| CHAPTER 13 : FIND A WAY |
A heater enveloped my body making me feel nothing but heat, heat and heat. Sweat trickled down my forehead, my armpits and my back, seeping into my clothes. I opened my eyes with a painful exhausted sigh. My hands fisted the covers underneath me. Everything seemed blurry with a layer of sweat covering my face. The lightbulbs looked like wide hazy stars above me.
A face loomed over mine with a cloth gently and frequently dabbing at my face.
Fatigue and tiredness were all I could feel, the heat and lack of fresh air making it worse.
It took some while and breaths to shift my tired eyes around. This room...King Alpha's room. I'm on his bed.
To my side, Katia dipped a cloth in a bowl of water before pressing it to my forehead.
"Katia." I breathed out, confused.
She gently smiled, "You tried."
"What's happening?" I asked, furrowing my eyebrows.
"You're having a severe fever. It's all part of what King Alpha had planned."
King Alpha.
The name itself brought a small sense of resentment and anger in me.
"Plan?"
She gave a nod, "That mark," she said referring to the one on my neck, "if your mate doesn't mark you back, then the mate who's been marked dies within a few months. Since you're human, the mark is affecting you at a faster rate. The mark makes you feel stronger at first. Then, it absorbs all your strength making you weak."
I didn't have the energy to act shocked or furious.
"How can I save myself?" I asked instead.
Her perfect curvy lips tugged into a look of a pity smile as she slowly shook her head, "It's gonna be hard."
"Everything in my life has been-" I sucked in a deep breath when I felt my lungs would combust without me not breathing for even two seconds, "-hard since he stepped into my life." I laced as much venom as I could to my voice.
"Maybe this was your fate all along." She pressed the cloth to the side of my head.
My fate? Anger bubbled within me. This was my fate?
I've been raised in lies and secrets, my brother - who doesn't seem like my brother anymore - kept me in the dark about who he is, about what I am, about this entirely different world. I've been hypnotized or whatever the hell Collin did to me, erased of my own memories and now I leave this world without getting proper answers, without actually knowing what the hell went wrong, why the witches mated me to King Alpha?
I think the hell not.
"What are you doing here?" I asked Katia, "I thought King Alpha ended you or something."
A flicker of anger and fear crossed her perfect features, but she just flipped her neatly styled golden-brown hair behind her thin back, "He only paralyzed me. He must not know that I was here."
I furrowed my eyebrows, "You survived King Alpha from whatever choking thing he did to you and then you come here instead of saving yourself to babysit me?"
She smiled giving a shrug, "People do tell I have weird ways of spending my days."
"Cut the crap Katia, tell me what you're here for." I demanded in the small voice my throat allowed, trying to not wheeze out of breath.
"Is it hard for you to believe that someone is taking care of you?"
"Yes."
"Ah. Well then." She finally put the cloth down on the bedside and looked at me, her lips tugged upward showing her perfect pearly teeth, at that moment, I didn't want to hear what came out of her mouth, "I'll tell you. I want you to save yourself. I want you to fight for your life and get better again."
"Why?" I whispered, staring into her intense wide blue eyes.
She leaned towards me, expression cheery but serious all at once, "Because I need something which only you can give me."
"What?"
"I can only tell you when you survive. Tell you what? Let's make a deal."
I furrowed my eyebrows, "What deal?"
She clasped her thin hands in front of her, "You try your best to survive. And when you do, I'll help you find your brother. I might even find him for you before you even step out of this mansion if you agree to give me what I want."
"I can't give you anything," I said in a matter-of-fact voice.
She nodded, "Not now, you can't. But later, you will. I just need this one thing. It won't cost you or your friends anything, of course. All it'll need is a little bit of your concentration, contribution and certitude."
I stared at her face for a while, not sure what to say.
"I might even help you get out of this mansion and away from King Alpha for good. All you need to agree to my deal." Katia offered further.
Away from King Alpha, away from this mess, away from his mess. I'll get Collin back. I can live my life as a normal teenager working in a bakery again. I can get Jade back and become the inseparable best friends we used to be.
But it won't be the same.
There is gonna be no proper place to live if we're gonna have to hide away from King Alpha. There is gonna be no 'brother-sister' bond Collin and I had after everything that has happened. I can't be the same around Jade knowing there is a whole different kind around us faking to be normal humans.
Nothing will ever be normal again no matter how much I yearn for it.
I looked back at Katia, "I think I'm good, thank you."
She blinked, clearly not expecting that answer, "Are you sure?"
I nodded, "I think I just want to wing it my style."
"Is this really your final decision?" she asked placing a hand over mine which almost made me believe for a second that she truly cared about me.
"I already have a lot going on and striking this deal with you seems to add on. It doesn't make me feel any better with you being closed off about what you really want."
"I cannot tell you what I want for a very serious reason. I also can't force you into this deal. It's wholly your wish."
The way she spoke so old and foreign still didn't seem to settle well with me. It's like hearing an old English radio.
"I'm gonna find a way," I said, "I'm not going to die like this. Especially in the hands of him."
She stared at me for a moment, expression unreadable, before standing up and smiling down at me, "I wish you my best to succeed. I'll be back within a week and hopefully, I wish to see you alive."
"I wish the same too," I said, weakly smiling at her.
She turned around and walked towards the door, placing her hand on the handle and sliding it open. Before walking out the door, she gave me one last look which made me question if I had done a mistake by not agreeing to her deal.
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Date: 17 July 2021