THE CONFLICT #2

CHAPTER 25

NOVENA

Embarrassed does not even begin to explain how I’m feeling. The blush continuously creeping into my cheeks is a recurring reminder of what happened with Zelus. I couldn’t scrub my skin hard enough to get his touch out of my head and off of my skin. My own conscience mocks me, reminding me of my lost ones, my father and Maddie. My people life’s needlessly wasted because of him, because of a revenge against long dead relatives. This is a test of will, a test of what kind of person I want to be. I don’t believe in soul mates and I certainly don’t believe that his gods care enough to hand pick me just for him. I continue brushing my hair while I sit by the vanity. I don’t even notice Soraya sneaking in like a thief in the night. She’s almost at my side when I catch sight of her golden hair, strangely loose around her shoulders. Her face is paler than usual, her eyes reddened as if she had been crying. She waits for me to nod for her to speak.

“How was your breakfast?” The words are sharper than usual too. Isn’t she the one who warned me against declining the prince?

“Not well.”

“I thought as much.” The words are barely a whisper. There is an accusation lying behind those four little words.

I raise a brow suspiciously, “Is something the matter?”

She flashes a small smile that doesn’t reach her eyes, “Of course not.” Then I see her begin to fugit, see her eyes dart around and her teeth bite nervously into her lip. She moves closer, lowering herself so that she can whisper.

“Do you consider yourself a just person?”

I consider her carefully. The air between us is suddenly intense with importance. I lean closer to her, looking up into her pale face and bright blue eyes. Eyes that remind me of Emmaline, eyes that capture and hold you.

I whisper, “I would like to believe that I make decisions that are in line with my moral compass. I would like to believe that I am just and kind.”

I watch her search my face contemplating something that so obviously is troubling her. Something that would no doubt land her in a lot of trouble. She is wondering if I am worth the danger. “You should come with me.” she finally says, so softy I strain to hear her.

I blink, “Why?”

“To see exactly what kind of male he is.”

I stare into her troubled blue eyes. I don’t have to ask who she is referring to. I know exactly who she is talking about. What has he done? What could he be doing that has warped her loyalty?

I swallow, “Show me.”

Soraya leads me through several fairly lit servants' passages, a meter in width. I try to memorise them all – the room we pass, the colouring of the paint. She is silent as I follow, quickly moving through the mass of connecting passages on silent fast feet until finally she slows to a stop. I watch her back warily as she leans forward, poking her head out, checking the room before she swings the wooden door open. The room is small. A waiting area perhaps, with a wall of books and a little fireplace. Simple yet stylish. Soraya walks straight over to the window and gazing down below. I hesitate only long enough to give the room a finally sweep before I too peer to the ground below. A crowd has gathered around a dais of marble stone. A man is strung up by his arms and stripped from the waist up. Not just any man, a man with white hair and pale skin gleaming in the sunlight.

“What is this?” I breathe, my mouth going dry at the sight of metal shackles around his limbs, holding him there like a prisoner.

“A whipping. A punishment for telling you about your father.”

I pale. Pallas takes up the barbed whip from a guard, letting it hang before he draws it back. He takes his time, enjoying this – savouring the pain to come. I always suspected that Pallas is not mentally stable, but now I'm sure of it. I can't imagine what type of person you'd have to be to enjoy inflicting pain on somebody else. I cannot hear the sound the whip makes from here. But I can see Huntley’s face. He bites his lip to keep from crying out in front of all those gathering people bearing witness.

“Have you ever seen a whipping before princess?” Soraya asks casually.

No shock in her voice, no surprise or outrage – no emotion at all. This must be a regular occurrence. She must feel something if she decided I needed to see this. Does everyone who displeases Zelus and his cousins end up stripped and whipped? Will I eventually be one of them? I feel the blood drain from my face as another blow is dealt to his exposed skin. Still he doesn’t cry out. My breath clouds the window in front of me, but I cannot help it, I cannot stop the revulsion turning my stomach or the deep breathes I’m forcing myself to take.

“No.”

“A light punishment, he should be grateful Zelus doesn't kill him.” She says, close by, “He probably has Selene to thank for that.”

This it is. The bitterness.

“Who is he?” I whisper, my forehead pressed to the window.

I wonder if she knows about his visit to my chambers. Is that why she is showing me? Does she see and hear more than she lets on?

She doesn’t hesitate to answer, “The heir to a mighty pack, adopted but still the sole heir.” She makes a sound in her throat, “One of his fathers’ are down there too.”

She presses her slim finger to the glass, pressing the tip again it. She points to a black-haired man I saw Huntley speaking to at the dinner before everything went to hell. He’s face is blank, expressionless, as he stares up forwards his son’s torn back. The face of a man willing strength to his son. The chains taught as Huntley pulls against them keeping him defenceless, keeping him prisoner.

“But he has white hair.” I leave out that his eyes are uniquely silver too. From here I cannot see them, and I shouldn’t be able to know their colour – unless of course, I had seen him up close.

“No one knows who his biological parents are or where exactly he came from. Only that he showed up at the gates of Zaire Legatus’s mansion as a screaming infant. Zaire Legatus is the ruling Alpha of his territory, the biggest apart from the royal families might I add.” She sighs as if that is unfortunate news.

“Can’t his father do something then?”

She shakes her blonde head, “Not even he can save his son this pain. Zelus could kill him just as quickly for daring such a thing. Or even have him strung up, right next to his son. He could even strip him of his title as an alpha if Zelus really wanted to.”

Such a thing is possible? Zelus has so much power? We certainly couldn’t just decide to cast aside a duke whenever we felt like it as the rulers of the south. So much unchecked authority.

“Of course, packs are extremely loyal to their alphas. Zelus would have a civil war in the wind were he that bold.”

I am hardly breathing when she finally finishes. For whatever reason she felt it necessary to tell me all that – I cannot bare to contemplate it right now. I can only watch as Zelus smiles cruelly at Huntley's suffering.

So, you aren’t one of them? I had asked. I pray you never find out what I am. He had replied.

Maybe it is fate or the gods still playing their wicked games, but it has felt so real with him in my dreams. I cannot help but trust that Huntley is not my enemy. A dangerous thing to admit even to myself. I believe him to be a victim of the Regius family too.

We are the same.

I watch, unable to turn away, unable to ignore what I am witnessing. I don’t know how long I stand there next to Nina, bearing witness. Maybe only minutes, maybe hours but finally, it’s over. Guards mount the platform to release Huntley from his chains. I feel the tight knot release in my chest.

It’s over.

Its finished, I tell myself.

I’m about to turn away, about to go back to my pampered prison and pretend I saw nothing – pretend that I know nothing – when something catches my eye. The royal’s faces are akin to that of a cold stone statue as Huntley is dragged away, Phobos and Zelus’s eyes trailing from the torn flesh to the abandoned chains. Selene, the most uncomfortable looking one of all, holds her head rigidly high. And maybe it is because the crowd has become silent or because everyone is staring at the same thing. Maybe it’s because Zelus and Phobos cast such murderous looks in Selene’s direction. There displeasure more evident by their lips curling back to expose elongated canines, while a small smile plays on her lips. Whatever it is that makes me feel the chilled fingers of dread creep along my skin, it makes me pause and take another look. A closer look. And where he was tired, a pool of blood catches the light like a mirror. A pool as silver as the moon itself.