CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: IMPOSSIBLE
1240 Words
Sienna's POV
The moment Clara's finger pointed toward me, his gaze landed and stayed.
My pulse spiked and my eyes dropped to the damp oil-streaked dirt at my feet before I'd decided to look away at all.
Something in my gut went cold. Clara hadn't found me here by coincidence. She had been embedded long before I arrived, already trusted at Duke's side. The entire time I'd been counting enemies, I had been walking straight toward her.
The red-haired girl trembled beside me and I held my face still, caught between the weight of Duke's presence and the useless desperate need to do something for the only person who had shown me mercy since I crossed into Blood Moon territory.
"Sienna. Look at you. You're shaking."
Clara's voice drifted from several yards away, light and deliberately sharp, her heels marking each step against the metal dais in a slow, measured rhythm. Something sat wrong behind her eyes, hungry in a way that put me on edge.
"I remember you having a much bigger mouth back at the pack," she continued, dropping lower as she stopped inches from me. "It's nice to see you finally learned how to keep it shut."
Iron cuffs pulled the last of the warmth out of my wrists. My throat stung with ozone and old blood every time I breathed. I kept my eyes on the floor until I forced my chin up and brought my gaze to hers, jaw clamped so tight the muscles ached.
"How did you even find this place, Clara?" My voice cracked halfway through the question.
"Please." A slow smile with nothing warm inside it. "I've always been part of the inner circle. You were just too busy playing house to notice. Now tell me what that omega just handed you."
The ring sat against my forearm inside my sleeve, warm and steady. My arm stayed rigid. My breathing stayed shallow.
"I don't know what you're talking about," I said. "The guards are seeing things."
"Don't lie to me, Sienna. If you won't give it up I'll just have to take it."
Whatever composure she'd been holding cracked, and something jagged came through underneath it, anger that had been waiting for permission. Her hand rose in a sharp silent command toward the shadows behind her.
A scream tore through the hall before I could draw breath.
The red-haired girl flew forward as the electrified wire caught her across the back, violet light strobing for a fraction of a second, shadows jumping across the rusted walls. The other omegas pressed backward, their chains rattling.
"Last chance, Sienna." Close enough now to see the frantic twitch running through her eyelid. "What are you hiding?"
"I told you." Rage cut through the fear, sudden and hot. "There is nothing."
Another strike. Wet and sharp, followed by a scream that broke halfway through.
Past Clara's shoulder, Duke sat in absolute stillness on his throne, watching the violence with detachment, his face giving nothing away about whether this was his business or his test.
Clara brought her lips to my ear.
"Tell me the truth and I'll make sure Damien wakes up," she whispered. "You want your mate back, don't you? You're dying for it."
"Damien."
The name hit me harder than anything Clara had said. A tear broke free and ran a hot, stinging line through the grime on my cheek.
The red-haired girl's breath came in ragged wet gasps, her eyes clouded through a curtain of copper hair. She gave one tiny almost imperceptible shake of her head.
Don't.
Still protecting me. Still.
"Wait," I said, my hand moving toward my sleeve. "Fine. If it stops the whipping, I'll show you."
Clara's eyes went wide with a frantic ugly greed.
"Do it now!" The mask shattered. "I'm out of patience!"
She lunged.
The air in the warehouse died.
Temperature dropped as a wave of dark energy burst from the dais. It wasn't a sound but a pressure, one that made the floorboards groan and pulled the air straight from every set of lungs in the hall.
"That's enough."
Duke's voice resonated through bone. Every wolf in the hall dropped their head at once without deciding to.
"Clara," Duke said, his voice sharpening. "The girl is clearly more stubborn than you anticipated."
"My Lord, she's nothing!" Clara spun toward the throne, her voice frantic and climbing. "She's a wolfless stray hiding something. Let me just break her."
"Bring her to me," Duke commanded.
Guards moved with mechanical efficiency, knocking the iron from my wrists before grabbing my shoulders and driving me toward the dais. Two massive hands forced me down until my head hit the floorboards with a thud that sent white sparks across my vision.
His face stayed hidden beneath the hood. His presence pressed down from every direction at once.
"Human," Duke said. "You have quite the spine."
He leaned forward without waiting for a response, the shadow of his hood extending until it covered me.
"What did she give you? Tell me now."
I kept my face pressed to the wood grain, blood filling my mouth from where I'd bitten my own cheek, and gave him nothing back.
The hall went heavy and still.
"Look at her," an omega murmured from the surrounding dark. "She isn't even flinching."
"I'm telling you, my Lord," Clara hissed, pacing now, her fingers twitching against her silk. "She isn't human. I can't feel her. She's dangerous."
Dark energy coalesced without transition, wrapping around my throat and jerking me upward until my feet left the floor. My fingers clawed at something I couldn't locate. My airway compressed and the world grayed at the edges, narrowing to the sound of my own choked gasps.
Duke made a casual gesture toward the guards and the wire found the red-haired girl again. Her scream was the last thing that reached me clearly.
"Tell me what I want to know and the pain stops for both of you," Duke said, his voice cold and hollow.
I had no air left to argue with, so I looked at Clara instead and let that be my answer.
She wasn't smiling anymore. She had stepped back, pale, both hands shaking as she pointed at me.
"What is that?" she breathed. "Look at her eyes. She's a monster!"
My arms had gone heavy, my lungs burning for something that wasn't coming. My fingers found the ring through my sleeve and brushed against it one final time.
Damien. Wait for me.
A tear slipped free as the world went gray at the edges. On the floor below me the red-haired girl lay in spreading blood. My fingers went slack around the ring.
The pressure vanished.
The floor rushed up and air flooded back into my lungs all at once. I lay there gasping and shivering while the darkness retreated from the edges of my vision, color returning in uneven patches.
Duke stood over me, his posture entirely changed from before, pulled tight, his head angled down toward my forearm. When he finally spoke the words came out low and fractured.
"The white wolf mark."
The beta beside him sucked in a sharp breath, color draining from his face. "That can't be right," he whispered.
"No," Clara stammered, every layer of composure gone. "That's impossible. She's nothing!"
Through the copper hair fallen across my face, I looked up and let my lips pull into a bloody smile.
- Writer
