Chapter 15

Reid’s head was twisted to the side as he looked at me questioningly, trying to figure out the puzzle that I had just created for him.

“What?” I aggressively said the single word to him, thinking that maybe playing the ‘oblivious’ card might be a good way to get off his radar. It worked though, he turned away from me and I looked to Corbin.

Corbin had noticed the indifference between us but had decided not to say anything. Instead, he turned back to his audience that was being held through fear and the threat of death.

Out of the corner of my eye, to the side of the room, I could see a male wolf from our pack twitching, his eyes frequently darting to and from the exit close-by to him and Corbin.

I started shaking my head and mouthing the word ‘no’, but it was no good, the wolf was not looking at me. He tried bolting as fast as his wolf speed could take him to the patio doorway. He never stood a chance though.

One of the many heavily muscled guards that was standing just outside of the threshold was ready to respond before the wolf had even lifted his foot for the very first step. Everything happened in slow motion. What felt like half an hour, was probably barely a couple of seconds thanks to our improved reflexes.

The ginger colour haired guard responded by lifting a weapon up that I had not noticed before; a Morningstar. He held it back and over his right shoulder, then swung it forward with all the force that his oversized and firm muscles could muster, exactly like he was swinging a bat. His eyebrows were pinched, face screwed up in concentration.

And then his weapon connected with the left side of the wolfs head, instantly putting a stop to his forward momentum with such power and abruptness that the wolfs legs had carried on going. They lifted high into the air and the guard let go of the murder device as the wolf fell to the floor, instantly still.

As the Morningstar had found its target, there was an almighty, sickening crunch that rang out through the mortified room. Blood and brain matter sprayed outwards everywhere, painting everything nearby red.

Not even a split second later after the life left the poor wolf, an earth-shattering scream pierced the suddenly crippled, silent air, followed by a female's constant pain-filled cries that echoed off the sad and dull walls. It had to be the mate bond snapping because of the male's death, killing half of her soul and instantly putting her in an indescribable amount of endless agony that I felt pinch my own.

The guard smiled, obviously now satisfied that he had finally gotten to kill someone gruesomely himself. The warm liquid dripped down from his beard to gather on the floor with the blood that was pooling from the broken, crumpled mess on the once-clean floor. The Morningstar had hit the wolf with such force that it had completely obliterated half of his skull, as if it was just mere playdough, easy to reshape. The weapon was stuck in place and remaking the spherical shape of his head.

I could not even tell what colour the hair was on the mangled head anymore, just that he had a bit of a balding issue now.

Corbin and his goons laughed, impressed with the macabre sight that their pack mate prick had created.

“I think that he’s gunna have a bit of trouble healing that one.” A humoured male voice from my left joked, causing more laughs to envelope me.

I felt all the remaining blood drain from my face, I felt numb and sickened to my core. I staggered backwards as dizziness started to consume me, before it was lights out and the floor jumped up to meet me.

~☆~

I came to slowly, like I had been waking from just a dull nightmare.

“Wakey, wakey sleeping beauty. You’ve had a long enough nap; it’s time to get up.” I could hear Corbin’s humoured voice, but it was slightly distorted, I still could not focus properly on anything. My eyes were still struggling to see the horrors that were around me; it was probably my minds way of protecting me from all the nights traumas.

As my sight cleared and became less blurry, more defined, the face that hovered barely a few centimeters from mine came into full view; Reid. His face was red, strained and the vein in his temple looked to be doing overtime. He reached a hand out for me to take, to help me up from my vulnerable position but there was no way that I wanted his assistance, especially when it was him and his dad that had caused all this shit.

I swiped Reid’s hand away, making sure to not have any physical contact so that it did not set off the mate bond any more than it was already going haywire.

With blood pumping in my ears, deafening me to all the scared whimpers, desperate murmurs and fearful shuffling, I turned my head in slow motion so not to make myself dizzy yet again from all the emotional trauma. I investigated what felt like every single pair of watering eyes of my terrified packmates, every single one of us stunned silent with all the horrific details that we were being subjected to. Males of mated pairs had gone into a protective overdrive, trying to shield their mates behind the only barrier and weapon that they had available to them; their bodies. I could just about see eyes silently pleading for help whilst peering around walls of muscle, grateful at the small gesture but pointless protection.

Fury surged through me, “You’re fucking batshit! You have absolutely lost the fucking plot. Who the fucking hell do you think you are, to think that you can play God with people's lives? Hey?” I have no idea where my confidence came from, but I was pushing my luck squaring up to Corbin and challenging him.

I charged at him, finger pointed and screaming what was probably incoherently at him. I did not expect him to laugh and congratulate me on it; I expected a fierce and swift punishment like all those had received before me.

“Ha! A she-wolf with confidence, I’m not sure if I like it, or hate it. But son, you’re going to have to beat that out of her.” He briefly pulled Reid into the veiled threat, before turning to address the cowering, tired and anxious figures. “Now, if everyone could line up quietly and quickly. I need you all to receive a little shot of wolfsbane.”

Gasps resonated from everyone, echoing off the high and empty walls. Instead of moving though, each wolf looked around in disbelief at the request that Corbin had issued, too scared to take a step in case he intended to mass-murder everyone with the injections.

“I fail to see how any of you think that you have a choice in the matter. If I tell you to do anything, then you do it!” Corbin started off speaking as if it was just something trivial, then worked himself up to an aggressive bellow at the uneasy crowd.

Before Corbin had even finished speaking, all the apprehensive wolves began shifting into a poor form of a queue.

Many of the guards that had been previously leering all around the edges of the Ballroom lumbered forward with several clear plastic boxes that were packed full of pre-filled syringes. The mysterious liquid that filled each dreaded tube was an opaque, dark green.

The herd of animals encased within the pen of guards started to unsettle more at the new visual threat of death. Fear rippled through the defenseless sheep like a stone thrown into a still, quiet and unmoving lake, but there was nothing that could be done. Corbin was the only wolf here that could put a stop to everything, but as he was the one that set this all in motion there was no hope in hell that he would save us from himself.

The first of the imposing and muscly guards reached the huddle of anxiety-filled wolves and placed the full box on the floor to free his hands, to start the numerous plunges of bitter poison.

From the first sharp sting, it was not long before the wolves were falling about, immediately affected by the wolfsbane now pulsing through their systems. Some were vomiting, others were now dizzy.

I was too busy watching what was happening to the other wolves to notice that Corbin had approached me with his own syringe and stab it into my arm without any warning.

The sudden explosion of pain started at just the site of the injection but spread rapidly from there throughout the whole of my body, crippling me and making panic rise instantly. My eyes clouded over as my veins seared. I distantly heard Reid snarl then shouting with someone, but it sounded as though my head was under water, distorting everything that reached my ears as I doubled over, struggling with all the new sensations in my body. My empty stomach tried to empty itself even more but could not and felt as though it was just twisting itself up into knots, causing me even more excruciating pain.

My whole body was burning uncomfortably hot, so I tried lowering myself gently to lay down on the cold floor to help. The sudden burst of pain and visual stars told me that it was not as gentle as I was aiming for.

As I lay there panting, waiting for some of these intense feelings to subside, I could hear garbled voices all around me.

‘I’m still here, Oli. You’re gunna be just fine.’ Beaux’s concerned and gentle voice spoke to me, soothing me through these new sensations and was the only thing that came through to me clearly.

The putrid stench of death in the room had my stomach and head constantly rolling as if they were stuck in the waves of a rough, turbulent sea.

My vision started to clear just as all the aggressive symptoms of the wolfsbane started to ease up, just as I was finally reaching the light at the end of the tunnel. But as my vision focused on the end, it was Reid’s handsome face that came pushing through the glow of the lights in the background. I scrambled away as fast as I could, still in my clouded state but he reached forward and grabbed my arms, holding me as still as possible in my fight for space. The tingles from the mate bond on my arms were starting to soothe every twitch.

“Just hold still, wait until it all stops so that you don’t hurt yourself, you prat.” His deep voice soothed me, making me stop my squirming. My eyes were glued to his, lost in the dark ocean blue, whilst I was still sprawled on the floor. Corbin’s voice brought me out of my trance and scrambling to my feet.

“Well, my little puppies. I think that whilst you all gather yourselves, I’m just gunna chat away a bit.” Corbin’s repulsive and fear inducing voice rang out, ringing bells of pain in my ears. “I apologise for the extreme measures, but there is only so long that my witch can hold up her spell for. You all probably noticed that since this second little party started, you haven’t been able to mindlink or connect with your wolf. That's because my little witch bitch prisoner has been preventing you all from doing that, but it makes her tired. Especially after hiding my warriors for most of the day. So, you can see why the wolfsbane is a necessity. It's not enough to kill you, just enough to stop that pesky communication or transformation into your wolf form.”

He slowly strolled back and forth on his stage, looking at each wolf that struggled to get through the worst of the symptoms of the poison, a sadistic grin on his face as he enjoyed their torment of agony.

“Oh yeah, I’ve just remembered a small detail of my plan that I wanted to do. Some of you grab that one there.” He pointed towards a small group of wolves that were huddled together, slightly distanced away from the others. “Take that runt, I don’t need him. He won’t be as useless as the others further down the line, but I can use him to make a statement tonight. Plus, he can help me to answer a few questions that I have had for quite some time.” Corbin wondered about the room aimlessly, seemingly bored shitless with our torment.

Everyone from the group of wolves that Corbin pointed to had turned to see who it was that he was singling out in the room of potential victims, only to find that he was pointing at one of them.

I followed Corbin’s finger to where he was pointing and realised that the group consisted of Mum, Elijah, Elliot, Ajay and Louis. I felt like someone had just ripped my heart of my chest and thrown it into a woodchipper. The fear instilled in me that it was a close loved one of mine that Corbin had cruel intentions for was paralyzing. All that I could do was watch on, muted and unable to move in any sort of way.

A handful of Corbin’s warriors hulked their way forward to the small and defenseless sheep that he had indicated towards, obviously knowing who their specific target was without Corbin having to say a name. Whoever it was that they preyed upon must be expected to still have some power, even after the wolfsbane jab, because they would not have had so many warriors approach them otherwise.

The oversized twats started to zero in on Elliot, when mum started to pull energy from the ether to defend her pup by kneeling in front of him, her arms outstretched to shield him as she pleaded.

“No, you can’t have him, I won’t let you take him from me. He’s just a pup, leave him alone!” She screamed and begged, but it was no use. The warriors had their orders and zeroed in on their target despite her pleas to spare her son; my brother.

My stomach dropped, and it most likely did not stop until it hit hell. My jaw fell, leaving my mouth open in a silent and motionless strike to their intended abduction.

The heffalumps reached down and pulled Elliot up by his underarms, one on either side. The other four warriors lingering as close-by as possible, ready for retaliation from him or the rest of my family.

I was blind to anything else happening around me. It was like I had horse blinkers on, limiting my view and making me watch everything unfold in front of me, as if I was watching some drama program on the tv. Like some nail-biting, chair-gripping and fear-instilling drama that I really did not want to watch, but the remote was lost, and this was all that I could watch.

Elliot started kicking and shouting, throwing his legs right into the air in an attempt to make them drop him because of his sudden weight, but the beasts were strong enough and probably trained to expect such things as their grip on Elliot had stayed just the same.

Mum, Eli and the others were up off the floor and trying to get to Elliot, protesting the wolves that had come forth to hold them back in the Ballroom as Elliot was dragged outside through the patio doors.

Mum was sobbing and screaming, the type of tears and noises that pierce through your very being, hollowing you out and making you feel every inch of their own pain.

“Little wolf, come here.” Reid’s siren melody seduced my ears and mind, making my heart twist and pull me around to face him and notice that I had subconsciously stepped forward, towards my family in their calls for help.

“Where are you taking him?” I whispered the few words to Reid, too afraid that I would say more or something that would offend them and cause drastic repercussions for me, resulting in more red and metallic scented blood to be spilt, or more darkness of death just like there was all around me.

I was beginning to emotionally harden to it all.

I think that I am going into shock, because it is not normal to not feel something when seeing your dad unconscious on the floor, or four of your pack member’s empty, lifeless faces laying on the dirty floor and getting just as cold. There is even nothing when I think about what they could be about to do to my brother, Elliot.

“We’re just taking him outside. We’re gunna do a bit of torture, bit of this and that.” Reid’s arrogant response to me stung. The way that he could talk so casually about hurting his fellow wolves was disgusting, not to mention my brother.

“Are you going to kill him?”

“I suppose that we are.” He was nothing but blunt as he watched my reaction.