Filed to story: My Kidnapper Is the Wolf King
“Break it!” His voice echoes. “You have the power! You always have!”
“No.”
“Don’t be obtuse, Aurora!” Rain rolls down his face, his lips. “I’ll pull you down with me.”
I think of every dream he wandered into, smugness etched onto his face as he told me to fight. The hypocritical, condescending, obnoxious fool. “You are not even trying!” I shriek.
His throat bobs. The thread of the bond flickers in front of his face. Blake’s gaze moves to it. I feel what he’s about to do. Panic bursts within me. “Don’t you dare.” I grip the bond harder and grit my teeth. “People like you and me, we do not let go, Blake.”
He’s breathing as hard as I am. He’s steeling himself for something, and I can’t tell what. His emotions no longer run through me.
“You will regret this, little rabbit,” he says.
“It’s my mistake to make.”
“Stubborn fool!”
“Obnoxious snake! Climb!”
He grunts as, inch by inch, he hauls himself higher. I bend over the side of the well, and stretch my arms as far as I can. He reaches for me. He starts to slip, and he roars as he swings and manages to grip onto my fingers. His hand is cold and wet. I cry out as I grab his wrist with my other hand. I pull with all my strength, but he is a dead weight. I reach for the frayed rope instead. I put all my anguish into it, and it mends, then strengthens beneath my fingers. He grabs my upper arm, and I hook my arms beneath his armpits. I scream as I hurl myself backward.
We fall from the well and collapse onto the ground. Blake’s body pushes me into the mud. I can’t catch my breath. The scenery dissolves.
We hurtle upward. I hook my arms around his back, and he presses his face into the crook of my neck. We break through the room with the woman and the rabbit, the torture chamber, the cell, and the darkness.
And we’re back in the amphitheater.
I’m on top of Blake. People fight around us, but it all fades.
His eyes blink open. A tear slips down my cheek. He looks, for once, as if he’s struggling to know what to say. He hooks his arm around my neck and pulls me into his chest.
“Thank you,” he whispers.
Even though I shouldn’t feel safe, he’s warm and solid, and I melt into his embrace. He holds me tighter, and my nose presses against his shoulder. Everything that has happened crashes, full force, into me. My strength wanes; my bones turn to liquid. Everything fades away.
I don’t know if a minute passes, or an hour, before I find myself scooped off the floor and held against a strong chest. The scent of pine fills my lungs as I’m carried away. I don’t know where I’m going. I have no strength left to care.
He’s alive.
James’s rough voice sounds distant. “So, she’s the Heart of the Moon.”
“So it seems.” Blake’s breath brushes against my forehead.
“Why you?” says James. “Of all the Wolves in the kingdom, why would you be her mate?”
“I don’t know.”
But he does. Blake knows why. I feel this with a certainty that tightens my chest. I try to cling onto it, but everything fades away once more.
Chapter Sixty-Two
There is something soft beneath me. The scent of pine hangs in the air and mingles with woodsmoke. The wind roars, but I don’t feel it on my skin. My body is like liquid, and my eyes feel as if they’re welded shut. With great effort, I open them.
I’m in a bed in a small room. A fire crackles in the hearth, its light dancing over the dark stone walls and the thin rug in front of it. I wait for searing pain to flood my senses, but it doesn’t come.
“Hello, little sister.” Philip sits in a wooden chair by the bed, his long legs stretched in front of him. His coppery red hair sticks up in tufts, and his skin is pale, making his freckles stand out more than usual. The last time I saw him, he was bleeding, shouting orders at the Wolves as that serpentine creature reared before them. There was blood everywhere. And Blake. . .
I take a shaky breath, release it.
“Where is. . .” I swallow. It’s strange that I feel disappointment that Blake is not here, that the first question I want to ask is his whereabouts. “Where is everyone?”
A grin crosses Philip’s face. “He’s dealing with the prisoners.”
I push myself into a sitting position and frown. “Prisoners?” My throat is dry, and Philip nudges the glass of water that sits on the bedside table toward me. Candlelight flickers across its surface. I grab it and take a couple of deep glugs.
“Blake had the surviving Wolves rounded up. He’s locked them in the Grey Keep dungeons.”
“Why? Haven’t they been through enough?”
The chair creaks as he leans back. Philip usually dresses in the height of fashion, so he looks strange wearing a dark shirt that’s too big for him. It hangs off his lithe frame, and a couple of swirls of ink creep up above his unbuttoned collar.
“There weren’t many left,” says Philip. “He’s given them a choice. They accept him as their alpha, so he can command them to stay quiet about you, or he’ll kill them.” He shakes his head. “The Blood of the Moon. Remind me never to get on your bad side again, little sister.”
I sit up straighter. “What about Ryan?”
“He’s fine. He tried to visit you earlier, but Blake has been a little bit. . . protective of you. You’ve been unconscious for twenty-four hours. He only just left your side.”
“He’s. . . he’s okay?”
“Yes. Your mate”-I wince, and Philip’s grin widens-“is okay.”
I put the glass of water down, and my shirtsleeve swallows my hand. It’s black and baggy, and smells like forests and fairytales. Blake’s shirt. He must have changed me out of the bloody rags I was wearing when he carried me out of the amphitheater.
The crack of the whip and the wet sound of my skin splitting open reverberates through my mind, and I close my eyes and take a deep breath. Blake’s scent curls around me, and I release a breath.
“Is it safe here?” I ask.
“For now, it seems. Alexander’s army are otherwise occupied with Callum’s army.” Philip shifts in the chair. There’s a leather satchel at his feet.
“Are you going somewhere?” I ask.
He glances at the door, then lowers his voice. “Yes. And I want you to come with me. We should stick to the original plan. Come to the Snowlands with me. I realize things might have changed between you and Blake, but there’s something off about him. I still don’t trust him. The Wolves will tear you apart when they find out what you are, and Goddess forbid Father ever discovers it. . .”
“I can’t come with you. There’s something I need to do.”
He holds my gaze, his eyes searching, then inclines his head. “Okay.”
“I saw her, Philip. I saw Mother.”
His eyebrows lift before a pitying look crosses his face. “She’s dead, little sister.”
“I’m aware of that,” I say. “I just. . . I don’t know. Perhaps it was just a dream, or a suppressed memory, or my mind making sense of all the things I saw when I was young-but I know that what she told me was true. Father hurt her. He killed her, Philip.”
He nods, and something like shame crosses his face. “I thought as much.”
I bite my bottom lip. “Do you. . . do you want to help me?”
“I should. I wish I could. There’s something I must do first, too. I’ve not been entirely honest with you, Sister. The reason why I was caught by surprise when Alexander could command me was because I was claimed by another alpha in the Snowlands.”
“Ingrid?”
“No.” He smiles sadly. “An alpha named Fenrir.”
My eyebrows knit together as recognition jolts through me. “He is the wolf Alexander said was in the prison cell, with Blake and the others.”
Philip nods.