The North Star | COMPLETED ✔️

Chapter 66 ~ Beatings

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Chapter 66

With the loss of rain, Mother Nature did a complete one eighty and brought the temperature up to a scalding, blistering heat.

The trees helped to shade us, but did nothing against the humidity. They blocked any breeze that may have come as a reprieve, and enclosed us in a natural sauna. Sweat soaked my shirt, my brow, rolled down into my eyes.

Drake's temper flared as if the heat itself were stoking it. The longer the day drew on, the worse he got. The men started to give him a wide berth after he lashed out the first time. They scattered about, no longer flies but dogs. Irritably hot, ugly well-trained dogs trailing behind the man that owned them.

We travelled like that for hours. All of us on edge. No one wanting to be the next one to piss him off.

I kept a steady pace beside Fred and stared at the back of Drake's head. The sun filtered through the leaves and painted the atmosphere in the same beauty I'd discovered with Bard the first time he'd brought me to this place, but it didn't give me the same feeling. I realized why. It hadn't been the nature I'd fallen in love with. It hadn't been the wildlife or the mountain. It'd been him.

A bead of sweat trickled down into my eye, and I lifted my shirt sleeve to wipe it away.

A snap echoed the air, and Drake let out a half-shout, half-roar.

I jerked my eyes back up and found him hung upside down, swinging wildly back and forth by his ankle. His head smacked against the trunk, and he grunted. It cut a gash across his forehead, and blood trickled towards his hairline and spread out like tree limbs across his brow.

His chest rose and fell heavily as he lifted himself up and tried to reach where the rope held him.

Everyone else stood frozen.

"What the hell are you waiting for! Cut me down!"

Two of the men scrambled into action, and rushed forward. Blondie wrapped his arms beneath Drake's back and shoulders, while the other pulled out a knife and cut the rope. The minute Drake was lowered to the ground, his hate filled eyes latched onto me.

I knew the look, and in a last attempt to save myself, took off running. I'd barely made it three steps, however, before one of the men grabbed me. I swiveled a kick across his ankle, but my position was too awkward. His leg only buckled an inch, his hold didn't loosen, and before I could strike again, Blondie took my other arm.

They drug me backwards, and I stared at the empty forest ahead of me. I could have made it. I could have gotten into the trees and disappeared. I could have been real quiet, like Bard was. I could have waited for night and left them behind.

I could have.

But I failed.

"Put her against the tree," Drake ordered.

"No!" I swung my legs up, kicked the air and jerked my arms. My chest tightened.

Not again.

Not again.

Not again!

No one batted an eye at my plea. The men all wore excited smiles. Fred was the only one to seem bothered, but with nothing he could do, only turned his back on the scene.

They spun me around, and Drake's eyes met mine. "I see you haven't forgotten me after all." He grabbed the rope. "Tie her."

Blondie jerked my hands up, while the other bound them to the same tree he'd hung from. The rope bit into my wrists and turned my hands an angry shade of red.