As soon as the door opened, everything crashed into me - the overpowering smell of blood, the sudden halt of voices in the middle of a hefty discussion, and pained groaning.
I didn't know what got into me, why I didn't run away at the first sign of trouble, but I stepped into that room. And once I was in, I no longer smelled the blood - I saw it.
The room was rather spacious, and it looked unfinished. The walls were made of a raw, shimmering stone, in the darkest black I had ever seen. The few white flamed torches that lit the room were completely absorbed in the stone-like material, vanishing into pure nothingness. The wall was textured, and it felt cave-like. Assuming we were still underground, it probably was a cave. Just one with a wooden door at the entrance.
But it wasn't used as a cave, I realized, it was used as a cage.
I stared right at Aven, who was positioned in the middle of the room. But he wasn't free. Both his arms were attached to chains that led to the walls, and when my eyes traveled down, I saw his feet were, too.
He hung there by the chains, limp, his head hanging over his shoulder and facing the floor. He was covered in blood. His blood, I realized, when I noticed he was entirely covered with cuts and bruises, some of those wounds looking too deep. The pained groans had come from him.
Upon my entrance, he had forced his eyes to open, and he lifted his head a bit, taking me in.
I was too late. I could barely look at him, without feeling extreme guilt. I should have run here, instead of going to those damned woods. I should have been here to warn him.
But my heart only stopped beating when I saw two familiar figures in the back corner of the room, two people I'd only see together in this way in the worst of my nightmares.
"Sari," Jerr exhaled. He seemed genuinely surprised to see me here.
Jerr's worried face contrasted against Beckett's sickening smile, a victorious look of a man who knew he'd win more than just one game today. "Well, Sun burn me. You're even more stupid than I initially thought," he laughed.
Perhaps I was. Only a fool would run back here, would march in this building and would step in this room. I had had multiple opportunities to safely escape, and I had utilized none of them. But what would my escape mean? I was sick of running. I was tired of being the one who needed help. I was tired of having to thank people for saving me - when I shouldn't have needed saving to begin with.
"Leave her alone," Jerr growled, his voice low. He then turned to me, but I didn't see him. I looked through him as I saw the villainous shadow of the man I'd grown to love. "Sari, get out of here," he ordered. "Now."
"She's not going anywhere," Beckett said amused, keeping his evil stare on me, ignoring Jerr's fuming gaze.
What was he so angry about? What had he expected? Was it because he didn't want to share his victory over me? I had to be his victim now, and his alone?
Beckett strolled towards me - but the first step he took, Jerr took a step to the side, blocking Beckett from getting near to me. "You will not touch her," he warned.
Jerr didn't realize Beckett didn't need to touch me to win. After all these years, he'd gotten creative in his ways to torment me - physical proximity wasn't always required. He could be just as vicious with words and threats that I knew weren't empty. Every promise he would make to terrify me, was one he intended to keep.
And nothing could stand in his way. "Careful now," Beckett warned him, breaking his stare off me and side-eyeing Jerr. The red flashes in his eyes intensified - something they seemed to do whenever he'd get angry. "I have no use of you anymore, Wise Moon."
Jerr didn't hesitate to respond. "The same goes for you."
Beckett laughed, unimpressed.
I took a step back, trying to disappear into the hallway, but before I could even reach the door opening, Beckett's eyes shot back to me as he tutted his warning. "Don't go just yet, Sari. You'll miss all the good parts."
Jerr didn't move an inch, his body now practically colliding with Beckett. "Leave, Sari," he ordered again, not looking back to see if I would listen.
Another step back, and Beckett's grin intensified. "I'll kill your Alpha if you leave."
He was going to kill him anyway. There was nothing I could do here to help - I was severely outnumbered. And unblessed.
"Well, I'll kill him anyway," he said dryly, confirming my thoughts. It was followed by a sly chuckle that sent shivers down my spine. "I suppose it'd be better to use Benjamin as leverage, no?"
Sun burn me.
"And what's his little boy called? Sam? And he has a girl, too, right? It's such a shame that such terrible accidents can happen during a war. Brutal, tragic murders that go unsolved. Don't you think?"
Beckett didn't know about these tunnels - he didn't know Benjamin had escaped. But neither did Jerr, and I needed to keep it that way. So I couldn't leave, Beckett knew I would never risk Benjamin's safety. I was stuck.
"What do you want, Beckett?" I spat as I froze in place, his name coming off my tongue like venom.
"You know very well what I want," Beckett sang, taking a step to the side, narrowly avoiding Jerr who kept a close tail on him. "I want what belongs to me."
"She doesn't belong to you," Jerr growled.
"Shut up," I bit at him. I didn't need him speaking on my behalf - defending me from Beckett when he was the reason I was in this mess in the first place. I didn't want him here, I didn't want him to continue his stupid game of pretend.
"Sari," he breathed.
"Shut the fuck up," I seethed. He had no right saying my name - breathing it and rolling it off his tongue.
Beckett's smile grew and grew. "Trouble in paradise, aye?"
"I wouldn't call it paradise," I sneered.
"Well, neither would he," he chuckled, nodding his head at Jerr.
I saw Jerr nearly heaving - seething at the fact that I refused to listen to him.
"I suggest you listen to the lady," Beckett said to Jerr, who in turn seemed unimpressed as well.
"I don't care," he bit.
"But you do. I will kill her if you say one more word. You know very well that I can. And if you don't get out of my way, I'll let my surviving pack members have a go at her first."
I'd sooner die.
There was nothing more Jerr could do here. Beckett played his move, and he had won. And making a counter-move seemed to be particularly hard if you had nothing to offer at all.
Jerr refused to move, but when Beckett took one more step to the side, Jerr didn't follow. Instead, his gaze dropped to the floor, his look completely defeated.
At least one good thing came out of this, but my heart wrenched at the sight all the same.
Beckett halted when he stood next to Aven. With a venomous smile, he grabbed his hair and pulled his head backward, so his face was angled towards the ceiling.
Aven looked at me through low eyes as he grunted, frantically panting.
"I've done a real number on your Alpa, haven't I? Not so deathly now, huh?"
He threw Aven's head forward again with such force, it made the chains rattle as his body tried following the motion, but was held back by the iron structure.
Aven grunted again, though he tried his best to hide his pain. I supposed he couldn't talk much, but he got his point across all the same when he turned his head and spat at Beckett.
The small puddle of saliva and blood landed on Beckett's shoe, but he still kept that amused, yet unimpressed attitude.
I didn't allow myself to look at Jerr, but I felt his gaze piercing me. The thought of his eyes on me - it made me sick to my stomach. I ignored him - refusing to give him that power over me.
"I must say, I am glad to have you both here in this room tonight. Just the two Death Moon shits I wanted to see. Our Moons have blessed me, tonight."
"They didn't twenty-two years ago," I shot back, the corner of my lip daring to go up with challenge.
I had never openly stood back to him like this. It seemed to take him by surprise. Everyone seemed surprised whenever I showed them how far I had come, how much I had changed since I had left this hellhole.
"So you know?" he asked, quickly dismissing the brief flare of shock I saw sweeping over his face. "Has that friend of yours finally told you the truth?"
I didn't answer him, but simply leveled my face.
"I bet he didn't tell you the whole truth." His eyes briefly widened in a playful motion, gauging if he'd gotten a reaction out of me.
"There seems to be a lot of that going around, lately," I said, keeping my tone as leveled as I could. Whatever he had to say to me - I didn't care. At this point, I was sure there wasn't anything he could say to me, that could make any of this worse.
"Looks like we have a lot of up catching up to do," he sang, clasping his hands.
"That's what Dexter said to me as well," I answered. "He was dead the next day." In the corner of my eye, I saw Jerr flinching. Could he truly not stand it when I was finally playing the game, too?
Beckett clicked his tongue against his teeth as I saw a subtle flash of outrage glimmer in his eyes.
"I almost forgot what your sunburned pack did to my Beta," he answered. "Almost." His hand traced past Aven's ribs, up to his chest where his fingers mangled their way into a slashed cut.
Aven flinched at the gesture, every muscle in the area flexing, trying to get rid off the unwelcome torture.
"It was quite an inconvenience." He retracted his fingers again, wiping the blood off on a bare piece of skin he found on Aven's shoulder. "Now tell me, Sari. How will I die tomorrow?"
Beckett took another step in my direction, but he glared over my shoulder, squinting his eyes as I heard Jerr also take a step forward behind me, and Beckett halted before he was within reaching distance. He sighed at the inconvenience Jerr was posing him, before he turned his attention back to me when I spoke again.
"I'll let our Moons decide about your end. We both know it is coming."
Something flashed in his eyes - something I had never seen in him before. They widened slightly, and the red dulled for a fleeting moment, before he speedily regained his composure.
I didn't know where I found the courage to talk to him in this manner. When I lived here, I never would have dared any of this.
But I was at the lowest of lows. What more could he do that he hadn't done already? What wounds could he create, when I was still drowning in those Jerr had afflicted?
"Our Moons are waiting quite long to kill me, aren't they? I'd think you'd know better than to make empty promises."
Yes, because the worst threats, were those with truth behind it. He and his sunburned pack had taught me that, time and time again.
But my promise didn't seem so empty. If our Moons had cursed me, and had doomed me to this miserable life, I'd take him down with me.
Beckett took another step toward me, forcing me to falter back. Jerr stayed put this time, I felt him steady behind me. His nearness made me ill, my heart churning and crazing.
"You want to run, Sari?" he challenged. "You're not a quick learner, are you? That's ironic, given your mother comes from Swift Moon."
What?
"Yes," he said matter-of-factly, reading the shock off my face. "I exchanged her for one of my wolves. I did regret that later on," he chuckled. "I told you our dear friend Benjamin didn't tell you the whole truth. I'm surprised that you still find it hard to believe me. I've never lied to you, Sari. I never needed to, because you only see what you want to see. Pathetic, and useless, if you ask me."
I heard a low growl coming from behind me, but a warning glare shut Jerr right back up, a fresh reminder of the promise Beckett made if Jerr crossed his boundaries.
But that didn't stop his frenzy. He kept digging his attacks at me, every vicious word meant to be daggers through my soul. He didn't seem to realize, someone else had daggered me, first. "I've kept their wedding rings, all these years. Framed in glass on my bedside. As a trophy, a reminder of a job well done."
"You stole them," I corrected him. Hearing him say the word keep felt wrong.
"Is it really stealing if the rings were mine in the first place?" he countered, his eyes growing more and more amused with every word he spewed. "I gave them those rings, as a token of my blessing. They used to crave my approval, your parents. So desperate, at times. Like you, I suppose. Maybe I'll add your finger to the collection tonight."
That was all it took for Jerr's thinly veiled self-control to shatter. In a split second, he passed me and before anyone in this room had properly realized he had moved, his fist blowed against Beckett's cheek, forcing him on the ground with a loud thud.
This was my cue. I looked at Aven one last time before I left, but he still drooped limply in those chains.
And when I took one last stumble into the hallway, finally leaving that caved room, I suddenly felt everything crashing into me. I felt it in every fiber of my being. I felt it deep in my bones. I saw it, I smelt it, I heard it. Every last one of my senses was heightened and was screaming the same thing.
It hung in the air before me, as if, if I'd reach out my hands I'd be able to grasp it, hold it, feel it. It hit me all at once. I had never been so sure of anything.
Standing before me, was my mate.