The Barren Luna

7 - Ginny

3 months later

The first weeks in the dungeon passed in a vicious haze of cold sweats, vomiting, diarrhea and uncontrollable shaking. I spent most days writhing and soiling myself on the concrete floor in unbearable pain caused by my body detoxing and my mind conjuring visions of Dorothy dying over and over again. My tortured drug-deprived brain manipulated the memory, adding dialogue written by my guilty conscience, so the hallucinated Dorothy would accusingly yell at me that it was all my fault, that I was the one who should have died, that I couldn't do a single thing in my life right. My shaking hands would clutch the bucket full of my various excretions as I would dry heave until my throat was sore as if I had screamed for hours. I almost welcomed the day the drugs were finally out of my system and the only pain I felt was caused by my mate's fornication.

Even when, after a while, I finally managed to fall asleep for brief periods of time, it was usually Dorothy I'd dream of. She would repeatedly get her throat ripped out – by Henry, by me, by Hannah. She would be begging me not to kill her, she'd be begging me to save her, and I'd wake up screaming and crying. Despite the profound sadness and loss I felt, I couldn't let myself mourn her, I felt like I didn't deserve it. I was the reason she was dead, what right did I have? I often wondered where they buried her, what they did with her pendant, whether she was with Thomas now.

Hannah came to see me once, not too long after I stopped detoxing. She could barely breathe when she entered the dungeon, the smell must have been revolting, but I was already used to it. Besides, I was pretty sure they were lacing my water with wolfsbane since I didn't feel my wolf at all, meaning all my senses were numb.

"I just had a check-up at the hospital, and I figured I'd pay you a visit," she approached the bars, sticking her pregnant belly out, but I didn't move a muscle.

"I can't believe you would try to harm a pregnant she-wolf, just because you are a barren failure.

Look at you, you're disgusting. How the mighty have fallen. Finally the exterior matches the interior. But I think you need a little more help."

She motioned someone over, and the same guy who had come to take me to Henry's office before it all went to hell opened my cell door, pinned me down on the cot and lifted my T-shirt up. It was the same shirt I had been wearing when he knocked on my door all those weeks (months?) ago. I couldn't imagine how I must have stunk. Good. At least let them suffer a tiny bit while they were here. If olfactory assault was the only type of assault available to me, I'd take it. Hannah took out a silver knife and relief shot through me. It would all be over soon and I welcomed it.

"I was thinking of giving you some scars on the outside to match the ones all my fucking Henry will cause your insides."

Instead of plunging the knife into my chest, she started making shallow cuts all over my abdomen. The silver burned my flesh and was a nice counter-balance to the emotional turmoil I was in these days. She kept talking throughout it but my head felt like it was under water and nothing could get to me.

I must have passed out from the blood loss, and when I woke up an Omega was applying a poultice to my abdomen, and my clothes had been changed. I wondered why she was here. The smell of honey and cloves from the mixture was divine. Something felt weird. I looked around the cell and no one else was there. But turning my head felt different, so I touched the back of it and gasped. My long hair was gone, and I was left with a choppy, uneven mess.

"It was all matted, Luna. We couldn't - " she said apologetically and I wanted to laugh. As if I cared about my hair at this point. I was living in hell.

"It's okay," I told her, and my own voice sounded weird to me after so much silence.

                                                                                  ***

Catherine also visited me one day, but she was much more old-school in her approach. She simply backhanded me as soon as she got close enough, and her heavy ring split my lip open. She must have been dreaming about that for years. I spat the blood in her face, wishing I had a horrible disease I could infect her with.

"The only reason you're still breathing is that harming you would physically harm my son. You jealous bitch. You useless piece of garbage."

Luckily Henry never came to see me, at least while I was awake. I knew it would have been difficult for his wolf to see me suffer, and there was only so much wolfsbane one could take. Judging by how often he fucked Hannah, he was playing a dangerous game. Much to my relief, their bedroom activities started to decrease in frequency as she approached her due date. During my more lucid moments, I tried reaching for the twisted sense of humor Dorothy and I shared, and I consoled myself with the fact that at least now no one was trying to cause my boobs to produce breastmilk.

One night I heard soft sobbing next to the bars of my cell. When I looked up I saw Lucy and I was mortified.

"What are you doing here? He'll kill you, Lucy, for the love of God, you have to leave," I started hyperventilating and pacing.

"Ginny, please, look at me. Relax, breathe honey. That's right. Henry's not in the pack, he went to Colorado. The new King is taking over."

"King Phillip died? How long have I been here?"

"A little over a month. It was unexpected, an aneurysm."

"And you thought this was a good idea?" I looked at her, incredulous and she grinned back at me:

"The best."

She helped me clean myself up, brought in Omegas to clean the cell and change my bandages. She could only stay for an hour but promised to come back. The next night she brought Liam with her; they brought food and more clothes and for a moment we all pretended we weren't sitting on different sides of bars, and that we were just three friends eating dinner.

"Luna, do you want any more pasta?"

"No, thanks Liam. As much as I'd like to, I don't think my stomach could handle it."

"Yeah, I imagine not," he said sadly and I didn't want them to worry that I didn't get enough to eat.

"Hey it could be worse. They could be feeding me Catherine's meatloaf," I laughed weakly and they humored me by faking laughs as well.

"You guys, you know you can't come see me anymore, right?" Before they could protest, I soldiered on, "No. One dead friend on my conscience is enough. I know you're on my side and it means more to me than you'll ever know, but please don't put yourselves in harm's way. You see that he's clearly unhinged and that no good can come of it. Please, if you want to do something for me, this is it."

"Okay, Ginny. But we will not stop thinking of something to do. We'll file an official complaint with the Royal Court - "

"I know, Lucy, but think of your pups. Don't get involved in anything that could cost them their mother, be smart."

"I love you, Ginny," she held my hand through the bars.

"I love you too, Luce."

The visit was a sort of goodbye on my end. I became completely catatonic and unresponsive in the weeks after that. The only course of action available to me was to die on my terms. However, the bastards wouldn't let me have even that. There were tubes down my throat and intravenous liquids and lights flashed in my eyes. I wanted to leave this world, I wanted it more than I'd ever wanted anything. I wanted to be wherever Dorothy was, wherever my wolf was. I missed both of them. I missed the best part of myself that now no longer was. One day, maybe years after I first entered the dungeon, I felt someone lifting my now horrifyingly frail body and jostling it as if carrying me somewhere. I sensed a trace of some familiar fragrance. Before I could get to the bottom of that thought, a strong light blinded me and I knew I was outside.