18. Mébh
When I awoke,I was in my human form. I was the most calm and content I had ever felt in my life. My Wolf was blissed out within me, having gotten a bonus full-moon run and the most brutal, animalistic, and amazing claiming that followed. There was no rage, only peace as I lay curled safely in Gray’s protective embrace, his black wings sheltering us from the rising sun. In the early hours of the morning, after I’d run for hours with him misting along with me, he’d made a nest out of wildflowers and grass in a meadow for us to rest together in.
Core clenching, my muscles whined in protest. My supernatural healing had been enhanced by the additional power that now flowed through my veins thanks to mating, so I knew I wouldn’t be deliciously sore for long. Same with his bite. It was almost all healed, but that mark, even though it was from a demon, would remain like a tattoo forever imprinted under my skin. Every werewolf would know who I belonged to, as well as every demon.
I’d tried to mind link with Gray. Mating should have opened a private link between us, but it didn’t seem to have worked. Molly and Nikos still had that connection, even though he was a vampire. However, when I’d tried, Gray heard me because of his own gift being enhanced, but he wasn’t able to reply the same way. Maybe mating with a demon was that different to a vampire, but who really knew?
Gray nuzzled my cheek. “I know you’re awake,” he rumbled.
I giggled and stretched my arms out in front of me. Gray sat up behind me and folded his wings in tight, allowing the morning sun to reach me. He gently brushed an unruly lock of my hair back behind my ear as he looked down at me with wonder.
The sound of chains clinking was the only hint something was amiss a split second before it was too late. Gray jerked with a snarl above me as a golden chain wrapped itself around his torso just above his elbows. It effectively trapped his arms at his sides and his wings painfully against his back.
I scented magic.
The chain was infused with it.
Gray struggled to break the chains, but even for a demon as strong as him, they held firm. His claws were equally ineffective. I reached to try myself, but he was wrenched backward by the chain away from me, and cruel laughter met my ears.
“Not so powerful now, are you, my prince,” Nicodemus said mockingly and stepped into view, holding the end of the gold chain.
Gray roared in fury.
I scrambled to my knees and flashed my growing fangs. “Hey, let him go!”
Nicodemus smirked. “This one was special, wasn’t she? Somebody bagged himself a mate and earned some new wings with that fuck. As if tracking you hadn’t been a piece of cake with the amount of times you misted around the forest, the noise you two made could be heard three regions over.”
Gray’s expression had hardened as Nicodemus talked.
“You’re just jealous!” I growled defensively.
Nicodemus pulled in air, ready to spew out a retort, when Gray suddenly interrupted him, his voice cold, and he said the last thing I expected to hear him say to me. “Just go, Mébh, it’s over.”
Wait, what the fuck?
I stared open-mouthed at him.
He was dead serious and glared at me with disdain in his gray eyes. Gone was the loving male from last night, the male who brutally and completely claimed me without a backward glance. I looked into cold eyes now, and confusion ate at me. My Wolf growled angrily. What was he playing at?
“What are you talking about?” I demanded.
“Just go. I am done with you.” He looked away, as if even the sight of me disgusted him.
“What about last night?” I spat in disbelief, the blood pounding in my head. I felt sick to my stomach. This couldn’t be it. This was some messed-up joke.
Nicodemus looked suspiciously between us, eyes narrowed.
“What about it?” Gray shrugged. “It was a fun fuck. The werewolf experience. Gotta be done once in an immortal’s life.” He smirked.
I gaped at him while my Wolf roared in my ears. My hand slid up to touch his mark on my throat. A mark that would remain forever, as mine would on him. I thought by him marking me, it meant he had accepted our matebond and forever with me. I couldn’t have been more wrong, apparently.
“A fun fuck?” I asked in disbelief.
“Look, you knew all along that I’m a horndog and I don’t do monogamy,” he growled.
I couldn’t believe the words coming out of his mouth. Did I really mean so little to him? Was this all a game to bag a werewolf, to gain an experience? Was I just a notch on his bedpost? What about everything we shared these past few days? From Portland, to London, Paris, Maui, Hell, and finally Shoal, we’d been on a whirlwind of an adventure, and there was nobody I’d rather have been with for the journey. This wasn’t the Gray I’d come to know, but then again, did I really know him? Or had he been playing me from the start with his ‘resistance’ game?
“So it was all a complete joke to you?” I screamed as the tears filled my eyes. “You led me on just to use me like all your other fuck toys?”
“Pretty much.” He shrugged again with that cold, unrecognizable look on his face.
I howled in fury, but it was cut off by a sob breaking from my chest. The tears started streaming down my face. I let my pain explode out of me. I let my Wolf guide me to my wolven form, but I refused to let her take control of me. I refused to let the rage get the better of me. Gray may be a tool, but he did help me learn how to control my Wolf. He couldn’t take that away from me. Fur bloomed all across my skin. My claws lengthened, my body contorted, and bones ground together as they shifted under my skin. I dropped forward on all fours, threw my head back, and finished that howl.
Several more demons were walking up behind Nicodemus, but he threw his hand out, halting their movement.
I took one last look at the male who was supposed to be my other half and was unable to keep the contempt and disgust out of my expression, even in wolf form. I’d given everything to him. I would never be the same again. I could never mate with another, not that I believed I would ever find another male as worthy as my mate. I turned my back on Gray and bolted into the surrounding trees.
The last thing I heard was Nicodemus’s command, “Ignore the werewolf. We have Gray!”
An inkling of something not being right kept popping up in the back of my mind, but I was too distraught, grieving for everything I had just lost as I ran headlong into the forests of Shoal.
~ Gray
I don’t knowif I did the right thing. Mébh had just given me the best night of my life—she’d given me my Goddamned wings back—and I’d repaid her by pushing her away in the most vile way possible.
Nicodemus had gotten the drop on me somehow. I’d not heard or felt him coming at all, but I had been distracted with my new mate. I cursed myself for having been so foolish about my blatant misting. He’d had the chain magicked, and no matter how much stronger I was since mating, the links had likely been spelled to be unbreakable. I vaguely wondered how he had managed to pay for this kind of magical fire power—the region of Envy was historically short on cash due to the amount of wars they tended to get into with other regions, forever envious of what others possessed.
The moment Nicodemus mentioned knowing Mébh was special, I’d broken. I had to get her away from him, even if it meant sacrificing myself in the process. I was already effectively captured, being bound in the magic chain; however, Mébh was not, and I couldn’t let her be taken. There was only one way I knew how to ensure Nicodemus would leave her alone: if he thought she was nothing to me anymore, despite the clear signs of our matebond. My act had to be convincing, and I’d felt sick as I said whatever I needed to get her to run as far from Nicodemus as possible.
Seeing her hateful wolven expression just before she disappeared between the trees made me feel nauseous. My heart ached, but this was currently for the best. She may be enraged, but at least she was the one in control, not her Wolf. I was proud of her for that.
Nicodemus tugged at my chains, pulling me to my knees in front of him. “Now, are you going to come quietly, or are you going to make this difficult?”
I sighed, defeated in this moment and just thankful he had fallen for it and let Mébh run away unharmed. “I’ll cooperate.” For now.
“Good,” he snapped, before yanking the chain again, making me snarl as pain racked my bound wings. “Come on. I have a cell waiting with your name on it.”
My mind returned to Mébh as Nicodemus and his demons all placed a hand on me. None of them were powerful enough to mist me alongside them; they had to combine their misting abilities to make it happen.
I silently prayed to the Lord that Mébh stayed out of trouble long enough for me to find a way out of Nicodemus’s clutches. I was going after her just as soon as I could, and I only prayed she would be willing to take me back. The act I put on had been to convince Nicodemus she didn’t matter to me anymore, but I worried I’d succeeded in breaking her trust forever with it.