Mate

Cyhilenia

One minute I was dead and the next minute I woke up with the face of another.  

If it were a rebirth, I would have understood. But this wasn’t. I was sure my face got swapped because my body felt the same.

Same scars under the skin. Same aches from the accident.

I kept staring at the mirror on the wall adjacent to the bed I laid on. Silver hair, did my hair get dyed?

I was wearing Summer Varye’s face.

This hospital felt familiar too. It belonged to Dr. Paedyn. But then, she was nowhere to be found.  

It got worse because my attempt to leave and see my daughter only had me in restraints, with nurses claiming I was going berserk.  

I’d demanded to see Paedyn at least. But they wouldn’t listen. Rather, they were respectful, claiming I needed to rest my head.

Then he showed up and time literally stopped.

Logan Dorne.

He filled the doorway like a storm that forgot how to be gentle. 

Tall. Broad shoulders straining the black coat he wore like armor. 

Dark hair, slightly messy, like he’d run his hands through it a hundred times tonight and still didn’t care.

His eyes, gods, they were grey like the winter before snow.

It was cold and calculating. But when they landed on me, they burned.

Like he was memorizing every inch of Summer’s face and hating me for wearing it.

He was breathtaking. Sharp jaw, cut clean 

enough to slice lies. 

His lips pressed thin, like he swallowed every soft word he’d ever learned. 

There was cruelty in the way he stood, in the way everyone bent around him without permission. Alphas didn’t ask for space. They took it.

My breath caught. My traitorous body recognized danger and called it beautiful.

"Hate him" my head thought because I heard of the rumor that he bought summer and signed her away like cattle.

But my eyes betrayed me. They traced the vein at his throat that jumped when he looked at the restraints on my wrists. 

The way his hands curled into fists at his sides, like he wanted to touch me and kill me in the same breath.

He was a sin made flesh. And I hated that for half a second, I forgot to breathe.

When he had stepped closer, his scent hit me, cold fire and cedar that made my knees weak.

He thinks I'm her and even if I'd argue, I still can't win this case because I wear her face.

Staring at him from this distance, I suddenly thought.

What if I was given a second chance? What if I use this position to gain my revenge?

Feeble, I lifted my head to look at him. The last conversation I overheard before the accident was summer vowing not to marry Logan.

The rumors hit me then. Logan Dorne killed three alphas before he turned 25. 

Bare hands and left their heads at the border as a message.  

He burned down the East Territory market because one merchant overcharged Summer’s father by two coins.

They say he doesn’t blink when he kills but watches. Like he’s memorizing how death looks on people’s faces.

The contract with Summer? He didn’t negotiate. He wrote it in blood and told her father to sign or watch his pack starve that winter.

Dangerous didn’t cover it. He was a rumor made of teeth and winter. The kind of monster parents used to scare cubs into bed.

And right now that monster was crouched in front of me, touching my face like he owned it. Because in his mind, he did.

I snapped his hand away, breathing hard.

Fine, I'd be her but never play a puppet because garett would pay for taking my daughter from me.

Logan left, which should be a relief but then with me, were bodyguards and nurses ready to guard me with their lives.

Few minutes after he left, the door burst open before I could breathe again and suddenly I was staring at averia and garett.

They rushed in like they had the right. Like grief belonged to them.

“Summer! Thank the moon!” Averia threw her arms around me first.

I smelt lilies and lies. Her nails dug into my shoulders.

"Let go" I whispered, with a voice that sounded like summer's voice.

It was broken and made me sick because I couldn't fight yet.

Garett was next. His scent hit me like a blade, pine and smoke and home. 

The scent that used to mean safety. That used to mean “I’ll kill for you.”  

Now it just meant traitor.

He pulled me into his chest. His arms, the same arms that used to cradle our daughter to sleep, wrapped around 

Summer’s body like he’d earned the right.

“I thought I’d lost you,” he murmured into my hair. “Both of you.”

Both of you? As if he hadn’t walked away from me and our daughter a week ago. As if he hadn’t looked me in the eye and said 

“Averia can give me what you can’t. An alliance with the Varye line. You’re just a rogue-born nobody.”

Hate flooded my head for them both yet they embraced me like I was something precious with their fake tears warm on my skin.

The door opened again and it was Logan with maids holding trays of different delicacies.

His eyes dropped to my face, while the maids kept the meal on a table.

But he said nothing, more like he'd anticipated them to come and rather than leaving, he took his seat to watch like it was some soap opera.

I wanted to scream, brawl Garrett's out and ask him if our daughter’s face haunted his dreams but I couldn't.

I played summer instead, the broken girl they thought they'd control.

“I… I’m tired,” I muttered as I let my voice shake, I let my hands clutch weakly at Garett’s shirt like I still needed him. The lie burned. “Please. I want to be alone.”

Averia pulled back, eyes wide and wet. The perfect victim’s face. “But we just got here—”  

“I said alone.” My eyes lifted just for a second and long enough for garett to see it.

His gaze wither but it wasn't recognition but unease, like he saw a ghost in summer's eyes.

He flinched and dropped his hands.

“Come on,” he told Averia quietly. “She needs rest.”

I was breathing hard and averia looked like she'd stay.

"You heard her" Logan finally spoke, cold and dominating. I shifted my gaze to him, only to find those grey eyes pierced my soul.

Averia rose up with garett holding her hand and immediately, they left.

The sob I'd been holding crawled up to my throat and my chest hurt as the room felt like it was going in circles.

I pressed both palms to my mouth to muffle the sound and my shoulders shook.

For one second I let myself break. I had to stay strong for me...for her.

I didn't hear Logan footsteps but I felt his presence.

"I said I want to be alone" I snapped sniffing and shaking my head. He bent silently, his face was so close that I lost my breath for a second.

"You're stuck with me summer" he whispered, we exchanged breaths. "Alone doesn't apply to me"

Was he scared I'd commit suicide? What does he even need summer for if she had no crown on her?

I was speechless, as my anger steamed up as tears in my eyes.

I don't want to be controlled in this life, I don't want to be stuck with another man that I might lose my sanity for.

He heaved a sigh, took his seat beside me, then glanced at his wristwatch like I was wasting his time.

"Just cry wife, you'd only die again keeping it in"

I tilted my head to stare at him. He was so bad at advising and I fell back to the bed, sobbing.

I felt his hand on the small of my back, petting me like he cares.

And I cried. I really did in the same space with a devil.