CHAPTER SEVEN
1354 Words
CHAPTER SEVEN
ELOWYNNE
No, no, no…
This can’t be.
The world around me felt like it was spinning around as Conrad’s words washed over me.
“I was awake because I don’t sleep well in new environments,” he continued to explain as my world unraveled. “I wanted to get a glass of water but lost my way in your big house. That was when I saw you sneaking out. I did the first thing my mind told me to, which is follow you—”
“Stop talking!” Shawn—or was it Xyron?—boomed. He looked like he, too, was processing everything he just heard.
“No,” Conrad said, surprisingly.
Xyron was bigger and obviously stronger than him. He could put him down in the blink of an eye. But I knew what emboldened Conrad.
The ‘atrocity’ he just witnessed.
“I call the shots here. I could end your lives by revealing what I just saw,” Conrad continued, stepping forward. “So I’d advise you to turn your back now, walk away, and forget any of this happened.”
Xyron cast me a glance, and I could see the several emotions in his eyes. Anger, hurt, but most potently, hate.
It was almost amazing how strong hate can be, even after being passed down from generation to generation. It was the same hate that was currently burning in my chest. The remnants of his touch that once felt so good now felt like sandpaper scraping against my skin.
“And you,” Conrad stepped into my line of view and roughly grabbed my arm. “I will take you home.”
“Wait.”
Xyron’s voice made us both pause. As he stepped forward, a traitorous part of me hoped he would stop Conrad from taking me. Instead, he stood right before me and placed his hand on his chest.
“I, Xyron Fang, reject you, Elowynne Vaelor, as my mate…”
“No…”
It was too late. Sharp pain pierced my chest as I stumbled backwards. I’d heard and read about the pain of a rejected bond, but nothing I thought I knew compared to the searing ache that tore through my entire body. I crumpled to the ground, clutching my chest as the anguish exploded through every fiber of my being.
Xyron looked like he was in pain too, but he tightened his jaw and spared me one last look. I memorized the hate and anguish in his silver eyes and locked them in a part of my heart as he turned to walk away.
Conrad grabbed me again, and this time, it seemed he was softer than before.
“Let me take you home.”
****
I didn’t sleep throughout the night. I'd lain in my bed with my hand pressed flat against my chest, willing the pain from the severed bond to dull, listening to the silence of the pack house and hating how loud my own thoughts were.
By morning, I was tired of lying in bed. I got up and freshened up. If today were to go like any normal day, I’d be early, even earlier than Elena, for healing classes.
But I knew today wouldn’t go like any normal day.
Immediately after breakfast, which I skipped, Father summoned me.
I stepped into his office to find Conrad already seated across from him. The sight of the two of them together made my stomach drop.
"Sit down, Elowynne," my father said.
"I prefer to stand," I replied.
Anger crossed his features. “I am your alpha, and I order you to sit!”
His voice boomed across the room, forcing me to take one of the seats before his desk.
"Conrad has brought something to my attention," he began slowly. "Something I would have preferred to hear from you."
"What would you have preferred, Father? That I confess to sneaking out for midnight training? That I'd been going to the forest for weeks?" I asked. My voice was steady, but my hands, clasped on my lap, were shaking. "Or that I'd found my mate, only for him to be a Frostvale?"
The room went very quiet.
Conrad shifted uncomfortably in his seat. My father's expression didn't change, but the muscle in his jaw jumped once, twice.
"All of the above would have been preferable to hearing it from your betrothed," he said quietly.
"He is not my betrothed," I said. "I never agreed to that arrangement."
"Elowynne!” He yelled again, but I remained unwavering.
“What punishment will I face for being caught with a Frostvale?” I asked stiffly.
My father exchanged a glance with Conrad, who has been silent all this while.
"Conrad has agreed," my father said carefully, "to exercise a degree of discretion in this matter."
I looked at Conrad, who had the decency to look mildly uncomfortable.
"Discretion," I repeated flatly. "You mean silence."
"I mean," Conrad said, "that what happened in that clearing doesn't leave this room. No one hears about the Frostvale you were caught with. However, I think we can all agree that the arrangement between us no longer makes sense."
"I'm relieved we agree on something," I said.
Conrad rose from his seat. He picked up his jacket from the back of the chair, nodded once at my father, and then at me.
"Alpha Vaelor," he said respectfully. Then, with something unreadable crossing his eyes, he addressed me.
"I hope you find whatever it is you're looking for, Elowynne. Truly."
He walked out of the office without looking back.
The door clicked shut behind him, and silence followed.
I turned to my father.
"How much?" I asked quietly.
He insulted me by pretending not to understand. "What?”
"How much did you pay him to keep quiet and cover up the embarrassment of your daughter?”
"I paid him to protect you," he said sharply. "Do you understand what would happen if the pack found out? If the Frostvale found out? You could be banished, Elowynne. You could be—" He stopped himself. Pressed his fingers to his temple.
"You should have thought about protection before you arranged a marriage I didn't ask for!" My voice rose before I could stop it. "If you had just listened to me, if you had let me be who I am instead of trying to package me into something neat and marriageable, none of this would have happened!"
"I was trying to secure the pack's future—"
"By selling me off! By deciding my entire life because you don't believe a woman can lead!"
"That is not—"
"You promised me!" My voice broke. "You promised me, Father."
The room was trembling, or maybe that was me. I gripped the back of the chair in front of me and stared at him across the desk.
He looked so much older under the sunlight streaming through the windows. So tired.
"I promised you I would try," he said, and his voice had lost its authority. “I tried, Elowynne. But the elders are pressuring me. The pack needs an heir—"
"The pack has one!" I cried. "Standing right in front of you!"
"You are a—"
"Don't say it." My grip on the chair tightened. "Don't you dare finish that sentence."
He opened his mouth and closed it. I waited for him to say something else or dismiss me if he had nothing else to say.
But his mouth kept opening and closing like he wanted to say something but physically couldn’t.
A grimace split his features as he clutched his chest.
"Dad?" I asked, stepping closer. Something was wrong. “Are you okay?”
Before I reached him, he had already slumped to the ground.
It happened so fast. One moment he was upright behind his desk, and the next the color had drained from his face entirely, and he was tilting sideways. I rushed over and grabbed his shoulders with both hands.
"Someone help!" I screamed toward the door. "Help! Get the healer!"
***
- Writer
