“She needs to get pregnant.”
I wanted to throw up.
“The council has not decided who is going to mate her. She is not yours to take yet.”
“And you think she’s going to be yours?” Gunther took a large step toward Peter.
Peter being the smaller of the two, though still large enough to rival a mountain, didn’t look scared in the least when he shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe now. But I know she’s not yours yet. If they find out you tried this… ” He shook his head. “You’ll regret it.”
It took a minute for that to sink into Gunther’s head but when it did, his skin paled and he scurried out of the room.
“Are you all right?” Peter asked without looking at me.
I nodded because there was no way I could speak while still trying to catch my breath. Somehow he saw my answer and left, locking the door behind him.
I collapsed onto the bed and curled into a ball to let myself cry for the first time. That had been too close and I knew I had to try something to escape but didn’t know what. Whatever I decided need to happen soon because I really would’ve rather be dead than with one of them.
That night I didn’t eat the food Peter brought. Not because I was worried they were poisoning me but because any appetite I’d had disappeared the moment Gunther put his hands on me. I stayed there on the horrible mattress and cried until there was nothing left.
I cried until I was no longer scared.
I cried until I fell asleep.
In the morning, the sound of the lock disengaging put me on full alert.
“Breakfast,” Gunther grunted before dropping a tray on the dresser next to the poor excuse for a bed.
I refused to acknowledge him in any way. I wished he was Peter. As much as they all scared me, something in Gunther’s eyes made me fear him the most. There wasn’t an ounce of humanity in those dark eyes. Absolutely nothing soft. He then turned and went back out the door.
A full glass of water slid down my throat but did nothing to quench my thirst. I refilled it from the pitcher Gunther set beside the tray but couldn’t bring myself to eat any more than the toast.
Hours later, another large man came through the door. One I hadn’t remembered seeing. Without a word, he grabbed my arm and drag me from the room.
“Where are you taking me?” I asked.
He didn’t answer. We stopped inside another room with a bed in the corner, very similar to the one where they’d been keeping me. He shut the door. Fear and acid rose in my throat.
“I’m sick of the fighting. We’re getting this done,” he said. As he unbuttoned his pants, I knew what he meant by “this.” He was going to make me his.
“Please don’t,” I begged. “I don’t want this.”
“It doesn’t matter what you want.”
I wasn’t just going to lie down and take it. I charged him. Digging my nails into the flesh covering his face. It took him almost now effort to toss me to the ground. When I hit, my head bounced off the wood. I groaned at the pain. This was far too similar to what had happened with Gunther.
I hadn’t caught my breath before he was on top of me, pushing my shirt up and I just wanted to pass out. His fingers were rough on my arms. He smelled of sweat and something else that made me want to vomit. My head felt too heavy to lift, my arms too heavy to use.
There was a loud crash from outside that made him jump off me. Still, he pulled me with him as he stormed out of the room. My feet refused to cooperate as I struggled to keep up. I didn’t know what had made the sound but I was grateful for it. That man tossed me roughly back into “my” room and locked the door behind him.
I shuffled to the window and tried to pry it open but couldn’t get it to budge.
Standing there watching, fear skittered up my spine. The Balodis’ were running. Not away from something but toward. One thing I’d learned about werewolves was that they never gave up. Never ran in fear. Something was coming to them and they were going to protect what was theirs. And now that included me.
I ran to the door and tried to turn the knob but it wouldn’t budge either. Not knowing what was happening wasn’t what scared me. Not being able to get away from whatever it was did.
The door to the house crashed open. I’d listened long enough and been out of the room several times so I’d gotten a pretty good layout of the place. That crash was the door in the kitchen. The one everyone used. There was yelling from all sides of the house but I couldn’t make out the words.
Grunting and the sound of something wet, came from the other side of my door. Possibilities were endless. Gunther could be making his move and within moments I was going to be used and defiled without a second thought. Growling cut through the thick air. A fight was definitely happening out there.
Something slammed against the door as if whatever was out there would be inside in a matter of moments. The door rattled on its hinges. Then whatever it was thudded down the stairs. I couldn’t just stand there and wait for them to get inside to me.
The pitcher of water still sat on the dresser. I grabbed it. The heavy glass pitcher might do some damage. I lifted it back above my head the swung it forward and let it crash into the window. The pitcher shattered but the window cracked a spider web pattern across the surface. Then I pulled the drawer out of the dresser and repeated. Finally, the window broke open so I could push the remaining shards out. It’d be a two-story drop but I would’ve rather break my neck than be raped by Gunther.
When the doorknob jiggled again, I acted.
I leaned down to carefully get through the opening but a large, strong arm grabbed me around my waist and pulled me back inside. I kicked and fought with everything I had, throwing my elbows and struck my feet to the man’s shins.
“Elizabeth… stop… it’s… Phillip. You’re safe.” Phillip’s voice was like coming home.
Someone I knew wouldn’t hurt me. Yet my body wouldn’t release the tension until I saw him.
“Phillip?” I spun around. When I saw it was actually him, I threw my arms around him and squeezed with what little strength I had left.
“Are you all right?” he asked, his eyes scanning over me to see for himself.
“Yes.” I tried to keep tears of relief from falling. I couldn’t come apart. We still had to make it out of this mess.
“Stay close to me.” Phillip grabbed my wrist and pulled me along behind him. We took the steps one at a time in quick succession like we were sneaking but very quickly. “Watch your step,” he said when we entered the kitchen.
My breath caught in my throat, which burned with the acidic preview of vomit that wanted out to mingle with the coppery smell of blood. Three very large, very bloody bodies laid out in unnatural positions around the room.
The body closest to me was Peter. I shouldn’t have felt too bad. He did help kidnap me after all but he’d been the most decent of them all and had saved me from some of the ugly. Now he was dead. He’d earned that death but I thought in another world he would’ve been a man worth knowing.
Phillip glanced back at me and his jaw tightened.
“I had to get you out,” Phillip said like he was trying to explain the deaths to me. Which he didn’t need to do.
He rescued me. I wasn’t about to question how. I’d learned that with Orin and his family killing sometimes happened and if that person was a threat to one of the members, it wouldn’t even be mourned.
It was how they survived.
“He was… ” I swallowed hard. “Less barbaric than the others.” I didn’t want to tell him what that meant. I didn’t want to tell any of them that I’d almost been raped. I wanted to keep that to myself.
With one quick nod, Phillip was back to dragging me out of that godforsaken house and into the woods around it. We’d be less noticeable among the trees.
“Where are the others?” I asked as we made our way through the woods trying not to make a sound.
The Balodis had enough people around and I wanted
to avoid any further confrontation. I just wanted to go home. But I also needed to know where everyone else is. His large hand was still wrapped around my wrist like an iron shackle as if nothing could make him let go. It hurt a little but also made me feel safer.
He stopped so suddenly that I ran into his back. He held his hand up to quiet me before I had a chance to ask why we’d stopped.
Then I didn’t need to ask.
Three large masses blocked our path and stalked toward us. There were very few times that I’d wished to have the heightened hearing and vision that the werewolves had but this was one of them. I would have heard them coming the way Phillip had.
“I think you’re trying to make off with something that belongs to us,” the largest of the three snarled. I didn’t recognize him but his voice sounded familiar. He’d been on the other side of my door at one point or another. “We’ll let you walk away if you go now. But leave her.”
“That’s not going to happen,” Phillip growled back as he pushed me further behind him.
There are moments when you know something bad is going to happen. I’d honed that skill living with my father. An odd feeling usually filled the air before he went off on me so I’d know when to back away, try to isolate myself in my room. It wasn’t an exact science but it did sometimes help me avoid the back of his hand.
The three Balodis’ leaped at Phillip from all sides. They hit so hard, I was sent flying into the tree behind me. The contact knocked the wind out of me as I fell to the ground scraping my arm against the bark along the way. I laid there, gasping, trying to get even the smallest amount of oxygen in. My head pounded against my rib cage and black spots edged into my vision. I thought I was going to pass completely out. Finally, the pounding began to subside and I was finally able to suck in a large breath that made my lungs burn.
I couldn’t see Phillip, he was on the bottom of the werewolf pile in front of me and I didn’t know what to do. I was no match for them. I needed a weapon so I searched for one. The only things I could find were tiny switches that wouldn’t make a difference.
“They’re coming. Grab the girl,” a different man said but I didn’t recognize him at all.
While I was scared of the ones I knew, I was terrified of the ones I didn’t.
Another hand, this one much rougher, yanked my arm almost completely off my body. I was definitely going to have finger-shaped bruises on my forearm not to mention a sore shoulder. I scrambled to my feet. The other two Balodis’ had their backs to us but somehow I just knew one of them was Gunther.
Orin’s voice surfed the air like a dream. He wasn’t talking to me, wasn’t even close but instead called out to his brothers. My entire body came alive regardless of the throbbing pain and exhaustion. Orin was coming for me. He was so close.
Everything happened so fast that I couldn’t take it all in. I couldn’t get a good read on Phillip, where he was, what was happening to him. He’d been outnumbered and I was useless against werewolves.
But the one I didn’t know still had a hold of me. He tightened his grip as Gunther hissed. He suddenly released his grip making me fall to the ground again and the air filled with growls. I readied myself to run as I’d never run before but I didn’t have the chance. As I was about to leap into action, the Balodis pack took off running back toward the house.
I didn’t know what scared them off and I didn’t care.
My body relaxed and took a deep breath before searching for Phillip. He had to be close.
When I didn’t see him, cold fear crawled up my body, straightening my spine. I didn’t want to be alone in those woods for even a moment not to mention what his disappearance could mean. Something on the other side of one of the large trees groaned.
That was a groan of pain.
I couldn’t move fast enough. It was like my legs were trudging through mud, slowing me down. Finally, I got to Phillip laying on the ground and dropped to my knees beside him.
“Phillip. Phillip, are you okay?” It was a stupid question. I touched his chest and my hands were immediately covered by something warm and sticky.
Pulling them back, there was enough sun splitting through the trees to let me see the dark crimson running out of Phillip’s body. Something wet gurgled in his throat. My eyes filled with tears. Ones that I had no hope of containing. “Phillip. They’re coming. Orin will be here soon. Hold on. They’re coming.”
Werewolves heal faster than normal humans. Phillip needed to heal fast before…
I yanked his shirt apart where it was already ripped to find the very large, extremely gaping, slice from his collarbone to the ribs. I’d never seen anything like it.
My stomach lurched. I wanted to cry. Wanted to vomit and wanted to recoil but I refused. I wouldn’t leave him alone. I wouldn’t leave him to die alone in the woods.
“Phillip, tell me what to do.” I sobbed loudly because I couldn’t keep it in. “Tell me what to do. I’ll do it. I’ll do anything. Please,” I begged. He needed to tell me what to do to make him better.
He’d promised to protect me. Now he was dying on the ground and I wasn’t any more important than him. He had a wife, a child. I wouldn’t let little Ruby be raised without a father.
Something heavy settled on my chest. Something I’d never felt before. I’d never had a family so I’d never lost one of them. Now… now I was losing a brother.
“Please, Phillip. Please,” I begged again but my voice no longer had any energy behind it.
His eyes rolled slowly toward me, his breathing uneven and labored.
“Please just tell me what to do. I’ll do it. Just tell me.” I begged him to give me whatever would magically repair his wound. And I would’ve done anything. Anything at all.
“Diana… ”
“No. Phillip, stay with me. Tell her yourself, please.” I sobbed again, this time louder. “You should’ve let them have me,” I screamed as more tears choked my words. I meant it, too. Being used to breed would’ve been better than this.
Phillip tried to swallow. His throat contorted and he couldn’t get it down. Instead, blur spurted from his mouth. His body trembled, sputtered against me then stopped as I cried louder.
“Phillip.” I shook his body. “Phillip.” I sobbed and begged. I didn’t know what I was begging for. Logically I knew he couldn’t come back to life but I wanted to trade places with him. I would’ve done anything for that. “Phillip, please,” I whispered before collapsing onto his still chest.
How was I going to tell Orin?
And what about Diana?
Chapter Twenty-Seven
My body shut down. Right there lying half on top of Phillip, my brain refused to function. The side of my face was right against the gaping wound, his body warmth fading. Cooling unnaturally.
“Lizzie,” Orin called out. He sounded like he was at one end of a tunnel while I was at the other. “Lizzie.” The relief in his voice was momentary. His footsteps faltered just on the other side of his brother. “Phillip?” He dropped to his knees beside me.
I didn’t look up at him, didn’t want to see the pain in his eyes as he figured out what I already knew. That I’d gotten his brother killed.
“What… happened?” I think it was Ivan who asked. “What the fuck happened here, Elizabeth?” Definitely Ivan. He pushed me off Phillip with so much force that I fell back onto my bottom. My hands took the brunt of the impact. I tried to focus on the stinging because if I felt pain it meant this wasn’t all a dream.
I wanted to it be a nightmare.
Somewhere in the periphery, I vaguely acknowledged Daniel, Roman, and Antan. I hadn’t had time to consider that Antan would arrive and find his son dead. Because of me. I was waiting for their reaction. For their anger to be directed at me and I would welcome it. My only hope was that Orin wouldn’t be injured too badly in the process when he put himself between me and them. He didn’t deserve that. I did.
They were talking all around me. Mostly in whispers though Ivan so
metimes was louder. I wanted to burrow into the ground below me. Maybe not loving anyone would have been easier. Phillip would certainly still be alive if I hadn’t come along. Orin wouldn’t have been beaten by his own brothers. Their world would have been the same, balanced. Not whatever it was now.
“Lizzie… Lizzie.” Orin gently coaxed me to look at him.
My head only lifted because he lifted it.
“I’m going to get you home now. Can you stand?”
I didn’t know. Could I? Orin used his strong hands to lift me and somehow my knees locked and I didn’t tumble to the ground no matter how much I didn’t want to move or how weak my legs felt. With his arm securely around my shoulder, we moved slowly away from the rest of his family. Branches snapped behind me. Antan barked out orders that didn’t make any sense to me.
“What are they doing?” My voice didn’t sound like mine. The volume was barely audible but Orin had above average hearing so he’d hear me.
“Making a cot to carry Phillip home on.”
It made sense but the numbness that had taken over wouldn’t let me acknowledge it. Take him home… Sadness consumed me, turned my stomach. I had to stop to vomit. Couldn’t help it. Orin stood beside me, holding my hair back, not caring at the disgusting thing I was doing. He rubbed my back while whispering soft words. I didn’t deserve his kindness.
“What do you guys do with… ” I didn’t know if death was handled the same for them.
“We will bury him, Lizzie, just like you would.” His voice didn’t betray anything he was feeling.
That was all I had in me. It could have taken hours or minutes, time had no meaning to me but everyone around me was absolutely frantic. I knew we had made it to through the back door into the house when Orin’s mother gasped and asked what had happened. I thought that was what she asked but she sounded as if she was under water.
Orin carried my weight up the stairs and then I was vaguely aware of standing in the bathroom, Orin turned the water in the tub on.
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