The grey ceiling of clouds is snailing across the sky silently weeping their feeling out. No thunder to be heard just the soft drops of rain against the glass in a particular pattern which reminds me of fingers on a table, tap, tap, tap.
"You're awake." Morning glory blues staring down at me, holding me still. Lifting my hand to her face, my thumb rubbing the length of her cheekbone before she softly pulls herself away. The warmth from her body laying next to me retreats leaving me feeling colder, lonelier than I have ever felt before.
I miss her warmth.
Looking around the room, the picture of us has been taken down once again. I notice a new picture of Charlie and Victoria up on the wall both showing teeth to the camera except Charlie only has gums showing, and it makes me chuckle sadly to myself because I should be in that frame with them. Instead, I'm looking at them on the outside when I should be inside with my family.
I've paid too much attention to the one thing that was taken from me long ago that I thought was mine to take. It was always Victoria's choice to give away her virtue to whoever she thought was special enough to receive her gift. I chose to focus on that singular act instead of focusing on the wonderful female I have been given by the Moon herself.
Feeling my neck because it's constricting tight against my own thoughts, making sure nothing is strangling me. The wound Grey gave me is deep, feeling the scar every member of the pack will understand that I have done something that deserved my brother's wrath.
Rumors will fly getting greater and greater as time passes on what it could be that had him at my throat.
"Do you feel better?" Victoria is eyeing me up with no expression on her face. It's as if she's looking through me instead of at me. That I'm just taking up space in her life, no substance in me.
"I feel better." The sound coming out of my mouth is dry and cracked.
"Good, now get up and get out of my bed and close the door on your way out." She's standing now motionless waiting for me to leave. She has a solid grace on how she can close her heart so easily while mine breaks, shattering against her hardening clay.
A sense of shakiness flutters my muscles while I sit up on the bed's edge.
A hint of tension as the time ticks by with my refusal to move.
"Victoria can we just talk about things?" Pleading for her ears to listen to me just for a few minutes.
"Talk about things? What things Fin do you want to talk about? The pack, Charlie, or how you just broke your brother's, heart? Is that what you want to talk about?" Slapping words felt across my face. The stinging feeling is lingering.
I just can't say anything back that would make things better between us, so I keep quiet.
"Nothing to say?" Maliciousness in the flexion of words she speaks out.
"What do you want me to say, Victoria? What do you want me to say to you?"
"You're the one who wanted to talk Fin; I'm just giving you suggestions on the topics to talk about because anything else is useless words to me."
"I thought we could talk about us, you and me."
"Us? What us Fin? There is no us, that doesn't exist anymore. Remeber? You broke us up. So now there is only you and me nothing else exists. The only connection we have is Charlie, and for her, I will tolerate you." Her fur is rising, agitation with the way she's starting to pace the room.
"Get out!" Two words pronounce slow, so I don't get the meaning of tone confused. She has no love left for me.
"I won't give up on us Victoria somehow I will try to make this better."
"Better, how? How will you do that? Listen Fin; you live your life, and I promise you, I'm going to live my life."
"What's that suppose to mean?" Not liking the way she's telling me this.
"You can do whatever you want to do from now on; I will not interfere with your private life. I just want you to give me the same courtesy back." The quickness of my lunge even surprises me. Pulling her body into mine, making sure she understands that she is not to live a life without me in it.
"Victoria you need to stop now. No one will ever be what I can be to you. I won't stand for what you're implying about private life, you are my private life, just like I am your private life. Have faith in me when I say this, I will show this entire pack what a jealous male can do. Don't test me on that." Lips pressed against her ear, words spoken clearly, so she understands just how serious I am.
The wolf inside rumbles his violent growl out vibrating the air not impressed with what she's thinking. He would never allow anyone to sniff around her tail. If she's not scared of me, she needs to understand that male wolf doesn't play games. He's a wolf who knows what he wants, and he will not share her with anyone.
He might have been quiet all these years before he marked Victoria but he will no longer be silent. He will no longer tolerate any female near us or her near any female of male.
Her hand is reaching behind my ear giving it scratch, looking directly in my eyes to the Wild inside. "It's only Finian I find unworthy, you are my king, always." That settles him down enough for my sight to see clearly again. He's puffed out full of his own pride as he retreats inside content.
"Go Fin, just go." Charlie is starting to cry in her crib as Victoria goes to her. Watching her pick her up while leaving her room to go downstairs because I haven't removed myself from her space.
Alone once again, not for long as the demon saunter in all glume, with a sharp smirk across its face while I'm trying to find the picture of Victoria and me to put back on the wall.
Victoria's and Grey's voices are mumbled sound coming from the floor.
Late afternoon eavesdropping does not become me; I just can't turn my ear away from it when I hear whispers start to turn into solid sound.
Grey's voice is rising through the vents into the room, the demon on the bed stretched out stinking up the room with its rot or is it my own ruin I smell?
"Victoria you tell Fin he needs to stay away for a while. I don't want to see his face."
"Grey, I'm not his handler, I will not come between you and him in this fight. It doesn't concern me this time. This fight is between Meela, you and him." A quiet pause from the both of them.
"What did he tell you about what happened?" Grey is pressing Victoria for my details.
"He just said that they kissed, he showed me how they kissed." Her voice is an octave lower in misery. My heart starting to speed up.
"He lies to you, Victoria." That just accelerated my heart rate.
"What do you mean, Grey?" Forgetting my mission to find our picture, instead, pressing my ear against the vent to actually hear her spoken word, the depth of sound falling with her question. The demon joins me with its face just inches from mine the both of us on the floor listening, the forked tongue flicking out touching my skin in annoyance.
"Did he look at your neck with his canine's down ready to mark you? Because I saw it in his eyes, Victoria, while he was kissing my mate, he wanted to mark her. He's always wanted her since the very first smell. He has pursued her, he has taunted me for years that he would have marked her first. When I was healing from putting myself in front of that bear, he repays me by feeling in between my mate's thighs who just pushed out our dead pup." I think I hear a fist bang against something. Grey's voice suffocating me on the truth about myself.
"She wasn't in her right mind when she kissed him, her mind wasn't in the right place, but his was. He knew what he was doing. He knew who she was to me, he knew I was her mate. Then lies about it, saying it was all him, trying to protect her from me. He lied to me Victoria, and he lied to you." Somehow Grey just made my hill to climb up into a mountain that its peak is obscured by clouds at how high it is. My hand wants to bang against the floor, but I think better of it. The demon laughs in my face; it's squealing with delight at my new found misery.
"Victoria, I didn't tell you that to make you cry, don't cry." A muffled sob as if her hand is covering her mouth trying not to let any sound escape. Grey's voice is trying to soothe her.
Conversation coming to a halt abruptly, no more sound heard except for Victoria's soft cries.
I never knew I could sink lower, but here it is another all time low.
"What do you mean he wanted to mark her, Grey? He told me that they just kissed." Victoria able to find her voice that holds a torture of shaky sound.
"I could see it in his eye's; I could see how close he was to doing it, wanting to do it." Another long pause of words while Victoria has a muffled cry again lasting long. Her clay has been broken again and now she will remold into something stronger from this because that's who she is making my recovery from this all that much harder.
"Fin said he kissed Meela, not Meela kissing him." Strangled words are coming out a tight throat.
"He probably said that so you wouldn't try to kill Meela." Grey knows me well. Another long pause in their conversation.
"I was tempted I won't lie to you, I wanted to. If she would have said one word, I think even with our friendship Grey I could have ended her. She just never said anything back to me, she just kept quiet letting me talk, it's as if she knew better." Victoria's voice becoming stronger now, not so full of hurt.
It's as if she's just used to hurting that when it happens she feels it then pushes it to the side and moves forward with her life. Always she's had pain, heartache and to her, she feels as if that's the normal way to live. That this is what's expected from her life, why try to change it or believe in anything else again when all that will ever come is a pain.
"Do you still want to hurt her?" Grey's caution voice sounding worried.
"No, I don't. I understand that she wasn't in a right place at the time. I guess I just don't care anymore. Also, she's your mate Grey, and when it comes down to it, I can't hurt her because then I would be hurting you and I can't hurt you because you're my friend. And I really don't have very many, so the ones I do have are special to me."
A long pause again muffled words that I can't make out until Victoria's voice rises again.
"I had this really stupid dream when I was younger. I found this little cottage on my father's territory, and I would go to it with Charlie at first then I would bring other friends to it. The place was in ruin, rotting wood, holes in the roof, trees growing in the kitchen but I would dream looking up at the sky thinking what a great place to raise a family in. I wanted to spend the rest of my life there with my mate and my pups. So I fixed it up once I took control of the East, knowing Fin hated me, that my chances of that coming true were non-existent. I really never understood why I did it, after all, it was just some stupid fantasy I had. But now I wish I could go there, bring Charlie with me and just live a quiet life without Fin, but I can't because Charlie is the next Alpha to this pack. She needs her father to teach her the things I can't because the things I have been taught are wrong, I'm wrong Grey and my daughter needs to grow up right." Victoria's quavering voice has my body feeling heavy with the guilt of everything I have done to that wolf.
"You're not wrong Victoria." Grey trying to give her reassurance.
"Are you hearing that Fin, listen to your mate's heart anguish. How proud and right do you feel now? Make sure you hold your head up just like Victoria is while you walk around your pack smiling to wolves that really mean nothing to you while the one soul that means the world can't even really dream anymore. All her hopes are gone." It's hissed out with the demon's repulsion of who I am.
When I look around the room because I can't face even my demon now my eyes land on the corner of our picture frame that's hidden underneath her bed.
Getting up off the ground because I can't stomach any more things about myself. Walking out as if weighted down by the world itself I chose not to put the picture back up, it's probably best if I leave it under the bed out of sight out of mind.
You are only defeated if you believe you are defeated. My father's words coming back from somewhere deep in my mind stopping me in my tracks. Turning my body around, reaching for the picture I put it back on the wall where it belongs. Even if right now it doesn't feel right up there that's where it will stay.
I have a giant shit pile I have to wade through before I can even begin to climb that mountain of redemption.
Odin's Prize Snippet....
Chapter name: Tree
Flickering candle light moving in slow motion shadows casting their shape on the walls of the cabin almost as if they are moving without a body attached to them. The heat rising in my body, flushing my face red hot almost to the point of burning.
"Charlie?" Odin's voice sounding distant, even when the delicate china cup cracks next to my feet I can't seem to focus my thoughts.
"Odin I feel funny."
"I know Charlie."
"How do you know this?" My tongue feels thick in my mouth.
"Because I gave you something that will make you forget about tonight."
"Why would you do that?" It's getting harder to concentrate on making sound come out of my mouth. Shaking my head back and forth as if trying to clear my mind that's becoming unclear, hazy.
Hands going out to the table to steady myself because the world is wobbling back and forth.
"Today is our mating ceremony Charlie, and it's best that you didn't know about when it would happen till now. Trust me when I tell you this. You will not remember anything about tonight. You will only see it through my eyes, and I have been taught how to look so you will remember only the beauty it holds."
Curles of vapor from the candle smoke starts dancing as if possessed by a spirit. I hear or rather sense that I can feel faint chimes coming from somewhere when Odin comes closer to me. Bending down at my foot he lifts my skirt up revealing my ankle; he's too quick for my lazy eyes now to catch all his movements but when he stands up, and I move my foot I can hear the silver bells tinkering against their casings. It's a beautifully crafted bracelet that now is secured to my ankle.
"It's a tradition that I put the first one on you." Moving my ankle again the sound memorizing to my ears that now can feel the sound of silver hitting metal.
"It's going to be alright Charlie; I don't want you to be scared, alright." He's got my face between his hands before his lips press against mine, kissing me fully without the need to stop. That singular act has me worried now because Odin just is never like this.
"Odin I'm scared." I really mean it, "I didn't expect this yet. I thought maybe I had more time." Another kiss coming so softly it actually has me becoming limbless to the point of almost collapse, Odin catches me from falling.
Strong arms carrying me out the door into the afternoon Sun that now won't stop glaring down at me. I can't seem to close my eyes from the harshness of its light.