Page 14 of The Barren Luna

“There is nothing left for you to take from me, Henry,” I managed to say through the pain.

“Oh, really?” He asked in a menacing tone, and then he leaned out the door and motioned for someone to come in.

A moment later, two guards came in with a bedraggled Dorothy, who looked as if she had been pulled out of bed.

“Henry, what are you doing?”

“I told you, I’m going to take what is most precious to you.”

I felt terror slither down my spine. I’d never been so afraid in my entire life. He wouldn’t. Not Dorothy. Not her. God, please, not her.

“Please, Henry, kill me, harm me, banish me, just please let Dorothy go,” I begged, on my knees, sobbing.

“Look at her,” he commanded me one more time, and my body obeyed against my will. I looked at the female who was basically my mother and this was where loving me had gotten her.

“I’m sorry, Dotty, I’m so sorry,” I sobbed.

“It’s okay, my pup, I’m going to be with Thomas now. I love you, be strong.”

With one swift motion, Henry ripped her throat out, and her lifeless body collapsed to the ground in a pool of blood.

I screamed until I passed out.

7 - Ginny

3 months later

The first weeks in the dungeon passed in a vicious haze of cold sweats, vomiting, diarrhea, and uncontrollable shaking. I spent most days writhing and soiling myself on the concrete floor in unbearable pain caused by my body detoxing and my mind conjuring visions of Dorothy dying over and over again.

My tortured, drug-deprived brain manipulated the memory, adding dialogue written by my guilty conscience, so the hallucinated Dorothy would accusingly yell at me that it was all my fault, that I was the one who should have died, that I couldn’t do a single thing in my life right. My shaking hands would clutch the bucket full of my various excretions as I would dry heave until my throat was sore, as if I had screamed for hours. I almost welcomed the day the drugs were finally out of my system, and the only pain I felt was caused by my mate’s fornication.

Even when, after a while, I finally managed to fall asleep for brief periods of time, it was usually Dorothy I’d dream of. She would repeatedly get her throat ripped out – by Henry, by me,by Hannah. She would be begging me not to kill her, she’d be begging me to save her, and I’d wake up screaming and crying.

Despite the profound sadness and loss I felt, I couldn’t let myself mourn her. I felt like I didn’t deserve it. I was the reason she was dead, what right did I have? I often wondered where they had buried her, what they did with her pendant, and whether she was with Thomas now.

Hannah came to see me once, not too long after I stopped detoxing. She could barely breathe when she entered the dungeon, the smell must have been revolting, but I was already used to it. Besides, I was pretty sure they were lacing my water with wolfsbane since I couldn't feel my wolf at all, meaning all my senses were weakened.

“I just got released from the hospital, and I figured I’d pay you a visit,” she approached the bars, sticking her pregnant belly out, but I didn’t move a muscle.

“I can’t believe you would do that to a pregnant she-wolf just because you are a barren failure.

Look at you, you’re disgusting. Finally, the exterior matches the interior. But I think you need a little more help.”

She motioned someone over, and the same guy who came to take me to Henry’s office before it all went to hell opened my cell door, pinned me down on the cot, and lifted my T-shirt up. It was the same shirt I was wearing when he knocked on my door all those weeks (months?) ago. I couldn’t even imagine the smell of my body at this point. Good. At least let them suffer a tiny bit while they were here. If olfactory assault was the only type of assault available to me, I’d take it. Hannah took out a silver knife, and relief shot through me. It would all be over soon and I welcomed it.

“I was thinking of giving you some scars on the outside to match the ones all my fucking Henry will cause your insides.”

Instead of plunging the knife into my chest, she started making shallow cuts all over my abdomen. The silver burned my flesh and was a nice counterbalance to the emotional turmoil I was in these days. She kept talking throughout it, but my head felt like it was underwater and nothing could get to me.

I must have passed out from the blood loss, and when I woke up, an Omega was applying a poultice on my abdomen, and my clothes had been changed. I wondered why she was here. The smell of honey and cloves from the mixture was divine. Something felt weird. I looked around the cell and no one else was there. But lifting my head felt different, so I touched the back of it and gasped. My hair was gone.

“It was all matted, Luna. We couldn’t - ” she said apologetically and I wanted to laugh.

As if I cared about my hair at this point. I was living in hell.

“It’s okay,” I told her, and my own voice sounded weird to me after so much silence.

???

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