start from the Aragnis pack,” Josh chimes in and I squeeze my hands together, my nails digging into my skin. “To start at the beginning.”
Are we really doing this? “I don’t think that’s necessary.”
“Why not?” That question comes from Damian.
“What good will it do?” I bite back.
Darius leans forward, elbows on the tables and hands clasped underneath his chin. “We already know that you didn’t do a ritual that caused the rogures as a child. Did you perform it as an adult?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“If you didn’t—“
“I didn’t have anything to do with the rogures,” I say firmly, holding his gaze. He scans my face for any lies, any deception, but he will find none. His jaw clenches as he squeezes his hands beneath his chin, looking at me so deeply I feel warmth build in my chest.
“Swear it on the Gods,” he says, and I hold back my surprise.
“I swear on Zahariss and Cazier that I know nothing, and have done nothing, to cause the rogures,” I answer immediately. No hesitation.
A pause, and then he eventually nods. I slump into my chair in relief. He believes me. Fucking finally.
“You believe her?” Damian asks, and the other Elites look to their Alpha for an answer.
“I do.”
“How can you be so sure, this could be another lie,” Leo suggests.
“And what would I get out of that?” I fold my arms, glowering at Leo.
“In this, I believe her.” Darius’s tone is firm, unmoving with an undertone of warning. For what, I’m not sure.
“This means the memory stone is wrong and it has been tampered with. The question is, how? Why? If we go through all that you had been accused of at Wolvorn Castle, we might be able to find out who has any reason to produce a crystal to make you look guilty,” Leo says.
I tilt my head. “I can tell you right now who would do that.”
“Who?” he demands.
“The Highers.” Silence. “More specifically Higher Charles, and then my family.”
Zaide grunts while Damian laughs through his words. “You’re joking right? Why in the Gods would the Highers care about you?”
“Isn’t Charles one of your guardians your parents chose for you? Along with Higher Warden?”
“Warden?” My brows pinch together. “I don’t even know who that is.” Then my lips peel back. “My parents choosing to have Charles as my guardian was a mistake, one we all paid the price for.”
“You’re going to have to explain this more,” Darius says. “We are trying to get the truth, no matter what it is. You have to give more than a few words as an answer.”
I tap my fingers along the table, wondering where to even begin. I don’t even want to do this, but we are here and what other choice do we have? Six people against the Highers and the Elites is suicide, never mind being the number one target in Vrohkaria, labeled as a traitor. If we can’t get them on our side all is lost. Even if it’s just to get Sarah, for now.
I’m not sure if us coming here was the right decision, but to gain their help, it has to be done. There is no one else.
“Charles was a very good friend of my parents. He’s been around for as long as I could remember. We all trusted him. My dad even helped him become a Higher.”
“He’s been a Higher for hundreds of years,” Darius points out.
“Then you know how long my parents’ friendship with him was. They didn’t know he would turn on them.”
“How?” Darius asks.
I sigh, looking down at the grain of the wooden table. “The Aragnis pack has produced Heirs for thousands of years, I’m told. My mom was an Heir, she had been for a long time, the longest that I know of any other. Before my seventh birthday, I went outside to play in the woods behind our house like I usually did, collecting lesia flowers as I went. But this time, I overheard something I shouldn’t have,” I choke out, the memories threatening to pull me under. I clear my throat. “Two people were in the woods, hidden by their cloaks. They said it was time to get to my mom, that it was time to act now. I didn’t understand but I ran. I was scared. I ran back home but they heard me and chased me. They knew I had overheard what they were discussing. I only got away because a wolf came out of the trees, it let me run past it, not interested in me whatsoever. Instead, it went toward those I was running from, enabling me to get home and tell my mom what I heard.”
No one speaks, and I look up. Darius stills, his eyes sharp as he tilts his head at me. The look on his face is indescribable as he’s lost in thought, his eyes clouded.
“Heirs are born as pups,” Zaide questions, and I shake my head and shrug.
“I wasn’t.” I continue on through their confused looks. “A few nights later, Charles came with both Highers and Elites. My dad hadn’t come home yet, which was unlike him. Mom and I tried to fight them off, but there were too many, they were too strong. I was only a child. I was eventually knocked unconscious as they dragged my mom away from me, and I woke up in my basement. Alone. Inside a cage of iron, infused with terbium.”
My pack shifts uncomfortably next to me, and Colten reaches out and squeezes my hand on the table. I squeeze it back before moving away.
“In your home?” Zaide grunts.
I nod, my eyes still on Darius’s now darkened ones. “I don’t need to tell you what happened down there. You have all seen my body, how being in a cage with terbium didn’t let me heal properly and caused the scars you all saw.” I swallow audibly. “If the cage would have just been iron, I wouldn’t have a mark on me, but they didn’t want that, or how quickly an Heir heals.” My vision wavers and I blink rapidly to clear it. “What I will tell you, is that Higher Charles, and a few Elites and members of my family, were involved. I was trapped in my basement, never once being able to leave until Josh found me and helped me escape, just before my eighteenth birthday.”
“But why would they do that?” Leo asks, a horrified look on his face, and Damian looks down at the table, a frown on his face.
I stare into the fireplace across the room, my words detached. “I was the daughter of an Heir, I was to be the next Heir. They were waiting for the moment of my eighteenth birthday when my markings would appear, as they knew I would fully come into my powers. They taunted me about my mom’s death, along with my dad’s, blaming it on me because I overheard them planning to take my mom.” I look back at Darius, trying to hide the pain in my eyes, knowing I’m unsuccessful. “I wasn’t lying when I told you my family was stolen from me. It was always going to happen eventually, but I sped up their plans with what I overheard. I spent many years in… training down there,“ I spit, gritting my teeth. “Them preparing me to obey their every command, to ready myself to be bred to create powerful children for their use. Or more specifically, Charles’s use.”
Darius stands suddenly, his chair crashing to the floor as his brows pinch together. I stare at him in shock at the sudden movement, apprehension swirling in my stomach. Then I squeeze my eyes shut at the onslaught of bullshit that I know he’s about to throw at me for my lies. I wait for the words, wait for any hope of getting Sarah back to go up in flames.
It never comes though, just eerie, tense silence. I peel my eyes open slowly, and watch in confusion as he starts to pace, his hands clenching and unclenching at his sides. I look at his men and they watch him with wide eyes, clearly not knowing what’s up with him either.
“Continue,” Darius demands, his voice barely above a growl, the deepest I have ever heard it.
I move my hands to my thighs, digging them into my legs as I wet my lips. “I was to lay on my back for as long as he saw fit. Patrick, my cousin, was to do the honors of breaking me in, tearing through my virginity to ease Charles’s access into me.” A shiver travels down my spine at the thought. “It was one of his rewards for his help in training me, he got to be the one to use me first. He loved to tell me all the ways he would use, abuse, and break my body. The perfect little plaything. He had waited years to be able to shove his disgusting dick inside of me. He wasn’t allowed until I was eighteen. Didn’t stop him from using my mouth though.” I ignore the way my voice shakes, the way my body starts to tremble, but they wanted to know. So here we are, listing to poor Rhea’s fucking sob story, just so I can help Josh, my brother who just hurt me, get his mate back. The pain of it all is welcomed now, maybe it will swallow me and I can never feel it again.
“Rhea?” Colten asks, his voice full of sadness and I blink slowly, turning my head toward him. Hudson rests a hand on his thigh, and I see him grab it tightly, his knuckles white.
I look over back at Darius, who hasn’t stopped his pacing, but now has what seems to be a dark sheen of mist coating his skin. “He would choke me until I passed out,” I continue. “Even that didn’t stop him. I would wake with either his cock still in my mouth or the evidence that he had been there.” Dark mist surrounds Darius violently as he stops in his tracks, his chest rising and falling rapidly as his men look at him cautiously. “He even reminded me at Wolvorn Castle how he would still get to have me, that he couldn’t wait to—“
“I think that’s enough,” Leo says as Darius practically vibrates on the spot, that mist of his moving over his skin like a river of rage. Is he angry at me for telling him this? Or is he angry that he can’t deny my words as lies after he has seen my body? I finally move my eyes from Darius to Leo.
“Do you also want to know how sometimes Patrick would bring a friend down, specifically an Elite?” My voice cracks. “How they would take turns with my mouth, touch my body for their own enjoyment and then add more scars to it?” I look at Damian. “Again, where is that Elite honor you so proudly declared?”
He swallows roughly, and I clench my eyes shut, my body shaking uncontrollably as I try to rub my sweaty skin where I can still feel their touches on my body. “No more, Rhea, I think they understand,” Josh whispers, and I look at him for the first time since he guilted me into revealing my body to them.
I ignore the worry in his gray eyes, ignore that everyone can see how speaking of these things has an affect on me. But then anger rises within me. At myself for showing how this affects me, at them for making me feel I have no choice but to tell them, and at Josh for causing it.
At Darius for not believing me, at the Highers for what they did, the Elites, my family.
“This is what they wanted to hear, is it not?” I snap at Josh. “This is what you wanted them to know after I showed them what was done to me. Do not fucking tell me ‘no more’ when all I give is more! More, more, more.” I bang on the table with my last words and stand, pushing my chair back and feeling my power rush through me, uncontained as my breaths become ragged. “I give every fucking thing I possibly can to anyone who deserves it. I showed them what they did to my body so they would help us get Sarah, because you asked that of me. I agreed to stay in Eridian and help others, bring them in and make sure they had some sort of life because it was the best decision for you, Kade, and Cassie. They needed a home and stability, so we stayed. I stayed. Even though every time a new person would come in and try and touch me, all I wanted to do was run and never fucking turn back, but I couldn’t, because they needed Eridian as much as we did. I do everything I can, and I have always done more, no matter how much I don’t want to, no matter how much my soul cries for the death on my hands that I have had to take to keep us safe, but it was all for fucking nothing.“ I look at Darius, tears falling from my eyes, and I wipe them away angrily, growling at myself as he now stands still, his focus solely on me. I laugh, but it’s weak.
“The day I went into The Deadlands and planned to kill you all? I did it to protect the secret that was Eridian, to protect my pack. The Highers and Elites would drag them back to where they escaped from.“ I point at Taylor. “They wanted to pin the murder of a woman on him, that an Elite killed after having too much to drink, and she refused his advances. Taylor stepped in to save the woman, but it was too late and Taylor was accused of her murder. They were going to sentence him to death. He escaped and came to Eridian.” I point at Anna. “Blood Witch, that’s it. She’s not dangerous, but she fucking can be if she needs to be. She came to Eridian after she was left, tied to a post in a town she had stayed in for a little while, stones thrown at her for weeks and weeks. All she wanted to do was buy new healing ingredients she was experimenting with as her mother was sick and she couldn’t heal her with what she had. She risked making the journey and got abused for weeks, then her mother died because she couldn’t get back to her with the healing ingredients in time. She escaped to Eridian.”
I point at Seb. “Accused of raping and killing his mate, and his mate’s family nearly killed him and left him to rot in the bottom of an empty well, over something he didn’t do. He escaped and came to Eridian.” I point at Hudson, my hand now shaking, my body vibrating with everything pouring out of me. I can’t stop it. “He didn’t want a pack, didn’t want to declare a home to the Highers and was a lone wolf. He wanted to make his own choices in life. The Highers don’t accept that, so they tried to force him into confinement if he didn’t choose a pack to stay with. He escaped to Eridian.” I point at Colten. “His family left him for dead because he prefers men over women, and he refused to fuck a woman to create offspring in their bloodline. He didn’t turn up to the rite of passage to be an Elite because he could barely move, and was drowning in his own blood from the hands of his own father. He escaped to Eridian.” My breaths become fast pants, struggling to take a full breath, but I don’t stop. “Sybill and Sam escaped from Sam’s dad, who used to beat them daily. Oscar and Katy would be locked in a cupboard while Oscar’s dad fucked other women in their home, then drag Katy out when he wanted to abuse her. Sarah.” I laugh through my tears, but it doesn’t sound right to my own ears. I’m too far gone in all the emotions running through me, feeling too much, hating too much, hurting too. Fucking. Much.
“Sarah. Drugged and raped, repeatedly by her own fucking pack, and when we found out about her, a plan was put in place to save her and bring her to Eridian. All who lived in Eridian escaped from the monsters in plain sight.“ I look at Josh then, my chosen brother. “Josh helped me escape my pack, he got me out of the cage I was kept inside of in my basement. I went to the kitchen and saw the knife my father gave me before my seventh birthday. I couldn’t believe I saw it, but it was like he was guiding me, letting me know it was now or never and gave me the hope I needed. When I made the split decision to quickly grab the only thing I had left of him, that’s when I saw Kade.” I let out a sob as I waver on my feet, numbness crawling up my body as my magic swirls violently inside of me. Josh stands with the rest of my pack, and when he reaches out to me, I push his hand away and stumble back, not wanting him to touch me. Not wanting anyone to touch me.
“Kade was chained to the family dining table that was made with so much love by my mom and dad, he was half-dead, starved and staring out into nothing. Josh and I managed to get the chain off of him and take him with us. I wouldn’t leave my cousin in the hands of monsters.” I let out a hollow sound, like a wounded animal. When I look toward Darius, his eyes are filled with concern and it makes me laugh. Laugh, and laugh, and laugh. “But that’s what happened anyway, didn’t it?” I look at each of the Elites in their eyes, until my ice blues land on fresh green once again. “You forced my hand when you came with the Elites in the Deadlands. And then we were exposed, and my pack was split up, pups taken from their moms, two died, and Kaden is in the hands of people that will only hurt and use him. They want him to rape women, to see if he can produce an Heir with being of my family’s bloodline. An Heir bloodline. They taunted me with it when he was born, bringing him down and forcing me to do things or they would hurt him.”
I step away from the table, the room shaking as my power comes to the surface, my markings pulsing as the ice-blue tendrils swish around me, lashing out uncontrollably. The fire goes out, empty chairs fly through the air and crash into the walls as an unseen wind travels through the room. I keep backing up until my shoulders connect with something solid, not sure what my power is doing, but not caring as everything within me is unsettled, wild.
Furious.
“All of it was for fucking nothing, wasn’t it?” I shout, shaking my head as they all look at me, look at the weakness I’m showing. “Because this is where we are now. Sarah is with my cousin, Kade with his parents, my pack is Gods knows where. More bodies are piling up, the rogures are getting worse and the whole of Vrohkaria thinks I did it!” I scream. “Charles knows I’m alive, along with my family and what the fuck am I supposed to do!? He will not stop until he has me, and that is not an option. I don’t know why he’s obsessed with Heirs, I don’t know why he did what he did, I don’t know why he killed my parents. He has taken pups from their families since I’ve been gone, to see if they have any traits of being an Heir. Training them like he did me, to get what he wants. And I just hid, to keep my own ass safe!” I pull at my hair until I fling my head back, banging it against the wall, but I feel no pain. “And you all just stood there too, the fucking Elites, protectors of Vrohkaria, time and time again while this has been going on under your noses. And then you took us to Wolvorn Castle. Fuck you,” I wheeze out, the words choking out of me. “Fuck all of you.”
I slump in defeat against the wall at my back, my breathing shallow and raspy, and I know I’m not getting enough air in, I know I’m not fucking breathing properly. My power dwindles, coming back into my body as the air stills. Furniture crashes to the floor and there is utter silence in the room, just a few wide eyes.
Josh rushes from his seat, his face blurry as he steps in front of me. His mouth is moving but I hear nothing at all, just silence as black dots coat my vision.
The next thing I know, the room tilts and the floor is rushing toward me, my face heading directly for the stone floor. Just before I lose consciousness, a soft, black mist encases me, turning the world completely black and I let it take me.
I hope it suffocates me so I can find some peace for a little while.
