dining hall within the castle, all seated around a light wood table as way too much food is set down before us. Leo sits to my right, followed by Damian, Zaide, Jerrod. Maize sits next to Charles who’s at the head of the table, the other Highers seated across from us as they discuss the trial. Though Higher Warden and Higher Aldua are not here.
“What do you think should be done with the boy?” Higher Frederick asks around a mouthful of food.
“He will return to his family of course,” Charles says. “Poor boy has been traumatized. I’ve ordered Maize to be involved personally with his recovery, and he can leave once he is better.” I look toward Maize as she gives him a smile.
“I never agreed to that,” I interrupt, leaning back in my seat.
Charles’ eyes swing to mine, food halfway to his mouth. “I don’t need to get your permission. She is skilled and will help the boy. You’re not going to deny his recovery, are you?”
All eyes are now on me, waiting for my answer. “I need to get back to hunting the Rogures. We found what caused them to be here, but haven’t found how to stop it. So in the meantime, we all need to be out there protecting Vrohkaria.” Until Rhea tells us how to reverse the ritual, if it can even be done, there is nothing else we can do until then apart from cutting them down.
“I will be seeing to it personally that we get the information needed out of the woman to stop the Rogures,” Charles says. “We will be close to peace throughout Vrohkaria again after the trial, and those who are rebelling against us will disband. Many have spoken of my capabilities of handling the traitor so far and put faith in me to put an end to the Rogures. I will not fail the people.”
“What if it can’t be undone,” asks Higher Aiden, his dark curls swaying as he shakes his head. “Can we even trust what she says with what the Elites have told us? She may have us do another curse unknowingly if we take her word for things and have her perform another ritual, if that is needed.”
“That is a concern,” Charles agrees, rubbing his chin. “We have to have some form of leverage over her so that she has no other option than to tell us the truth.”
“Like what?” Higher Frederick asks. “She’s a traitorous cunt who has caused so much death. What could we possibly hold over her when she cares so little for the world she lives in?”
“That is true,” Higher Mathew chimes in. “The bitch couldn’t care about anything.”
“What about Kaden?” Maize muses. “I watched her in the pack. She was always with him if he was around, and she protected him from Darius in The Deadlands.” She looks at me, teeth showing with her laugh. “Well, as best she could. She was crying on the floor, scared to death that Darius would slice the kid’s neck. She obviously cares about him even though he hates her now.
You have part of my world in your hands. Will you help me protect it? I shake my head as Rhea’s words echo within me, and Drax growls. With him being so close to the surface, I have to forcefully shove him back for control, taking his anger and holding it at bay. He’s been unstable since we watched Rhea being carted off out of the great hall unconscious, bleeding from her wounds.
Wounds I inflicted on her flawless back.
Everything revolted inside of me as soon as I stood, whip in hand and staring down at her. But she lied about everything. Despite all of that, I nearly refused Charles’ order, even though it was an order with an undertone of a threat. Then I nearly lost control of Drax during it.
“Hmm,” Charles hums thoughtfully. “It could definitely work then along with other suggestions, if her feelings are true,” he says to Maize, a glint in his eyes. “Which we don’t know for sure since she’s a manipulative woman. With the trouble she had caused the Aragnis pack over the years after her parent’s death, Kaden’s family may agree.” He shakes his head, seemingly lost for words. Which I know is bullshit.
“How did her parents die?” Leo asks, taking a drink.
“A terrible accident. It’s a shame. Her father was a great Alpha and a very dear friend of mine. It was a sad day when the news of his death reached me, and it saddens me what his daughter has turned out to be.”
“You knew them?” My brows furrow at him. Why hasn’t he mentioned this before now? We have sat here for hours, and we talked before he ordered a trial.
He nods. “I did, I was even there for the birth of Lasandrhea,” he sighs. Lasandrhea? That’s her real name? “I was her chosen guardian of sorts, along with Higher Warden. I’m ashamed of what has become of her. I wonder if she had stayed in her pack if I could have guided her. I visited often over the years, but she was volatile. I thought it was the death of her parents that had caused it, but clearly the girl is unstable.” He glances at the drink in his hand, a look of sadness crossing his face.
“You seem to be taking it in well,” Zaide states, not looking at him as he cleans one of his blades. I have to wonder why he’s asking, the guy rarely talks to him unless he has to. But that’s why he’s the best at what he does. Observing. “Considering you were close to her parents and there when she was born, I would have thought you would be more conflicted over this.”
“Yes… well,” Charles clears his throat. “I am Lord Higher, and my personal feelings cannot get in the way of a wrong that has been done.” He takes a drink before continuing among the Highers about Rhea’s sentence, and how they can get Kade to help the process of her undoing the curse.
I tune them out, wondering why Rhea never mentioned her guardians were Highers. She was adamant not to let them know about Eridian, well mainly her pack. Was it because she knew they would know she was alive with Kade and Josh, and punish her for stealing Kade and having Josh help? She was going to be punished anyway. She said she had no family, and yet she has an aunt and uncle, who are the Alpha of the Aragnis pack and many cousins. That pack has been around for hundreds of years, even before I was born, and is well respected and in alliance with the Highers. So why did Rhea leave? She said her parents were stolen from her, but they were killed in an accident. It doesn’t make sense, yet does it matter?
She caused the rogures to come to the Vrohkaria, performed the ritual to make it happen. I saw it with my own eyes. It’s her fault my parents and little sister died, mauled to death by them. I was away hunting rogures in a nearby village when they attacked the town we lived in. Isabell was three years old, a whole life ahead of her and it was ripped away along with my mother trying to protect her. I found their mutilated bodies huddled together at the side of our home next to our garden they spent many hours in. My dad survived a week from his injuries from the rogures until he couldn’t hold on any longer. He made me promise on his dying breath to aid the Highers in what they need to do and become Alpha of the Elites. I keep that promise to this day.
Rhea has murdered thousands with what she did. Living away in Eridian without a care and letting Vrohkaria rot around her. She will undo the curse and pay for what she has done for the rest of her miserable life. The only question I want answered now is why.
I walk down the steps toward the cells, the smell of death hitting me as I open the door. It slams shut behind me, and I walk down the stone hallway toward the end. I can smell her blood in the air mixed in with her usual scent, and I lock down Drax before he can react. He growls inside me at her smell, the smell of her blood. Reaching her cell on silent footsteps, I walk to the bars and lean up against them.
Rhea is on her knees facing the bars, but her head is turned toward the wall, just staring at it, unaware of my presence. Or ignoring it. My eyes track down her body, looking her over with precision. Dried blood covers her in splotches, darker in places, especially around the sides of her ribs. Bruising is appearing on her left side, and I tilt my head at it, studying it intently and wondering where that came from. Her chained hands rest on her thighs, not even a twitch coming from them as the silence continues. Not even her breaths can be heard. More dried blood covers the ground to the side of her, and I see the t-shirt I ripped to expose her back has been thrown off to the side. I refuse to acknowledge the feeling bubbling up inside of me at the sight of her.
I look down at the streaks of red from where she’s sat to the cell’s bars, and fury rises within me at the knowledge that she was dragged into her cell instead of placed down. “Why did you do it?” My tone is neutral, almost bored. I’m only greeted by silence, not even a twitch. She knew I was here. I tsk, waving a hand and making an opening in the bars before entering. I walk until I’m a few feet away from her before crouching, resting my arms on my knees. “Can you undo the curse?” I move a finger, and her chains pull at her wrists in warning, jolting her, and she finally turns her head to me.
Dull eyes collide with mine, and I hold back my reaction at seeing that look in her once lively ice-blue orbs that sometimes look like glass. No fire, no light, no flecks… just nothing. Not even tears, though I can see she has been crying, her eyes puffy. But the look in them is so much different than what I have seen over the weeks since I have been her shadow. Since the moment our eyes caught and collided in The Deadlands.
Why don’t I like that look?
Everything within me feels restless, and Drax growls low and deadly, hackles standing high. That I react at all to her is starting to piss me off. From the very first moment, it’s like I’m attuned to everything about her. I want it gone. I want it to stop. This need I have to be around her, on her, in her all the time. I want to scent her, bite her, mark her so I can see them on her skin for myself, just like I did after we fucked. It’s a constant need, never wavering. That’s why I was following her around for weeks. Sometimes she noticed, when I let her, other times she didn’t. Especially when I followed her into the forest and watched her play with wild wolves like she belonged there. I stood there, watching from a distance, and nothing could have taken my eyes away from the way she laughed and smiled so freely. Playing with pups and their mother just watching on with trust in her gaze, letting me know that wasn’t the first time she had done so. I suspect she went to see them often.
Yet she fucking caused a plague of rogures to wreak destruction across the lands, caused my family to die painful deaths for no reason that she has given, so my reaction to her can get fucked. She deserves a lot more than the whipping she received for what she as done. I will just have to contain my fury and instinct in the process.
Drax moves within me, tries to come to my eyes, and I remember how hard I restrained Drax when I let the whip glide through the air to split her skin on her back. I ended up having to shut myself down to punish her for the crimes she committed, because everything in me told me to get her out of there to stop that from happening. I didn’t even want to whip her, but I couldn’t back down from Charles. He had a challenge in his eye when he said I should be the one to do it, and to refuse would make me weak. Expose a weakness I don’t have. So, I held that whip and gave her the lashes until she passed out, listening to Drax snarling inside of me with every strike. Every tear. Every drop of fucking blood.
She didn’t grow up in Eridian. She was born in the south in Zakith, at the Aragnis pack, stole a kid and manipulated another male. How did the other pack members get in Eridian? How did she make them stay? She must have stolen them too, like Sarah. Though I have no idea how that even happened. That girl is terrified of everything that moves, even her father.
“Do you know we have a graveyard in the forest,” Rhea says suddenly. Her voice rough from the lack of water, and my hands ball into fists at the thought. “We made headstones after a few years of being there. I made one for my mom and dad, and others made them for the ones they lost too. We have a celebration of their life every year at the end of winter and then to welcome the new life that appears in the spring.”
“Why are you telling me this? I don’t fucking care,” I growl. Where is she going with this?
“I doubt I will see it again, to add more graves there for the ones that have been taken from us. I would have liked to celebrate Solvier’s life with my parents and some of the members we have lost over the years. He protected Eridian, you know? He had done so for so long. Remember the story I told at the gathering? I told the story of the Canaric wolves. He was the male in that story, finding his bloodmate when he was about to run away with his pregnant chosen mate. Years later, that male’s bloodmate died and he went searching for his daughter and the woman. He eventually arrived in Eridian, and the Gods spoke to him, told him what had happened. He was distraught, unable to believe it and full of many regrets. But how can you go against what the Gods had chosen for you? He made a pact with the Gods that very day that he would protect the last place his chosen mate and daughter were, connecting his essence to the lilk trees that surround our home, which made the barrier. The Gods granted him a longer life than what he would have had, ensuring he could protect Eridian for a long time, but that didn’t make him immortal. When the barrier broke, so did he.”
“What’s your point, Rhea?” I sigh. The barrier had to break to get the Elites and guards inside. Aldus made sure it was done.
Solvier, the so-called guardian that he was, knew things he shouldn’t have. I could tell Rhea was close to him, he told me as much when he spoke to me. But she doesn’t know the things he told me, she probably never will.
“Solvier was chosen to protect Eridian and all who entered there that were worthy, with the barrier by the Gods. I was chosen to protect all life. Just like you were chosen to destroy it.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” I look her over closely, wondering where she is going with this.
“I wonder who will be in the graveyard when this is over.”
“I don’t care about your graveyard. Just tell me how to stop the curse,” I growl at her. She needs to give me something.
She shakes her head slowly from side to side. Her hair sticks to the blood on her face and body as it sways. “I do not know, Darius. I didn’t cause it, so how would I?”
“You’re lying, I saw it from the memory crystal. You can’t deny it.” She was in the middle of a stone circle, writing glowing around the edges, her arms stretched out at her sides as she chanted her curse and darkness flooded into her. Rogures came from the dirt around her, clawing and snarling their way to the surface.
“What you saw wasn’t real because I didn’t do it.” She hisses in pain as she shuffles on her knees, and my body jolts forward before I still myself, Drax pushing me toward her to ease her pain.
I lock him down.
“You will tell us eventually how to stop it, more blood will be spilled until then,” I snarl at her and stand in frustration. Turning and flicking a finger at the bars behind to reappear, I ignore the sigh I hear come from her. It’s weighted, resigned. I need to get out of here before Drax takes over.
“You have to believe me, Darius. I need to get out of here.” Rhea’s voice echoes after me. “You’ll end up regretting this if you don’t.”
We both regret a lot of things, and meeting each other is one of them.
