I awoke the next day sometime in the mid-afternoon. Not that it was very surprising given the events that had occurred the night before. Confusion was my initial reaction, finding myself in a strange bed, before my mind finally caught up. It still all seemed so crazy that, had it not been for the aching in my body, perhaps I would have thought the entire thing was just a nightmare. Or maybe I could have at least pretended it was. I changed into some clothes that were left for me and made my way into the living room, my movements all still incredibly stiff… only I found the quarters to be completely empty. I knew it was unreasonable to expect Aleric to be here but a part of me was still on edge from almost being kidnapped. Had he left to speak to Tytus in my stead? A knocking then came from the front door, making me jump, and I approached it warily. “Yes?” I called out. Without any warning, the door then swung open to reveal Alexander behind it

“...What the fuck are you doing back here?” Aleric asked. He stood in my doorway, arms crossed, staring at me like I was insane. But I didn’t care. My mind was made up. There was no way I was going to have this conversation tonight. “No,” I answered flatly. “‘No’?” “No, I’m not doing this now,” I clarified. “I’m too tired. We can talk later.” I rolled onto my side, facing away from him, and pulled the blanket up over my shoulder. Maybe if I closed my eyes and pretended to sleep, he would just leave on his own accord. “Aria, you need to tell me what’s going on,” he pressed. “Joseph told me you came back over the border and I thought he was joking until I caught your scent by the stairs. Did something happen? Were you caught?” “No,” I mumbled, repeating myself once more. “Stop that. Regardless of how tired you are, this is more important. I need to know if something went wrong.” I groaned out in frustratio

'...I could just ask her,' I thought to myself, staring in the mirror at my reflection.After that night, Aleric and I had agreed that we needed to come up with a plan on how to free myself from the collar… as well as remove Tytus as Alpha in the process. For obvious reasons, allowing him to proceed with marking me was out of the question, regardless of the terms Aleric and I were on now. And so we’d conceded that it was time. Time for Tytus to step down, allowing for proper change....But now that just left us with having to think of a way to actually achieve that.I’d spent hours already pouring over different ideas, but was mostly coming up empty. All of them either wouldn’t work or were morally questionable....Which was how it eventually led me to be staring at my reflection, contemplating something I normally never would have considered.To ask my former self for her help.The girl I hadn’t heard

“This is fake,” I said, coming off far more flustered than I intended. “There is no way there are people out there just running around with… with god powers. That’s… that’s so stupid.” It’s absurd. Insane. Some sort of joke. Because if it was real then that meant my life had been far more controlled than I initially realised. That there were powers at be far more advanced out there than just a Goddess mark. And it meant that Cai… I wanted to throw up. “Based on your reaction,” Elder Luke said, his eyes examining me, “I can’t help but wonder if this discovery isn’t actually all that foreign to you. Would I be correct in assuming that perhaps you have personal insight into the theory?” He was right. I was getting overly worked up because a part of me had already started piecing it together… and it scared me. The more I thought about it, the more plausible it became. Because, truthfully, there was something I wa

Warm. It was so warm. Everything around me felt like it was burning, our skin already flushed enough from the training just prior. …And I wanted more. With one hand tangled through his dark hair, my other was tracing slowly down the front of his chest, feeling every muscle under my touch. And Goddess was it flawless. His body moulded against mine perfectly, as if it had been made to fit there. '…This is wrong,' a voice whispered inside. And yet that thought only seemed to excite me further. It felt a million times better than I thought it would, his mouth moving hungrily as it responded against mine. His lips softer than I would have ever imagined. '…Stop…' There was a sense of urgency, a sense of need as I clung to him, pressing myself up against him closer, desperately searching for as much contact as possible. '...You need to stop.' No, I r