The Queen's Conquer

Chapter 54 : Tainted Minds

Induratize • [en-der-a-ties]
To make one's own heart hardened or resistant to someone's pleas or advances, or to the idea of love.

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~ Samuel ~

There's a terrifying thing that shakes the air we've succumbed to. This tight, dense air. This soundless yet all-too noisy room.

"Xander." His name manages to leave my lips, but there's something else that tells me what he has said isn't wholly true—some awful part of me that doesn't want to believe him. That there's a chance he's only hallucinating this new, unsettling information.

But what wolf would lie about such a raw topic? Especially someone like Xander.

"I remember this sensation," he starts to say slowly. "It was like electricity shooting through my veins." This is when I think I'm going to be sick. "It was like being awake after being asleep for so long."

"When you woke up? When she was there?" I clarify.

There's a pause. "Yes," he finally answers quietly. "The details are vaguely there...but her words against my ear...her skin touching mine..."

"Xander—"

He cuts me off.

"Sam. She's my mate."

Indefinitely, I know this now. What he has described to me can mean nothing else—can't be given another logical explanation. Because someone does not just feel something like this with a stranger. It's all bound by blood. It's written in the motherfucking stars, for Goddess sake.

And what makes this all so much worse is that this woman is supposed to be the enemy. Serofina is the enemy and she is Xander's mate.

Oh, my Goddess.

I turn to my left just in time as bile rises up through my esophagus, letting it all out onto the floor beside me.

"Samuel..." Xander's now saying through the blurbs of nausea controlling my every move, likely hearing me empty the contents of my stomach. "Samuel, I'm so sorry. Shit...T-This is so shit. This is the opposite of what—"

I force myself to stop so I can speak. "You swear you're not lying to me?"

"What—?"

"Swear on it, Xander," I grit out, now feeling how badly my body aches as I attempt to sit up—how disabled my muscles have become with the injuries inflicted on them.

"I-I swear, Samuel," he spits out.

My breaths are sharp, every inhale shredding through my lungs just as that silver whip had. "Do you know what this means?" When he doesn't respond I say, "None of us can lay a fucking finger on her, Xan."

The air feels too tight for me to be speaking such horrendous words. This is why I had felt so sick only moments ago: knowing I've thought of killing Serofina just to protect Anastasia—to protect my entire family.

I officially met the huntress what was likely only a few hours ago; time is no longer guaranteed nor accounted for when you've been dying in a cave for several days, I can only assume. And I have nothing but hateful feelings for her. I was supposed to have nothing but hateful feelings for her.

But this is the most basic rule of Phantomridge I initiated after what had happened to Markus' mate, Ella. To all of those super-wolves who deserved so much more than for their lives to end as soon as they did.