Chapter One
Sylvia
Ever since I was taken and brought here, I’d had the same dream. Not a single part of it changed. And if it was a dream filled with sunshine and roses, I’d wouldn’t have minded. But it wasn’t. Not even close.
My dream would start with me trying to call…to beg my brother to save me, to stop them from stealing me away from him. Not a sound came out. And just as I thought I might manage to cry out his name, I’d be back at my mother’s deathbed as she whispered over me the spell that ultimately saved my life.
No words shall be spoken until you are safe and free, my princess.
My mother recited them over and over and over again, as I sobbed, knowing that she was using her last breaths to put a spell on me. She didn’t stop, no matter how hard I cried or pled. It wasn’t until the moment the Goddess came for her that she stopped.
That was when I realized that it wasn’t just a mother’s wish; it was a spell. I never spoke another word again. I hated her for her parting gift…at least I did until it saved my life. My mother had seen what was coming in a way a child could not, and the guilt of my anger still weighed heavy on me.
Growing up, she told me what a princess I was and that one day I would take my place as royalty. It was the stuff of storybooks, and I believed that’s all it was. I’d tell her repeatedly I didn’t want to be a princess. I wanted to stay with her.
That was until I realized my words made her sad. Then I played up the being-a-princess joy I’d been read. I talked about how fun it would be to have a ball in my honor and how one day I’d meet my prince and fall in love.
I was pretending, and she was pretending; it was a huge game of make-believe. Or so I thought. After she died and I was brought to my father, I saw she meant it in all ways. I was a princess by birth. Only I wasn’t going to get the happy ever after that came in the books.
Still, as the castle came into sight, silly me thought that maybe I was wrong, maybe I was entering a world of tiaras and fancy dinners.
I wasn’t wrong, but there was one prince in my life…my brother. He and his friend Tyrone snatched me away and hid me. Only then did I learn the ugly truth. I was the “demon bastard child” of the king. My father didn’t want me. He had never wanted me anything but six feet under. If he knew that I was there, I’d die.
But my brother? He wasn’t like my father. He loved me and treated me well. He hid me and kept me safe, until the day the darkness came. I was playing behind the barn, using pebbles as dolls, when my world shifted once more.
I didn’t hear them coming. I didn’t see who it was. I didn’t know why they were there. But a bag was put over my head, and I woke up locked in a room with no windows and barely enough light to cause a shadow.
That’s where I stayed for weeks, and they only let me out then because they broke me. Or so they thought.
They wanted answers from me. Most of the questions were ones I didn’t understand, much less have the correct response to. But I wasn’t able to answer the ones I did know the answers to. My voice was gone.
At first, they thought I was lying, that I wasn’t speaking because I was being, “stubborn as a mule,” and they tried to beat it out of me. But they couldn’t. My mom made sure of it.
Eventually, after needing to take a three-day break after nearly killing me, they realized I didn’t have speech. That’s when they switched tactics and told me to write it down. At least I was small enough to fake not being able to write. They decided I was useless and uneducated, as my poorly formed letters created non-real words, the type that I hoped equaled what I’d done when I was little and pretending to write a book long before I could read.
It worked.
It kept me safe, safe enough to do labor, and safe enough to listen. They wanted me for the same exact reason my father didn’t, because I was his. They hatedhim. They wanted to take over. And somehow they thought I was the key to that.
He wanted no part of me. My life wasn’t the key to anything. Still, they kept me, sure an opportunity to make use of me would arise. I played clueless and it kept me alive.
Only, this dream was just like that one I had that very first night and every night since, but something had shifted. It felt different. The dream was the same. The room was the same. Everything was…except when I woke up, it was quiet.
So, so quiet.
For a moment, I thought I was still sleeping. When I determined I was awake, I feared I’d lost my hearing too. I knocked on the wall just to make sure I could hear it echo. It did. This eerie silence wasn’t in my head or in my ears only; it was real.
I shivered, from the cold and fear.
The door banged open, breaking all the silence.
My world was turned upside down with that one crash, upside down in the best of ways. My brother and Tyrone had discovered where I was, and, after all thoseyears, they rescued me and brought me back to my brother’s house with his mate and her two other mates…their pack.
I was scared, unsure, but for the first time in a really long time, I wasn’t alone. And that was something.
Chapter Two
Talon
