Callista.A week goes by, and my life becomes one series of events repeating from sunrise to sunset.Every morning I am woken up before dawn and given food. After, I’m taken for a walk around the inner courtyard. That’s what the friendly guard meant when he came to take me outside the very first day it happened. I’d been afraid that the King had finally had it with my nuisance and decided to dispose of me before I could become a real problem. Then I wondered it I’d been transferred to the dungeons. But neither of them happened. As the friendly guard says, Theon had thought that I needed some daily exercise to help me fight off the effects of being drugged with Wolfsbane. I’m a little touched by this, and I scold myself for being pathetic. The man had literally bought me, for Goddess's sake. Whether it’s knowingly or unknowingly did not really matter to me when I was pissed.After that, I’m taken back to my room, where I am to spend the day as I please. I have been given a heavily form
Callista.“What the actual hell?!” My mate growls, storming his way into my room. The guards are standing outside, silent as stone. Theon is seething, his lips pulled back into a snarl.Yet all I can think is how good he smells, and how much I just want him to take me in his arms and maybe just kiss me a little.'Pathetic, Callista, really pathetic.' I tell myself. The man looks like he wants to murder me! I need to grow a spine someday soon, I don’t owe him anything, much less subservience.“I save you from exile and give you a comfortable place in my castle, yet you don’t do the single thing I ask of you?”Oh, is that what he thinks this is about?“Comfort? What’s the use of comfort when I’m a prisoner here! It doesn’t matter if it comes with a shower and some cushions, a jail cell is a jail cell!” I yell back at him. “I’ve been ripped from the life I’ve led and locked up in a tower! The last thing I’d do is find it cushy!”For a second, Theon seems stunned at my outburst. Good.“Y
Callista.I remain near the bed as my adoptive sister circles me, like I’m prey caught in the web she has woven. Her face is deadly serene as if she doesn’t have a care for this world, yet her voice is hard as steel when she talks.And again, she is wearing my clothes. These further cement my theory on how she’s deceiving my mate.The audacity of this woman, I swear.“What’s up with your closet recently, Ruelle?” I ask, instead of answering her question, “Did Mommy and Daddy forget to pack your own million-dollar walk-in closet or something?”“Answer my question!”“Pass.” I sneer.She halts her pacing and stares at me. “Were you trying to tell him about feeling his scent again, Callista?” She asks, “What did you say he smells like, wet fur and dog vomit…”“What the-no, he smells of pinecones and sea breeze and everything warm and nice!” I burst out. Immediately, I realize what I said, and curse myself for giving Ruelle that information. “Oh, you bitch.” I'm blushing like an idiot.It
Callista.The crunch of Ruelle’s nose breaking under my punch is so, so satisfying.I’ve never been a violent person, hell, I've never even liked violence, which is kind of contradictory to what I’ve witnessed all my life. When you’re a werewolf, violence is an inherent part of life. So are blood and death. If a wolf wants to challenge their Alpha, they will challenge the Alpha to fight till the death. Then, the one who lives gets to be the next Alpha. The punishment for most crimes here is death or a gruesome beating. Or, if you’re really unlucky, a whipping. Jail is really a privilege for a crime, wolves weep in relief when they get life sentence with hard labor. The worst of it all is being exiled. I’ve actually heard some wolves say they’d rather be killed than be exiled. It’s a matter of honor. Personally, I prefer the latter option. Being without a pack doesn’t seem all that bad to me, especially when being in a pack is proving to be such a disaster these days.But I digress.“Y
Theon.“Ruelle!” I yell as I run down the stairs of the tower, chasing after my mate.My wolf is rebelling in my head. Before, after I had spoken to Callista and returned to my office to take care of pack business, my wolf had suddenly screamed at me that my mate was in danger. Immediately, I had taken off, my wolf guiding me up the stairs that led to Callista’s quarters. My vision had immediately gone wolf-like, the colors paling around me, and my mind had become singular focused. I had barely kept from turning into a wolf.When I’ve seen Ruelle on top of Callista’s, her fist colliding with the stealer’s eye, my wolf had roared. I didn’t have control of my body anymore.If I had, I wouldn’t have done what I’d done.With my actions, I have deeply hurt my mate. She had been the bleeding one, but I’d cruelly shoved her off in favor of Callista, the stealer. I hated myself for that. Yes, she had been hurting her, yes, I didn’t know what had happened, but Ruelle was the one who was hurt m
Callista.I look at my face in the mirror, hours after the assault, and realize that yeah, I do look as horrible as I feel.My face is swollen with purple bruises, and my eye which got hit was blackened. My eyes are tinged with red from all that crying, and my white t-shirt is white no longer. I look like I’d gone a few rounds in a boxing ring and lost the fight at the end.I have no one but myself to blame for this whole thing. If only I had controlled my temper and not fallen into Ruelle’s ploy... A knock comes from my door, and boy, I’ve had enough human interaction for the day.“Go away,” I reply petulantly, cringing at how wounded my voice sounds. Ugh, it’s going to take a while for me to heal, given how I was still wolfless.“Yeah, not doing that.” The friendly guard says as he opens the door. I turn to him, only to see him holding a Ziploc bag in one hand and my dinner in the other. I didn’t even realize it was nighttime already, and I don’t particularly feel hungry, but the
Callista.“Ruelle,” I greet her, vowing to be on my best behavior this time although the very sight of her makes my blood boil. The last thing I want is to associate with her in any way, seriously, can’t she leave me alone?Not to mention what she said about meeting my actual mate. A sense of foreboding settles in me once again, and I force myself to be calm and collected rather than panicking.“Hello, Callista, don’t you look nice?” She gives me such a sunny fake smile that I feel like gagging, “How’s the eye?”“Perfect, how’s the nose?” I retort. The guards around us are watching us like an interesting football match.Her smile doesn’t reach her eyes, “Healed the same day. You know, because I’m a full werewolf.”Ouch. I walked right into that one, I need to do better.“So, what’s on the itinerary today?” I ask in a cheerful tone. “What’s this about my actual mate then? Ready to give up your ruse, finally?”Instead of denying anything, Ruelle gives me a shark’s grin, “Theon’s Beta to
Theon.She’s in the hospital, having lost too much blood. As a result, her healing had slowed down, so we had no choice but to take her to meet the head doctor of the Rexellen Hospital. As werewolves, we rarely ever visit hospitals, as our natural healing factor takes care of most of our scrapes and sicknesses before they can become problematic. When a wolf goes to a hospital, it could mean only one thing. They’d caught an unnatural sickness, had a mental ailment, or had been grievously injured.More often than not, the case is the latter.“She’s going to be okay.” Says Dr. Haeger, “At first, she was in a critical condition, and her body had slowed down healing to keep her alive But her natural healing accelerated as soon as we did a blood transfusion. She’d passed out from the mixture of blood loss, pain, and shock, I believe. She might possibly have a brain concussion, albeit a mild one. Other than that, Ruelle is steady and out of the danger zone for now.”“What about the stealer?”