The Silver Lycan Queen

Chapter 3 - Sleepless nights

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Cora

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“Damn it! What took you so long? Is it done?” Nolan asks, letting me inside and closing the door after making sure the floor is empty. “It’s done,” I reply, putting the metal pail on the table. “Finally,” he says, taking the lid off and staring at the contents. “Are you sure it will not stop?” he asks, now looking over at me.

“It won’t, not as long as you follow the instructions I gave you,” I say, sealing the pail again. “Here,” I add, handing him the ring. "Remember never to take it off.”

“I won’t.”

“Does the King know?”

“Yes, the news was delivered this afternoon. He’s in pretty bad shape, and he’s not the only one, it seems.”

“I’m fine. I knew this day was coming.”

“You don’t have to pretend with me, Cora. You tried to save the guy because you loved him.”

“I lost focus, and he helped me find my way by rejecting me.”

“Mmh.”

“Do you need anything? I would like to go lie down.”

“His body, you—”

“—I threw it down the mountain.”

“Without a head, right?”

“There was no need—”

“—Cora!”

“If it were your heart beating inside that bucket, would you have survived?!”

“Keep your voice down. Do you want the whole palace to hear you?”

“No! I won’t! You’re not the one who had to look him in the eye while ripping out his heart!”

“You’re right. I’m sorry, I’m paranoid,” he says, pouring himself a glass of whiskey. “We grew up together, Cora. We may not have the same blood running through our veins, but he was always a brother to me.”

“And yet you plotted his death.”

“That’s Father’s fault for insisting on making a weakling king. Ares didn’t have the stomach for this. He didn’t even want to be king. That in itself proves just how unworthy he was. I don’t know... Do we speak about him in the present or past tense, since, you know, his heart is still beating?”

“I have a long day tomorrow,” I tell him, and I walk to the exit.

“You don’t want to spend the night together? Grieve?”

“No, thanks. I’ll pass. I grieve better alone.” I reply and walk out before he has time to say anything else.

“Goodnight!” I hear him shout out as I walk down the corridor, and I don’t reply.

I walk inside my room and close the door before sliding down on it, my heart bleeding as Ares’s dying face keeps flashing before my eyes, his last breaths haunting my ears. He was good, gentle, and kind; he didn’t deserve to die like that. I feel hot tears running down my face and wipe them off before pulling my knees to my chest. “It was a necessary evil, Cora,” I whisper to myself, burying my head in my knees, but the words don’t bring me any comfort.

When I stopped by the coven to complete the ritual, everyone was in good spirits, as we had taken one more step closer to our freedom. It hasn’t been easy living in hiding and away from our ancestral land. After my people were exiled in Silvera for working with the vampires, they went into a hideout they had prepared in case something like that was to happen. They saw how careless and greedy the vampires grew, and after their cautions fell on deaf ears, they started preparing for the worst.

As witches, we draw our strength from our dead, so we must remain in one place if we are to remain strong. But what our regent never saw coming were the vampires coming after us. After they were defeated, they turned on us and started coming for us. They terrorized us at night, causing us to flee and leave everything behind. When our regent saw the suffering of our people, she made a promise to return them to their homes. She didn’t have a clear plan as to how she was going to do it, but she knew something had to be done.

For her to even know where to begin, she needed someone inside the castle—someone to be our eyes and ears. So, having watched my family and the people I loved killed by the king in front of me before we fled, I was angry and out for vengeance, so I volunteered.

When I turned eighteen, I left the coven and came to Silvera. I had to get into the palace by pretending to be a human servant, but I didn’t know how to go about it, so when I heard about the ball that was to be held in honor of the prince’s eighteenth birthday, I decided to attend. And I guess my ancestors, whom I spent the previous night calling on to accompany me, heard me because, from the moment I walked in, the Prince couldn’t take his eyes off of me.

The next morning, I woke up in Anselm’s arms, and the plan was suddenly clear. We didn’t have the numbers to fight a king’s army that had already defeated us at our best, so the easy way was to get the prince to fall madly in love with me and become his queen.

Once queen, I would bear him an heir to cement my claim to the throne, then kill him and bring my people back. But I was stupid enough to believe him when he said he wouldn’t bend to his father’s will and that he would marry a woman of his choosing. His father had already picked out a bride for him and would not hear of him marrying anyone other than her. Eventually, he caved and married his chosen bride.

I tried to stick around as his mistress; I even gave him a potion so he and his wife wouldn’t have kids, buying myself time to figure out something, but when it rains, it pours. I received a blood-curdling call from the coven. The vampires had found us again and decimated our coven. And when I got there, only our regent and a handful of children had survived, and only because the children were cloaked.

She was badly wounded, and it was clear she would not make it, so she used the last of her strength to put us into a deep sleep—long enough for the vampires to think we had all perished—and sealed us in a cave that hid in plain sight using a cloaking spell that will lift when we awaken. The spell was to last for fifty years, and we were all about to stop aging at twenty-five.

The spell broke after fifty years, and we had to live up to the promise we made before our slumber. We promised to keep our coven alive, restore all that was lost, and pay the vampires back in kind for their betrayal. We lost everything because of them, and instead of protecting us, they preyed on us. But we woke up to a different world, and we needed a new plan, or at least that’s what I thought until I discovered that the potion I gave Anselm had worn off and he had two sons, which meant my plan was still viable. I just needed to change my target.

Getting close to the older prince wasn’t hard, given how things are done nowadays. He was arrogant, but it didn’t matter as long as he served his purpose. However, I soon discovered that he wasn’t Anselm’s son; he was Alastair’s son. Alastair was Anslem’s best friend. They were like brothers, and he and his wife died fighting to protect Anselm’s wife, leaving a few-month-old Nolan behind. This forced me to set my eyes on the younger brother, but the more I got to know Ares, the more the lines blurred, and I found myself straying from my mission.

I fell for him and believed I could reason with him, but unlike his father, he didn’t fall into my traps. I could never get through to him no matter what I did, and I tried just about everything, even making him think he took my virginity.

Time was ticking by with no results, and my people started getting restless. Eventually, I had no choice but to exploit the only other thing I had discovered since getting closer to them: Nolan’s thirst for the throne and his envy of Ares. He and I struck a bargain. If I helped him sit on the throne, he’d gladly allow my people to return.

I went back to the coven to look at our ancient volcanic scrolls, and there was only one spell capable of doing what needed to be done, but it required a big sacrifice—a sacrifice I didn’t want to make. So I went back and tried to come up with another plan, but Marlene, our new regent, discovered that I had found a way and I was stalling. I begged for more time to get Ares to fall for me, but they didn’t want to hear of it. So, eventually, I did it. I killed Ares.

••••••••••••

Novah

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I groan, checking the time; it’s 7 a.m. I’m normally fresh on my feet by this time, but ever since that day in the forest, I haven’t been able to sleep well. It’s been a week since then, and we haven’t seen our savior again. But every night we wake up to his scent filling the air as if he were in the room. When I came to, I was in a hospital room. I panicked and tried to leave, but a doctor came in and told me my secret was safe when she saw how panicked I was. She told me she was the one who received me when I was brought in and knew who I was. She’s also a werewolf from the Violet Sky Clan, and she made sure I was attended to by an all-werewolf staff.

Dr. Bennett asked them to keep my identity a secret; otherwise, the media would have been buzzing with the news. I was incredibly lucky she was the one who received me, considering the hospital is not exclusive to werewolves. When she gave me my folder, detailing just how severely injured I was, I broke down and cried. I almost died if it weren’t for my... mate? I woke up clutching a bloodied shirt—the one I’m wearing now. It’s the shirt I was wearing when admitted to the hospital, and I’ve been sleeping in it ever since.

Dr. Bennett told me I was unconscious when I was brought in, but the moment they tried to get me out of it, I woke up and fought them off, desperately holding onto it, which is why I was still clutching it when I woke up.

I bring it to my nose and inhale before closing my eyes, enjoying my dose of high. But my eyes snap open as a memory of his eyes comes back to me. Were they really just black with no white in them, or was I hallucinating that part? The only creatures whose eyes change completely are vampires and hybrids, at least according to the stories I’ve heard, but they become red, not black. I sigh, getting up and deciding to shake it off. First things first, we need to find him. So I get up and head to the shower.

I’ve returned to the hospital and ask Dr. Bennett for more information about the man who brought me. Based on her description, it wasn’t my savior, but I’m assuming he must know him.