I heard movement at the entrance and quickly scrambled up. I didn't know what to do or how to proceed. My first instinct was to hide. To hide from Valens. To hide from the world. To hide from the reality setting in. I wanted to somehow hide from myself too. I wanted to hide from the disgust crawling on my skin. I wanted to hide from the anger consuming me. I just wanted to disappear.I also wanted to sleep. I wanted to close my eyes and open them to see none of this actually happened. I wanted to sleep and wake up to see all of this had been a terrible nightmare and not the reality I was about to face.Who would I tell? How would I bring it up?I didn't even have the complete details. I could not say for certain how it happened or why it happened but it happened. Those pictures were proof of the violation. Proof of the lack of empathy, the wickedness, with which I'd been treated."Sagira?" I heard Valens' footstep approach and suddenly I was scared.I wasn't properly dressed. I didn't

I prepared myself to bare it all. I stood in front of a mirror and I prepared what I would say to Valens and how I would say it. All the time I looked in the mirror, all I could see was Lucien's hand all over my body and all I felt was a thousand bugs crawling all over my skin."I have no idea what happened but I woke up and I was in the basement and then –" I wiped the tears from my cheeks as I forced myself to look into the mirror. "And then there were pictures and I know I didn't – I didn't consent to them." My hands went through the mirror and it came down in a cascade of broken glass that dug into my fist."You son of a bitch!" I screamed, feeling numb all over as I gripped my head. My wolf still slept and I could only imagine how much wolf's bane I had ingested.I wanted to kill Lucien. I never felt such a violent urge before, never wanted anything as much as I wanted to see his lifeless body then. The minute the thought entered my head, my mind seized on it flashing countless p

I managed to fall asleep in the early hours of the morning but it felt as if I'd just closed my eyes when loud knocking sounded on the door. It took a minute of the knocking intruding into my dreams for me to get the memo to move. Celeste got the door before I fully woke.When I got out of my room, I came face to face with a grave-looking Jabari. The memories I tucked away to sleep came flooding back into my consciousness when I saw him look at me like that."What happened to him?" I asked, swallowing down the lump blocking my throat."We received a call." He paused and I wished he would spit out the words faster. The anxiety was choking me. "We – The Alpha pack, I mean. We are moving." The look on his face was the same one doctors wore to deliver terrible information about their patients."So he isn't coming back?" Celeste demanded, crossing her arms."It doesn't seem like it." He glanced over at me before looking away. "Usually he sets up an administrative before leaving but it look

I asked Jabari to add Skylar and Bethel to Lucien's cell but it turned out no one had seen them all day. I fiddled with the heart-shaped pendant on my throat as a feeling of being overwhelmed washed over me.Celeste had to report back to work for a few hours and Jabari assured me that he would secure the pack until Valens' return. He seemed to have a lot of faith that Valens would return soon. So much that I kept looking out the window expecting to see my mate. That was how assured Jabari made me feel.I looked at my allergy medication and wondered why it wasn't working. If anything, it just made me feel even more tired.Octavia brought me lunch and when she tried and failed numerous times to get me involved in a conversation, she finally left with an empty tray. I was hungry today and not as queasy as usual."I brought some snacks." Celeste came in holding a bag. Whatever was in her bag smelled delicious and I went at it with fervour. Celeste had a big grin on her face when I was don

VALENSI was going to be a father. My curse was broken. I don't think I had ever been happier than I was then.When we landed in Redville, I took a deep breath of the stent of the place.When I first arrived, there was no indication that this place would be any different from the others. When my mind set on claiming Redville, it didn't feel any different from all the other times when I seized on an idea.I'd long since adapted to the life of a wanderer. My leaving a pack was as swift and unexpected as my taking over it. My wolf told me he wanted a place and my body itched until I got up and went to take it. I'd repeated that process over forty times so there was nothing special or exhilarating about it.In the early days of my curse, I'd assumed the itch to move, to settle someplace else was a sign. The itch controlled me as I first saw it as a clue. I thought of it as a prompt from the goddess to enter a new land where I would find my mate.I couldn't spend more than three months in