Chapter 4
FOUR
Lucien
After a meal of hearty soup and some rustic bread, and two of the maiden priestesses finally removing the cursed silver cuffs from my wrists and ankles, I slept fitfully and woke with the first slanting rays of sun through the clinic’s window.
Surprisingly, I felt halfway decent, my wolf rapidly repairing damage now that I’d seen a healer, had another meal, and gotten some uninterrupted rest.
I sat up, feet dangling off the side of the bed and eyeing the distance to the tiny clinic bathroom, when Brielle backed into the room with a tray absolutely laden with hot, steaming plates.
“Oh! You’re up already. You definitely shouldn’t be getting out of bed by yourself yet.” Her stern tone stayed my movements until she slid the tray onto the counter and turned to help me ease off the side of the bed.
Her grip on me as she guided me to the bathroom was unexpectedly strong, and she had no trouble holding me up when I leaned on her more heavily than I would have liked. Or admitted in alpha company.
“You seem to have powered up since the last time I saw you.” I wheezed a little as we made it to the door, leaning heavily against it as I waved her off.
“Just a bit. Do you need my help to, ah…” She gestured toward the toilet.
I scoffed. “The day I can’t hold my own dick is the day you can put me down, Doc. I’ll manage.”
She rolled her eyes but turned her back, giving me privacy as I shuffled across the small space. Luckily, it wasn’t all hubris this time.
I still hurt all over, but I was steady on my feet, if slower than a turtle and half as enthusiastic. When I finished and hobbled over to the sink to wash up, I froze midstep, and would have lost my balance if it weren’t for the cold porcelain sink my hip crashed into.
All my attention was locked on the mirror. Horror, thick and sickly, consumed me as I gripped the side of the basin. My face wasn’t mine anymore.
An ugly, knotted, red, scabby scar ran through my right eyebrow, narrowly missing my eye as it cut down my cheek, ending at the bottom of my jaw, slightly altering the shape of my mouth as it clipped the corner of my lips on the way down.
I flashed back to the sight of a rusty blade descending toward my face, oily black liquid dripping from it. The breath-stealing burn, and Dominik’s wicked grin as he asked how I’d feel if it was permanent.
My breathing was rapid, too rapid, and my vision blurred as I held on to that sink as if it was the only thing tethering me to the earth.
He’d ruined my face. I was hideous.
If I hadn’t deserved Olivia before, there was no way she’d want to be saddled with me now.
Dominik—and Petró, by extension—had taken away the one thing I had going in my favor. My looks. The outside matched the inside now.
My father would be so smug, if he were still around to see it.
You might look like an angel, but you ruin everything you touch. You’re no angel. You’re a devil in an angel’s disguise.
The remembered jab was the final straw. A bellow of rage tore itself from my throat, leaving it raw, and had Brielle scurrying into the room, the sounds of more feet racing toward us in the hallway not far behind.
I wanted to rip the sink out of the wall and smash it against the old, warped mirror.
Smash everything. Make everything as broken as I was in the only way I knew how.
Maidens surrounded me and led me like a child back to the exam table, a flurry of conversation and worried glances surrounding me as hands pulled at me from every direction, but I ignored them all.
For the second time in my life, I’d lost everything. The first time, there was nothing I could do. I’d been helpless, a victim of circumstances outside my control.
This time? I was going to personally wipe the Hungarian pack off the face of the earth.
The motherfucker who did this to me was going to pay with his life, no matter the cost.