“It means,” he starts, pushing against the table to stand and lean towards me, "that you have become too influenced by the outside world. This simply will not do. As you and I well know, you are already too fragile, too impressionableto continue down a path such as this.” He holds his knife in his hand still, lifting it almost absent-mindedly towards me as his voice raises. He’s not yelling, not shouting or losing his temper. But there’s a threatening intent behind his words. The power of the Alpha slipping through.
His eyes flick down to the fork in my hand and plucks it from my grasp with frustrating ease, before nodding to the servant standing behind me. “So, we are stripping things back to the basics. Scrubbing your routine of any variance and focusing on the details we should have been prioritizing all along.”
The servant steps forward, clearing my nearly untouched plate.
“And what details would those be?” I ask, ignoring the fact that I am apparently being denied dinner now. My voice is shaky as the words come out. Because I already know the answer.
“More time within the Temple,” he offers finally. He takes his seat once more, the remnants of his chewing overlap with his words. He pulls a napkin off the table and dabs at the corner of his mouth before lifting his glass of wine again. “Dedicated time to your studies. Perhaps some service to the gods alongside the other abominations.”
I flinch at the word as he takes a long, deliberate sip from his wine glass.
“And obviously, a more aggressive treatment plan. Not at all unlike what you experienced today.”
My head spins, my stomach sours. “No,” I argue, but it comes out a whisper. I cannot withstandmoretests, more experiments. I’m at my wit's end as is, clinging to what threadbare strings remain of my sanity.
I throw a desperate glance my mother’s way, a plea in my eyes for her to do something—say something. But as always, her head is bowed, her concentration elsewhere. As if she’s not even present for the terrifying truth my father just shared.
“You can’t.” My voice breaks on the words. He has to see the torment he’s putting me through, how he’s whittling me away, till not a scrap of my true self will remain. Till I’m nothing more than a hollowed out core, mindless and subservient.
But no matter how much it pains me to accept, I know that’s what he wants. That his entire world would be simpler if I was someone else entirely. A good and faithful member of the Watchers. A respectable daughter to the Alpha. One that doesn’t question the way of things, doesn’t doubt her faith or fight her orders. And no matter how much he beats me into submission, I know I will never have it in me to be that person.
“Tamiel,” my father calls out. My brow furrows, because I hadn’t known she was even here. But his command pulls his right hand from the shadows, nonetheless. I feel a swift pinch in my neck followed by a burning sensation. “Take my daughter to her room. It appears the new medication is not agreeing with her and I’d rather not have to witness her hysterics.”
I cannot even process what is happening, the world around me blurring at the edges as I slump into Tamiel wrapped around me. I open my mouth to argue, urge my arms and legs to fight back. But it’s like my whole body has become heavy as stone.
I hear something like a whimper, and realize too slowly that it's my own pathetic voice crying out for mercy.
“Of course,” Tamiel responds, and I hear it through layers of fog, as if the words are traveling underwater to reach me. I feel my body going horizontal, my view of the dining room spinning on its axis as Tamiel gathers me in her arms and turns away. I watch my mother and father through the blur of the sedatives now flowing through my veins, the picture–perfect couple enjoying a meal as if it was any other night. As if they weren’t locking their only daughter away to erase all semblance of her existence from this realm.
And I know. This will always be my reality. No amount of treatment, atonement, or supplication to my father will ever make him reconsider the hells he’s putting me through. Tears roll down my face, the image of my parents enjoyingtheir meal bobbing as Tamiel carries me further and further away, until the sight is extinguished altogether.
Iease myself behind the door to my room, making my movements as quiet as possible when I spot Sterling curled up in my bed.
Shit.He must have been waiting for me to return, and fell asleep. I don’t want to wake him. He looks so peaceful in his sleep. Instead I shrug off my veil and leather jacket with the Blood Order’s crest stitched across the back. I throw the mask on top of the dresser and drape the coat across the chair in the corner, making sure to pull a pack of smokes and my lighter from the breast pocket before slipping through the sliding glass door on the other end of the room.
I don’t bother closing the sliders, letting the wind play with the dark curtains that separate me from him. It’s quiet out tonight, a rare occurrence in the ungoverned district. But I know why that is. I may have been masked, butI made my presence known when I dropped the burned remnants of Tyge’s body—made sure everyone knew the Blood Order had exacted vengeance for the shit Tyge was pulling and would do so again, if necessary.
The truth is, I don’t give two fucks about the people of the ungoverned district. This isn’t my home. These aren’t my people. These shitheads can fuck their lives away for all I care, strung out on some lab-manufactured drug peddled by the very people working so hard to eradicate our kind.
My eyes drift to Sterling and I wince. Except I have my own shithead to worry about. It’s been years since he’s been exposed to a substance like that, but I worked too damn hard to bring him back from the brink of death. Have spent too long repairing the trauma he faced at the hand of our previous asshole Alpha and nursing him back to health after we left our city, Sommael.
We’ve fought hard to get him to where he is, finally sleeping through the days and only experiencing the occasional panic attack. I’m not about to let some fuckhead come along and bring that poison into another city. Nor will I let that shit traumatize Sterling further or trigger him into some sort of regression.
I lean against the half wall that lines my patio, looking back into the bedroom through the curtains rustling in the night air, and catch glimpses of Sterling’s tranquil features in the quickly receding moonlight. I let a cigarette slip out of the pack in my hand and hold it between my lips as I flickthe lighter on and cup my hand around the flame to protect it from the breeze. When it ignites, I suck in the smoke, letting the nicotine flood my system and take the edge off from another shitty night in this shitty city.
“Is it done?” Aamon’s voice calls from the shadows of the next patio over. I leave the question unanswered for several moments, needing a couple more drags to have this conversation.
“It’s done,” I answer at last, the smoke putting an extra layer of gravel on my words.
Aamon emerges, swinging his legs over the halfwall and perching atop it. His hands are folded in front of him, his elbows resting on his knees. He’s shirtless—the jackass always is—proudly showing off the never-ending layers of ink dancing across his skin. My eyes track the dual blood drops on either side of his collarbone, the mark of the Blood Order. My own heat against my chest, making my skin itch in recognition.
“I’m sorry, Zeke. This shit wasn’t yours to deal with.” He shakes his head, the shadow of a bruise still lingering on his cheek—one that should have healed hours ago.
“You should spend more time looking after yourself and less time apologizing for shit you can’t control,” I respond, taking another drag before plucking the cigarette from my mouth and offering it over. He takes it reluctantly, and I watch the end crackle with specks of orange. I motion to the bruise lingering on his face. “You need to feed.”
Aamon runs a hand over the abrasion, chuckling to himself as if there’s some inside joke I missed. “It will fade, it’s just a bruise.”
I eye him warily. This is a game he’s known to play with his primal side, starving the beast and denying himself what he needs most. A game I tire of putting up with, because it will only end in misery.
