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Chapter 27

       The King was enraged upon his return. I could feel it like a sharp stab in my chest the minute the loud thundering of slamming doors was heard around the castle.

       I snapped wide, horrified eyes over at Eildor and Finn. They were on babysitting duty since Aeyron was still with Mae, and Terif had gone down the Mountain with the King. They shared brief, and rather frightened glances before looking back at me.

       "It would appear the King was not pleased with what he learned." Finn muttered as Eildor stood to his feet and held his hand out towards me.

       "Let us leave his wing for a while, my lady. I doubt he would want you to see him in such a state."

       I wanted to shake my head and stay firmly in my spot, to demand that Eirik tell me what had happened, angry or not- but when the loud, angry roaring of his voice started carrying throughout the halls, I was nodding my head and slipping my hand into Eildor's without hesitation.

       "Mind your wolf." Finn chided as we slipped out of the North's sitting room and headed for the small staircase at the end of the hall. "Be prepared if he suddenly invades your head, we don't want to end up hurting Lady Emrie like Aeyron." He shot me a smile, one I didn't have time to return before Eildor was escorting me quickly down the back stairwell.

       I stared after Eirik's wing for as long as I could, a worried frown pulling at my lips. I hoped he was alright. What could have made him so angry?

       "Don't worry, my lady. Terif is used to dealing with him when he gets all moody like this, he'll calm him down." Eildor's always amused eyes were beaming down at me, but his words did little to reassure the uneasy turning in my stomach.

       I thought we would have avoided the furious King completely, but the moment we stepped into the main hall his furious form was looming just ahead. My steps faltered as my breath caught in my throat.

       Blood.

       He was covered in it. It drenched his shirtless torso, covered the dark of his pants in a black stain, and was even clinging to his mouth and jaw.

       And it was not his.

       "Was not expecting this..." I barely heard Eildor say over my own blood pounding through my ears. What had he done?

       The King's eyes snapped towards us, to mine, and I flinched backwards at the furious look dancing in his no-longer blue gaze. His eyes were black, the entire expanse of them. I gulped nervously and took a small step back.

       He growled.

       Dear lord...

       "Y-You killed them..." I knew the answer before the words even slipped past my lips. There was too much blood for it to be anything other than a handful of bodies he must have torn through. I could feel the color drain from my face.

       "Oh my god-"

       My head was beginning to pound, and it felt like no matter how hard I tried to breath, air refused to reach my lungs. He had killed them. People I had known my whole life- that practically raised me besides Lei and Mae.

       But was it even the Elders? Perhaps it was just some random family that got in his way at the wrong time.

       Rumors. Rumors from before started flashing through my mind. The King of the North, a great, terrifying being who showed no mercy. Who killed if you looked at him the wrong way- or if you looked at him at all.

       A Man who would dismember you in front of your family just for wandering into his lands. A beast who would kill a village just because they pissed him off.

       I staggered backwards, my palm pressed to my suddenly throbbing forehead- but the action only seemed to worsen his already explosive anger. He let out a dark growl, and then was in front of me in a flash- his black eyes glaring down at me like two dark, burning, coals.

       "Yes-" His voice came out as a dark snarl, sharp teeth biting into his bottom lip. This was not the same man who had held me so gently the other morning.

       "I killed them. Every last one of those pathetic Underlings that dared called themselves Elders."

       I flinched back from that hard bite in his voice with wide, and slightly terrified eyes. All rumors stemmed from something, and this North looked like he couldn't care less whether I was his mate or not. Just another Underling who he could easily tear apart.

       "You shouldn't be so surprised." He snarled, the light from the ceiling reflecting wickedly in the black of his eyes. "I am a wolf-borne- mate. Fulfilling monstrous actions is what we do. What we enjoy."

       "Easy North, Emrie doesn't-"

       North's black gaze snapped to Eildor's, his lips pulled back in a life-threatening snarl as he growled at his General. I eased further away from him. This was all- too- much...

       "You killed them... They didn't do anything!" I shouted up at the still furious, blood soaked Eirik, but that did nothing to calm his rage.

       "They fucked up everything!" His voice came out as roar, one so loud it caused my ears to throb in pain.

       There were tears pricking my eyes, a few falling to my cheeks before I could stop them. My head was pounding, my lungs unbreathing, and I could barely make out anything besides the black dots dancing around my vision.

       This Eirik was terrifying. He was the man of the stories, of the rumors. This was the true King of the North.

       And of course I blacked out because he simply yelled at me.

-&-

       I groaned against the pounding behind my skull and blinked my eyes open. The room was dark, the air cold as warm blankets pinned me to the bed. There was no light shining in its bleak expanse. I let out a shaky breath.

       How did I get here?

       There was movement at my side, a soft rustling of fabric, before the bed dipped softly beside me. I blinked up into the darkness. "Are you okay?" North's voice was gentle, caring even, but it took me a moment before I realized the light shining down at me was the glow of his blue eyes.

       "My head hurts." I murmured as I pressed my palm to my throbbing skull.

       His blue eyes darkened and a flicker of memory shot through my mind, then another, and another until I remembered just what had landed me in such a predicament.

       I'm sure he heard the hitch in my breath, or noticed how I leaned slightly away from his heavy weight at my side, because he let out a soft sigh.

       "Emrie I- I can't say that I am sorry, because I am not." He started softly, his large hand resting just beside my hip- or at least I thought it was. "The only thing I regret is causing you pain."

       I remained quiet. I had been so terrified of him. Horrified at the blood soaking his body, and the black color of his eyes. He looked like a murderous beast, one with little care in the world. He was not the Eirik I knew, but one I had heard about from traveling lips.

       "I tried so hard with you- I try so hard to not let you see what is always simpering just beneath my surface. But it is so ridiculously straining." His voice had dropped to a hoarse whisper, one he didn't bother hiding the emotion from.

       I couldn't see him, but I knew those blue eyes were gleaming down at the ground. This was the most open, and vulnerable, I had ever seen him. It was just a pity that he had to kill a handful of people for it to happen.

       "I was not always like this, not always so mad all the time. When I still had my family, I was happy." He spoke softly, his voice distant as he recounted long-forgotten memories.

       "But that was so very long ago, and I've been so alone ever since. It is easy to lose control."

       His words tugged at me, at that lonely part inside of my chest I knew so well. But that didn't make up for what he had done.

       "Some of those Elders were kind to me."

       Images of Elder Lana's gentle voice teaching Mae and I how to read and write with the other town's children flashed through my mind. Even memories of Elder Cane, despite how pompous he was- he always managed to keep the village safe with Leikos.

       They might have invaded my privacy, experimented on me and my power, but they were still good people- some of them. Or I thought they were. I didn't know what to believe anymore.

       First Leikos had come storming up the Mountain, saying they had lied to me my whole life, and then Mae had as well. Had even showed me a hidden tomb where they had supposedly kept me locked away for hundreds of years.

       I didn't know what to believe anymore. I wanted answers, but the ones I were getting seemed too ridiculous to be true. I had to have parents, had to have a legitimate past. I wanted to, more than anything.

       I didn't want to be some star that had been cast out of the sky- didn't want to be that girl locked away in a glass coffin for centuries. At this point, I wasn't even sure if I wanted North.

       That wasn't true.

       "I would ask for your forgiveness, if I knew you would give it to me."

       For the first time since I met him, I wanted him to stop talking- stop trying to make me understand. I was tired, so unbelievably exhausted at the ridiculousness of it all.

       He should have killed me when I trespassed on his lands all those months ago. Or, rejected me at least. He always made up excuses for us not to be together anyways. What difference would it have made?

       "What did they even do?"

       His blue eyes snapped over to mine, and the saddened look in them only grew, but he didn't reach out for me. I was thankful really, I doubted I would have let him.

       "They kept you from me, Emrie. With or without my anger, I would have killed them. I'm sorry that you must know this, but it is true. I am a wolf-borne, and I don't like it when people take what is mine."

       "What does that even mean?" I groaned and pressed my palms into my eyes. No one has kept me from the King, accept the King himself. Just more secrets and more lies. It never seemed to end.

       "Stop with all of the secrets, all of the lying. It's becoming ridiculous." I didn't bother trying to stop the hard bite in my tone. I didn't want to. I had every right to be upset, and I cared little if that aggravated him.

       He was quiet for a moment, his blue eyes hard before he let out a dark sigh. "I know, but I do what I believe to be for the best. Just give me a little more time. Then I will answer all of your questions- truthfully."

       His words offered little reprieve. I felt like all I had been giving him was time. Time and patience, and hope. But now- now he killed an entire town's Elders without a blink, locked my best friend up in some infirmary, and tossed her brother off the Mountain. This was just one giant nightmare after another.

       "I am sorry I have caused you such turmoil," He spoke again at my silence, but I refused to look anywhere near him. "But I will not apologize for killing them, or for keeping things from you- nor do I have to." He stood slowly to his feet, his blue eyes gazing down at me in a sharp concentration before he turned away.

       "It is late, and you should go back to sleep." He muttered before I heard his footsteps walking to the door in the dark of the room. I could only lay there in a quiet, numbness- as if none of this were real. How I wished it wasn't.

       He paused just inside of my door, the dim light of the hall shining through to reveal his no longer bloodied skin and dark attire. "I understand if you fear me right now, or- or if you will never see me in the same light again. But I..." He hesitated and licked his lips, his blue eyes sad as they flickered back to mine.

       "I need you, Emrie. I do not know how I was able to live without you before, but I know I cannot now."

       His words squeezed painfully at my chest, his soft tone filling my brain with a groggy fog. Why couldn't he just let me hate him, if only for a moment?

       "If you can't sleep, or if some part of you forgives me enough to tolerate me, I will be in my room." He gave me a small smile, and then walked out into the hall- the door closing softly behind him. 

-&-

       I wanted to stay viciously mad at him, to hate him at least for a little while, but it was increasingly hard. He has hidden so much from me, kept me locked away in isolation with only Aeyron's presences as a reprieve, and killed those who held significance in my life.

       And yet, I could not hold onto the hate and anger that I desperately wanted to.

       I'm not sure if it was because of the mate bound, or simply because I was weak, but I wanted nothing more than to curl into his arms and press myself against him for as long as possible.

       Arms that had just recently been drenched in the blood of my town's elder's.

       Pathetic and weak. That was what he had made me- but I still did not hate him for it.

       He was right. He was a wolf-borne, the King of them all. He has done far worse in the past- and he would probably do far worse in the future.

       Could I be with a man like that? One who killed those who made him angry simply because he could? Could I love someone as such?

       It was a stupid question, because no matter how hard I told myself 'no, it's far too soon'- I knew I loved him. I knew I would always love him. But I could easily write that off as the mate bond.

       Love was such a temperamental word. I loved Mae, and Leikos, even Terif and Aeyron. And a part of me had even loved the Elders. But the odd emotion in my heart for Eirik was foreign to me, and it was scary. I didn't want to admit it to myself, to tell my mind what my heart already knew.

       I could leave the Mountain, leave the entire North for that matter, but I could never truly leave him. A part of me, the part that hung on his every word, would stay. This was my life now.

       I stood just outside his door, all those thoughts tumbling through my mind. Could I so easily forgive him? Was I really going to run back into the hands he had used barely a day before to kill four people?

       I let out a heavy sigh and shook my head. It honestly didn't matter.

       I knocked softly on the large wooden door, but heard no reply. He must have been sleeping, it was late anyways. I should have gone back to my own room- but there I was, pushing the door gently open before I could listen to my better judgement.

       There was a thin beam of moonlight streaming in through his large windows, and I used it to walk slowly over to his large four-poster bed. He was lying heavily on his side, his blue eyes closed as he grimaced in his sleep. The sight made me frown.

       He looked so gentle, so vulnerable like this. It was hard to believe he was the same man who could kill so mercilessly. And yet, I was still climbing into the bed beside him. The minute my head hit the pillow, his frown eased and his tense shoulders relaxed. My lips pulled into a small smile.

       My life was just one, big, jumbled mess.