Chapter 45

Aurora

I’ve been doing the same thing every day for so long that the days are starting to jumble up in my head. I start in Xander’s room, wiping the floors on my knees, just like he forces me to do every morning. I am not allowed to sweep it with a broom, only given a simple, ratty rag and some kind of cleaner in a spray bottle.

My joints ache on the solid, thick floors. Xander is getting ready in the washroom, shaving the fresh, blond stubble that pokes out of his jaw and neck. He works slowly, carefully, and I try to match the opposite of his pace to get this tedious task over with.

It’s only to demean me. Just like the act of cutting my hair. It’s short and gray in color almost, so white that the shadows reflect off the strands to be slightly darker. I miss the feeling of my long hair. I miss feeling beautiful. Last I checked, my eyes are pale in color, void of any blue hue as I look like I’ve been given glass for eyeballs.

I’ve lost all color in my face except for the bruises. They spot me all over like bug bites, spread down the length of my limbs and across my neck and temples. Xander loves the sight of them. He taunts me with pain and it turns him on.

It’s only a matter of time before he takes the rest of my body and forces himself onto me. I am surprised he hasn’t done it yet but when I have asked before in the heat of him beating me senseless, he simply replied it’s not useful to me yet.

I didn’t ask him to explain further. I don’t want to know.

My fatigue hits again, a dizzy spell engulfing me as I fall sideways to the ground. I grab for my stomach, feeling my body cramp, while the migraine and daze attempt to pass through me. I know I’m gaining speed closer and closer to death with no end in sight.

Sometimes I beg for it to be here sooner.

“Get up!” Xander barks from the washroom. I spot his eyes in the reflection of the mirror.

I feel my head spin and I can’t even fathom the idea of standing, let alone sitting up, without threatening to fall back over. I line my arms up to help push me upright but it’s too late; I’m too weak. My pulse slows in my head, ringing slower and slower until it’s a constant ticking noise in the back of my mind.

“You better be dead or dying,” he rumbles, stomping a path over to where I lay.

He looks a hundred feet tall from down here. I blink lazily at his assertive presence, feeling his heat and his annoyance with my existence just by the way he ruts his brow at me.

My eyes close for longer and longer periods as I blink, feeling nauseated but managing to feel my wolf somewhere within me. She cowers under his heavy, hateful glare. He’s been ruthless to me and my wolf, degrading and abusive any time he can spare.

For a few short moments, I wonder if Jaxson is looking for me, wanting me back, but I know better than to let final wishes in death take over my mind.

He is moving on. I should try to do the same.

Xander hisses at the sight of me, still feeble and numb. “Aye!” He barks so loud that I flinch, waiting for him to kick me, hit me, or throw something in my general direction as always. Instead, he faces his bedroom door, one of his little minions poking their head into the doorway. “Bring me the other mutt,” he growls.

My heart flutters when I see Luke paraded into the room, silver chains wrapped around his wrists before his tired, skinny body. He is just as weary as I am but seeing him here helps me a little. My head finally eases in tension and I let my eyelids fall heavy under the weight of exhaustion. Seeing Luke is just the permission I needed to pass out.

Xander doesn’t seem to agree. He nudges his boot against my bruised cheek, forcing my eyes open. “Not so fast,” he hums. “You’re not dying on me, princess.” He turns to Luke who is holding his breath, his face ivory, as he and I haven’t seen much of one another in a while but we can both recognize we have lost weight and color. “Grab her,” Xander growls to my best friend. “If she isn’t back to normal before dinner then you’re cooking.”

I’ve been doing everything for Xander’s makeshift pack, including cooking meals for up to sixty wolves a meal. I know he has more in the pack, too, at least three hundred, but they are either rogues use to running free all day or royals who love the suffering of a commoner.

That doesn’t bode well for me and Luke.

“Undo these,” Luke growls, still so rough with Xander even after he has taken a number of his own beatings. He doesn’t care, still speaking through his locked jaw as he holds his arms out to display the heavy, silver chains.

Xander raises a cautious brow. “I am not my brother. I don’t give infinite chances. Be smart.”

My chest lurches, my body shivering, and I let my mind draw in the darkness at the mention of Jaxson. He did always resent Luke, and I know I’ve given him plenty of reasons to do so, but he never once actually did enough to kill him. It would be easy for Jaxson to kill Luke. It would take more effort for him to hold back than it would for him to go ahead and hurt my best friend.

I was angry before, seeing him hurt Luke, but I know it was harder for him to hurt him while he had to hold back trying to actually kill him outright. Jaxson was doing it for me, for the love of my best friend, and I never saw that until now, seeing Xander absolutely come close to killing both Luke and me on several occasions.

The chains hit the floor and Luke is by me in a second, his hands pressing under my side until he yanks me off the ground and into his hold. I’m weightless, partly dead, and all I can see if the night of my birthday party with my parents, at home, seeing Luke and Jaxson fight outside the front widow. Luke loves me, no matter how confused he may be, and I feel his love now as he hums a tune into my ear while whisking me from Xander’s room.

His tone is soft, slow, and it distracts from the oncoming of death.

I nuzzle in his hold, his arms weak like his body but he doesn’t let it show.

I hear a door close, similar to the one that leads to the basement where I have been sleeping for most nights. Luke is still sequestered in the small, metal cell on the main floor, apparently more willing to fight the royals while I have managed to be docile and of service.

I feel a cot below me, Luke’s arms retracting, and I muffle a cry as his warmth and familiar, musky scent leave my sides. He brushes his hand down my jaw and I feel it now that my bones have fractured, my facial features crooked in an unnatural, unpredictable way.

“I’ll get us out of here,” he says, speaking so low I almost miss his words.

He leans in, his lips pressing to my forehead, and the feeling sparks warmth through my body. It also gives me a burning feeling, his lips tainted with wolfsbane he is forced to drink in a venomous poison so that he doesn’t get to reach out to North Woods, or Mary.

I haven’t asked about his mate. He hasn’t seemed interested in sharing any of it with me.

“I’m ready,” I sigh, the words lingering on my lips for days but finally freeing themselves.

Luke brushes his hand over what is left of my hair. “Ready for what, little one?”

“Ready to go,” I cough.

My eyelids fall closed, the darkness so welcoming.

“Please, little one, hold on just a little longer. You can’t leave me. You can’t—”