Permission to love - The Rogue Pack

Chapter 11

"Your wolf's name, I don't know it." The voice caused Sam to freeze in her tracks, come to a stand still in the middle of the barracks. 

She'd been on her way out when she'd felt a consciousness brush against hers. It had been warm and comforting, and as she walked, she let herself become immersed in the sensation. For the first time in her life she hadn't felt the need to shy away from another's contact, hadn't feared the intimacy. Instead, she'd felt like curling into the other person's consciousness, as one would curl into the arms of a lover. Sure, she'd felt nervous, almost fearful of the intimacy, but she hadn't wanted to end it. Instead, she used the techniques she'd been practising and recognised her fear, acknowledging its presence. 

Even when the words rang in her mind, the voice of the speaker was so intoxicating to her senses that it took her a while to register the words. Despite being in her mind, Aiden's voice retained its honeyed lilt, the slight foreignness to the accent that made her toes curl and her heart race. 

When the meaning of the words did sink in though, that's when she stopped. She had never told anyone about Evie. No one knew that she'd lost her wolf when she was 12, after four years of torture. No one knew that her mind still played tricks on her. That sometimes, for one incredible second she'd hear Evie's voice again, hear her cheerful bark, only to realise that she was still gone. That she was never coming back.

She didn't know how other wolves would react if she told them. It was unheard of; a werewolf without a wolf. She would be shunned, rejected, stared at. And she didn't think she could handle it. So she'd kept quiet.

'But surely Aiden deserves to know. Not only because he's your mate.' Reminding herself brought the familiar sensation of excitement and stress twisting her stomach. 'But because he's your friend. He's always been there for you, ready with a joke to brighten the darkest of your days.'  Yet still she hesitated.

"Brae wants to know." At that, her already weakened heart crumpled. She couldn't tell him everything, but surely a name wouldn't hurt?

"Evie..." a wave of doubt washed over her. She couldn't dishoner Evie's memory by lying. But how to tell him? She wasn't ready to tell him. But she would give him something.

"Her name was Evie." She cut off the connection, not wanting to hear the questions that were bound to follow. Sam needed to be focused, and answering a flood of questions would distract her at a time when distraction wasn't an option.

Taking a deep breath, she pushed the remaining clouds brought on by Aiden's voice, forced her stomach to unclench, and took a wobbly step. As she moved her feet forwards, forcing herself to walk, her legs strengthened and stopped shaking. 

Yet her mind inevitably strayed back to Evie. She still had no idea what the DIR had done to her, had no idea if they'd intended to remove Evie's consciousness from her mind. All she knew was that it had changed her.

After being taken by the DIR when she was eight, she'd spent four years surviving their torture, four years fighting with every bit of strength. And she'd never given up, she'd never lost her will. She was a fighter and so was Evie. After every year, they'd upped the experimentation, torturing her in the attempt to make her blindly follow orders. By the end of the second year, she'd learnt to play along with their orders, although always strove to find a new way to twist the instructions, making them more bearable to undertake. And gradually, she built up a resistance to the horrific things she was made to do. Each death, each killing bothered less and less.

At first, when Evie disappeared from her mind, she assumed that she'd given up, retreating to the corners of her mind so that she wouldn't have to witness the horrors. But then Sam had realised that she still had her wolf's abilities, her senses and power, so she was still present, but just gone. It had happened just after she'd killed her first cub, and she'd wondered whether killing so many helpless werewolves had caused her wolf to snap, her consciousness disappearing, leaving only the shell of her body. Yet even that explanation didn't seem plausible.

But she couldn't come up with anything better. She still had her wolf's abilities, so she knew that the bond hadn't been severed, and that Evie hadn't just disappeared. Even now, after all these years she still didn't have answers, and Evie's ghost still haunted her. Reminding her of everything she had lost because of the DIR. 

Yet the worst thing, the thing she hardly dared admit to herself, was that when Evie's voice disappeared, she'd felt whole, almost more powerful, more at ease, more in control of her own body. And a part of her shied away from the idea that maybe she had done it? Maybe she had gotten rid of her own wolf. Maybe killing so many wolves had subconsciously made her so indifferent to the life of wolves that she'd forced Evie's consciousness to disappear. That she'd effectively murdered her. And for Sam, that thought made her feel more like a monster than any of the other murders she'd ever committed. 

***

Sam looked up, she'd reached the corridor leading to the garage, its large double doors towering over it. Shaking her head, she brushed away the remaining tendrils of safety and comfort leftover from the sound of Aiden's voice, pushing them aside in her mind. Now was not the time for soft and loving Sam. She had to be fierce and powerful, cold and calculating. If she did this right, she might get rid of the DIR forever. 

And it was with that thought in mind that she pushed open the doors, ready to face her destiny.