Chapter 59 #3
"I don't feel ready for any of this." I looked away.
"No one is."
"I was just... Katie." My voice becoming quieter.
"I worried about exams. I complained about assignments. I argued with my parents because they worried too much. I fought battles no one in my place could and became the most fucking decorated soldier in my generation." A bittersweet smile crossed my face.
I looked down at my trembling hands.
"Now I'm supposed to believe I was born a princess." The word felt absurd.
Princess.
"What princess goes to the frontlines and kill enemy soldiers with just her sniper? What princess has medals of valor attached to her bedroom wall?"
"You do."
It sounded like something from the fairy tales my mother used to read before bed.
"I don't feel like one."
"That is because you confuse royalty with a crown."
Where's my gun?
The figure continued.
"A ruler is not made by blood alone. Blood may determine inheritance, but it does not determine character."
I remained silent. "You have already displayed more compassion than many who have worn the crown before you. You've bled for the sake of others, united broken bonds. You protected people, strangers that had every right to harm you because of your identity but you prevailed.
You had turned enemies to allies, dear goddess, if the crown had personality, it would glow for you."
I thought back to the battlefield. To every wolf I had shot, to the blood that had soaked my hands. I remembered how natural it had felt.
How fucking easy.
"You wanted justice, and so justice sought you out. I have known no ruler who had the guts to face mermaids and live, even dive down to their home. You have done something that earned you their favor and made the king of the waters accompany you and your friends safely, might I say."
I scoff. "Yeah, right. You probably saw me in the battlefield. I felt good after every head that has rolled through the mud. Darkness always claws at my chest whenever I hold a gun. I can't stop it, I want to stop it."
"There is darkness inside every person, Katie. The difference lies in whether that darkness controls them."
I looked back toward the figure.
"Shouldn't you be telling me I'm a monster?"
The figure smiled sadly.
"If taking a life alone made someone a monster, then every soldier who died protecting their family would deserve that title."
I frowned.
"So where's the line?" The question lingered between us. The figure took a slow breath before answering.
"The moment you stop asking whether you've crossed it."
The figure's voice became solemn. "When violence no longer troubles your heart, that is when you should fear what you've become."
I let those words settle. Maybe that was why the battle still haunted me. That I could still hear the gunfire, see the wolves collapsing beneath my bullets.
I still remember the hatred that had fueled every pull of the trigger.
"I don't regret killing anyone who stood in front of me with intentions of stopping me."
"You shouldn't."
I blinked in surprise. "I thought you'd disagree."
"I did not say vengeance is always wrong." The figure stepped closer.
"I said vengeance must never become the only reason you continue living."
My gaze slowly drifted into the endless darkness surrounding us again.
"I don't know who I am anymore."
The admission came easier than I'd expected. I've always told myself to stay true to who I really am, to remember where I came from and why I'm here. Yet everything that was given to me, everything that I know was nothing but a facade that had helped me survive this world, thanks to my parents.
My parents who had sacrificed everything to raise me and put a roof on my head.
"I'm not the same girl who walked into that forest."
"No."
"I'm not the same girl my parents raised."
"No."
"I'm not even sure I'm Catalina." The figure smiled warmly.
"You are all of them. The frightened child named Catalina still lives within you. The daughter called Katie still lives within you. The warrior who challenged a kingdom is you."
I felt something loosen inside my chest.
"They are not separate people. They are simply different chapters of the same story."
For so long, I had believed reclaiming my past meant losing the life I had built but now I understood.
Nothing had been taken from me. My story had simply been incomplete.
I opened my mouth to ask another question but the figure raised a single finger.
"No more."
"That's unfair."
"It is."
"You promised answers."
"I promised you would find them."
The darkness around us began to tremble. Hairline fractures of brilliant silver spread across the endless void like cracks forming across glass.
I looked around. "What's happening?"
"The world has grown tired of waiting for you."
A distant sound reached my ears.
Voices. I can finally hear voices other than ours.
Blurred, indistinct. Someone shouting. Another voice calling my name.
"Katie." My heart skipped. I knew that voice like the back of my hand.
"Katie... love, wake up..." The sound became clearer, stronger, and closer.
In panic, I looked back at the figure. "I don't want to leave yet."
The figure smiled with unmistakable fondness. "I know."
"I still have questions."
"You always will."
"Will I see you again?" The figure's smile never faded.
"When you need me."
The cracks widened, flooding the darkness with blinding white light.
I instinctively shielded my eyes.
"Who are you?" I called out one final time. The figure's silhouette was already fading. Disappointment flooded me, but this time it answered.
"I am you."
Its voice echoed like a gentle breeze through the void.
And then the light swallowed everything. The cold had disappeared. Seering pain returned but so did warmth, and so did life.
The first thing I felt was the steady rhythm of a heartbeat beside my ear.
The second was someone's arms refusing to let me go.
My beloved.
I blink the haze away, bright light blinding me for a mere second before I managed to adjust.
I was in the pack's ward, the familiar white walls and the thin bedsheets that clung to me. I looked down and witness the gown that had covered me once.
But the strong and warm arms that was wrapped around me had stunned me. I had felt Titus close but it still feels strange to me.
Yet I don't want to leave.
My eyes traveled up slowly, reminiscing the feel of his presence that was coiled all around me. His scent, his heat, everything about him is being transferred to me.
Where's my goddamn gun, I think I need to shoot myself in the head. The fuck you mean transfer?
I exhale slowly, finally meeting his dark gray eyes that had always looked at me in contempt. Now, it was different.
I can see in his eyes the worry, the pain, the hopelessness, and the relief all in one. Without even thinking, I raise my free hand slowly, I was shaking by the time my palm softly held on to Titus' cheek.
He leaned in on my hand, inhaling deeply, his eyes closing in pleasure. His arms tightened around me, pulling me even closer than before.
His orbs opened and looked at me longingly, as if he's been waiting for this moment for forever. It's like he can't believe it.
"I have been waiting for you." He whispers, his deep voice sending shivers down my spine.
I smiled softly, "I know, but I don't know why." Titus nods his head.
"Ask me anything, I will gladly answer if it means I get to hold you longer, even if my arms tire, I will not let you go."
I suck in a breath, he's such a romantic if he's not being an ass. Maybe that is why I fell in love with this man. His softness reserved only for the people he adores, yet he's a mighty ruler of his pack.
The masculinity in him had always been a weak spot for me. I have watched this man for days, I was beside him for months. How could I not fall in love with a man that was already in my heart?
But I can't remember properly.
The door opened and came out Lennox. The old man seems to grow more wrinkles the last time I saw him, worry etched onto his face.
"You're awake." He breathed out a sigh of relief, closing the door behind him.
"Your friends and sister is waiting outside. I told them you needed to rest, and rest you shall do." He smiles but his sudden glare caught me off guard and it was aimed at us.
At Titus' arms that was wrapped around me. He sneers at our hugging form. "What ever happened to personal space, Titus? Let her go."
I chuckled in response, Titus pays him no mind as he continues to hold me in his arms, landing a kiss on my forehead. "You will have to kill me first."
"I will not hesitate to use my hammer on you, you imbecile. I have taken down Alpha's like you, what's one more?" Lennox growls, murder in his eyes.
I bit my lip, though I enjoy the banter, I think I know something about myself. Why I have another me inside my consciousness.
"I think I have DID." I blurted.
"What is that?" Both men turn to me, confusion on their faces.
"Dissociative Personality Disorder."