One Bite

Chapter 3-9

Two days after my emotional shift into hardened, slow-simmering anger, Luna Rashida came over to me during lunch. I still had no appetite for food and embraced her hands in mine.

"Miss Zara." Her eyes pooled as she looked at me like I was the only person inside the crowded dining area. "How are you feeling?"

The best answer to her question was none. While the initial shock, mental overload, and subsequent mental shut down I experienced in the library had passed, my mind and body both felt numb. Even days after being bombarded with shocking amounts of information, I didn't register my environment. Keeping to myself, I probably came off as cold and detached to the Yellow Sun pack but I... couldn't pretend anymore.

Or, not at this moment.

Part of me acknowledged that Luna Rashida felt she acted in my best interests, but an unspoken, condescending air that I should've known the truth before now was very off-putting.

Not my fault I'm not as smart as the bookworms.

If I knew this crazy 'choose your mate' trip was fake, then I wouldn't have gone.

A stark, sobering realization became obvious.

He would've come up with something else.

My voice was tight and strained, "Best I can."

I needed multiple, three-hour training sessions with Raina and Idris until my aggression worked out. Each session, I stopped when my body collapsed down into the grass, my muscles screaming for relief and breath burning my lungs. We concluded the last one, a two-on-one against me, with an audience that included Torak and Rose.

I hadn't spoken to Torak since our lake incident. He got over the experience and still smirked at me whenever he could catch my gaze, but my current unstable mental state left me distracted. A fleeting smile before a cold shoulder was all I had to offer him, or anyone else.

Like within my father's house, here I felt alone within a crowd. I was different, segregated, and lonely. Lumi retreated after learning she might have a developmental delay and my quiet headspace unsettled.

Rose and Idris however, were attached at the hip. For a healer who spent most of her days cooped up in the infirmary all day, she was extremely curious about life outside the Eastern territory. Their instant bond made me wonder what her and Idris' long-term plans were, but my place wasn't to barge into their personal business.

"And Lumi?" Luna Rashida snapped me out of my thoughts as her hands gave mine a gentle squeeze.

"She's still sorting things out." Terse and bitter, my normal filter wasn't present.

While she hadn't spoken a word to me, she emerged from her comfort shadows during a few fights against Raina, then slunk back after.

"I'm going to let her run again this evening, see if that will make her feel better." Masking a smile, my words felt forced and pretentious.

My relationship with Luna Rashida was strained. I appreciated her up-front honesty and wanted to trust her but my walls of insecurity were up. An unfortunate side effect of having my eyes opened was that I lost my blind trust in people.

It's better in the long run.

I wasn't going to be rude about my reservations though. At the end of the day, I was a guest in their home and they deserved my best manners.

"Before then..." Her hazel eyes sparkled. "I was hoping that Torak could show you the greenhouse this afternoon?"

"Oh, yeah." I forgot how much I wanted to see the greenhouse space. "I'd like that very much."