Behind Broken Eyes | 3

Chapter Six

Rachael Grey didn't know where she was. All she could see was white. It felt like a room, padded, and cushioned for her comfort but Rachael felt nothing of that at the moment.

Her mind was sliced, her body weak from healing, and her soul was in ashes. Rachael Grey, the former Reaper of Buchannan Blood and known as Raven to the Werewolf world, was a shadow of who she was.

In a sad way, she was greatful for it. The person she was before was someone filled with despair and pain - the only memories she had were of death and destruction.

Been tortured and experimented on, Rachael had. The young wolf had seen her mother die in front of her, was the cause of two of her friends' deaths, and was 'made' into the desired weapon of the Master Vampire.

Buchannan had injected, over time, vampire venom into her system. Her wolf had been poisoned, and it became a creature beyond Rachael's control. Her wolf became it's own self. A Death Wolf. A Reaper.

When the Goddess told her to save either Lord Thaddeus or Elijah Griffin, she gave the only thing she had. Her wolf in return for both of them to be saved.

Rachael prayed that it had worked, and that this white room she was in was her time of peace after her tortured life.

As she took in the surroundings, Rachael's tired eyes focused. It was a room - she was familiar with being locked away from the world. Cloud-like floors and walls surrounded her, like Rachael had been swept up to the realm of the Moon Goddess.

Somehow, Rachael could tell she wasn't really here. This was where her mind was at, her body was probably lying in a ditch in the forest somewhere. Very few people cared for her, and no one knew where she had gone the day the Goddess gave Rachael her options.

Her mind was here, in this clouded room. Rachael had seen inside her mind before, seeing the darkness and the shadows that spread from her wolf, trying to attack her mind. Rachael didn't know why the inside of her mind was now clean, but didn't want to hope.

She didn't want to hope that her wolf was destroyed.

As Rachael took in every detail about the room, she froze as she took in what lay in the opposite corner to her.

Her hope depleted.

A large wolf lay, sleeping, in the corner of the room. Its claws and snout had been cleaned of the blood Rachael knew it had shed. She remembered its obsidian fur, coarse to touch, and the urge to kill flowing through its veins. It's eyes were shut, but she knew that cold gold eyes which switched to a deadly black haze lay beneath.

Rachael knew this was her Death Wolf...almost.

The Bane of the Wolves was breathing slowly, time with Rachael, and looked as though it was at peace. Like herself.

Rachael was almost convinced that its dark coat was lightening - at its paws and snout, the tips of the ears and the long tail, it took a shade of dark grey. Her fur was getting lighter.

As Rachael stored that fact away, she felt a presence. Somewhere. Maybe where my body is? It wasn't in this mind-created-room, that much she knew. Compared to the light aura of her padded room, whoever it was had a heart of coal. A darkness prodded at the corners, and her wolf stilled in its slumber.

"Hello Reaper." A whisper of a voice. Rachael shivered. Her nails dug into whatever was below her, and her eyes filled with fright. She knew that voice. She remembered its fangs, venom, and glee in torment. Rachael would never forget a vampire. But him?

"I'm disappointed, you know." His voice was wind in her state-of-mind. Carefully brushing her face with a gentleness she could hardly recall. Her wolf, however, bristled as the voice reached its ears. "That you didn't kill Buchannan."

Rachael jolted. Buchannan Blood. Her tormentor, butcherer. The murderer of many wolves, including her own mother. The wolf in front of her twitched its lips, as though desperate to remember the taste of blood again. Panic ran around her system, its familiar grasp holding Rachael's voice down.

"But he is dead, I should be happy with that." They continued. Rachael remembered who this vampire was, his peculiar nature, and his lack of emotion. She vividly saw his ruby red eyes in her nightmares alongside her ones of his Master. 

"You however..." He paused. "I don't know how you're alive."

All she could do was listen, even if her body wasn't frozen in horror. "Buchannan destroyed you, and yet you still held that sacrifical streak: the one that saved Elijah Griffin... For a Hunter, I will never understand why you saved him. You still gripped that determination, even with your own wolf fighting against you.

"You shouldn't be breathing."

Rachael's death wolf stirred, a low snarl working its way up the throat and rippling between its lips. The white floors darkened slightly around her wolf, and the white, somehow, forced it back. It wrapped tightly around her wolf, smothering it, as the darkness oozed from its claws.

He's going to kill me. Rachael thought, gripping tighter, heart beating faster, and panic bounced around her mind. She had no one to turn to, couldn't call on anyone.

But she could try.

Rachael remembered the feather-light touch that held her hand - who ever they were. The warmth and the safety she had felt, that feeling of happiness she had from the touch. Rachael shut her large eyes to Light and Dark's battle on her deadly wolf and screamed down the connection. The tether between them rumbled as her piercing cry for help whipped down the line.

If it got through, they would go to her aid. They would find her. They would help her. 

She hoped.

She prayed.

She wished they would arrive soon.

Or the ravaging monster she harboured would awaken again.