The Indifferent Luna 1 - Austan wolf
CHAPTER 16

I pushed the dreadful feeling that I had that cold morning down, wrapping my cardigan around myself as I walked the path that led to the lake. I don’t know why, but for some reason, I couldn’t stop remembering the moments we had along this path. Our first kiss, our strolls, me riding on Adolphus’s back and my hair in the wind.

I could feel myself tearing up again. I sniffed continuously, wiping the tears off my eyes. Was this what he wanted, for me to remember our time together? Did he really have a reason for marrying Layla? Was it the pack? Why didn’t he tell me about it? I would have easily agreed with him. I had been the one who had tried to convince him to take his mother’s advice and marry her. He had said it wouldn’t hurt us. It couldn’t hurt us.

Was I now walking this path to hear an excuse from a man who had promised me that nothing could keep him away from being with me? He had said I made him happy. What am I going to do if he said he had done it to protect our pack? Would it change things? Would I be willing to be his second woman?

No. Layla would kill me before she even let that happen. I don’t want to be the second woman either. Why then am I going to see him? I asked myself stopping in my tracks and rethinking my decision.

Why am I walking this path? I asked myself again and I realized I wanted to forgive. I love him. I don’t want this anger in me. I have never been this angry before, not even when my parents abandoned me. Well, theirs hadn’t come as a surprise as Eric’s had.

I could feel this anger changing me, I don’t recognize myself in the mirror anymore, I don’t recognize who I am anymore. All I saw was a broken person and I wanted him to explain so that I could at least have an excuse to let go. I want to let go…. to let him go, but I don’t know how.

I felt the rising sun shining on my face almost as if welcoming me, and I looked up smiling at the peaceful atmosphere around the lake. The lake has always been an amazing place for one to relax and watch the sky. I had been there with Eric so many times, those magical moments when I was so sure that he felt nothing but love for me.

Maybe he did, but why didn’t he ever tell me he loved me? Maybe if he did, I would have trusted in him now, but I never confessed to him either, so I guess that makes two of us.

He wasn’t here, however. He hadn’t been around here recently either, there was no trace of his scent anywhere here. Signing, I went to sit on the fallen tree I had once sat on with Eric.

It’s funny how I turned out to be the one waiting for him now, it used to be the other way round. I smiled sadly at that and watched the calm lake, remembering how he had once skipped stones into the lake so professionally. How I was so mesmerized by his looks and his abs and.....

“You’re here early.” I heard someone say and I jumped up immediately and turned around to see Layla walking towards me with a smile on her face but she wasn’t alone, two men that I had never seen before followed behind her. They had a strange scent and I could guess that they were not from our pack, probably her bodyguards from her own pack.

But then how did she know this place? No one knows this place except myself and Eric,

“Why are you here?” I asked her as anger began to bubble within me.

“What do you mean? Eric sent me to meet with you because he can’t make it.” She said and I was slightly taken aback, but quickly composed myself.

“Or you sent me the message in Eric’s name.” I declared angrily.

Eric would not….. Eric could not….

But she stared at me ignorantly,

“And how would I know where your so-called special place is?” she said as she walked forward, closely followed by the men, and I frowned, trying to guess how she knew because I couldn’t agree with the nagging thought that Eric told her. But I never told anyone, even Lady Freya, who had been here once, didn’t know that this was the place.

Did Eric really tell her? I asked myself as despair began to rise up from deep within me.

“I think I see why this place is so special to him. It is peaceful and calm, good for clearing one’s head, especially for my mate who is the head of such a noble pack,” she said as she walked around leisurely. I bit my lip to prevent myself from shouting out who Eric’s true mate was.

“And you, you look better than the last time I saw you. Are you planning on seducing my mate now that you are feeling a little bit better?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, he asked me to come here!”

“And, of course, you came because you were hoping to make up with him. Right?” she asked with a wicked smile on her face. When I didn’t respond, she continued.

“You pathetic child, why don’t you come to the realization that Eric feels nothing for you? Why don’t you see that it was all a trick? He tricked you.”

“Don’t waste your time telling me lies, I won’t believe you.”

“ah.” she sighed and gave me a bored look, before glancing at the men behind her, she smiled again.

“I don’t know how best to make this fun for both of us. Eric told me to make sure you never show your face in front of him again, but I don’t know how best to carry that out.” she pouted and I looked at her with disbelief.

“Didn’t you say you wouldn’t believe anything I say?” she taunted, obviously seeing the look on my face.

“I don’t!”

She nodded, still having the bored look on her face.

“How best should I do this,” she asked no one in particular as she began to signify with her hand “chase her away, beat her up, have her raped,” she weighed as my face paled. I looked at the men she had come with and saw the smirk on their faces and my heart started to beat faster as my anger now turned to fear.

“But if I do these things, there is a high probability that she will still show her face to Eric and he won’t like that.” she pouted and I looked at her with new eyes.

She was a psychopath!

“Oh, I know a lasting solution.” she continued, as if no one was present but herself, but then her smile faded into hatred as she looked up at me.

“Kill her!” She announced and the men started walking towards me slowly with extended claws and fangs, their eyes pitch black. I stood glued to the spot in fear as my brain went blank.

They were going to kill me. It was all going to end here.

“Lady Silveen!” I heard someone shout from afar with fear, catching all of our attention as we all turned to look at the source of the voice. We saw Cecilia standing afar looking at us with wide eyes.

“Run!” I heard a voice scream in my head and I snapped out of my daze and bolted. Running for my life, but as I ran, I heard Layla laugh,

“Oh, she wants us to hunt her. This would be fun.” I heard her say before the sound of breaking bones. I pushed myself harder, running as fast as my weak legs could carry me.

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I had been running for a while now and I knew that they were stalling because I wasn’t fast, I wasn’t fast enough to outrun a normal wolf, not to talk of well-trained ones, they were letting me run, enjoying the chase as if I was some animal.

I felt tears blur my vision and I quickly wiped them away. By now I had fallen numerous times, had lost my shoes, gotten my blouse torn and scalded my knee, but I was still glad that I had come to the lake dressed in dark pants and a short-sleeved turtle-neck blouse with a grey cardigan, which was nowhere to be found by now.

I tripped again and this time I rolled down what seemed to be a hill. As I rolled down, my side collided with a stomp on the ground and I heard the loud crack that seemed to be from my ribs, but I didn’t wait to feel the pain, a high dose of adrenaline was coursing through my veins and I stood up immediately and continued running but now breathing in and out brought pain to my chest and it felt like that it would explode, so I held unto it but I couldn’t stop, I had to escape now that I had a chance.

It’s funny how I was so determined to die just some days ago and now I am fighting so hard to live. Yes, maybe I had wanted to die but no one said anything about dying by Layla’s hand. There was no way I was letting that psychopath kill me.

I felt the pack boundary close now and I pushed myself to get to it. Maybe I would be safe if I left the pack. if I disappeared from their faces forever.

They must have felt it too, because before long I saw an auburn-colored wolf in my line of vision, just before I felt a force on my back. I tumbled over to the ground again as I felt excruciating pain in my back as it hit the soil, a slow trickle of fluid, and then the smell of metallic blood in the air.

My blood.

The other wolf had clawed my back, tearing the cloth and flesh away from it. I glanced at the menacing wolves once as I saw them walking majestically towards me before dashing for the borders. They immediately followed.

I broke through it, running down a slope into a no man’s land, filled with nothing but faded grasses and shrubs, feeling relieved that they wouldn’t be chasing after me anymore.

I mean, they wanted me out of Eric’s life and I was, I had left the pack, haven’t I?

I was proved wrong when I felt something slam into me. I tumbled again, hitting my head against a rock in front of me.

I came to rest lying down as the impact of the hit had almost blurred my vision. My adrenaline seemed to have burned out as I felt all my pain intensify in a matter of minutes. Tears streamed down my eyes as I coughed, before feeling the warm fluid trickling down my head. I raised my hand and immediately touched it then looked at it. It was my blood again, its smell filled my nose, making me want to choke.

The sound of growling wolves made me try to stand up again, a desire to run rising within me, but before I could achieve that, I felt a jaw close in on my left foot, biting deeply into it and dragging me along the shrubs on the floor.

I screamed from the pain in my leg and the one on my back as I felt the grass tear my wounds wide open.

Soon the wolf let go of my leg and I was only glad that it wasn’t torn off. Then I saw another wolf, grey in color walking towards me majestically, a smirk on its face. Before I could think of who it was, it shifted back to human. It was Layla herself. In all her glory, not even bothering about her nakedness.

She had been pursuing me too? She really wanted me dead, didn’t she? What have I done to her? She had Eric, did she not? Did Eric really send her?

No, he would not. Even if he didn’t love me, he wouldn’t go to this length. At least I can vouch for that.

“You look injured, Silveen.” she said, and that was the first time she had called me by my name. It would probably be the last.

The other men shifted quickly and wore a pair of shorts I didn’t know they had, then threw an oversized shirt to Layla before coming to pull me up to my knees, making me groan as they did.

I looked at Layla who was now dressed and then at the sky and saw the full moon somewhere in the sky even though it was still well into the day or was I imagining it? It didn’t matter. These were the kind of people the moon liked, people like Layla who hurt the weak. They were the ones who got what they wanted. There was no justice for people like us. Maybe it was a good thing that I was dying soon.

Maybe it is a good thing that the moon was watching, let her glory in my pain and see what life she had given to me.

While still lost in my thoughts, I felt Layla’s hand hold my hair and I winced in pain but her other fisted hand connected to my nose forcefully. I heard my nose crack from the impact of the punch but it didn’t stop, it kept coming and I had no time to react to the pain. By the time it stopped, I fell to the ground coughing violently as I sprawled on the ground, the pain in my body screaming from every corner and now blood was pouring from my nose, a few entered my mouth and I winced at the metallic taste of blood in my mouth, but I didn’t spit it out.

I turned around on the floor and began to try to crawl away from them, but the men grabbed me again and pulled me to my knees to face Layla, who smiled at my bloodied face. She obviously liked what she saw.

“You should have taken my advice when I gave it to you freely,” she said as her smile turned to anger, “ But no. you just had to prove that you could take what was mine.”

Eric. Eric was the offense I had committed against her. My offense was choosing to be with my mate? I smiled to myself weakly at how pitiful that sounded.

If Eric saw me now, what would he think?

Was all I thought about before I felt a piercing burning pain in my right shoulder. I screamed at the top of my lungs and tried to claw at it but my two hands were held by the two men.

I looked at my arm to see a silver dagger being thrust into my shoulder. With a psychotic smile plastered on Layla’s face, she pulled it out and they let me go. I held onto it crying and weeping as I rolled on the floor. I had never experienced the pain of silver before and now.....

“Please just kill me please,” I begged, and she looked at the men in amusement and laughed.

“Did you hear that? She’s already begging for death. I must be really good.”

Then she bent down to me. “Not yet honey. You see, since you decided to run, I thought it would be more fun to do all the things on the list before finally killing you.”

I looked at her confused. What list was she talking about?

Her smile disappeared again and she stared hard at me, “ pull her up.”

The men immediately pulled me back up into the kneeling position.

“No amount of begging is going to save you now, omega. You dare try to be him? You dared to even dream of it?” she said and stabbed me on my right abdomen with the dagger and I shrieked at the top of my already hurting lungs. I was certain that every living thing must have heard my cry.

“Ple.....ase. Stop. I will never appear before Eric again. e...ever again!”

She twisted the dagger and I screamed, feeling my blood pour from the wound as my skin burned. I am going to die of blood loss, I am sure of it.

“Oh, I know you would, because you would be dead.” then she sighed, obviously feeling bored again, I wanted to curse her.

“That should be enough venom,” she said and my brows furrowed.

“V….Venom?” There was venom in the dagger? It wasn’t just silver? What kind? Could my suffering get any worse? I asked myself

But I knew it would only get worse when she said the next word,

“Well, up to you guys. You can have your fun with her. I lost interest.” she said as she pulled out the dagger. The men nodded as I groaned in pain with tears.

“Please don’t do this.”

“Eric would be proud to see what I have done with you.”

“Liar!” I screamed. “Stop lying. Eric would never! Never do this to me.” I said with a conviction I never knew I had, as I felt the pain or was it the venom going to my head.

I was losing control of my body parts slowly. No. no, I couldn’t let myself be raped by these men I couldn’t.

I felt my blouse being torn off my body as the men laughed with Layla. I couldn’t see them anymore now, black dots had already begun to taint my vision as I laid there in the grass.

I felt Layla move close to me, “You fool, you are still putting your trust in him?”

She sighed and then turned away, just as I felt someone begin to rip my pants apart. I screamed but I couldn’t get a word out, I had lost control of my lips, I was paralyzed.

“Please help me. Someone, anyone.” I cried mentally,

but no one replied, the darkness submerging me further and I was just a step away from finally losing consciousness, as my eyes now fluttered shut. There was no use fighting anymore. I had lost. I had lost everything. If I could see Eric just one last time.

“Are you just going to keep on hiding there? She’s going to die soon. You should at least tell her the truth. I don’t like her but I don’t think she should die trusting you either.” I heard Layla’s happy chirp sound venomous at the end.

Who was she talking to? Who did I trust? Who was I dying trusting? Don’t tell me......

I heard a steady footstep walk toward me, then I heard the words that I knew would haunt me for eternity.

“I’m sorry, Silveen I didn’t mean for it to end this way, but this is for the best.” I heard Eric say.

“Eric?” I asked mentally,

“Eric!” I felt my heart shatter at his voice. The voice that I hoped was the voice that would only bring me salvation, the one that I was so sure if he was here, would save me from Layla, was the mastermind of this whole thing? He was......

“You monster!” I screamed in my head as anger and pure hatred for him fueled from somewhere deep within me,

“You Monster.” I whispered mentally now, as I felt tears roll down my cheek, the anger had only weakened me more and I felt myself being plunged into the darkness.