“I’m so sorry. I really am. I want her to come back too. You are all I have left of her…. I only wish I could stand in her place and shelter you now, but he won’t let me be with you. Our time will come, I will see you again. Sweet, sweet, Alora.” She sobs a little under her breath, and then seems to swallow it down and push herself back to calmer. “I’ll sing to you, the wolf song. Such a pretty lullaby which’ll help you go to sleep. Your mother said she used to sing it when she nursed, and it was always Colton’s favorite melody to fall asleep to…. shhhh now.”
Sierra gently starts to sing, her voice wavering with emotion, but yet still lovely, so quiet, hushed in volume, so as not to disturb anyone else. The words of the Nordic song of old, that we sing at the Awakening ceremonies, according to my mom, because I’ve never been allowed to go just yet. They’re for the grown-up wolf’s who have something special beginning, and I hope one day that will be me too.
The notes and melody fill the air, like a beautiful serenading ghostly echo, calling on our ancestors to help pave my path to slumber, and I black out completely as voices begin to invade the room in which I lie.
You are Mine
I gasp, inhaling a deep almost vicious breath as reality crashes back in on me, shuddering my brain around my head and I’m startled awake ,back where I began, in the infirmary, gripping onto Colton’s leg for dear life, and so disoriented as my vision returns to normal. I can hardly breathe for a moment and have to drag air into my lungs while I get my bearings and shake my head to clear my blurry vision.
“What the hell?” It’s an automatic response, tartly said, as I try to catch my breath and Colton’s arm around my waist loosen as he lets me go a little. He was holding me up, I guess, and I flop as I’m released, using my hands on my knees to bend forward, and finally pull myself together. It all starts to fade, and the noises, and smells of reality fully bring me back to clarity.
“That was a memory… I saw it too.” Colton’s voice is gravelly, as though he’s just as shaken as me and I untangle myself from him and push to standing. My body spiking with unwanted tingles, and feelings I can’t contain, as so many things rush through my head. I guess we somehow mind linked while all three were connected and he got my memory too and could see what I did. My emotions are all over the place, as though I just experienced something traumatic, and he gets up to follow me around the bed, sensing I’m not emotionally calm.
“Are you okay?” he can sense my weirdness in mood, and I wrap my arms around myself to shut out the cold clawing feelings rising up to strangle me. Knocked sideways mentally, just needing a moment to claw my mind back together and figure out why my heart is pounding through my chest, and I feel sickly, and agitated. It’s more than the memory invading my brain, it’s what Sierra’s words told me.
“All I remembered before that, was being asleep in that room, and then waking up in a new place with other kids in the orphanage. There was nothing in between, and now I know why. He must have taken me there, and when I slept, I forgot it all. They told me the Munro family were gone, but I never really understood what they meant by that until later, when I was told the vampires came. Just kid, and then they told me my family was dead, and I never stopped to question anything beyond that.” My voice cracks, my throat aching with the effort as it drives home that now, I understand fully that they were killed because of my mother and my gifts. All of them! My mother, my family, the Munroe’s, my whole pack died, because of us, and what we are…. The vampires were never the monsters in our midst. We were, the wolves, and those of us who would slaughter women and children in the name of power.
We created wars to cover our sins and let a hatred rage for centuries without learning from the mistakes. It makes my skin crawl to know the vampires were the innocents in all of this, they are just avenging their lost loves. They were fighting the Juan’s of the world for what he had done, and now, I’m on the side that they are, in trying to find reason in the death of everyone I cared about.
“She really is a witch…. I mean, I know I saw what the Doc said, and all of this, but seeing it. It’s a whole other thing.” Colton pulls me back to him with his voice, he sounds distant, his tone low as he turns his head to her, and that spike of emotion hits my hard in the stomach once more. Tears threatening, and the sudden rage shooting up through my stomach, and chest, a pang of anger aimed his way. Remembering her words and what she said, and not for the first time, anger so intense for Colton, I could hate him.
“Why didn’t you just do it when you were meant to? …. This could all have been avoided! It would have been done and we would have remembered. Our gifts restored and taken another path! Why didn’t you just mark me when you had the fucking chance?! You’re an asshole! You could have stopped so much of this bullshit, by just doing what I needed!” It’s a sob, the damn breaking and my hurt showing, set loose amid fury as tears hit my cheeks, and I spin away from him, aware the medic in the far corner is trying to pretend she isn’t here and I’m going to wake doc up. I don’t want people watching us or hearing us fight. I want all of them to leave me alone while I go somewhere and cry this all out. Hate on him and mourn the path we never took. So much hurt that could have been avoided. The fates didn’t separate us to lead me somewhere else, they were backtracking to fix his wrong decision and circle us back around together to fix this. He just kept, and keeps on, screwing it up.
“Hey? … Lorey? …What the? …” Colton seems surprised at my reaction, blanching at me as I walk off, and as I stalk out of the room away from him, he doesn’t hesitate and follows me. Close on my heel as I get out of the doors into the middle corridor where he catches my wrist and tries to tug me back, but I shrug him off, pull my hand away and keep going. My head is bubbling with the facts staring me in the face, my heart panging with the reminder he destroyed everything between us.
“Leave me alone. You ruined it all!” I’m crying brokenly, tear sodden with the outpour, wracking pain in my chest that makes it difficult to breathe, as though an elephant is sat on my ribs, but he does not relent and sticks to my ass trying to catch my hands.
“Baby, come on. Can we at least talk about this… about that? I know I fucked up, but this isn’t ruined! Just give me the opportunity to do something about it.” There’s panic in his tone, an attempt at gentle, and soothing, with a lot of confusion as to my turn in mood. I storm down the corridor back to the room I was meant to sleep in, and push the door open with a palm slam to the wood, swinging it open at speed so it crashes against the foot of the bed and exposes the room. In no mood for him anymore, and I want to lie down and let this all wash away on a sea of heartbroken tears.
Colton doesn’t give up, he’s hot on my heel, relentless in his pursuit, and almost suffocating me with his proximity. This time he catches my upper arm, grasps tight, yanking me to a halt as I proceed inside, and spins me to him, so I have no choice but to face him down. I tense, body turning stiff in defense mode, and my eyes glow red in readiness to battle myself free.
“Talk to me!” He snaps the order at me, but it only riles that inner fierce that hates when he tries to command me to do anything.
“Stop it. Let me go. I don’t want to talk to you. It’s pointless and it’s done. You were an idiot, and you broke me, broke us, and now my memory tells me all you had to do was mark me and it would have changed everything! Why did you have to screw it up? Why did you have to choose her over me?” I slap at his fingers on my arm, and shove at his chest, making every effort to have him release me, but Colton is as stubborn as I am and only tightens that grip and stands steady, turning around halfway to push the door closed behind us, and conceal us in here. His face showing hints of piquing anger, in that furrowed brow, and one dimple is prominent as a scowl slowly appears. His eyes amber to match my own fierce glow.
“Okay, first, my marking you would have changed everything, yes, and I regret it, I fucking do, Lorey. More than you will ever know, but we would never have found her. You had to run, I see t
hat now, to be led to her, and maybe any other way we wouldn’t have. My mom would still be hidden because of that choice. Secondly……… How can I fix the damage if you won’t give me a chance to try? I love you, and we’re here together … I am not the one fighting this, and I’m not the one refusing to try. You were never second choice for me…. the problem was I didn’t want anyone else and didn’t have any fucking choice.” His tone is both tinged with anger, yet also not. He’s mad that I’m resisting and making this physical, pissed at me for what he thinks is my being over dramatic, but he’s trying to get through to me and communicate with that subtle hint of control, and softness, he’s trying to insert and it just makes me break all the more. Sagging as tears pour down my face, and I keep tugging at his fingers like a spoiled child, to be set free. Unable to really do much more, as energy drains from me. I’m exhausted and this isn’t helping.
“How can you fix it? You marked her…. You betrayed the bond and you’re linked to another, forever. I won’t be your whore, and the memory said marking…. not screwing. Let. Me. Go!” I tug one last time, glaring his way through watery eyes and he finally let’s go, with a weird sharp inhale, and stares at me like I have two heads as I jump back out of his reach. My entire body wracked with the hurt I’ve been carrying all this time, my throat aching with finally saying it out loud and how much agony those words inflicted on my soul.
“I did what now?” Colton on the other hand seems a tiny bit shocked, a lot dumbfounded, and his tone drops a level or two, his eyes on me homed in hard. His pulsating temper subdues to a low thrum, and genuine confusions takes over his face, with a deepening of his brows as he narrows his eyes on me, and that dimple disappears again as his mouth straightens out.
“I felt it… don’t try and deny it. I know what you did.” I snap at him, consumed with grief and turn away, unwilling to let him manipulate me with fast words and untruths. Wiping my face with the back of my hand and pull myself together, trying so hard to find my inner rage again, over this damn stupid weakness at what he’s done to us.
“We’re linked, you and I. Meaning you feel things like my marking someone else. Which you couldn’t have because it didn’t happen! Is this why you are so fucking mad at me? You have this crazy notion in your head I marked Carmen?” The bitter way he says it, the tinge of anger, and the less than friendly deliverance, only fuel the tornado in me I was trying to calm and I spin back on him, eyes glowing painfully as my inner wolf jumps out to battle for me.
“Don’t you dare! I did feel it… the pain and betrayal about four days after I left, so don’t stand there and fucking lie to me about what you did! I’m not stupid.” I yell it at him, temper hitching, and equally riled as I stand up to him, but he doesn’t back down. Colton can be scary as hell when riled, and he seems to stand taller, and bristle at my verbal attack. His eyes much like mine, increase in glow, of an equally pissed wolf and he reaches down to the hem of his t-shirt and yanks it up over his head, in one swift hasty motion, and throws it on the bed, exposing that tanned muscular physique. He spreads his arms out wide, looks me dead in the eye, before turning slowly and giving me a full three sixty of naked upper torso.
“Show me…. Because marking, is a two-way thing, and something I wouldn’t be able to hide! Look real hard because on my life, Lorey…I didn’t fucking mark anyone.” He bites it at me as he comes back to face me, and the blood drains from my body leaving me cold inside, as I take in his tanned skin free of mark. It’s hard to stay on this idea about marking when there is nothing at all on the flawless physique, except inky tattoos on one shoulder of his pack tribal, and a lot of carved toned muscle. My anger simmers, but she isn’t about to back down because I know what I felt! In the woods, that kind of pain and betrayal, it doesn’t come from nothing, and he had to have done something.
“Fine…. Okay, so maybe it wasn’t that, but what I felt was real. You obviously just screwed her then. Either way… this will never happen; the bond is marred, and damaged, and you did this to us.” I cross my arms across my chest, my fight dying because I was so sure, and yet I’m wrong. My heart pounding like a war drum within and my body, is beginning to tremble with the excessive amount of pain, and energy, coursing through me. Colton looks like he might explode, standing menacingly close, a new rage ignited in that angular face as he tenses his jaw and grits his teeth.
“I DID NOT fuck her!! What is wrong with you? All this cryptic bullshit since I came for you…. The refusal to let me touch you, all this. You think I cheated on you? That’s what all of this was about? Because…. You felt it? No, Lorey, what you felt around four days after the mess hall conversation was me finding you gone. Was me coming back from four days recon with Matteo, to find, not only the girl I decided to fight for was gone and it utterly destroyed me, but my Beta, my best friend, kept it from me! Stopping me from being able to find you and betrayed my trust in the worst way. Meadow broke my heart with a betrayal... You broke it by leaving. I came back for you, and to tell my father I would leave and take you with me if he stood in my way. She knew you leaving would break me and it did. I wasn’t ever going to mark Carmen; YOU, are my mate, and have been since the second we imprinted, no matter what I said, or how I seemed. I always wanted you. I’m devoted to you, crazy about you, and I won’t be happy until I’m marked to you! You’re my soul mate and I need you. Why in the hell would I fuck that up any more than I did?”
I stand in stunned silence, Colton breathy with the deliverance of an angry, then almost soothing to calm splurge of words, his whole demeanor softening as he reached the end, and his eyes returned to chocolate brown as he let go of the rage and tried to drive the point him that I was wrong.
He stands now, just looking at me with a slightly furrowed brow, over that cute boy expression of ‘forgive me’ and I can’t move. Stomach twisted in pain, and caught in a world of confusion, as his words reverberate through my mind, and heart, and I see-saw a bunch of emotions all at once. Elation, that in one rant he wiped away all doubt and confusion about why he’s been trying so hard to get us to connect romantically, the sweep of mad at myself that I left when I did and could have been with him all along, but he’s right about Sierra… I wouldn’t have found her otherwise, and maybe the fates always intended it this way after all.
I feel so stupid, so guilty, and ashamed, and I regret that it took until now to know this. I look down at the floor, unable to look him in the eye while shame washes through me and my own stupid pride takes a dent.
He didn’t break the bond, he didn’t betray me, and in fact, he came home willing to fight for me, only to find me gone and it was too late. I’m mad at myself for the weeks of shutting him out, when one link and he would have told me to come home to him or came for me. Weeks of heartbreak, and loneliness, when he was always there waiting for me, looking for me, and not about to give up on us. He meant it… he really didn’t, and I’ve held him at arm’s length because I believed his pain and betrayal was something else.
“Why didn’t you just ask me when I came for you? This could have been over then.” Colton steps towards me, his voice now low and level with regret seeping in. A soft little movement closer towards me, to tighten the gap and surround me with his smell, and presence, and I stay still, eyes dropping to my feet in both apology, and mental fatigue. Finally, able to let go of some of this anger, and pain, and it leaves a gaping heaviness within me because I’ve been carrying it for weeks. It was all so unnecessary.
“I didn’t think I needed to. I felt something…… we’re linked. I figured you knew that I knew.” I sound feeble, small, tears stinging my voice as he moves closer. Colton slides his strong, warm hands up my arms, from my wrists, until one rests on each shoulder, and he exhales heavily as he pulls me the last tiny inches towards him, so we are only millimeters apart. His touch and heat soothing me with his gentleness.
“I had no idea you even thought it, or I would have told you, Lorey. I had no idea this was in your head and assumed you would
have known I didn’t mark her. I figured you were mad about how it ended, and that I made you feel like leaving was the only option. I’m sorry, baby, for everything, but I swear on my pack, on my life, on us, that I haven’t done anything to betray the bond. I’ve stayed true to you. I’ll project every memory you don’t have of our time apart and prove it.” His soft voice falls over me like a warming balm, and I break down into stupid little sobs and thrust myself at him to be held. I’m the one who needs a little forgiveness in this moment, so easy to break when I know he never did anything to make me hate him.
Colton doesn’t hesitate and wraps me up in his arms tight and presses me to his chest, a full body hug, safe, and secure, as all the pain and heartbreak ebbs away and I cry for everything I’ve gone through these past weeks. Hating him, needing him, being broken hearted over him. It all seems so foolish and nothing now I’m wrapped up tight against him, with his breath on top of my hair, sweeping away all of it. The boy who was my rock, and my words of wisdom, right back here, where I need him, and he does what Colton does best. He holds me up and soothes away my anxiety and tears.
“I’m sorry…” It’s a muffled, pathetic noise, I make against his solid, smooth chest, his skin on mine is like coming home to the best place in the world and being enveloped in warm cozy safety.
“No, baby. I am, for everything. This is my fault. I failed to do what I was meant to. I failed to nurture and protect my mate and didn’t even figure out how much pain you were in over a stupid misunderstanding. Forgive me, Princessa…. Give me another chance to prove I can be what you need. What you deserve.” Colton leans back, sliding his hand between us to separate us a little, guides his fingers under my chin and tilts my face up to him so he can look me in the eye. The watery mess of a girl having an emotional break, and he wipes my jawline with his thumb as he does so, to catch some drips waiting to let go. Taking care of me, how he always does, and it makes it hurt with more intensity. I’ve been so stupid.
Awakening: Book 1 Page 52
