The Golden Wolf

Screaming

And she fell from the sky to join the ocean's roar

"So you're the Golden Wolf." I hear. "It's both an honor and a humbling reality to see you this way." The woman's voice is smooth and soft.

I pry my eyes open, but everything is pitch black. Did they blind me?

Something is poking into my neck, and I raise my hands to find a collar with spikes on the inside holding me still. Spiked cuffs surround my wrists and ankles as well. I am sitting on a cold stone floor, my back against something hard. My eyes search the blackness for some sign of light, but cannot find even a trace.

Someone touches my cheek and I lash out, but the cuffs and collar dig into me with the sudden movement. "There, there, Golden Wolf. Er, pardon me, you're just a shadow of what you once were now, aren't you? No mask to give you the identity you crave. You're no one, now."

No one.

"You humans do think you're so powerful. Well where's your God now, girl?"

I work to steady my breathing. I always have been better at taking physical pain than mental.

"You're all alone now, and no one will ever come looking for you. You're going to die down here as soon as Alpha decides you've had enough. Until then, you'll live down here, all alone. Just some animal existing in the darkness."

I feel a tear run down my cheek.

"You don't exist." A clawed finger runs down my cheek, wiping away the tear. "You're as good as dead now, little girl. As good as dead."

The collar unclips from around my neck, quickly replaced by another one without spikes. The same with my wrists and feet. I am too weak to fight back. Everything hurts, but at least the spikes are gone.

Suddenly a bright white light enters the room, and I cover my eyes. "We'll turn the lights on for you eventually. For now you will live in the darkness." The woman's footsteps leave the room, and the door shuts, blocking out the light and plunging me back into the darkness.

I'm alone. No one is looking for me. No one even knows I'm alive besides the pack. Not that they would care anyway. I was just someone they captured. I was more trouble for them than I am worth. Why would they want me back anyway? They would hate me if they knew what I did. How many loved ones did I take from them?

I am all alone.

A picture of Abarron jumps to the forefront of my mind. The last image I saw of him, when that wolf slashed at his chest, ripping it open. The crimson blood that flew from his gasping mouth as he looked at me with such shock and pain.

For all I know he is dead now. How could anyone survive something like that, werewolf or not? Abarron is dead, and the others hate me. What am I supposed to do now, but let myself die?

She lied about turning the light back on. It feels as if I've been in this room forever, but I know it could have only been a few days. I haven't gotten food or water. Did they really forget about me? I sit on the floor as colors spin through the darkness in front of me. Am I losing it? Sensory deprivation is kicking in. My brain is creating it's own sensory stimulants. The colors I'm seeing aren't real. Neither are the voices. When they first began, I thought they were someone outside, coming for me, but now I know they are not. I can never make out the words, but I know they sound angry.

Death too must be earned.

Am I not earning it now? I'm going crazy in here. In our organization, you had to earn death. The saying applied to not only our victims, but to us as well. We killed our victims because they were monsters, like rapists and gang leaders, or so we thought. We sometimes had to kill each other for betraying us. Death was always earned.

Why cant I just die?

I want my mask. It gave me an identity. With my mask, I am something. I'm something people know about, something people remember. Without it, I'm not even Kaliya. I'm nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

I tug at my collar again, as I have been doing for the past few days. It chafes my neck, the smooth metal wearing my skin raw with every tug. I just want it gone. I want to be free. I'm not made to be chained up.

The voices come. Just a small echo at first. All around me. The voices echo off the walls of the room I'm trapped in. They begin quietly, but are getting louder. So many voices, all talking over each other, yelling at each other, steadily increasing in volume. It's all I can do not to yell back at them.

This isn't real.

This isn't real!

"This isn't real." I whisper.

I clutch at my ears, falling onto my side.

"Stop. Stop. Stop." I chant over and over as the voices continue to increase in volume. I'm screaming. Begging them to stop. I feel tears streaming down my cheeks in torrents. Why won't they stop?

As if a mute button was pressed, I am suddenly surrounded in complete silence. I hear my heartbeat in my ears, and my shallow, ragged breathing, but no voices. They finally stopped.

But they start again. Louder this time, screaming at me. One voice stands out above all the others, a male voice, louder and more aggressive than the others. I can make out his words. 

"You're dead!" he screamed. "You're dead! You're dead!"

I clap my hands over my ears, trying to drive the voice out.

"You're dead! You're dead!"

I am screaming.

It will never stop. 

Perhaps Apollo let him fall

Perhaps he kissed Icarus's wings with sunsoaked lips

and burnt him into long legend so that he may hold him forever and ever

in a kinder world