Chapter 73: Chapter 73

Lily

The last month had been a blur. No – it had been a whirlwind for Lily, sending her heart lurching in turbulent circles whenever it escaped from the cage she had so meticulously built for it.

Every day, she stared at herself in the mirror as she dragged a comb through her dark blonde hair and tugged it into a loose braid down her back. It had grown, and as the autumn crept in, carried on the cold breeze that shook burning leaves from the trees, it was starting to darken in colour, too. Her eyes were her own, although they were set back further into the hollows of her eye sockets and glazed in a perpetual way that spoke of more than pain – it was an ever-present ache that ate away at her flesh, day and night, dawn and dusk.

That was what the gaunt look to her features and the pallor to her olive skin spoke of, too. Even her plump, red lips appeared thinner and paler.

Lily scowled up at the ceiling. She’d been on the cusp of returning to herself – she had returned to herself the moment she’d understood Eryne’s plight, in fact – but Atticus had stolen her hope. Along with everything else she’d held dear.

And now she had to share a bed with him. She glanced over her shoulder, watching the steady rise and fall of his chest as he slept. He looked innocent as he dreamt, she thought – all of the hard lines of his jaw and cheekbones softened, and his lips went slack as he breathed heavily through them.

She would have to be a fool to not see how handsome he was. Long, dark eyelashes formed crescents on his tanned cheeks. Up close, a smattering of freckles kissed the bridge of his nose. They were starker after the heat of summer and spending so much time outdoors. Lily hadn’t asked him what had become of the Blood Moon pack, or why there was no food save for that which Red Ripper had given them. She’d accepted it without question, because she had no other choice.

Everything she’d ever chosen for herself had been taken from her.

With a near-silent huff, Lily turned away from him. It was stupid to look at him like that – like a lover caressing his face with longing gazes. Her throat bobbed. He was the enemy, just as much as Apollo and Morvand were.

That was one thing she did know – not that she’d asked. Fear had sliced through her chest as they’d been sucked into the ether and transported across Eldda magically. One second, they’d been in Red Ripper’s territory; the next, they’d been clutching at each other, struggling to stand on wobbling legs, and staring up at a pack house Lily had once thought she’d never see again.

Atticus had gloated of his triumph over Alpha Nobody as he’d dragged her inside. He hadn’t seemed to realise that she was broken, or that her heart had remained with Elijah on the other side of Eldda.

The only escape she had came with the dawn.

In a month of nothingness, of empty sunrises and of empty sunsets, Lily had lost herself. But as the dawnlight splintered the horizon, she found peace for an hour or two in her old home. Sometimes, she would climb into her bed and close her eyes. Sometimes, she could almost pretend that her dad was in the cabin, too, and that nothing had changed.

But it had.

That relief was only ever short-lived. Then, once the beautiful haze of nostalgia had faded, Lily would pull back the covers and look at every piece of physical proof she had that the last half of the year had happened. Six months didn’t sound like long, but so much had changed for Lily.

Everything had changed.

She started with her left leg. The one that had been hurt by the leurcher. Each wound, every scar, was like a splinter pressing through her skull and forcing her to remember. From there, she traced the cut down her temple and cheek. She ran her hands over her whole body, feeling the faint press of Elijah’s imagined kisses on her lips and the agony of everything Morvand and Apollo had done to her.

Then, when she had found every shattered piece of herself and shoved it back into place, Lily would brew wild nettle tea and sip it in the doorway of her old home. She missed her father, and Rose… But most of all she missed Elijah.

Her life in Sea Pine had been short. Too short. But as she sipped the scalding tea and watched the steam evaporate against the pale dawn, the rim of the mug gilded in the gossamer sunlight as it climbed above the horizon, she allowed herself to think longing of not just Elijah, but of Ithia and Caslein, too. Of everyone she’d lost.

Sometimes, it didn’t feel real. It felt as though it were a strange and twisted dream – but Lily would take the bad if only it meant she could claim the slivers of wonder and joy that intertwined with the dark and the gory so neatly that they were impossible to unpick.

With a quiet sigh, she rolled over to check that Atticus was still asleep. She knew he wanted her to be grateful that he had saved her, but his rescue mission had only made her hate him more. He’d rejected her. Now that she was happy without him, he wanted to dig his claws in and drag her back. It wasn’t fair. She almost laughed. When had Atticus ever been fair?

She dressed quickly, quietly, and walked out of the pack house in a dream.

A dream that was shattered when a hand clasped her bicep.

She stopped with one foot in the doorway. The hands spun her roughly, and she swallowed hard as she came face to face with Alpha Atticus.

“Atticus?” she breathed. What was he doing here? This – this was her only solace, her only peace, and he was here to steal it from her yet again. Was there nothing of hers that would be left untouched by his greedy hands?

His hands tightened on her upper arms. “What are you doing out here?” he asked, his deep voice dipping into a growl.

Was that supposed to scare her? He didn’t know what she’d been through. He didn’t know the person she’d had to become to survive.

She offered him a half-truth, one that cut deeper than she’d intended as she said it. “I miss my dad.”

Atticus’s eyebrows pinched together. “He’ll be back soon. Three days at most.”

Lily tangled her hands together. She missed the feel of her mother’s garnet ring – missed twisting it around her finger – but it afforded her some small measure of comfort to know that Elijah had it. He had a piece of her. Proof that she had been real to him, even if he was becoming less real to her with every passing day.

Stars, she worried about him. Had Red Ripper captured him? Was she trapped in a cell as she had been? It had been a month in the natural realm – how long would it have been for Elijah?

She bit her lip. This was why she had to bury her thoughts and feelings as far down as they would go. With Atticus watching her, she had no means of escape. She had thought of a thousand plans, her heart and soul desperate to reach her mate, but she could see no clear path to retrieve him. So Lily forced her feelings aside. For now. That was her promise to herself, the lone promise that made survival here possible. This was temporary, as Red Ripper had been.

Atticus’s jaw clenched. Lily saw the tell-tale sign of his temper a half-second before his fist hit the door.

She flinched. “Atticus?”

This was why she couldn’t run. Because for all of his gloating and all of his glorified tales of her rescue, he hadn’t done it for her. He didn’t even really know her, let alone desire her as he claimed. No – he’d done it for himself. And Lily knew, with an almost painful certainty, that she wouldn’t get far if she left. He’d even discovered the single thing she did for herself and ruined it. She couldn’t bear it if he did something to Elijah because she had tried to go back to him.

Slowly, Atticus got his face back under control. The deep shade of puce still lit his cheeks, but his scowl slackened until he almost looked… Kind.

“I’m… Sorry. I don’t want to frighten you.” A likely story, Lily thought. That was all he was: rage and terror, seeking control over everyone around him. “But I have brought you back from Red Ripper, Lily. I don’t know what more I can do.”

The wall in her was cracked. It always was, in the quiet mornings when she came here – a slim crack that let the memories and the ache in. Atticus shoved his hand into the crack and split it wide. So wide that Lily felt her chin trembling. She bit the inside of her cheek, hard. It did nothing.

Nothing.

That was all there was, now.

And that was all Atticus could offer her.

“Because there is nothing you can do,” she said. Her voice sounded throaty and wet. She bit her lip to stem the tears, hard enough that she could taste blood on her tongue.

She stared in shock as Atticus bushed his thumb gently – so gently – over her lip and wiped away the blood. He cleared his throat – maybe he was as surprised by his actions as she was. “What happened to you?” he asked.

Lily felt her walls crumbling. She lunged for them and tried to gather the falling stone with desperate hands. Her eyes closed and she shook her head as she felt the last of the bricks shatter. “You don’t want to know.”

She tried to keep him out. But he had already wormed his way in.

“You don’t sleep,” he said, concern swelling in his quiet voice. “You barely eat.”

As if he cared! He was the one that had done this to her. The arrogance, the conceit… “Why you do care?” Lily barely managed to rein the scorn in her voice in.

As his lip curled, Lily realised she’d not barely managed to rein it in. She hadn’t at all. But, before the inevitable lash of his words or his fist came, he softened. He looked down, focusing on wiping away her blood on his trousers.

“You are my mate,” he murmured, his eyes trained on his thigh. “Of course I care.”

Lily turned away. She couldn’t stand the sight of him. Rage flickered in her chest, a tiny candle’s flame – but rage, nonetheless. “No, you aren’t.”

He snorted. The candle flame grew brighter, stronger. “You can’t still believe you and Alpha Idiot are mates, can you? I was first, Lily – and I will be your last.”

She spun around, sucking in a breath fuelled by fire. She hated when he called Elijah Alpha Idiot, or Alpha Nothing, or Alpha Nobody. He was a million times the man Atticus was. He was honourable, and kind, and fierce, and fragile, and though he was half wolf and half faelen, he was more human at heart than any creature Lily had ever met.

“Are you crying?”

“No.” Her hand scrubbed away the traitorous tear as soon as it fell.

“What can I do?”

“Nothing.”

Atticus frowned at her, his head tilting to the side. Then he sat down in the doorway of her family’s cabin. “You could tell me about it.”

Her strength left her. He was right – she hadn’t been eating or sleeping. And now her walls were down, she had nothing left to keep her standing. So she gave in, and she told Atticus everything. Each word she spoke was another lance through her battered and bruised heart, but some of the tension around her shoulders lifted as she shared the horrors of that cell with another. Somewhere amongst it all, Lily realised she missed Efaffion. She’d lost herself with him, but he’d been with her through it all. A companion in the worst of times.

“It’s okay,” Atticus whispered, his green eyes wide. In him, she saw the child he had once been – full of love and admiration, yearning to do the best he could by the pack that would one day be his. It hurt to see it now, a fragment of good lost to the darkness of power that had consumed him. “You’re here now. You’re safe.”

Lily lifted her chin defiantly. He was wrong. “I’m not. And I won’t be – not until Red Ripper are destroyed.”

His tongue flicked out, wetting his lips as he considered her words. “Then we will destroy them.” He said it so simply – like that had always been an option. Like he hadn’t struck a deal with them to free her and feed his pack.

“You don’t mean that,” she muttered, looking away. The sun was almost directly above them, now – and what a relief it was to be able to mark the passage of time with the sun’s movements once more.

“I do,” he swore. “I want you to feel safe again.”

The unspoken words were what kept her from feeling hope. He wanted her to feel safe here, with him.

Atticus cleared his throat. “I was wrong to let you go, Lily. I was…”

Her lips twitched. “Stupid? Arrogant?”

She expected him to lash out, but he grinned at her easily. “Both of those and so much more. But I swear to you that I will make up for it all. This is your home, just as much as it is mine. And when you were gone…” He swallowed again and ran his tongue over his bottom lip. “I couldn’t cope. Ask anyone when they get back – I was a nightmare. But now you’re here, I feel like I can breathe again.”

Lily stared at him and, for the briefest of seconds, she almost wished that she still felt the same. But Atticus had scorned her, had sent her away, and Elijah filled her heart and soul now. Green eyes were not grey, and one gentle touch was not a plethora.

Lily stared at Atticus, and she didn’t know what to say or do. She fumbled for her callous mask and for the stones to rebuild her wall.

But they were gone.

“You know…” Atticus worried his lower lip between his teeth. “It’s almost Mabben. I thought we could try to celebrate the festival when the rest of our pack return.”

Our pack. She tried to smother the heartache she knew was burning in her brown eyes, but without the wall or the mask it was impossible. Atticus peered straight in – straight in to her soul. His mouth tightened into a flat line at whatever he saw there.

“The animal of September is the hawk,” he added. She’d never seem him like this. Trying. “It’s symbolic of a new perspective.”

Maybe… Maybe if she couldn’t leave, not yet, she should try. If Atticus really wanted her to be happy, then he might let her see Elijah. Or at least write to him, or Ithia or Caslein, to make sure that he was okay.

“Okay.” She nodded, and touched the back of his hand. “Let’s prepare for Mabben.”

Lily could play nice with Atticus. At least, she could try to.

For Elijah.