Matey-Dearest
1452 Words
ALLE
I'm not sure what their goal is, to starve me into submission or to starve me to death.
None is working.
The only thing they successfully manage is making me lose control of my emotions more times in the span of three days than I have in the past four years.
It makes me mad, knowing fully well what has happened to the pack members who were at that wedding, not knowing the fate of the rest of my pack.
We have a population of over ten thousand, every tribe and family all my responsibility in Grey Tree and now...their fate is uncertain.
All because of my incompetence.
I swallow, willing my heart to calm its endless racing, but it doesn't stop.
I pace every corner of the room, it has become a pastime in the past three days since I've been stuck here. My mind racing with countless possibilities.
I wonder if they must've made it out of that burning building.
I wonder how this...man, Winter Draven, manages to bypass a complicated security system that not even the biggest pack in the continent can break through.
We aren't the largest, but we are feared, revered even. So much so that no pack ever wants to have issues with us.
Who is he?
Who is Winter Draven?
And how do I kill him?
The door clicks open for the first time in three days and I don't give myself a second to think before lunging at whoever it is that steps in. I've gone over the plan in my head rather obsessively.
Rip the throat of the first person that walks in and then rip every other throat after that.
But whatever it is that they gave me remains in my system, and my claws are a disappointment, so I settle for my stiletto nails, digging them into the flesh of--him.
Something clatters against the wooden floor and the smell of something sweet and meaty hits my nostrils, momentarily distracting me from that scent he carries around like a curse.
"You smell." Are the first words Winter Draven says to me, his left hand holding a tray tightly while the other has turned red from something hot spilling on his pale skin. But it is healing, at a rapid rate.
An Alpha, just like I suspected.
My eyes snap up to meet his, but his remain trained on the spot behind me.
Right.
Blind.
He catches my hand and pulls away.
How's that even...possible?
"I had some things to attend to," he continues, speaking as though he didn't just make a nasty ass comment on my body odor which of course is his fault.
"I should have instructed them to feed you."
He walks around me, towards the bedside table and sets down the tray as well as what is left of the meal he brought over, for me.
"First of all, f**k you." My voice rasps from lack of use, "Secondly, if you put me in a room with an actual functional bathroom, or maybe--" I gasp dramatically, "--stop holding me against my will and face me like a f*****g man--" I grit out unable to hide the annoyance that pours through every inch of me, "--maybe I wouldn't smell so much."
There it is again, the slight twitch of his lips when he turns in my direction, the only proof that the man can actually feel.
"Since you spilled the beef stew, you can just have the porridge and I'll send someone over to clean up that mess." He gestures at the door before digging his clean hand in his pocket and the other he glares at, if that is even possible, as though he wants to cut it off.
Is he even listening to me?
"Why not just kill me and get it over with?"
I watch his shoulders tense, broad, powerful and they shouldn't flex so perfectly beneath that dress shirt but they do.
And I'm reminded of something else, something I've been trying to ignore and forget.
The mate bond.
He takes one step closer, and then another and then a few more until his leather shoes are touching my bared toes.
"I have no intention of killing my mate," he leans down, brows pulling together in a rather conflicted frown, "Not until you fulfill your role."
Right.
Bear him sons or whatnot.
"f**k that."
"You have a foul mouth," he muses, looking as though curse words are simply the tantrums of a child. His scent is there, piling up alongside the thousand other problems I have in that moment.
"Eat, you'll need your strength for the next full moon," he pauses, "When I'll mark you," he clarifies with a neutral tone.
Mark. Me?
Somehow I weaken even more in his presence, under that nonexistent scrutiny, my drug seems to work its way deeper into my system like a cancer. Burning through all of my defenses, silencing every strength of protest, settling in the pit of my stomach like a warning.
"And like I said before--"
"I remember what you said, they didn't hold much importance then, they definitely won't now." He interrupts with a haughty yet, chilly tone.
"Eat." He orders again, this time his lips pressing into a thin line. Disapproval, disappointment?
Impatience?
The man is an iron clad book with metal pages, I can open nor read a single thing.
"You think I'm going to eat anything you give me?" I bare out a humorless laugh, "Have you forgotten how I ended up in this cell?"
"Cell?" He raises a brow but says nothing else, speaking the word as if it is something revolting.
If his next words are 'I'm not keeping you in a cell' I'll claw his f*****g lips off that perfectly smug face.
"So," he leans back, crossing his arms over his chest, "You intend to starve yourself to death?"
I shrug.
He doesn't see it.
That must be their goal.
Oh right.
I have to give him babies first so he and his doctor, emotionally unstable girlfriend can play happy family with my child.
"I would rather starve, yes, but I won't die before I kill you,"
"Is that so?" I can actually hear the amusement in his words.
"Of course, matey-dearest," I respond in a higher pitched, sickly sweet voice.
A low rumble leaves his throat, I watch as his adam's apple bobs as the sound is made, I watch with unnecessary yet, fully focused deliberations as a vein makes itself known right next to his pulse.
I have to drag my eyes away.
"I have not, nor will I drug anything I feed you, moving forward," he declares in an all too self-righteous tone I've heard before, "The first dose is the only dose you need for complete docility."
I raise a brow, my expression mirroring his, "Excuse me?"
What the f**k does he mean by the one dose is the only dose I need?
What exactly had I ingested at that wedding?
He turns back around rather than reply, mutters something under his breath that I can't make out for some reason before picking up the spoon on the tray, opening up the bowl of porridge and then taking a bite.
I am beginning to doubt his 'blindness'.
Maybe it is a metaphor, when he says it.
I watch in awe and maybe deep down, sick satisfaction, as he eats and then swallows, his lips moving only for a few seconds.
"There." He doesn't turn back around only slightly faces the side, "Eat."
I make my way to him, slow, quiet steps.
He's blind, I think to myself.
Would he really see an attack if I am quiet enough?
"Alle?" He calls out. And every doubt I have about him being blind goes out the window.
"What are you planning?"
I don't breathe, don't speak. I force out a claw with severe strain. One is enough to get the job done.
Slowly I walk towards him, tiptoeing until I am right in front of him, his face comes into view and my foolish heart momentarily stutters.
Hatred. I remind myself as I raise my claw to his throat.
"I can smell you." He suddenly says and then his face turns, and his empty eyes are on me now.
"You smell like flames, Alle."
There is an intensity in his words that makes my breath catch.
"You smell like you'll burn if I touch you."
Then he leans down, placing his pulse directly over my claw.
"I will let you out, but only if you behave."
His breath is hot, torment against my face.
His words sink in.
"Eat, flame," he breathes, "You're going to need it."
- Writer
