Mated

Thirty-One

I vaguely remembered that I had showered and dressed in clothes that seemed to be cut and sewn specifically for me, when I felt my wet hair seeping into the material on my back. Though it was a cave, the atmosphere was oddly warm with a heat source concealed in the cave's walls. I wore the combat boots that had been in the bathroom beside these clothes.
I'd returned to the steamy room after he showered and left it vacant, to use the mirror, though I didn't use it at all. I stared unblinking at my reflection, staring at the girl who found out she lost her mother and father today, and everyone she  knew since infancy. I desperately held on to the image of the one person I have left who shares the same blood as me, who wouldn't have been at the compound because she mated with an Alpha at age fifteen, and she was no longer a member of the Vienna compound. Tami.
"Hi," James poked his head in the bathroom. He had never spoken to me so carefully before, as if he were meeting for the first time and he was afraid of giving me the wrong impression. Despite his blank expression, that is.
I turned around and faced him. His eyes swept over my face, then my outfit and–despite my current state of silent, splintering grief, my cheeks warmed and my stomach crawled at being under his scrutiny.
"Are you ready?" He stood in the doorway now and I noticed his outfit was similar to mine, but structured to flatter his stature. The sleeves of his long sleeve curved around lean muscle up to his forearms where they were pushed up, and his pant legs were long enough for his height before they dipped inside a clean pair of boots.
I gave my reflection a final look in the glass. "Yes."
He led me out of the room and walked by my side down the hallway leading into the front room. Everyone was already gathered, either sitting on couches or chairs, or on the floor. My eyes fell over Raquel. She sat between Mike and Ryder on a couch. Cort leaned against the far wall with his arms crossed at his chest and his legs crossed at his ankles. His eyes flickered to each face in the room, never lingering on one person for too long.
"The first thing we need to address is this place," James looked up at the ceiling then around the room. We hadn't gotten a tour when we arrived. Not that it mattered how many rooms there were or if everyone had their own bed–comfort was the least of my worries.
"Like I mentioned, James," Eva began, picking up his question. She was sitting on the arm of a chair Colby sat in. "It's unreachable. And even if the Rogues find it, it will take them a while to figure out the kind of tools they need to get down here."
"Not if they find it. When," I interjected. Everyone's eyes focused on me. Eva appeared to be shocked by my correction. So, I continued.
"Raquel–" She perched up when she heard her name. Her eyes were soft, waiting for me to continue. "Tell the room what happened in Vienna."
"Oh," she shrank a little, looking nervously about the room, seemingly uncomfortable with the attention. "Your father called for a pack meeting. Everyone was to be there, no exceptions. He'd said he'd been given information about a Rogue army. He didn't want anything to be missed and wanted the urgency to be understood. At least, that's what he said when he called for the entire compound to attend." Her eyes flashed up to me before dropping to stare at her hands in her lap.
"So, everyone was there. It was the perfect time for the Rogues to...attack. I could feel it in the air that something was off but I didn't know what, so I couldn't warn them. The next thing I know, we were rushed with Rogues from every direction, throwing Molotov bombs. My family and I got separated. I managed to get away, but they were all trapped in a ring of fire surrounding the area. There was nothing I could have done. There were no other survivors left at the compound when I went back." The room seemed to stop breathing and everyone's eyes shifted from looking at Rocky to looking at me. I could feel Eva's pity staring me in the face.
"But before I went back, I stayed close enough that I could watch them. I heard them say the Pierce family name but that's about it–" She paused here, took a deep breath before sitting straighter, lifting her chin, and raising her eyes to me again. Though, briefly, before she cast her eyes down. "And I watched them drag away your sister."
The last stilt holding me together cracked, and finally tumbled down.
"Tami was there?" I heard the incredulity in my voice. It wasn't entirely disbelief, it was partially in defeat.
Rocky winced, nodded slowly. "I'm sorry, Malia. She had been visiting, and she attended the meeting as well. I'm sure she only wanted to carry the information over to her husband and her pack when she was to return home."
"And you couldn't help her?" My voice was accusing, though she wasn't at fault.
"I couldn't–I was outnumbered...by a lot," she answered, locking in my gaze. "Believe me, if I could have–you know I loved Tami. I wished I could have stopped them. I stayed back in case anybody came, any one who hadn't attended the meeting. It was when I realized no one was left and I had made up my mind to come find you, that I felt you releasing your grief as a signal."
"How were you close enough that you could see the Rogues, but far enough that they didn't sense you were there?" James asked her.
She flicked her eyes in my direction. "There's a phone tower close to home. Malia and I used to climb the ladder to the top when we were little because you could see the entire compound from there."
James spoke again. "You're packless." I didn't like the way he said it, with a cautious, warning tone, but I understood it.
I looked at him as I said, "How do we know we can trust you Raquel? How can we know you didn't become one of them and were sent here to know of my exact location?'
Raquel's mouth dropped. She looked around the room but had no friends here beside me so they stared at her with blank expressions. Ryder narrowed his eyes at her.
"I wasn't, and I'm not a Rogue–"
"You're pretty close to becoming one," said Ryder at the same time James replied with, "Not yet. Did they promise to accept you into their group once you become Rogue if you found Malia for them?"
Rocky's head was shaking side to side in jerky movements and her eyes were wild. "What?" She appeared to be utterly confused when James didn't elaborate. "No–no, I would never–" Her eyes fell over me. "Malia, you know me. I would never agree to that. I got away! I want an Alpha, I want a pack. I didn't talk to any of them, I don't—" she looked around the room as of to convince every single person. "What they did was a massacre, it was planned. They murdered our family, a compound full of innocent people."
She looked at me, then looked at James. Then, without looking away from him, she extended her claws and slowly pierced her left hand, drawing a straight line of blood. She held it out for us all to see, looking back and forth between James and me. Her dark eyes shone, marbles with a bright gold rim. "I will fight with you."