Page 27 of Shadowed Spirits

Izzy lets go of my shirt and steps partially in front of me, like her small body can shield my much larger one. “Hey! Cain’s super fucking impressive!”

“I didn’t address you, earth dweller. Learn your place before I put you in it.” Mira seems to grow an inch as she stares down my mate. This puts the woman only three inches shorter than me. Her eyes glow red, and black, wispy flames curl around her. “Have you even shifted into a hellhound yet?”

I mutely shake my head, not trusting my voice to stay steady in the face of her displeasure.She is not Mother, she is not Mother, she is not Mother, I chant in my head, hoping saying it enough times will make it feel true. The familiar self-loathing surfaces as I war with my emotions, hating how weak I still am.

“Pathetic,” Mira spits while shaking her head in disapproval. “You’ll be coming with me, you sorry excuse for a hound. You’ll start mandatory hellhound training now.” Her hand darts out, maybe to grab my arm, maybe to slap me. Regardless of what her intention was, I’m unable to stop my flinch. This only enrages her. Mira moves farther into my space and reaches out to grab me by my hair. Before she can seize me, Isabel steps between us and shoves her away.

“Don’t touch him!” Isabel’s shout is the last thing I hear as the memories finally escape and do their best to drown me.

“This is all your fault!” Mother screams at me. I cower on the uncomfortable wooden bench she made me sit on until every last mourner left. My legs are cramped from being squished while on the bench for the four hours of the wake. While I’m only ten, I’m tall for my age and often mistaken fora teenager, leaving me feeling even more uncomfortable on the short seat. “It should’ve been you!”

Staring at the ground, I try to will the tears away because Mother hates when I cry. She says I don’t deserve to cry after what I did. Papa, Dad, and Pops are gone. Forever. They were ambushed by Knights on our way home from a camping trip. They gave their lives to protect me, and I’ve spent every day since wishing I had died with them.

Mother has always been distant with me. My fathers made up for the lack of her love and then some. They were the most important people in my life. My role models, my biggest supporters, and the three people I knew would always be there for me. Now they’re gone, and Mother looks at me with a newfound hatred contorting her features.

“I’m sorry,” I rasp for the millionth time, my voice roughened by my suppressed emotions. A stray tear drips onto my two sizes too small black suit. The rough black dress shirt scratches my skin, but I welcome the discomfort. It’s better than feeling the gaping hole in my chest my fathers left.

“You’re sorry?” Mother shouts incredulously. “I don’t want your fucking sorrys, you worthless child. I want my mates back!” I can hear the pain and grief in her voice, and it makes me feel even worse. Even though she hates my guts, she’s still my mother. All I’ve ever wanted to do was earn her love and affection. I never wanted to cause her all this pain. I would trade places with my dads in a heartbeat if I could.

When I don’t respond, she stops closer until she’s looming over me. I keep my gaze on the floor, not wanting to set her off by looking up at her. Surprising me, mother fists my shoulder-length hair and hauls me up by it. I cry out in pain, but that doesn’t stop her. She hauls me to the kitchen before throwing me to the shiny white marble floor. I land hard on my knees and let out a small whimper at the throbbing pain.

She rummages around in the kitchen cabinets for something, slamming the doors as she goes. I flinch at the loud sounds but stay on the floor. I know it’ll only get worse if I try to get up. As Mother says, everyone from our pack hates me and blames me for my dads’ deaths. Even if I were to run, I have nowhere to go.

Eventually, Mother finds what she was looking for and stomps back over to me. She roughly gathers my hair and yanks my head back hard enough to make the vertebrae pop. When I see the scissors in her hand, I start to struggle, knowing exactly what she is going to do. “No. Please!”

My fathers said it was a rite of passage for boys to grow out their hair. In their youth, long hair symbolized masculinity, strength, and maturity. Right before I turned nine, they said I was old enough to start growing out my hair like they had. For the past two years, I’ve been letting my hair grow. My dads were so proud of me, and now mother wants to cut it. It’s the last thing of them I have.

Mother aims a vicious kick at my stomach. I double over and wheeze in pain. My momentary distraction allows her to cut off the bulk of my hair. “You don’t deserve to have anything from them, you pathetic waste of space!”

A sob rips out of my chest as my hair falls around me, the black strands standing out starkly against the white marble. I don’t bother fighting her as she hacks at the rest of my hair. When she’s cut off as much as she can with the scissors, Mother backhands me into the cabinets. My head slams into the countertop, and I fall to the ground in a daze.

I don’t know how long she kicks me while I’m curled up in a ball on the ground, but it’s long enough that a crimson puddle of my blood grows around me. I fade in and out of consciousness during the first of many beatings from mymother, until I grew old enough and strong enough to stop it once and for all.

“Cain! Cain, man, you gotta come back to us. Izzy needs you.” Archer’s panicked voice mentioning my mate finally breaks through the memory. I fight to push down the other memories of blood, pain, and despair as I frantically look around for Isabel.

Instead of standing next to me, she’s in front of one of the ornate columns to my left. Mira is pressed against the column, hovering six feet in the air. Isabel’s magic glows an eerie purple around the hellhound, whose panicked struggling isn’t doing anything against my mate’s extremely strong magic.

I notice a few guards scattered on the floor around my mate. By the steady rise and fall of their chests, they’re alive but unconscious. I’m guessing they tried to stop Isabel and failed. The remaining guards eye her warily but make no move to intervene.

When the hellhound starts clawing at her throat, I worry that Isabel might accidentally kill her. I don’t want her to have another death on her conscience on my behalf. “Angel,” I call, trying to get her attention.

She turns to look at me. Her eyes are glowing the royal purple of her magic, and her blonde hair with multicolor tips is floating around her shoulders. “What do you want me to do with her, quiet boy? I’ll happily kill her. I can also hold her down so you can kill her. Just tell me what you need.” Her voice is almost pleading as she tries so hard to solve this problem for me. Her concern thaws out my frozen insides and begins to mend pieces of my tattered soul that I never thought could be fixed.

I hesitantly approach my mate, not wanting to startle her. When she doesn’t show any signs of being distressed by me getting closer, I hold out a hand to her. Isabel grasps my palm and lets me pull her into my chest. I’m impressed that her magicdoesn’t even waver when she looks away from it to focus on me. “I don’t need you to kill her, angel.”

“But she scared you! She tried to grab you and hurt you. She deserves to be skinned alive, chopped up into tiny pieces, and die choking on her own blood. Then I’ll stuff her soul back into her body, put her back together, and do it all over again and again and again.” Mira struggles even harder at Isabel’s angry words. The hellhound and I both know she means every word of her threat.

I smile softly at my mate, who is so fiercely protective of me, and brush a strand of golden hair off her forehead. “She didn’t scare me. Not really.” Isabel skeptically raises her eyebrows at me. Sighing, I hug her slight frame closer to me, needing the comfort. “She just reminded me of someone I wish I could forget.”

My mother and Isabel are so different, not just in appearance but in temperament too. My mate is incredibly kind, cares so much about others it hurts her, is self-sacrificing to a fault, and loves fiercely. On the other hand, my mother was cold, distant, cruel, and self-absorbed. I don’t know what I did to deserve a mate like Isabel, but I am so glad she came into my life.

“Who?” Isabel’s voice comes out as an endearing little growl. I run my hand soothingly up and down her back, trying to calm her ire on my behalf. Holding her in my arms, I feel some of the tension drain out of me. It’s not completely gone—the memories are too close to the surface—but my head is clearer with her so close.

I shake my head slightly to refocus on her question instead of the peace she brings me. “My mother.”

“Let’s find out if I can raise the dead, then. I’ll resurrect her and kill her as many times as you want, quiet boy.” Isabel pulls back like she’s going to do just that right now. I keep my armsbanded around her, which stops her momentum. She gives me a put-out look.

I huff a laugh. “I appreciate it, angel, but I’d rather she stays dead.”

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