Star Blessed

I Know Where I Belong

MERIBELLA

The voices coming from the other room were nothing more than a low rumble. Any other time, Meribella would've fallen asleep despite the light noise. Pulling the comforter up to her chin, she burrowed into the soft bed and clenched her swollen eyelids together. But like all the times before, the same scene played on the black screen: blue eyes going wide before disappearing from her sight.

Exhaling, she sat up and shoved the covers back. Three days. It had been three days, and they had found no trace of Raff. Thorne thought coming back to Camden- back to Raff's loft apartment- would be soothing, but being surrounded by his things only reminded her of their failures. This place was a soulless shell without the Alpha. She was a soulless shell without him.

The phone on the nightstand beckoned to her. So many times she'd picked it up to dial her mother. If Dorea knew what fate awaited her, she'd said nothing, but Meribella didn't know which would be more cruel: letting her live the next few months in ignorance or letting her prepare and say goodbye. There was also the small detail of her baby daddy being deceased. The captured Starless pack members confirmed Chad numbered among the dead. A small, bittersweet victory after everything that had happened. Yet, those were not the reasons she wanted to speak to her mom.

No, she wanted to apologize for all the cruel words she'd thrown at her. Amends needed to be made before it was too late. If this past year had taught her anything, it was words that needed to be spoken were not guaranteed delivery by the gods. You either spoke them immediately or prayed that fate would provide another opportunity.

A tentative knock on the door distracted her. "B, you have a visitor."

"One minute," she replied, dragging her legs over the side of the bed and using the edge to push herself up. The standing mirror in the corner caught her reflection. She was a misshapen lump in Raff's sweats, but it was the closest she could get to being in his embrace. Red blotches from tears that seemed to spring forth whenever it grew too quiet, too loud, too crowded, too empty- too much- covered her face. Whoever came to visit could accept the mess or leave. She didn't really give a damn.

"Caspian," she said, her pulse picking up its pace when she spied the large selkie male in the living area. For the first time since she'd met him, he was clothed from top to bottom, and something had changed in his demeanor. A worldliness had settled on his shoulders that had nothing to do with his acceptance of human fashion. He'd never done anything to harm her, but he'd made his allegiances clear. And she had a bone to pick with his head bitch.

"May we talk alone?" he asked. His questioned earned raised eyebrows from Thorne and Lincoln.

"Why?"

His relaxed posture stiffened. "Meribella, please. I won't take long."

A bit of her old self peeked through- the defiant part that protested for the hell of it, but she retreated on a sigh. "Fine."

"Meribella," Lincoln warned, "I don't think this is a good idea."

"Just wait downstairs, please. I'd like to walk to Joe's after this and get a breath of fresh air. Caspian won't hurt me."

"She'll be fine," Thorne agreed, gripping him by the shoulder before sliding down his arm to twine her fingers through his. "We'll be waiting."

When they'd gone, Meribella moved to the sofa and took a seat without offering one to her kin. "Say what you need to say and be quick about it. We can't prove your involvement with everything that's happened, and that's the only reason I didn't let Lincoln tear you limb from limb."

"Your hair is shorter."

Instinctively she reached for the strands framing her face and hanging just above her shoulders. The damage caused by the explosion had forced her to cut her hair. As the scissors snipped across each strand, she expected to feel a sense of loss, but a lightness settled over her instead as the black curls fell to the floor.

"That's what you want to lead with?"

"Meribella, I don't understand the hostility. The last time I saw you, I helped you save the life of your friend."

"And for that I'm grateful. It doesn't change the fact that you pledge your loyalty to a ruthless queen. A woman whose machinations are likely behind Raff's disappearance."

Caspian sat beside her on the couch but did not look at her. He wiped his palms across his pants and when he spoke, it was with his face pointed to the center of the room. "I do not deny that the Fae Queen set all of this in motion, but Raff's demise was not her doing. That bomb was set many years ago."

"Yet without her interference, the Starless pack would not have sought to assassinate Raff, using me as a pawn. Thorne would not have been murdered, my mother wouldn't have been targeted and sentenced to death. And most of all," she continued as he spun around to speak, "Raff would not have had reason to be at their headquarters, and the bomb would not have exploded."

"There is so much more going on here that you don't understand. A bigger picture you need to see."

"The picture I see is clear enough, and I don't want you in it. For so long I wanted to be part of a family- the selkie family, that I never dreamed of making my own. I have that now, and it's far stronger than one made by the sharing of blood."

He pressed something cold into her hand. When he pulled his away, she saw a familiar bottle. It was the elixir Morgan had offered her in exchange for murdering Raff. That liquid held the dreams of a lonely woman.

"Take this. Consider it an apology for everything you've been through."

Meribella opened his hand and dropped the vial into it. Rising, she pointed to the stairs. "I want nothing from that woman. Goodbye Caspian."

"Don't be foolish, Meribella. You're giving up the chance to swim beneath the waves with your people. It doesn't matter that your Blessing allows you to go further from the ocean, it's still part of you, and you will live a half life if you never get to experience what it really means to be a selkie."

She started to poke him in the chest but stopped. It was a little thing, but it reminded her too much of arguing with her stubborn, pig headed, Mr. Bossy. "You're never going to understand. The girl who took that offer was weak and lonely. She hurt people and made excuses for her lies. She tried to straddle the middle road for too long because she didn't know where she belonged."

"And she does now," Caspian taunted, his features grim.

A dream of woods and water filtered through her mind. A choice that wasn't really a choice at all anymore. "She does, and it's with Raff."

"He'll kill you," the selkie snarled, red staining his high cheekbones as he stalked towards her. "He'll breed you, and you'll die giving birth to his filthy mutt. You're meant for bigger things, Meribella."

"But you don't get to choose for me," she said, drawing on her height as he loomed over her. She would not be cowed. "You've got until the count of five to turn away and walk down those stairs before I do something we'll both regret. One."

He pressed his hand against her cheek and brushed her bottom lip with his thumb. His palm was rough, and something tickled against her skin. "Two."

The hand drifted lower and settled on her throat. Holding her gaze, he searched for fear she refused to let him see as he wrapped his fingers around her neck and squeezed. "Three," she wheezed.

With a laugh, he leaned forward and kissed her. It was short but filled with vile threats. A luminescent shine prickled through her skin, the shimmer dim from overexertion. She had her own way to issue threats, but the light seemed to excite him. "You're exquisite."

"Four." How she wanted to encase his head in a bubble of water and squeeze until it popped like a melon, but she didn't think she could summon a sprinkle.

Holding hands in front of him, he stepped back. "No need love. But you will come to me. Sooner or later."