The Captive

Chapter 9: A Drunk Man's Words Are A Sober Man's Thoughts

Vasilisa's POV

It had been only half an hour before he began to stir.

I called on the healer, a hunchback old woman with a head full of gray curls under a bandanna. She came in with a large walking stick and jangling, gold adornments tinkling about on it.

She sat Scar up and put a jug to his mouth. "What is that?" I asked.

She turned to me and gave me a toothy grin; I was surprised to see she had most of her teeth "Whiskey. It's wonderful for pain relief."

I sighed and repositioned myself on the ground before changing my mind and standing up.

Scar coughed after taking the first sip, opened his eyes a little, groaned, and fell back asleep. I grabbed a cloth wiping his brow. "He has a fever." I muttered.

The woman nodded, eyeing me with suspicion "Aye. Duran is one of the more powerful warriors. It will take longer for both of them to heal than it would if it were, say, just your run of the mill wolf that they had been fighting."

I glanced up at her and then back down at Scar. He was ashen. I bit my lip. "I thought Rhyn was the second in command?"

She nodded "He is, but Duran has the potential to be at his rank. He is an Alpha of a smaller pack and is just serving under Scar at the moment. Scar outranked him already, but they are both Alphas to varying degrees, so any damage they do to other wolves would be far more severe than what even a Beta, like Rhyn, could inflict."

I dipped the cloth back in the basin of cool water, taking in her words and nodding. "That makes sense, I guess."

Another thing came to mind but I was hesitant to ask about it. The woman eyed me with her blue eye. The other one was brown. She was startling to look at, at first, but I think I was starting to get used to it "Spit it out." She scolded me.

I inhaled sharply and then did was she commanded "What are mates?"

She smiled "Ah, mates, are life partners. Wolves mate for life. When their inner wolf finds the person whose soul is attached to theirs, they bond and become mates. Of course, to you human girls it is unusual and unnatural, but you will all grow to be bonded to your mates the same way. It is fate and fate is not to be denied."

I nodded before freezing and jerking my face up to meet her gaze. She was giving me a pleasant smile "You might be able to fool these other dunces, but I know a woman when I see one, dearie. If you ever need someone to talk to, please feel free to stop by."

I was too shocked and afraid to say anything as she turned and scuttled out of the dim room. Would she tell anyone else?

Scar's POV

It seemed like I was in and out of a nightmare. It had been a while since I'd been in such a serious fight.

Whatever I was being fed wasn't helping either.

It burned going down my throat and then a few moments later, I'd feel all warm and fuzzy.

One time I woke up and my hand was in a head full of soft, thick hair. The head of hair was leaned against my mattress. In the dim light of the flickering oil lamp, the face was pretty. Her long lashes cast shadows over her cheeks, her lips were parted, and soft sighs of breath escaped them.

I didn't know who she was exactly but I wanted her to stay forever.

She jerked awake suddenly and groaned, rubbing her face and eyes. She stood and twisted, her shirt clinging to her slim midsection as she popped her back. Everything blurred before refocusing.

She was wiping my face "Damn fever won't go away." She muttered. "And I thought I was stubborn."

I smiled at that. "You're pretty." I mumbled.

She stilled and pulled back, looking at me with wide eyes, which helped me to see them better. I couldn't exactly tell what color they were, but I was sure they were beautiful. "She really got you drunk, didn't she?" The girl asked.

I gave a groggy smile "I like whiskey too, except when I realize that I don't, but that's not usually until the day after."

She sighed "Definitely drunk."

She reached across me, leaning to dip the cloth in the basin again and I saw the shirt tighten over where her breasts were. I couldn't resist but to reach up and lay my hand on one. She squeaked "Scar!" She exclaimed softly.

She had bound them. I'm not sure why. I wondered how big they actually were, and if they were soft. or firm, or round.

I inhaled her sweet scent and leaned my face closer to her gently sloping neck to get a better sniff. It was the smell of that star-shaped white flower that grew back home.

Jasmine. She smelt like jasmine.

I ran my nose along her neck and heard her whimper. I smiled against the soft skin at her sensitiveness. Before I could pull her beneath me and take her, she managed to wriggle out of my hold, panting and scared, but the flustered scared, not the running for your life scared. I was sure if we were in daylight, she would be flushed a pretty pink color.

"Scar, I think you need to go back to sleep." She suggested, taking deep breaths. I whined "No, come back."

She shook her head "Oh no, that's not going to happen. You need rest...not whatever it was I think you were thinking about."

I chuckled readjusting "If you come back over here, I'll show you what I was thinking about."

I heard her mutter something about me being an arrogant bastard before I dosed off again. I dreamt of what she would look like with long hair, wrapped in silken sheets, waiting for me.

Vasilisa's POV

He had been in bed for a day and a half, nearly two. 

That second twelve hours, when he woke up, I was sure I had been found out.

Did he think I was a girl in his subconscious.

Many these days considered science a witchcraft, but I knew there were creatures like these beasts, and vampyres out there. Science may be witchcraft, but the fact was, it was real and we shouldn't discard it as worthless.

I traveled with my father into the big city an hour east once; it was called Valkaria.

In Valkaria he met these people who studied other people. All kinds of people, short, tall, fat, skinny, red-heads and brown-heads. People with yellow skin and squinty eyes, and people with ruddy skin and high cheekbones.

They studied how they thought and what they though about another one of the scientists that volunteered herself to be part of the experiment. Then they put them to sleep by something that was called...uh...hypnotism! Yeah, Hypnotism, and then they saw what they thought about the scientist then, and they told them something that was closer to the truth about the scientist.

They would ask questions like what do you think her age is, or what her home-life is like, or if she is married and has kids.

My father let me watch these experiments and I soaked it in. That's when Doctor Heatherfield told us that her and her scientists were studying this thing called the subconscious. I asked what that was and she smiled and told me that when you go to sleep and dream, that's your subconscious. When you're awake, you're limited, but when you're asleep or under hypnotism, your brain was more open and pliable, but it was also more susceptible to figure out things and catch things that you didn't notice or pay much attention to when you were awake.

Apparently, being hypnotised was a lot like being drunk. Or that was my hypothesis anyway. Somewhere, deep down, Scar knew I was a girl. I just hope he could not figure that out long enough for me to get out with my family.

At this point, what really scared me, was that I wasn't entirely sure I wanted to.