Chapter 74

Book 2 starts here! Thank you for your amazing support!

Alyson

I've known pain. I've lived in a world with nothing but pain. My teeth are stained with the excess of blood I've tasted, the wounds I have healed from physically, but the ones that scared me so deeply that I may never recover from fully, those are the ones I will never heal from. I try not to let it show, masquerading around my new life like I don't recall the last, like I don't know that the moon goddess sought pity on my life and sent me back to do what I was fated to do; find my mate and become Luna. Everyone sees it, though. Everyone.

As privileged as I feel, I still cower in the dark, fighting off the memories and flaunting a smile. I walk through the pack lands now, watching as the clan wakes to the morning, meanwhile I haven't slept in days. I lay in bed, beside my mate Ryan, the Alpha, and I wait for him to drift peacefully into oblivion before sneaking off to kill the night hours. He would hate if I were out here alone, meandering around as though I am a lost pup, but it's the only time I have to think in peace. I just need peace.

Truthfully, If I don't sleep, I don't feel the pain again.

My heart was broken, thinking I had found my mate, only to be betrayed by my own damned sister. Ryan killed his own brother, a necessary sacrifice, but I was only mercifully allowed to watch as my sister Jennifer was banished from this pack. She cursed my name, and our mother, before she shifted and fled. I still think of that day a lot in my sleep and even if it wasn't physical torture, it ached terribly. She treated me horribly but she was my sister. She was supposed to be my best friend. Everything changed when I died and Jennifer wasn't even upset, she turned into an opportunist.

I try to focus on other things now, my head spinning too quickly.

My wolf whimpers in my head, begging me to return to the palace, to our mate, but I can't bring myself back to lay down beside Ryan. He will ask questions, knowing I've slipped out again, and I don't have the answers. I don't have it in me to explain what I feel, what scenes reply over and over in my dark dreams until I wake up in a sweat and try to go at the cycle once more. It's exhausting. I can't have that night play out again.

I only have the memories.

I feel the needles in my arms, draining my life source, stealing it to be used to heal and feed the one man I thought would be my mate but he kept me locked in the basement dungeon, uncaring and ruthlessly using me to better his health.

Sometimes I think about how useful I was back then, how I was a toy waiting to be played with, but everything changed when I finally died. The moon goddess may have sent me back a different person, but the memories and wounds were still there. I would have accepted the death, taken to lose of my life with honor, if I had never been left with the exact memory of everything I went through the first time with these clans.

I try to blink back the sight of the dungeon, the bland gray walls and the murky, dark floors. I snatch my head away from the looks of the long, endless needles that poke into my surface, drawing more and more red by the days, weeks, and practically all my life. The stench is iron, both in the making of the bars of my cell, and the stench of my blood. They said it was perfect, useful, and it didn't matter how much it hurt me; in fact, I think they enjoyed it.

My legs are trembling now, my feet in the grass of the fields just outside the village, and I can't recall how I've gotten here but I settle for the spot, collapsing at last. I grasp at the wheat, the sunrise warm on my back in my silk gown, the wind brushing through my long, cinnamon hair and the light freckles perking up along my shoulders and cheeks.

I inhale the fresh field air, pulling the fragments together from my broken past. I know I can't heal myself by dwelling on the aches of what happened, but it seems familiar. I miss familiar. I only knew pain for a long time, torture being the one steady of my life, and it was always something I could expect. Being mated to an Alpha, being a new Luna of this clan, I don't know what to expect. It's petrifying at times.

"Alyson," Ryan says, his voice so calm and nearby. "What are you doing out here alone, my Luna? It's not wise for you to wander this far without some sort of protection."

I feel him sit beside me, his hand grazing my arm gently, kindly, and I fall into his warm side. "I don't need protection," I say. "I can handle myself, Ryan. You shouldn't worry."

I need sleep. I need relief. I need memory loss.

"You do, Alyson, and I have every right to worry. You have been through a lot in the last few weeks since we were mated in ceremony. I don't need anything else happening to you. An Alpha can't function without a safe, healthy Luna by his side."

"Then you shouldn't have mated me," I mumble, guilty of the words as I speak them.

"Enough," he snaps, a little more abruptly than I anticipated. "I mated you for a reason and I refuse to let you disparage it."

His hand brushes my neck, his gentle touch grazing the mating mark we created not so long ago. I eye his, just under his light sandy hair, his bright eyes finding mine in the haze that is between our wolves. We both feel the pull, the need to mate, but we fight it off for now.

It almost aches to do so, the feeling in my stomach growing into a painful boulder that pulls me further into my abyss. I've dug myself too deep now, falling into his lap, his hands holding me still as I let the rhythm of the memories jolt through me endlessly.

His hands on my arms, they feel like needles penetrating my skin. His gaze, it burns into my soul, like I'm being examined behind the bars of my prison cell, foot-tapping away while they wait for their blood. The heat in my stomach now, it feels like the heat in my throat, like I'm moments away from finally breaking free and burning that damn palace down to ash and pebble.

I manage to pull myself from the hole my mind has been swirling down into, Ryan cocking his head as he tips his head upward into the breeze. My wolf is whining in my head, my body hot to the touch like my perfect blood is on fire. He seems distracted, before returning to focus on me in his lap, brushing the hair off my shoulders.

Still, his eyes trace my mating mark. My eyes do the same to his.

I hold back a cough, a whimper of slight angst, and I tilt my head back into his hands. I watch his jaw lock, his wolf coming forward and communicating with mine. I can read his look clear as day, fully aware of what our bodies and our wolves are trying to say. I'm too scared to mention it out loud.

Ryan tries to lift me into his arms, out of his lap and this desolate spring field, but it's too late. I growl a noise unbecoming of myself, the pain shooting straight up my spine and fireworks popping through my veins. I can't hold it in anymore, I can't comprehend what this means but Ryan already does. His worried and hungry eyes say it all.

I'm defiantly in heat.