Gifts of the Moon Goddess

Ch. 1

*Disclaimer: Despite many mentions throughout this book of the potential of multiple mates, there will only be ONE mate for the lead female. This is not multiple mates.

Disclaimer #2: This book is written fully with the intention of being dark fiction, emphasis on the dark. Many characters will not receive a happy ending and there will be many elements some readers may find abhorrent and will not be to everyone's taste. I HIGHLY recommend you read the trigger warnings in the blurb before beginning this book.

Thanks for giving my book a try!*

Ice-cold water crashed into me, shocking me awake. The breath I gasped in made my throat and lungs burn like a fire had spread through them. Every inch of my small body felt far too heavy and any attempt at movement sent waves and waves of agony coursing through me. All I could do was cry out in pain. The heat I could feel on my face was a good enough indication that I still had my fever, a common side effect of a wolf shifter after being injected with a little bit of wolfsbane. Enough to suppress the wolf and weaken the person, but not to kill.

I thought I could almost hear a soothing voice trying to talk to me, but I couldn't make out the words. It was like they were being drowned out in an ocean of water before they could reach my ears. Honestly, I desperately wanted to believe maybe it was somehow my wolf, but the rational side of me knew that was impossible.

Wolf shifters usually first hear their wolf's voice at ten years old and experience their first shift around seventeen or eighteen. In particular, strong wolves, like Alphas, were even able to shift as early as fifteen. The years talking to their wolf and getting to know each other were really important. However, I had been getting regular injections of wolfsbane since the day before my tenth birthday, and had never once gotten the chance to hear her voice as a result.

Something cold and wet touched my skin, causing an involuntary shiver to race through me. I squirmed in discomfort as a pair of hands began to massage it into me, over the wounds I had gotten earlier. It burned, but moving too much hurt even worse, so I tried to grit my teeth through it.

"It's okay, Kyssemi. You're okay." Came a gentle voice I recognized.

I risked opening my heavy eyes, but regretted it immediately as the light in the room burned my overly sensitive retinas. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to twist away, groaning in agony as waves of hot pain seared through every muscle in my body.

"Don't move, sweetheart. The medicine will help soon. I promise." The voice sounded worried now.

I dared not look again just yet at the risk of my poor eyes, but I knew it was Layre, the doctor of the White River pack. For the last year, she had come to treat my wounds every few days and made sure I didn't die from the wolfsbane.

Once my wounds were taken care of and bandaged, and I had time to adjust to being conscious again, I peeked my eyes open warily. I looked at Layre, taking her in. The same short brown hair, the same green eyes full of sympathy for me, the same thick white coat that looked too big on her slim frame, the same strained smile that tugged on her lips.

"Kissi, are you okay?" She asked, her voice quiet this time.

I didn't know why she asked me that every time, when she could see better than I could that I was clearly not okay in any sense of the word. What wolf would be okay after being drugged, beaten, and then lashed with a silver whip? Even so, I barely manage a nod just so she doesn't pester me. There's no point in saying no. It's not like she could do anything for me if I did. Layre was kind, and I liked her, but she either could not or would not do anything to help me.

"I'll come back in a few days." She promised, but to me it's just a reminder that in a couple of days I'll be receiving my next wolfsbane injection.

She gathered up her medical bag and stood from the chair she dragged over to my bed, and I watched her retreat towards the door. Layre stopped short, though, and she stared at the door for a few moments too long before it opened and in stepped the cause of all of my agony: Bryce. My 'guardian', as he used to call himself, once upon a time. He had a head of messy black hair and bloodshot gray eyes accompanied by a pale, sickly complexion. He looked like a mess. He always looked a mess, but lately he also always looked sick.

"Remember, Doctor," he said, puffing out his chest in an attempt to be more intimidating. "No one is to know she's here. No one." He warned her.

"I remember, ex-Beta Bryce." Layre bared her neck submissively to him. "I won't tell anyone."

He moved out of the way, letting her leave, and instead turned his cold gaze to me. I felt knots forming in my stomach under his gaze. Bryce wasn't slurring, or swaying, or wearing vomit on his shirt, so I knew he wasn't drunk right now. I wouldn't be getting beat right now.

"You look like the spitting image of your mother." He growled out.

I wasn't sure if he was angry at me for looking like her, or angry at her memory. But, I wasn't about to ask. Without another word, he turned sharply on his heels and stormed out of my room, closing and locking the door behind him. The familiar 'click' of the lock was a reminder to me: I'm just a prisoner. A weak, helpless prisoner.

With whatever energy I could muster, I slipped my legs over the edge of my bed and sat up. The noises of pain I made only irritated the burning in my throat. Layre was right about the medicine, though, it was already helping. I already felt less feverish, and the pain wasn't all-consuming like it had been just a bit ago. It was manageable for now. At least until the meds wore off.

I forced myself up off the bed, my legs nearly giving out under me, but I grasped at the chair to keep me steady until the room stopped swaying. Or maybe I was swaying? It was always hard to tell. But once I felt a little more steady, I carefully made my way towards the mirror against the wall.

I wasn't really shocked by what I saw.

Bruises at various levels of healing covered my face and every bit of skin I could actually see. Bandages covered my arms where the needle marks were, my legs, and even though my nightgown hid them, they covered my back as well where the gashes from the whip lashings were the worst. Dark bags hung under my eyes, my skin pale, beads of sweat from my fever still spotting my face. I looked like a wreck. But Bryce also wasn't wrong. If I had been completely healthy, I would've been the spitting image of my mother. Long, wavy and untamable white hair cascaded down my back. Pale blue eyes. Freckles dotting every inch of my face, my arms, just over the swell of my breasts. The only difference was that I only stood at a height of 4'10, whereas both of my parents were actually rather tall, according to my memory.

Mind you, the last time I saw them was when I was five.

I still remember the face of my mother as the alarms in the pack went off. She scooped me up in her arms, intent on bringing me to the pack's safehouse, but father came running inside yelling at her to hide me. She did. She hid me in a wardrobe. She begged me to be quiet. To be safe.

"Don't leave, my sweet flower." She said to me, tears in her eyes. "Mama and papa will be right back. I promise, my love."

What felt like hours later, the alarms stopped, but neither of my parents came back to get me. I waited obediently. But they didn't come. Eventually, the wardrobe doors opened, but the face of a man I didn't know came into view. He looked like a man whose entire world had just come crashing down around him. Yet, somehow, I felt comfortable and safe with him. That same comfort you feel with someone who is family. He scooped me up and ran from the house with me, cradling me protectively in his arms. He didn't stop running until we got to his house. This house.

Bryce later revealed to me that he was the ex-Beta of my father's old pack, the White River, and that both of my parents were dead. Rogues, he said. They went into my parents' parklands to try and get to me. He said it had something to do with my wolf, but he didn't know many of the details. He felt like family to me, and I was only a five-year-old girl with no parental guidance, so, of course, I believed him.

For my safety, he kept me locked away in a bedroom with no windows. But Bryce took care of me and kept me fed, clothed, comfortable, and educated. Even though I was lonely and cooped up, it wasn't terrible. I was happy with him. He became someone I trusted and relied heavily on. Even when I started taking injections of wolfsbane ten years ago, life with Bryce wasn't really that bad. The pain and feeling constantly sick was awful, sure. But he took care of me. He was always there for me. He promised me that I could only ever be truly safe if my wolf never surfaced.

The younger me never questioned it. I fully trusted the man who saved and raised me. Everything he said to me made me fearful of the world and I clung to his every word.

I was just a young fool.

Honestly, I don't know when exactly it started. Everything is such a blur from the constant illness from wolfsbane. But, one night he came up to my room and woke me up by trying to undress me. He kept calling me by my mother's name, Amarant, feverishly. The smell of alcohol was sickeningly strong on him. When I finally made him realize it was in fact me and not my mother, it was like a switch flipped inside him and everything changed.

He beat me mercilessly until I lost consciousness. It was the first time he had ever raised a hand towards me. But from then on he would come up and beat me on the nights he was drunk. Always when he was drunk.

When I turned 18 he brought home the whip. It was made entirely of silver thread, which was another poison for wolf shifters. On the nights he administered the wolfsbane to me, he'd put me up against the side of the bed on the floor and he'd whip me, as well. My back and my legs bore the scars as memories

My life became so miserable I tried to end it myself. I tried to take my own life. To this day, my wrists bear the scars of those memories as well.

Bryce had brought in a doctor to save my life that time. Layre. I don't know why she won't help me to escape from my abuser, but at least she helps me to manage the pain.

I shuffled over to the bed and lay back on it carefully, groaning in pain. Closing my eyes, I focused inwards, trying to feel out my dormant wolf. Sometimes I can feel a presence and it comforts me to know that I haven't completely killed her. Other times I find a dark, heavy rage that's thick enough to choke on. But usually, like right now, I simply find an emptiness that doesn't belong. It's almost all consuming, like I'm missing a very important part of me; and I am. I am missing my other half. My wolf.

Despite the pain in my body, I move to curl up into a tiny ball, hugging my knees to my chest, and I let exhaustion lead me to sleep.