with a howl, stumbling back, her silver energy sizzling along the wound like wildfire.
"You’ll regret that," he hissed, his magic surging violently.
His free hand shot forward, a column of dark green energy slamming into her chest. It lifted her from the ground and hurled her across the room. She crashed into the floor, her wolf form flickering before she shifted back to human, coughing blood.
Her vision blurred, but she pushed herself up on shaking arms. She could smell him—his pain, his blood.
She’d hurt him. Badly.
Caroline’s lips curved into a weak smile. "Run, Marcellus. I’ll make sure Odessa finishes you."
For the first time, she saw it—the faintest twitch of unease in his eyes.
But he didn’t reply.
Instead, he released a final surge of magic, a concentrated spear of green light that shot straight through her stomach.
The force pinned her to the cracked marble, her breath leaving her in a sharp gasp. Warmth spread under her as her own blood pooled fast.
Marcellus clutched his wounded side, glaring at her one last time before turning away. His steps were uneven, his breathing ragged, but he didn’t stop until the smoke swallowed him and he was gone.
Caroline lay there, her vision dimming, the divine energy in her veins pulsing faintly like a fading heartbeat. Vilda’s voice was a whisper now, mournful.
’We fought well.’
Her lips trembled, but she managed a rasped sentence. "Odessa... please, stop him."
In her final moments, she thought about one last person. Someone whom she had once written off as evil and rotten.
Regina.
She wasn’t even sure if what she felt for her was "love"... But she had just one hope.
That she found her way out of Ryker’s claws.
With that thought, the world around her faded and darkness embraced her, her heart beating for the last time...