Lunar Court (Alpha Girl 8)

I hoped she hadn’t come alone.

“Van! Come quick.”

Not alone, then. That was good.

Within a second, a man stood in front of me. Fey—because he didn’t drop down from the trap door. He just appeared.

The fey man was tall and looked strong. His hair was long and whiter than starlight. “You’re the one who called?”

I tried to swallow a bit, but the pain… “Yes.” My word was more croak than anything else, and I dropped my gaze to the floor.

Other than the pixie, I’d never met any fey. I wasn’t sure if they played the same dominance games that we did, but pissing him off now would be stupid. And yet I had to ask. “Wa-ter?”

He pulled a bottle from nowhere and handed it to me. The water was cold and felt like salvation. I drank in little sips, savoring the feel of each drop as it rolled down my tortured throat.

“Most of your pack is gone.” He paused. “We’re waiting for them to come back, but now that I see you, maybe I should hunt them.”

He definitely needed to hunt them. “Kill. People.” I fought for each word. “Eat them. You kill them. Before...” I realized a second too late that I ordered him to do something. I bowed my head. “I-I’m—”

“Don’t. I was getting bored at court. Seems like a good night for a deadly game of chase. What did they do to your voice?”

“Burn. Oil.”

He crouched beside me, careful not to touch too much of anything on the ground. “Open.”

I opened my mouth wide and tried not to flinch at the wince on Van’s face.

“Not oil. Vampire blood. It was boiling?”

I nodded. I wanted to cry at how stupid I was. Of course it was a supernatural hurt. That was why it was going to kill me.

“They're giving you a slow, painful death. Vampire blood doesn’t act as quickly as the venom in their saliva, but just as bad.” He touched my throat for a second, glowing brighter, and his magic felt like moonlight on a warm night. For a moment, the pain in my throat lessened, and then he stood.

“I’ll need help to heal this, but that should ease the pain temporarily.”

I nodded. It didn’t hurt quite as much, but still hurt pretty fucking bad.

He stood, but before he could leave, I knelt, hoping he’d take mercy on me. “Don’t leave me. Don’t leave me down here. I—” My voice cracked and it wasn’t just the sound of my voice, but my soul. It was cracked—broken—and I wasn’t sure who I was anymore. But it didn’t matter as long as I wasn’t in the pit anymore.

He grabbed my hand and the world spun. If I’d eaten anything, I probably would’ve lost it then, but there were so many sounds that I didn’t care that my stomach was rolling. I managed to keep the little bit of water down because the air was so shockingly clean and pure. And there were so many stars.

I started to cry and fell hard. My face slammed into the ground and I didn’t care because I wasn’t in the pit anymore. My tears fell into the grass and dirt, making their scent richer. I wasn’t sure why I was crying exactly because there were too many reasons and feelings to be able to put them into words, but the strongest one of all was freedo

m. After all these years, I was really and truly free.

My grandfather had cut all my pack ties before he beat me. He hadn’t wanted me to be able to draw strength from them while I died in the pit. He wanted me dead as much as I wanted it. But I hadn’t died. These two fey had saved me.

Which meant I was free. For the first time since I was born, I didn’t have ties to my twisted, evil pack.

I was truly free.

“Van.” The girl’s voice said again. “Help him. He’s crying in pain.”

“That’s not about pain, Coco.”

“I know, but some of it is. Heal him.”

“You know I can’t heal what’s really hurting him, just as I am unable to heal what has broken you.”