Chapter Two: NIGHTMARE

Lily’s pov

Red water pours into my throat. I'm sinking, slow, heavy. Above the surface, shapes blur, shadows moving, clashing. The scrape of claws echoes, distant and sharp. A howl cuts through. Mother's face wavers, then vanishes. Dad's roar trembles through the red. Deeper. Darker. The water closes over me.

***

“No!!!” I screamed and jerked off. 

A burning sting tore across my skin. I jolted awake with a scream, when I opened my eyes, the world blurred through tears, iron weighed down my neck, 50 metres long, holding fifty slaves in a single line.

A voice dictated, “Up! Up!” Another hot sting landed on my arm.

“You need to be fast, else the beating won't stop, I am Veyla.” She said with her bruised face, pale skin and a blistered lips

“I am Lily Ashcroft, how long have you been held captive? I asked carefully 

“Three years,” she replied

“Stop talking to avoid flogging” a voice came through from behind.

“That's Marathiel, my twin,” I looked at her small, violet eyes, scars filled her face with acne on her cheeks, the resemblance was uncanny.

A shadow shifted before me, “And I am Lady Seraphina Draegor, RISE!” She commanded

The iron weighed down my neck, the thick, cold chains clanked with merciless weight, dragging me down as I walked on the dirt.

“How dare you stare at me, lower your gaze,” she snapped 

“That's Zaryth” Marathiel whispered, “she doesn't like us looking at her, she loves Lord Gavin”

My mind pondered, “and just like that,I have lost my freedom, A slave overnight”

***

We walked through a narrow path. Tall grasses whispered in the wind, trench-like formations in a dense, green forest, thorny bushes clawed at the edges of the trail, and the air was thick as we marched, the narrower the way became, funnelling us toward a sacred well.

Lady Seraphina Draegor’s shadow stood with cruel poise over one of us while forcing his lips to the cold water. 

“It’s bitter” He spat out, eyes squeezed as if laced with herbs and strange minerals.

“We will call you, Echo” Zaryth smirked as Echo fell like his thoughts fog over, as though his very soul was being tethered in chains. 

My turn came, I resisted. The iron around my neck rattled violently as Seraphina shoved me forward. 

Veyla’s voice trembled beside me: “Don’t fight too much… It only worses the pain.”

The liquid burned as it slid down my throat, chilling my insides, I gasped, clutching the chain, my body weak. A strange calm settled over me.

Lady Seraphina Draegor watched from above, her eyes sharp with satisfaction. “Good,” she said. “Now you belong to us.”

We continue walking, beyond lies a port, Steep earthen and rock walls flank the sides, their surfaces covered in moss, ferns, and creeping plants.

“March forward” Zaryth barked

***

We stopped in our tracks, shackles rattling faintly.

Echo whispered, “It looks alive… as if the earth is breathing.”

“You are right” Veyla added “The wall rippled with strange, flowing designs,wave after wave pressed into the clay, as if someone had taken the sea itself and frozen it in mud. The surface caught the light in such a way that it seemed to move, alive with rhythm.

Marathiel muttered, “These are not walls… They are chains made from earth. Do you not see how the waves trap us? There is no escape.”

Zaryth barked at us to move, but we lingered, caught by the hypnotic patterns. 

An old man which Zaryth named Draven , his back scarred from countless lashings, lifted his chained hands toward the surface. “I remember these marks,” he said softly. His voice cracked with the weight of memory. 

“When I was a boy, my father told me that these patterns were water, the gift of the gods. They pressed it into the mud so the land would never forget. And yet here we are thirsty, broken, staring at water that cannot quench.”

Veyla tugged on my arm. “But it is beautiful,” she said, her voice almost childlike in its wonder. “Like fish scales, shining in the sun.”

The wall rose higher than any man could climb. Its rectangular openings,narrow, vertical slits, stared down like watchful eyes. 

Seraphina cracked her whip against the ground. “Move!”

One of the men dared to speak again, his voice low. “This wall will outlive us. Long after our bones have turned to dust, it will still stand, holding the shape of the hands that built it.”

Echo spat weakly onto the ground. “Then may it remember our suffering too.”

***

At The Courtyard 

We were herded into an open courtyard, the stone cold beneath our bare feet.

The sun beat down mercilessly, but it offered no warmth, only exposure.

And on it stood Gavin Frost Moor.

His presence commanded silence. He wore dark leather armor, his silver eyes scanning the line of slaves with indifference. Marrok stood beside him, arms crossed.

Zaryth stepped forward , bowing low.

“My lord, the new acquisitions. Fifty in total. The white haired one,” she pointed directly at me, “is the wolf from last night.”

Gavin's gaze locked onto mine.

The bond flared between us, sharp. I felt it thrumming in my chest, pulling me towards him as my mind screamed to resist.

His expression didn't change 

“Bring her forward,” he commanded.

Seraphina shoved me hard. I stumbled, chains rattling as I was dragged to the base of the platform.

Gavin descended the steps slowly, deliberately. He stopped just in front of me, towering over my kneeling form.

“You saved my life” he said, his voice low and devoid of emotion.

I lifted my head, meeting his eyes. "Yes."

"And now you think that earns you something?"

My jaw tightened. "I think it earns me my freedom."

Zaryth slapped me on the face. Pain exploded through my cheek. I tasted blood.

"Ingrate!" I screamed, spitting blood at Gavin's feet. "I saved your life, and this is how you repay me?!"

Zaryth grabbed my hair, yanking my head back violently. "You dare speak to the Alpha like that?!"

But before she could strike again, Gavin raised his hand.

She froze.

He crouched down, his face inches from mine. The bond pulsed between us, hot and suffocating.

"You saved me," he said quietly, "because the bond forced you to. Not because you wanted to. Not because you care. You're a wild, untrained wolf with dangerous power." He stood, towering over me once more. "And until I know what you are, you will remain exactly where you belong."

He turned to Zaryth. "Twenty lashes. Then send her to the dungeons."

"No!" I lunged forward, but the chains held me back.

Zaryth pulled me roughly to my feet, dragging me toward the whipping post in the center of the courtyard.

"A slave wants to be Luna?" Zaryth hissed in my ear as she bound my wrists to the post. "In your dreams."

She stepped back, drawing the whip from her belt.

"You're just a privileged damned girl," she sneered, circling me slowly, "who had temporary power to save the Alpha. Nothing more."

The first lash struck.

I screamed.

The second. The third.

Fire tore across my back. Blood ran

hot down my skin.

Through the haze of pain, I saw him.

Gavin stood on the platform, watching. 

Expressionless.

Our eyes met.

And he did nothing.