Huntress

Chapter 66

I couldn't figure out where the pain was coming from. It was everywhere and nowhere. I needed a source, but every time I searched my body for the starting point, it seemed vague and blurred. Everything was on fire. Everything was freezing. Everything was screaming. Maybe I just couldn't think that hard right now. All I knew was that I was still wailing and the agony was beyond anything I could comprehend.

Black dots danced over my vision.

"Georgia!" Ryder cried.

He was here. I had almost forgotten about him. I had almost forgotten everything in the face of the hurt tearing me apart. But he was in front of me, one hand still gripping at his chest, the other reaching towards me.

"Georgia!"

"Ryder." It was Ajax rushing to his side. An arm was thrown around him just as Ryder's legs released beneath him. He would have tumbled to the floor if Ajax hadn't been there to catch him. "Ryder, what's going on? Can you tell me what you're feeling?"

Ryder just groaned out my name. his eyes were now jammed shut and he teetered onto all fours. A violent noise crawled out of his throat.

"Ryder, please. Talk to me," Ajax begged. "Did that hunter do something to you?"

Keiko plowed through the front door a second later. Her dark hair was strewn all over her face, mouth falling open at the scene in front of her. A girl screaming in her living room, her mate holding onto Ryder who could only say my name. "What is going?"

"I don't know. Call Claudette. Tell her to get here as fast as she can."

Keiko vanished. And I was pulled back into the dreams that haunted me.

I was still screaming here.

This was the place I had come to when the world felt like it was too much. This is what I fell into when I couldn't bear it any longer. There shouldn't have been pain here. Only numbness and a man who wanted to hold me, even though his eyes didn't twinkle the way I needed them to.

He was here.

"You're leaving me," he accused. Venom was in every word that was spat from his lips. It stung as if it really were acid on my skin.

"No," I managed. "I'm not leaving you. I'm going back to you. The real you," I pleaded. Tears were gushing down my cheeks. I felt like my entire body had been plunged into boiling water, then right over the hot coals of an ancient fire. Relief. I needed relief however it came. Even unconsciousness would be a blessing.

"Don't you understand what you have done? Don't you know what you have sacrificed?"

"I haven't sacrificed anything," I protested.

"Oh, but you have," he murmured. A thumb traced the shape of my jaw line. "You have given up everything."

When he drew away, I spotted the knife in his hand. I was shrieking well before he raised it to his own throat. Then there was nothing but blood.

"Georgia," Ryder croaked. He was in front of me, still on all fours, still had Ajax at his side. No blood. There was no blood here. It had all been a dream. He was still alive.

"Fuck, what is that?" Ajax whispered, gawking at me.

It was then that I realized a redness was circling me. it was alive and shifting, flames lapping and falling. It was sheer for me and clear enough that I could see the men in front of me and Keiko when she reentered the house, her cell phone still clutched in her hand. They all rippled as if they were a mirage. Maybe this was the final stage of wolf drain. Maybe this is how my parents died, in so much pain that the end would be a blessing.

Ryder gave out a strangled sob, his back straining as he moved. One hand in front of the other. One knee sliding on carpet. "George. Georgia."

It had always been so lovely when he said my name, a balm over a wound. Now, it was gasoline on the fire. Salt in a gaping wound that was sure to kill me.

Ryder reached out a single hand. I watched his entire body tremble with the effort, sweat beading on his forehead. He leaned forward, looking like he was on the brink of collapse. Fingers touched the shimmering redness before me.

He only had time to let out a startled bark before he was thrown across the room.

"Ryder!" I wailed. The tears streaming down my cheeks were bleach, tearing through my skin. each sound of out my mouth was corrosive, shredding my throat, my tongue.

"What the hell was that?!" Keiko screamed.

"Just stay over there, sweetheart," Ajax commanded, steady as he went to Ryder's curled up form. "Ryder? Ryder, are you okay? Can you hear me?"

The redness around me gave a final shake. Then it fell.

My screaming ceased immediately, but my body pitched forward with exhaustion. My clammy forehead rested on my knees, each breath cooling the scorching from within. Every part of me was shaking. Every part of me was too cold and too hot at once.

Ryder. Ryder was down. I had...I had done something to him.

"Georgia," he moaned, his head lifting from the floor.

I thrust my body off the chair, falling flat on my stomach. I only let out a little wheeze in acknowledgement. My fingers clawed the hardwood flooring for purchase. Ryder. I needed to get to Ryder.

"Oh my God, she's moving by herself," Keiko gasped. She was at my side in an instant despite Ajax's repeated protests. Her hands were on my shoulders. She pulled me away from my pursuit gently but firmly until I was on my knees, looking at her worried face. "Georgia, are you okay? Can you talk, honey?"

"Ryder," I choked, my throat raw.

"Ryder is right there. Claudette is coming, she'll make sure both of you are okay, alright? For now, I just want you to talk to me. Tell me what happened. What are you feeling?" She moved as if she were about to help me to my feet then stopped. "Are you feeling like you can stand?"

I couldn't feel anything right now aside from a whirling in my head and the rough pants in my lungs. I just needed to get to Ryder. Whatever I had done to him needed to be fixed.

I focused on Ryder and it was like seeing him for the first time. A scar on his cheek that I had never noticed. Traces of acne from his teen years. Eyes that seemed less alive than before. A nose that was crooked from one too many breaks. Hair that didn't seem to lay quite right.

Something was wrong. I knew it before I saw the way he looked at me, eye wide with horror, tears welling in them.

"No," he whispered. "No, please." It was like an axe was swinging towards him and he was powerless to stop it.

"You're alright my friend. We're going to get you taken care of," Ajax assured, squeezing Ryder's bicep.

"Ajax, what if—" Keiko's cool fingers brushed the side of my throat. A gasp choked her. "Ajax, she doesn't have a mark anymore."

A rough sob tore through Ryder. "The mate bond has been destroyed."

~~~Question of the Day~~~

Who is your favorite Disney hero?

I love Wall-e and Hercules!