Present day
Stalsgard, Arszden Kingdom
Belladonna
I stared at the wolf's eyes.
It's the strangest thing to see myself reflected in them.
It's been 321 days since I've been in captivity.
He's been here for 157 of those days.
And for the entirety of my existence, I dreamed of him every night.
Until I saw him for the first time.
And the dreams stopped.
But throughout each and every single one of the past 157 days, I have not once seen the fire in his eyes grow a shade lighter.
Neither of us is caged, but we are both prisoners all the same.
Not because we are both surrounded by walls, although I would understand why anyone would assume that was the main reason. To be fair, it was a fairly important part, but, more than that, we were prisoners because our hearts had been caged.
We were both butterflies — gathering, swarming —, with bulging eyes and fragile bones, flittering around nervously toward imagined destinies. We hurled our bodies at the panes of tantalizing windows, aching for the world promised on the other side. Day after day, we dragged injured wings and eyes and organs around the same four walls. And yet, opened or closed, the exit eluded us.
Still, every day, we hoped to be rescued by a breeze, hoping for a chance to see the sun.
And each day we didn't and the venomous plants nearly ate our wings, we lived in despair, still batting our wings in stubbornness looking for the way out.
We both struggled to survive, but we both knew we were meant to die.
Like him, I still have a wild spirit that breathes as boldly as it did the day I was first carried into this place, bleeding and unconscious. His eyes were a shade away from golden, but under the faint morning light, they looked almost translucent gray, though the frigid determination could not be mistaken in the way he followed the movements of the humans around him, noticing all details, waiting for the time when he'd be able to pounce on his chance to run free.
Like him, I have a potent instinct with which I knew from the very first moment I opened my eyes I would either die in this place or die fighting my way out of it. He carried himself with elegantly lifted shoulders, proudly defiant as if he would never bow himself to the will of another, except that of his own fate. In all the days he's been here, I have never seen him follow a single command or look at anyone with anything rather than contempt. He knows he is not in the position to bite back whenever the tip of a whip smacks his loin or muzzle for growling, but he has never backed down from a single lash, accepting them as valiantly as he should a soft touch.
Like him, I am loyal, deeply protective of those I love, and consider family, having been willing to fight to my dying breath for them. His pack was all massacred the day he was brought here, by the guards themselves. They'd been tracking his pack for weeks before they approached them, having waited for the perfect moment to attack. The females had new pups, born in the middle of the winter season, still young and fragile. When the guards attacked, they all rushed to protect them, leaving their male alpha vulnerable. With an arrow to its hind, he was left incapable of protecting himself or others, though he'd tried. After killing the entire pack for pelts and meat, the guards brought him in, dragged by a rope around his hind legs, yelping faintly with his thick, smooth, white fur coated in blood, thinking they'd have better luck bending a wolf that'd been wounded than one that depended on no fragile kindness to survive.
Like him, I have been hunted and captured. Despite being feral at his core, willing to claw and maul his way through whoever he needed to in order to free himself of this place, he'd grown docile to those who'd shown him compassion over his time here. He was too big and too wild to be safe to stay within the farmhouse, so at first, he'd been chained by a collar in the snow-coated slave quad. As he'd learned by the sting of a whip not to bite the hands that fed him, the chains were taken off, though the collar remained, as did the sod and stone wall that kept him enclosed, which he'd never managed to jump over. Now, he usually sleeps inside the farmhouse, in a stall of his own near the door, domesticated enough to let himself be hauled in and out of the farmhouse at will. Still, he allowed no one to touch him, but he will eventually bow his head and blink his eyes slowly at those he is thankful for making his days any more bearable.
In his eyes, anyone can see the longing to run free, and the resolve that should such an opportunity arise, he will either be gone or dead before anyone can stop him.
But that day has never come — for either of us.
My footsteps slowed as I let my gaze drift over him.
And for the first time in 157 days, as I stared at him, he stared right back.
My breath caught.
Head settled on the ground, he'd lain down on his belly on the frosting snow that'd fallen overnight when he'd been taken out of the farmhouse into his old shackles earlier this morning, letting the fresh snow gently fall over him, nearly burying his large body, leaving only his muzzle and one of his ears peeking out. His eyes looked almost orange with the contrast of the snow around him, but the same observant gleam covered them, as always.
And in the translucent irises of his eyes, I see myself, reflected there.
It's grown hard to tell which one of us is more feral. Wilder. Hungrier. Bloodier. We've both grown compliant at the hands of merciless violence, but neither one had bowed before the hands that beat us. In fact, some days, I feel more wolf than woman, almost as if I carried this wild wolf's heart in my chest, howling at the moon through the cracks on my ribcage, his racing footsteps echoing around the walls of my lungs.
A broken echo of a heartbeat resonated inside my chest and the air I'd been holding left my lungs in a cloud of white mist.
The sky was gray as always, nearly paper-white, becoming one with the fallen snow, the fresh snowflakes tumbling from the sky with lazy graciousness, a view only contrasted by the dark branches of the trees weighted down by sprinkles of snow that resembled fingers reaching out into the misty sky and coming up empty. The wind was razor-sharp, cutting into the exposed skin of my cheeks and lips, whipping my hair around my head in a turmoil as rebellious as my thoughts. I hid my chin within the old brown cloak I'd been rewarded with a long time ago, the fur at the top now raspy and scratchy from overuse.
I long for freedom, too, wolf of the wild.
"What are you staring at?"
The voice came from somewhere in front of me as a guard noticed that I'd stopped walking to stare at the wolf lying in the snow. I immediately heard footsteps signaling the guard had backtracked his steps to reach me, forcing the line of thralls to stop, their chains clinking as they all came to a halt in the snow.
Startled, I broke off contact with the wolf, glancing down at my feet in subservience just as a shiver danced down my spine and multiple grumbles of protest rose from all around me as the thralls were forced to endure another moment in the piercing cold of the winter. The one behind me was changing her weight, shivering quite severely despite the cloak on her shoulders being even thicker than mine.
The guard stopped at my right side. "Why did you stop?"
My eyes flew to the wolf as I noticed in the back of my mind that he'd lifted both his ears, his eyes set on me and the guard lingering at my side. The fact that he'd taken notice of the guard's presence and his attention on me made a small furnace ignite in my chest.
Could it be…?
As the wind blew more softly, I could smell the honeyed scent of sweet alyssum flowers clinging to the guard's undergarments that reminded me so much of home the homesickness made a fist squeeze my heart into a ball of pure feeling.
The Keiserinne often used the scent of such flowers to torture me by having bouquets of them placed literally everywhere in the fortress precisely because she knew it reminded me of home — a home that was forever lost to me when she'd taken me from it by killing all the family I had left.
It felt like a rather poignant reminder that she'd taken everything from me.
"Why did you stop?" The guard repeated.
I stared at him. Then at the wolf, swallowing something that tasted an awful lot like venom.
"The wolf?" He asked.
Startled at the guard's voice so close to me, I trembled, blinking as I came out of my own thoughts. For a few seconds, I had to furrow my brows as I couldn't understand what he'd meant by the question.
Though it dawned on me quite quickly.
I didn't answer, feeling my body grow stiff until a single flutter of a muscle could make me come unhinged.
"Colt, we're going to be late." Another voice said from further down the line of thralls in front of me.
"The Keiserinne will forgive us just this once," the one closest to me replied.
I didn't dare to move my head, but I wanted so very desperately to look at him that I nearly did, before I realized that that would most likely be a mortal mistake.
"Fine." The other one replied with bored exasperation, shielding himself from the wind a few feet further against the barracks of the hay stocks. "Indulge yourself, then."
I dared a peek at the guard still beside me, feeling my cheeks grow warm as I realized he hadn't deviated his attention from me. Clearly, he was watching me quite closely — either for my reaction or for another reason altogether, I couldn't be sure —, and when he saw how my eyes skirted upwards in surprise at finding him watching me, he smiled, showing off his teeth that seemed sharper than a wolf's — and just as deadly.
Like all guards, he was tall and muscular, all sharp edges and built strength, blunt like the blade of a sword and just as tempestuous. He was dressed in the usual black-leather attire with a black cloak hiding away his weapons underneath it and even without looking at his eyes, just his closeness told me he meant to do harm.
The guard smirked wolfishly as he leaned closer a few inches, placing his mouth at my ear. "I know you are the dødelig nattskygge," he whispered, leaning in as I felt a hand lacing around my elbow in a loose grip, and through the corner of my eyes, I saw the wolf lift his head from the snow, eyes sharp as he stared at the guard.
I know you are the deadly nightshade.
He'd said the words in his native tongue, but I understood it all the same. I hadn't been born here, but I recognized enough of their native tongue to be able to translate the few words I'd heard most often since being here.
Especially the nickname I'd been given upon my arrival.
I knew I couldn't deny it, but confirming it meant probably an even bigger punishment for having stopped to stare at the wolf.
Every day, the guards resented the fact that they had explicit orders not to touch me — which encompassed harming me in any way —, so they took their frustration out on me however they could when the Keiserinne wasn't present to protect me — if her sort of possession could even be called a form of protection. They hated my status within the fortress and the forbidden stamp on my body was something that never failed to make them more ruthless than usual.
I kept silent.
"I know you are the Keiserinne's favorite toy," he kept whispering. I heard a small grimace from behind me, probably from the girl behind me, but he didn't even look up. His hand moved from my elbow to the small of my back, until it landed at my hip, firmly settling on the side of my hipbone, and even though it was covered, the mere touch seemed to make my scar burn. With a strong push, he hauled me into his chest and the scent of his clothes, rather than his skin, invaded me once more, making it very hard to breathe. "She doesn't let us touch you, you know? She says you're sacred. Won't let anyone take your innocence from you." His lips touched my earlobe. "I think she's scared that if anyone deflowers you, you won't be able to perform for her. A bit of a puritan belief, in my opinion, but she's the boss." He shrugged, masking the shiver that moved like a blizzard through my body. "However, I am sure that if I tell her the wolf got loose and took a small bite out of you, she won't be too angry."
This time, I couldn't contain the tremble that took hold of my limbs — and we both knew it wasn't from the cold.
I did agree with him, on one point, though.
The reason behind the Keiserinne's safe-guarding of my purity had very little to do with my ability to 'perform' for her, as he'd put it. To be honest, I wasn't even sure that sort of concern was even rightly justified — or possible, even. It actually had quite more to do with the fact that she knew, from her time torturing me after she'd kidnapped me, that I wasn't as scared of that possibility as I was of the part of me she was constantly forcing me to use.
And why torture someone with something they're not scared of?
"I happen to think it's cruel to deprive you of that experience," he continued and my eyes pointed pin-straight as I felt his hand moving lower over the side of my thigh. I felt his chest, solid as a rock against my shoulder as he leaned in, and even through the clothes, I felt his groin hard against my other thigh. I shut my eyes tight. "She's not the boss of your —"
A loud snarl interrupted him.
Surprised, the guard's head tipped to the side as a shocked laugh flew out of him. His chest shook against my shoulder and I realized that my heart was beating erratically in my chest.
As I brushed one eye open, I followed the guard's gaze across me to the wolf, that'd risen from his spot lying on the snow and was now poised in the stance to attack, snarling viciously with all his white, glinting fangs showing menacingly. The fur at his loin was standing and his hind legs were bent like he was ready to fly through the distance separating us and tear the guard apart.
What the Hel?
The guard didn't seem all too threatened by the wolf's sudden aggression. Mostly surprised. Intrigued, even. I'm sure the wolf had had sudden spurts of hostility before, though the surprise on the guard's face didn't match that assumption, nor the fact that the other guard quietly moved closer from his shelter beneath the storehouse barracks.
Like they'd seen him angry before but had forgotten how dangerous he could actually be because he'd stopped going through the effort of actually showing any aggressiveness.
However, I knew two very distinct things.
There was a reason the Keiserinne kept the wolf as a pet and it wasn't just for show. The wolf wasn't loyal to her, but it was a dangerous weapon nonetheless, birthed as an expert assassin since birth by nature itself. I had heard rumors about what he'd done to some of the thralls he'd been left alone with, though I had never witnessed any form of violence from him firsthand until now.
I usually only ever saw him lying in the snow on cold mornings, looking extremely bored and tired of it all.
I feel just like you.
I held my breath, but the truth was I could barely move — could barely breathe as the guard slowly moved his right hand under his cloak, presumably to take his sword out of its sheath, his eyes never leaving the wolf.
I watched in awe as the wolf took a few steps forward, snarling, each step crunching into the snow under his paws, the sound reverberating in my ears. His eyes never wavered from the guard and as he let out a low growl deep from its throat, for some reason I couldn't quite explain, I felt a sense of relief wash over me at the realization he was protecting me.
He was protecting me, wasn't he?
Although, if he was indeed protecting me, why?
Not that I was complaining, but I did wonder.
I had seen him many times before, but he'd never looked more majestic than right now.
He was big, even for a wolf. He was about half the size of a full-grown man, with teeth just as big as a man's, but sharper. His fur was thick and heavy, but soft, hanging to his sides like a thick curtain of white, as white as the snow, his eyes burning golden like embers in a dying fire — even without his direct stare on me, I knew how intense it was, like he was looking right through me, almost like he could see right into my soul. His body was tense, claws sinking into the snow. He wasn't too far away, only around twenty feet or so from us. His chain would probably allow him to travel around over half of that distance. Still, his smell carried with the wind, just like the air, but richer. It smelled like freshly tilled soil and firs and wet grass, a deep smell that lingered after the wind robbed it from me.
His eyes moved for a few seconds to me and I could have sworn his eyes turned a heavier, darker amber, almost burnt orange.
I saw him as the glorious and graceful creature I'd always known he was.
His fur was like battle-worn armor, its eyes like lava stones, its sinews like black leather. It was old, ancient, drenched in the wisdom of ages, and it was in love with the snow —
His eyes darted back to the guard in a flash as the man moved his hand the slightest bit.
The wolf's snarling was a low rumble as it stood still, eyes on the guard, evaluating, observing, watching.
Waiting.
"Kortev, we really have to go," the other guard said, his voice penetrating through the silence that had settled over us.
"I know," answered the guard, voice light, though I could feel his unease at the wolf's behavior.
The guard's hand tightened on my hip as if to shield me from the wolf's fury, but I knew that wasn't his intent altogether. If the wolf wanted to harm either of us, there was nothing anyone could do to stop him. I could see the fear in the guard's eyes as he backed away, his own hand reaching for the hilt of his sword.
But before he could unsheathe it, the wolf lunged forward, his jaws snapping shut just inches from the guard's face as the man was quick to push us both back a step. The clanking of the chains around my hands and the wolf's neck followed the sound of surprised shouts from the other thralls as my movement jerked their own chains. The girl behind me toppled to her knees in the snow.
The step back made the guard's hands fall away from me and relief poured into me again for a totally different reason.
The guard had been too close, had been too much and the wolf had sensed it.
The guard pushed me behind him.
"Kortev!" The other guard yelled. "Seize that wolf!"
Footsteps sounded, muffled by the snow.
The wolf snarled again, advancing slowly, displaying menacing teeth, and emitting a new deep, guttural growl that reverberated through the air. With each step it took, the ground seemed to quake beneath his feet. His fur rippled and shifted like a sea of molten lava. The air around him shimmered with the darkest aura of wrath with the heat of his breath. His ears lay flat against his head and his eyes glowed fiercely in the scarce daylight. The clinking sound of his chain added to the eerie atmosphere, like a constant reminder of his captivity.
And how he was going to make them all pay for it.
I waited with baited patience for the wolf to attack.
But as the other guard approached, sword-drawn, the wolf suddenly stopped his advance and instead turned towards him. His snarling grew louder and more ferocious, causing the guard to hesitate for just a moment.
It was all the time the wolf needed.
With lightning-fast reflexes, he lunged forward, his jaws clamping down on the guard's sword arm.
"Kerr!" The guard in front of me screamed.
There was a sickening crunch as the wolf's powerful jaws shattered bone and tore through flesh. The guard cried out in agony, dropping his sword as blood sprayed from his mangled limb. The other thralls screamed but remained locked in place by the set of chains linking us all together, and so did I, transfixed by the violence unfolding before me.
The wolf shook his head, flinging the guard's arm back and forth like a rag doll. Blood splattered across the snow as the guard writhed and screamed in pain. I could hear the sickening sound of bones snapping and tendons tearing as the wolf continued to savage the man.
I couldn't move, could only watch as the wolf shook his arm in his jaws and then finally, spat the mangled arm out, the hand gone, flesh hanging from his mouth. In fact, he released the hand he'd severed from the arm like a piece of rotten meat he'd been tricked into tasting. Blood poured from the sides of his muzzle, between the teeth he now bared at the guard down on the ground before him, as he focused his entire attention on him.
I shut my eyes, refusing to look at the man's severed hand and arm as he clutched the stump to his chest, slowly crying as he cradled himself as one does an almost-asleep baby.
The wolf stood over the whimpering man for a few seconds, seemingly toying with him, before he reared on his hind legs and landed his front paws hard on the guard's chest. His claws sank into the man's chest and slid down hard, flaying the skin and muscle away from the bone. A sickening crunch sounded as he punctured the man's chest, blood welling up around the wolf's white paws.
The guard screamed and thrashed, writhing in the snow.
Blood poured into the snow.
More shouts, louder this time and more desperate, pierced my ears. I looked over the guard and saw the other thralls standing, trying to break free from their chains.
To no avail, of course.
The guard in front of me was yelling words I couldn't make out through the blood rushing through my ears as he tried to approach his injured brother, but the wolf bared his teeth at him.
The guard froze in place, but the wolf didn't hesitate.
Now, the wolf's eyes shone like fire and his snarling was unending. He was like a beast let loose from a cage, a well-oiled killing beast. At the guard's apparent intent to move, the wolf was poised and ready to attack, his fur standing on end, his eyes still blazing like they were lit by some unearthly power.
I heard shrieks coming from the thralls around me, chains rattling, feet shuffling, and heads shaking in disbelief.
I couldn't move.
But then, I heard the sound of rushed footsteps and several faint glimmers of light reflecting off the snow. I narrowed my eyes as I suddenly realized what they were, eyes widening in shock.
The guards were coming.
Running towards the blood and the screaming.
And the wolf.
The snow crunching under their feet, the cold steel of their swords, the creaking of their armor.
The guards were fast, their speed unmatched with the wolf still chained to the wall. The snow rose in their wake, their boots thudding against the earth, their swords smacking against their sides, their weapons rattling like the chains of their thralls. Along with the wolf's howling was a chorus of grinding gears, stomping boots, and blood-thirsty howls. They all wore black, combat leathers, but their shining silver swords reflected the sun's light.
Seeing them coming was like having acid poured into my veins.
The taste of blood filled my mouth as the guards approached. There had to be at least a dozen of them, which meant they were probably almost all here, right now. My throat burned like I'd been gurgling lava, my lips cracked, and my tongue felt swollen. The taste of iron and salt flooded my mouth as I licked my lips.
The first guard drew his sword, forgetting about the still-screaming guard in a pool of his own blood on the ground, forcing the wolf's attention to shift back to us. He growled lowly and bared its teeth, ready to attack again, muzzle dripping blood onto the snow.
The smell of fresh blood was like the scent of cloves in the air, a thick, sharp scent and so red against the snow it resembled coals freshly pulled from the fire to quietly pool on the ground in thick streams as they cooled down.
"Come on, mutt. Come taste the end of my blade," the guard coaxed, voice low and murderous.
No.
I knew I had to do something to prevent them from hurting him, but I didn't know what to do.
I stupidly stepped forward —
The chains kept me back, of course, and before I knew it, I planked on the snow on my stomach, arms pitched forward above my head, the nearly sizzling cold assaulting me through my clothes.
In one swift jump, the wolf jumped, jaw wide open —
I screamed.
I felt the saliva from his mouth on my hands as I heard his jaw snap closed. His breath of fresh-fallen snow and the human blood on his breath reached my nostrils, turning my stomach. I felt him pull, paws digging into the snow and through the tunnel that was my eyesight on the ground with him above me, I saw that he'd mouthed the chains around my wrists and was savagely pulling on them.
He was trying to get me free.
Oh, Gods in the Heavens.
The smell of fresh blood assaulted me again, only it wasn't my own.
It was the wolf's.
His gums were bleeding from the chains. It smelled like copper, like when I used to hold a coin in my hand as a child and inhale deeply. The warm smell was sweet and sour, like a mixture of iron and vinegar.
But with another few tugs, he ripped the chains off my wrists, the pieces of metal falling limp on the snow beside my warm, slightly flushed wrists. My skin was red where he'd forced the chains through, and small lines of blood trailed over my skin. The thralls beside me yelled, scuttling away from me like rats. Guards rushed to catch them, holding each end of the chains the wolf had torn apart with his teeth, controlling the mass of panicked girls.
"You filthy animal!" Someone growled.
"Grab him!"
There were footsteps.
"Pull his chain!"
"Get him out of there!"
I felt a lick of a slobbery tongue on my hands.
"Did he bite her?"
I couldn't breathe.
The snow was too cold. It was constricting my lungs, seizing my breath. I think I'd swallowed mouthfuls of it. The voices were screaming, their words unintelligible. The world tilted sideways, even though I was already on the ground. The wolf's eyes, blazing topaz as he was dragged away, fixed mine.
I lifted my head from the snow and saw that the guards were hauling the wolf back, the sound of their whips crashing against his loin nearly making me retch on the snow.
"Stop!" I shouted, my voice shaky. "Stop, please! Don't hurt him!"
I struggled to my feet, nearly face-planting on the snow again as my footing slipped. After regaining my balance, though, I hit the snow running, dashing for the guards.
Less than fifteen feet were separating me from the wolf. I could see that a guard on the back was pulling on the chains connected to the wolf's collar. Another one, on the animal's left, had wrapped a loop of rope around its neck and was pulling it as well, trying to hold him in place as a third guard tried to slip a second loop of rope around the wolf's neck to immobilize him. I saw the wolf try to shake the guards off, but given there were three holding him by rope and two more holding him down by hand, there wasn't much he could do to free himself.
They can't hurt him.
I still saw him reach around and bite one of them on the hand, blasting screams into the heavy atmosphere, but he didn't free himself.
No.
The first guard that I pushed away — directly in front of my path to the wolf —, I touched on the back, over his mantle as I threw him on the snow.
The second one wasn't as lucky, though.
I grabbed the forearm that was holding the first rope —
He started screaming, making my ears ring at the intensity of his shouting. He released the rope and fell back like a plank on the snow, barely making a sound. His body thrashed on the ground as he kept screaming agonizingly, his voice raw and shrill. The agony in his voice couldn't be described in words, and to be honest, I wasn't sure I wanted to. The guilt and shame of what I was seeing were enough to give me nightmares for a lifetime — neither of which were new to me, at this point —, so I didn't need the extra fuel provided by the look of complete suffering on his face to duel on. Still, as I stared at him on the ground while my touch still affected him, I saw my shadows trailing along his skin lazily — which on any other living being aside from me, placed them in a world of pain —, and I was assaulted by a rush of emotions.
Blood rushed through my veins like electricity.
I realized with a start that the empowering static I was feeling was the sickening part of me that felt satisfaction at his agony. Like all the other guards, he'd played his part in my imprisonment. He deserved this pain. He deserved to feel an ounce of all I'd been through, so he'd never forget that suffering of such kind didn't just hurt in the moment, but it left deeply indented marks.
But another part, however, stared at his suffering and, like any compassionate being, yearned to end it. It made me want to rush to his side and somehow pull my shadows back so he'd stop suffering.
But I didn't move.
I felt frozen.
The kind of frozen that wasn't reasonable and didn't feel right. Because staring at this man's tortured face both pleased and haunted me. These two parts of me were battling each other, each fighting for power but neither finding absolute regency within me. I'd never once used my shadows purposefully on another being of my own volition, but I wondered if this would be how it'd feel like. If forcing the shadows into another's skin by my own choice would feel this gratifying and this shameful.
Like a noble punisher and a nefarious coward.
Like a monster.
Suddenly ashamed of myself, I nearly lost my balance, my legs giving out beneath me. Shame seemed to pool inside of me and threaten to trickle out of me through each of my pores. My hands touched the cloak over my shoulders and I had the urge to fling it off me, suddenly too heavy and smothering.
The guards started yelling, too, and they all let go of the wolf, rearing back with fear in their widened eyes, just as whispers rose among the thrall girls.
I blinked.
I lounged for the wolf, grabbing him around the spades and pulling him into my embrace. As he tenderly yelped, his slobbery tongue lashing out against my shoulder in a sickeningly disgusting lick, I sighed in relief and contentment, not knowing why I felt this much comfort with him in my arms.
My heart rate slowed down.
I heard a colossal silence behind me like the world was holding its breath waiting for something to happen.
Yet…
Nothing did.
I leaned back from the wolf slowly, pulled the rope from around his neck, and disconnected the chain link from his collar, freeing him without any resistance from the guards.
I could feel the wolf's trembling as I let both things fall to the snow, and all I saw was a look of gratitude in his eyes when he tipped them to me with a gaze that looked so much like mine they could have been my own eyes staring right back.
Then, with a deep breath, I turned back, stepping in front of him with my hands extended to my sides, tendrils of darkness dancing over my skin like diamonds on my skin that under the sunlight refracted into a million colors.
The wolf stuck his head, ears still slightly bowed, beneath my armpit as he snuck weary glances at the guards.
The wolf was free, and I was between him and the guards.
The wolf hesitated for a moment before stepping forward from under my outstretched arms, snarling lowly as he ran his eyes over the circle of guards now around us both. The sound echoed like thunder, the music of a winter night, of a starving wolf, of the scent of prey in the air. I let out a sigh of relief as the guards remained immobile, probably too scared of me to be scared of him. He leaned his side onto my hip, the steady rhythm of his heart through his fur giving cadence to mine as he watched the guards warily.
"What's going on here?" A voice boomed from in front of us and we all turned to see the Keiserinne herself standing there, flanked by more guards, with her fifty-four other bought thralls trembling in fear behind her in their chains. She looked at me with a scowl, her eyes flickering over to the wolf who reached even closer to me, molding his body around mine while snarling protectively. "What is this beast doing free with my slave near it?" She demanded, her voice low and menacing, clipped with the fuel of her anger. "Someone explain what is happening here."
With my slave, she'd said.
That's all I was to her.
I remembered the first time I'd laid eyes on the Keiserinne. Beautiful as she was, I'd thought she was a friend, coming to save me from the demons who'd come in the night and had taken away the last person I considered my family, leaving me crippled and mutilated to survive her loss. I remember staring at the smile on her plump lips when she'd cupped my cheek and thinking that maybe I'd been lucky enough to find another who'd take care of me the way the woman I'd called a second mother had, after my parents had died.
I'd been wrong.
In the middle of the snow, with my own blood in a river around me and the ghosts of the settlement where I'd once lived glowing under the moonlight, she'd had her Vefari — a fowl woman named Asta with whom I'd spent far more time than I'd ever wanted to — brand the mark of slavery on my collarbone. She hadn't cared that my entire settlement had been slaughtered. She hadn't cared that as I was dragged away, delirious with the pain, I screamed myself voiceless wailing in miserable grief for the people she was forcing me to leave behind in the ashes of the life I'd owned moments ago. She had made me her property like one might pick up a flower from its stem and use it for a wreath, simply because she'd learned of what I'd done so long before and knew the only way she could control it was if she owned me.
I was brought to the fortress that night, incapable of fighting or resisting.
And with each step that took me further from the place where I lived, I saw the flames light up the sky in flashing red and oranges, the amber glow of the fire licking the tall tree tops, the smoke drifting up into the skies and dissipating the ashes of all those people she'd buried around the world, unbeknownst to it that, sooner rather than later, it would bear witness to the monstrosity that'd happened that night.
The second she branded me, I became nothing.
Nothing if not a possession.
And to this day, whenever I stared at this woman, all I saw was her smile that day, as she leaned her face through the bars of the wagon she'd stuffed me in and said in the most pleasured voice I'd ever heard, "Your touch may taste like poison, but your skin feels so much like satin that even the wisest man will drink it willingly, to the sound of a sweet melody that your pain will silently lullaby him in." Her hand had reached through the bars and she'd cleaned a drop of blood from the burning mark on my collarbone, making me grimace. "You will sleep to the sound of such music for winters to come, my Belladonna."
The promise she'd made me that night still brought chills to my spine, today.
I lifted my lashes to stare at her and like the innocent girl I'd been the day she'd enslaved me, the words she'd whispered to me that night reminded me of what I was and who was my owner.
Immediately, the glimmer disappeared from my skin, the fear clogging my throat drowning out whatever strength it gave me. I gulped, my heart hammering inside my chest, knowing that if I spoke up now I could be punished or even killed.
But I had to say something.
I stepped forward, not daring to look the Keiserinne in the eye, and putting as much of the dull obedience she adored into my voice as possible to mark my words as weak as possible. "The wolf didn't do anything, he was only protecting me," I said, my voice trembling slightly. "He only attacked because he —"
The slap came strong and swift, making my ears ring and nearly bursting my eardrums. I stumbled back a couple of paces, blinking as I held my stinging face.
I felt blood on the left corner of my lips.
The wolf growled, snarling as he slowly backed up against me, paws scratching at the snow impatiently, though he didn't attack, like he knew that pouncing on the Keiserinne was not only foolish but certain death.
I could feel her hard stare on me as my face burned, my eyes falling to the snow at my feet. "I didn't speak to you, Bella," she sneered, her voice cold and unyielding. "You dare speak to me without permission? And to spew excuses, no less? Words to forgive this beast that clings to you like a defenseless pup?" One of her hands ruthlessly cupped my chin, forcing me to look at her. "Who exactly do you think you are to directly address me without my permission?"
The wolf snarled in response to her insult.
I prayed it would remain quiet because if it attacked the Keiserinne, we'd both be dead before either of us could blink.
My lashes feel closed. "I am naught but a slave, Keiserinne, but, I beg of you to —"
She opened a smile as if forgetting what I had done to deserve the smack, her face livid with something close to psychotic amusement. "I know full well the venom of your pretend obedience, Belladonna, and such poison will not ever blind me to the truth of your wildness," she respited harshly, her lips twisting the smile on her lips until it resembled a scowl. She released my chin, only to swiftly slide her thumb over the corner of my mouth, where her slap had drawn a drop of blood. "I have to be honest when I say I did not expect this rebellion from you, today," she shook her head like a sullen, disappointed parent, before turning back to the guards, and they began to march towards me. "I thought I'd made myself clear about what I expect from you."
Complete subordination and amenability.
I knew the answer from the thousand other times she'd beat it into me.
I heard the wolf growling lowly, fur bristling dangerously, making me fear he'd attack the Keiserinne, too.
And knowing that would be even worse.
Nobody knows the Keiserinne's real name.
We all call her 'Keiserinne', which in the north people's native tongue, means 'Empress'. She stood before me, dressed in a short, thin, black sleeveless dress that came halfway down her tanned legs. The back of it was only a couple of inches long, showing off her long, taut legs and petite, round buttocks. Her arms were bare and her skin was tanned a healthy bronze. Her shoulder-length, bronze hair hung down on both sides of her face, framing it perfectly, and accenting her cheekbones and dazzling dark-blue eyes. She wore a heavy pelt cape above the dress that came only to above her waist, leaving her legs mostly exposed to the cold and I could see the serpentine tip of her whip showing below her cape over the side of her thigh. Her voice was raspy, like the crackling of a burning fire — hoarse and sharp.
Beautiful on the inside, but horrendous on the inside.
She was a bird that hunted certain fishes in the darkness, that made itself white so it could give the illusion it wasn't there.
A wolf in sheep's clothing.
"But in case you've forgotten what you truly owe me, allow me to remind you." She moved her hand in an upward movement, stepping back. "If you will, guard."
A terror, so strong it caught my next breath, seized me from head to toe, immobilizing me before the woman who'd taken everything from me and who I'd seen with my own eyes smile at the sound of my pain before she promised she'd spent the rest of my life trying to hear it.
How such a monstrous person existed, I wasn't sure.
She worded no order, but a guard moved towards me, and before I had time to realize what he was doing, he grabbed me around the collar of my cape and flung it to the side so harshly it ripped the material from my shoulders.
Tears clogged my throat.
I wondered if it was my fear that paralyzed me even as the guard manhandled me and I tried, as best as I could, to accept it. If I was honest with myself, I knew it most probably was. I was pretty sure of that. It most definitely was. My paralyzing terror of the woman before me was what stopped me in my tracks because the certainty that death was near, now, froze me as if my statue had been forged in ice.
I could almost taste it.
Death.
Lingering in the corner, waiting for the right moment when it would finally take me into its arms, rope me with its shadows, and lead me to a place where oblivion and emptiness awaited me. Every time I breathed, the musty air entered my lungs and I tasted the flavor of my own death approaching. It was very much like every step I took brought me closer to the aura it shed, dark and spotted with hollowness, flaying me as a bitter taste in the back of my mouth. A bitter taste that grew more acidic by the second as I attempted to swallow my fear and stamp down the panic.
So bitter.
This bitter, bitter taste.
Pushed out of my daze with brutal hands, I looked at the Keiserinne, pleading with my eyes for her misery.
Which I knew she'd never grant.
She never had before.
I wanted to close my eyes.
I wanted to seal my eyes shut.
I wanted to glue my eyes closed.
But I couldn't.
I swallowed my own hiccup.
The guard tore the cape away from me and let it fall to the snow. Then, he grabbed the collar of my tunic and even though I knew he wasn't trying to completely expose me, the brute force with which he forced the fabric to the side over my right shoulder made it rip a couple of inches. Enough to expose my chest, the mark the Keiserinne wanted to show off, and most of my right breast. At my yelp, his hand then pulled back and I careened sideways until I fell on my hip on the snow.
Fire exploded through my bones.
I shuddered.
Whispers filled the air.
The wolf growled low on its throat and I could feel its warm breath on my hair as it moved as if to protect me —
Suddenly, a yelp filled the air, so loud and close it made my ears ring. Turning back quickly, I saw that Asta was there, a hand placed against the wolf's loin. Her eyes were closed and her lips were moving, though no sound could be heard coming off her lips. She'd appeared out of nowhere, just as always, rushing to the defense of her own master, whom she loved more dearly than one would their own child. Her short above-shoulder-length hair braided over the sides of her head shimmered a deep reddish-brown under the morning sunlight, stark against the white fur of the wolf she was somehow controlling.
The wolf shook its head, whimpering, moving its paws restlessly in the snow as it lowered its snout in pain.
I knew quite well the agony of that touch.
I crunched my teeth together, holding my tongue and my fury in before I said something that would only buy me a quicker death.
My mouth opened to beg —
"Please, Asta, I believe the beast will now submit."
The Keiserinne's words felt like a request, but everyone present knew it was an order. One which Asta followed without question, pushing her hand away from the wolf's fur, that immediately took a gulping breath and fell to the snow with a huff, his eyes falling shut immediately. I could hear his heavy breathing, though, and I wondered if it was pain that made him pant like that or exhaustion.
Probably an assortment of both.
The Keiserinne placed her thumb on my chin, raising my face, and staring into those large eyes was like looking into soulless pits, because there was nothing there. The only emotion I saw in them was viciousness, malice, and a thirst for violence that disgusted and horrified me. "You have privileges under my ownership that you will never fully grasp, Bella, but you also have obligations that all the other slaves here do not," she sounded extremely calm and savory bland when she spoke, her eyes earnest as she held mine. "Everyone has to follow my orders, but others I can control by disciplining them, I will never do such thing to you. My mercy is a gift you haven't yet earned, and you won't see it for a long time if you keep this up."
I shut my eyes.
I knew what she was saying.
The underlying context of her words was the exact reason why she kept torturing me. I didn't abide by her rules, didn't follow her orders, rebelled against her power, and defied her ruling, and unlike all the other girls here, she would never threaten me with death because she couldn't afford to give it to me — to follow through with that promise. Not the way she did with the other thralls. Those, she'd kill without so much as a lingering thought, and others would swiftly replace the one she'd disposed of. She saw their death as a clemency and, to some extent, she was right to think it was. Indeed, death was a type of clemency to most of the girls she kept here, for their purpose in life was much darker and much more painful than that of the blackness of death. But the truth was the world didn't care. No one cared. After all, merchandise of the type she owned would never be missed and no one would care that she'd murdered one of her own thralls. To society, that was their purpose — to live and die at the whims of their master.
But me?
No.
Never.
I was too valuable. Too important. I had a purpose she'd never have enough of. As long as I drew breath, I was useful to her. And since she knew quite well I did not fear death, she found that the only way to truly punish me was to torture me by keeping me alive at all costs.
At one point, that had even made her my protector.
From myself included.
"Asta? If you will." The request was innocent enough to almost pass as an invitation. "Remind her of her position."
I only felt the tip of a finger on the back of my shoulder and whatever control I had over myself evaded me.
Screams tore out of my mouth, vibrant with the timber of the forest and the coldness of the snow echoing my pain. My back arched back and my shoulder brand burned like it was being made once more, even after all these days I'd spent with it on my skin. I couldn't move away or push her finger away from me, but even as I tried to fight back with all my might, I could still feel her, draining — sucking — from me.
It was nothing like what I could do.
Her control was unbreakable. She was too powerful, her spells impossible to be fought. I'd seen her do things I'd often found inconceivable, despite knowing what I could do myself and knowing that it, too, shouldn't be possible. Still, what Asta and I were capable of was very different. She used whatever link she had to the Seid in ways I'd never seen anyone do before. I'd grown up around a Völva myself and I'd never seen her do anything like what Asta can do.
When she did this, it was like she was sucking the life out of me.
"I believe she's got the message."
Then, her finger disappeared.
I inhaled sharply —
My entire body failed me and I fell forward on the snow, my hands softening the blow of my upper body instinctively. The cold seeped through my clothes and I shivered as my body temperature lowered. I reached for my tunic, pulling it over my shoulder to hide the burn mark now glowing red and burning on my skin. The mere touch of my fingers and the fabric of my clothes made me want to scream, but I bit my lip, keeping the pain locked inside. My breath came out in spasmodic spurts out of my mouth as I struggled to breathe, all the muscles in my body aching like I'd run a mile. The world spun and I felt the need to vomit, though I swallowed it down, knowing it would only make me look weaker.
"Have I made myself clear, now?"
I didn't move, staring at the snow with wheezing breaths.
A hand reached through my hair, forcing my head back with a strong tug that made my scalp burn fiercely.
The Keiserinne's royal-blue eyes came into view before me as she leaned forward to meet my stare. "Have I?"
I nodded.
The hand disappeared.
"So!" The Keiserinne clapped her hands once, making me tremble. "Now that we've completed this sour display of brutality, I want to know what's happened here."
"Keiserinne," the guard closest to me spoke, placing a hand against his heart as he addressed his patron. "The beast attacked me when I was trying to lead the thralls to their chores inside the pavilion."
Of course, he left out the part that was convenient to him.
I raised my head, lifting my eyes toward the gray sky above us.
"Put down the animal," the Keiserinne ordered the guards, waving a hand. "Chain the girl back and let us forget this ever happened. We have much yet to prepare for tonight's festivities and I have some very important personalities coming who'll be expecting my best."
Her best. Not ours.
The guards started moving —
"No," I cried, scrambling on the snow to get to my knees and somehow to get to the wolf, still lying on the snow, as exhausted as I felt. "Please, don't," I said but all defiance had rushed out of me. Only complete desperation remained, now. I could feel the wolf's hot exhale on my back as I stared at the Keiserinne with the guards around us in a loose circle. "Please… please… don't."
The Keiserinne sighed. "So, you'd rather I keep him chained or in a cage?" She asked. "That's a large animal, expensive to feed and, after today, it's proven I have no use for a wild animal I can't control, so it's best to do away with it."
She turned to leave, her decision final.
"Please!" I shouted and then regained my composure as I realized I was all but begging for another burning session — or something far worse. She turned back to me with ice dripping out of her posture. "Please, don't."
Her eyes flashed. "There will be no arguing about this," the Keiserinne said, her voice cold and foreboding. "You will do as I say, Bella, or I will make you draw this animal's last breath yourself."
I shook.
I knew she could.
And I knew she would.
I stepped back, my eyes darting between the Keiserinne and the guards. Fear gripped my heart, but I refused to let it show on my face.
"No," I said, my voice shaky but my head shaking. "I won't — you can't — no."
She would.
And she could.
The Keiserinne's eyes narrowed, and she took a step forward, her hand reaching for the whip that hung from her belt. "Why, Bella?" She hissed, the whip cracking against the ground. Her eyes moved over the wolf, raising her brows as if she saw nothing of interest. "Why does your heart beat for this beast?"
Every muscle in me clenched. "He is not a beast."
"You say that like you've seen any other kind."
You have no idea.
My hands fisted. "Have you?"
I saw her curiosity light up like a candle flame in her eyes.
I was the puzzle she desperately wanted to solve. The mystery she had never been able to uncover. The power she'd never been able to control. She'd proved as much the day she brought me here and questioned me for hours about who I was, where I'd been born, what had happened to me, and what my name was.
When I failed to answer her, she'd grown nothing if not more interested.
That's why, now, at the very prospect of any new information, she acted like an obsessed fanatic.
The Keiserinne's eyes narrowed. "I can see your words hold no lie. But, please, be wise not to underestimate me, Bella," she warned, her voice low and dangerous. "I have also seen and been through things you could not begin to imagine and, unlike you, I am capable of doing things just as horrific when my hand is forced."
I held her gaze, unflinching, but said nothing, feeling my tongue tied into a knot.
"Don't give me that look. He is not innocent." The Keiserinne stepped closer, her hand still on her whip. "He attacked one of my guards."
"The guard —" I stopped myself, my voice rising slightly. "He was defending me."
"Keiserinne —"
"Silence!" She thundered, holding up a hand at the guard that'd threatened me earlier. The Keiserinne's eyes flickered with annoyance. "I will not tolerate lies, Bella."
My nails dug into my palms. "I'm not lying."
"My guards would never go against my orders."
I looked down at the snow, the wolf behind me quiet. "I'm not lying."
The Keiserinne studied me for a moment before letting out a scoff. "So, you're telling me one of my own men defied my orders and laid hands on you when I specifically told them not to." Her head tilted. "He knew the rules and he still challenged my authority. Is that it?"
I swallowed.
I knew she wouldn't show clemency to anyone who broke her rules, but she surely wouldn't punish her own guard for the audacity of going against her, would she?
"Is it, Bella?"
My eyes fell shut. "Yes."
The Keiserinne turned to her guard, the one who'd approached me first. "You've failed me, soldier. You know the punishment for defying me."
The guard, who looked handsome in a prim and angular way, trembled as he knelt on the cold snow, and yet the kinks in his posture did not mar his appearance at all. His knees were not trembling from cold, but from the fear. His body was shaking uncontrollably. His face was pale, stark in comparison to the dark fabric of his uniform. His hands were raised in a beseeching gesture and his eyes were pleading with the Keiserinse for mercy. "Please, Keiserinne, have mercy. It was a moment of weakness."
"Mercy?" The Keiserinne laughed, the sound cold and bitter. "So, you do not deny it?"
The guard's eyes widened with fear as he tilted his gaze up to the Keiserinne. "No, Keiserinne, I do not. I did touch and threaten the girl. I was only trying to scare her, I wouldn't truly wound her or —"
The fall of her whip on the guard's shoulder echoed all around the quad. He let out a single scream, muffled as if he'd held it back.
"I've said this to the thrall seconds before, soldier. Mercy is not something I give lightly," she seethed under her breath, ignoring the looks of borderline terror on the other guards' faces. "You know what happens to those who fail me."
The guard's eyes widened with fear.
He knew what was coming.
We all did.
The Keiserinne raised her whip and this time managed to hit the guard's throat with it, cutting off his oxygen supply effectively and leaving him gasping for air. Whatever scream he might have growing in his throat died, but whimpers could still be heard as the other guards rushed to grab his arms and start to drag him away.
I felt my stomach twist in horror.
This was not justice. This was cruelty.
The Keiserinne turned to me, the whip still in her hand. "I hope this serves as a lesson to you, too, Bella. Today, he'll be whipped. Tomorrow, I might not be so benevolent and have you stand at the whipping rack yourself for this," she threatened, voice sharp as the edge of a knife. "No one defies me and lives to tell the tale."
Me?
For what? I hadn't even been able to protect myself. There had been no influence on my part on what'd happened. The guard had started all of this.
Not me.
I met her gaze, my eyes blazing. "I didn't do anything."
The Keiserinne looked at me, her expression unreadable. "You didn't. But don't lie to yourself, Bella," she countered bleakly, though a corner of her lips lifted. "I don't care that he threatened you. I care that he touched you, though I can clearly see that if he did, it's because you let him, or he'd be screaming on the floor the same way Sven was when you rushed to protect that animal."
I froze. "I didn't mean to hurt him…"
The Keiserinne raised an eyebrow, considering my words. "And yet, unwillingly or willingly, you did it. And if you'd ever been in danger, you'd have done it before, too, and prevented all of this. So, don't bother lying —" She lifted a hand, running a thumb over my cheekbone and I tensed, waiting for any onslaught of pain, but none came. Only her sugary voice, as she leaned in to speak against my skin. "— because I know you enjoyed it."
I gritted my teeth against the sudden burning in my chest.
That's a lie! I wanted to yell, but she'd never believe me.
A rotten stench took residence in my stomach and I wanted to vomit it straight out of me.
The Keiserinne stared at me for a long moment, her eyes flickering between me and the wolf. I could see the conflict in her expression, the battle between her desire for control and her intrigue. "Anyway, I am feeling quite generous, today," she bristled, voice cherry, making me shiver. Her smile widened as she winked at me. "So, the wolf lives," she announced, turning to the guards. "Close the girl in her room and chain the wolf with her. From this day on, this wolf is not to be harmed or handled without my instructions under any circumstance. She stays with him indefinitely, until I feel like she's either proven her success or I've grown tired of waiting. I want a guard stationed at the door at all times. From now on, Bella will be responsible for his actions and if he does anything to harm my property or my thralls or my guards again, she will suffer the consequences."
I nodded, relief washing over me as the guards approached.
"But I believe you've learned a valuable lesson, today." She tweaked my nose. "Do not ever lie or defy me again." The Keiserinne came forward to speak in my ear, leaning a hand on my shoulder. "And don't think I'll forget what happened here, my beautiful Belladonna. You and I will soon make for plenty of time to investigate exactly why this beast is immune to your shadows."
What?!
I looked down at the wolf, eyes bright as fire torches, as he let himself be collared and chained once more, giving me long stares.
Gods.
I'd touched him. Nothing had happened.
A couple of guards moved out with the thralls, chains clinking as they moved.
As new chains rattled around my wrists without a sound of protest from me, the wolf tracked the snow to me and leaned in, his hot breath on my neck as he nuzzled against me. Both ends of our chains were secured at a guard's hands and I remained there, watching the guards march with the thralls to the pavilion, feeling his heart beating against my back.
A steady rhythm that gave me hope.
As I ran my fingers through his fur, I could feel the ripples of muscles and skin underneath, but neither was sharp and they didn't cut or tear. The wolf's fur was smooth and warm to the touch. Thick and heavy, but soft. It felt like velvet under my touch. I caressed it, letting my fingers slide through the fur, all the way down to his hind legs, and then back up again.
We were in this together, now, and I was determined to keep us both alive. Somehow. Now that the Keiserinne knew he had immunity from my shadows, she'd never let him go until she figured out why. Nor me. She'd seen what I'd done to the guard I'd touched. The guards had carried him out, still shaking and twitching, whimpering on his apparent deathbed, though I knew, quite well, he had a chance of surviving.
People had before.
We would survive this, together.
The Keiserinne gave me a kiss on the cheek that made me fall to my knees before turning on her heel and following her thralls to the pavilion, where tonight they'd serve to the best of their capability or be punished afterward if they didn't rise to the standards their empress had been paid for.
I looked up at the sky.
The wolf nuzzled my shoulder, and I caught his smell of dirt, blood, and musk.
Home.
I have this dream almost every night.
One day, I will be an old woman with long, silver hair, magical skin, glowing hair, scarred skin, faded tattoos, heavy eyes, and wisdom beyond words.
Since before I could speak, I've had this dream.
Every night, in this dream, I will lay out under the stars by a campfire, snuggled up by this giant white wolf, who sleeps under the stars with me, offering his loin as a pillow as he keeps his body molded into mine to warden off the cold that every night seems to try to break my bones. His golden eyes glow with the embers of the cracking fire beside us and his white fur shines a soft topaz that makes him look otherworldly.
A noble companion and protector from which I'd only part the day I died.
All the while, the wind makes music to us both, with whispers of a fate carried in the spine of this world, a wyrd long-ago prophesized, and a war to be ended by a great sacrifice and a great loss.
This is the dream given to me by the spirits of the wild.
And for the first time in my life, I wondered if it wasn't all a lie.
My eyes met the wolf's once more.
He stared straight back, eyes a deep orange topaz, and even though the only thing he did was blink, I saw myself reflected so clearly in his eyes, that my world spun on its hinges and a broken echo of a heartbeat resonated within my ribcage like a message from some unknown force telling me this was right and true and pure.
Because, for the first time, I hoped.
For the first time, I wanted.
For the first time, I dreamed.
At last, my wolf of the wild, you have come.
And, staring into his eyes, now, I was surprised to find myself believing we might yet find what we were both looking for.
Because for the first time, I believed.