Chapter 13: Beast

My hands were still pressed to the cold marbled counter, fingers digging into cold stone as if it might keep me upright if I let go. My heart refused to slow, pounding so hard it hurt to breathe physically, each heart beat drowning out the thoughts. Ian’s voice still replayed itself in fragments, cutting deeper each time I tried to make of it all. But I couldn’t.

A toy.

Temporary and easily replaceable toy.

As much I tried not to think, or remind myself that he was cruel on purpose and that he wanted to scare me. But fear never needed any logic to settle into your bones. It only needed space and my empty heart had plenty of it.

I forced myself to breathe. In. Out. In. Out. My lungs burned like I’d been running, though I hadn’t taken a step from the place he left me in.

I grabbed the bottle of water, my hands shaking as I nearly dropped it and drank the water so fast it spilled down my chin, soaking the collar of my cardigan. But I couldn’t bring myself to care anymore.

My reflection stared back at me from the dark glass of the cabinet doors. My eyes looked wide and skin too pale. Someone I barely recognized. I looked like prey that had finally realized it was trapped.

Azran’s face flashed in front of my eyes. His calm voice when he talked to me, he hadn’t raised his voice at me since I arrived. He didn’t need to for that matter. That was worse, I knew. Men like him didn’t rely on force, but on inevitability they were the reason for.

Was Ina telling the truth?

I wanted to believe Azran had meant what he said. That he’d keep me safe, protected, and provide for me. But Ian hadn’t spoken like he was making assumptions. He spoke like he knew the rules of this place intimately. As if this wasn’t the first time for him to see a woman in this house.

My stomach twisted painfully, hunger replaced with sour and heavy taste of my own uncertainty.

I pushed myself away from the counter at last, my legs still unsteady.

What did I expect anyway? Did I really think men like them gave without taking? I walked in on my own. But still, did I have a choice in the first place to begin with?

Get it together, Kaela.

But my thoughts refused to obey.

What had I walked into. Who was Azran really. And why did it felt like everyone knew the secrets except me.

“Kaela, are you alright?”

I flinched and looked up, my grip loosening as I turned my head to find Eli standing near the doorway with concern written all over his features. He looked like he’d rushed in, as if he knew Ian was here a moment ago.

I shook my head, not trusting my voice. “What does Azran do?”

Eli looked startled by my sudden question, even it surprised me. I wasn’t the type to voice my thoughts openly, I’d learned that a long ago, but I couldn’t help it. I needed to know, if not, I’d go insane with fear coiling up my chest.

Just for a second, I saw something crossing his face. Then he smoothed it away and smiled in the same polite manner he did every time.

“He runs chains of hotels across the continent,” he said evenly.

I stared at him.

“That’s not what I meant, you know it,” I muttered. “What does he really do, Eli?”

When Eli didn’t answer, I sighed. “I know he’s a beast. I can feel it. Is he normal? Or is he… something else I should be wary of?”

Eli exhaled, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. “Master Azran isn’t normal like any of us,” he admitted. “But not in a way you’re thinking. You don’t need to be scared of him. He takes care of his belongings very well.”

Belongings.

I wanted to laugh.

So that was what I really meant in this house.

Azran’s belongings.

He met my eyes. ‘He’s an hybrid and our Alpha.”

“An alpha,”  repeated, not know what it meant. “What does that mean?”

Eli stepped further into the kitchen, his voice becoming more controlled and serious. “An Alpha isn’t just a leader,” he said. “He’s our protector. Our ruler. Bound by instinct and responsibility. You see, Kaela, our kind follows strength unlike you humans, but we are not as cruel as you perceive us. Our Alpha keeps his people safe, ensures they live well, even if they don’t stand beside him . It’s his duty as our leader.”

My head swam. “Your kind?”

“Werewolves,” he said gently.

I swallowed. Somehow, it didn’t shock me the way it should. Cause I knew this world now had been divided into two, one ruled by beasts and other by humans. It was known since I was a child.

But hybrid, I’d never heard of it. Did that make Azran powerful? More scary?

“Where is this community you mentioned?” I asked. “Why don’t I see anyone?”

“They live around us,” Eli explained. “Same neighborhoods, and cities, same lifestyle as humans, blended into their kind. But Master Azran doesn’t force proximity. He’s different. He believes in freedom, rather than typing something or… someone to him. He only intervenes to make sure they’re protected and comfortable.”

That didn’t ease the tension in my chest to the slightest, if anything, it deepened it.

Eli’s words about Azran contrasted the ones Ian spoke.

“So he’s watching everything,” I murmured.

“In a way,” Eli said. “yes.”

There were more questions on my tongue. “Does he live alone? Does he have family?”

Eli opened his mouth to answer then froze.

“Master Azran has a brother,” he said automatically and then his eyes widened as if he hadn’t meant to tell me that.

“A brother? Where is he?”

Eli turned sharply toward me. “Don’t mention his brother, Kaela, if you want to live.”

My stomach dropped. “Why? You said he has one.”

“he doesn’t live here,” Eli replied shaking his head. “That’s all you need to know.”

“But Azran told me,” I said slowly, confusion knotting tighter. “He said I was meant to carry heirs for both Blackthorne brothers.”

Eli went very still.

I watched as his jaw tighten, watched the careful control settle back over his features. “that’s a matter for Master Azran,” he said after a moment. “Not me or you.”

My head throbbed. Nothing made sense. Every answer led to another door to more questions, darker ones without any foundation. Why mention a brother who wasn’t there. Why warm me away from even saying his name when I was meant to carry his child. Why involve me at all.

I couldn’t breathe with the confusion clawing at me.

“I need to talk to him,” I said suddenly. Eli studied me for a long moment, then nodded once.

“He’s in his office. It’s on the second floor, third door to the left. You may go.”

I nodded, walking past him and to the stairs.

Eighteen years. That was how long I had lived inside the wall that weren’t my home’s but the brothel’s I was sold to. You couldn’t learn about power or hierarchy or hidden societies in the brothel. It was the place where rules were simple yet no less cruel. You existed to be wanted. To be used. To be traded. The world outside those walls, had never been real to me. It had been an idea. A rumor whispered among girls and guards.

I had learned how to read men, not systems, or how they worked. How to anticipate moods, their eyes and their gazes. I’d never survived a man’s touch, even if I cried and begged, and screamed. If they wanted something from me, they’d take it mercilessly.

I remembered bleeding the first time I was taken against my will. There were nasty marks all over my body. Blood and dried semen of the old man who raped me whole night and day. For several weeks I cried, but then I stopped, cause resisting hurt more. So I decided to close my eyes and let it happen. If I wouldn’t struggle, it’d hurt less.

That was the notion of life for me.

No one ever promised me anything except pain and torture. But when Azran brought me, he promised me so many things and I, was the desperate little girl, wanting to believe whatever he meant was real. And maybe it was, but when people, around you keep feeding you words, I didn’t know whom to trust.

If Azran had taken me by force in that car, or made me sleep in basements, I would’ve never gotten the courage to walk into his office as I was doing right now. But he gave me hope, and I didn’t want that hope to be useless.

So how was I supposed to grasp something like a hybrid.

A man who ruled without chains, I believed. A leader whose people chose to follow him.

And yet, Azran didn’t fit the shape.

That realization unsettled me more than anything Ian had said.

If Azran was truly what Eli described, then why did he feel so dangerous. Or worse, why did he feel safe. I didn’t know how to exist around someone who didn’t use force to assert his dominance. My instincts turned for cruelty, for survival and the absurd notion of hope. I knew how to endure pain physically, I didn’t know how to endure it when it’s in your chest.

If Azran had a brother, and I was meant to carry heirs for both of them, then what did that make me. A vessel. A bridge. I clenched my hands, forcing myself to breath. I had escaped one cage only to stumble into another whose bars were invisible. At least, in the brothel, I had known the rules. But here, everything was layered and far more dangerous.

I reached the second floor, took left and stopped in front of the third door. My chest tightened as I rested my palm against the door. I didn’t know what I was walking into as I raised my hand, and knocked.

Whatever Azran was, whatever his world demanded of me, I would have to face it. And that terrified me more than any beast ever could.