Chapter 10
Arielle’s POV
I couldn’t breathe, it was like my lungs were tied with a rope that was equally weighed down with a rock.
Valery’s words echoed in my head, looping over and over again like some curse I couldn’t escape.
Damian marked you.
Marked me.
Like I was some bitch in heat because it wasn’t just a mark. It was a territorial claim on me, because he felt entitled to me even though I was no longer his.
The worst part was I wasn't sure how permanent it would be.
Even after rejecting me, even after throwing me aside like I was nothing, Damian had bound me to him forever, I hadn't even thought that was possible so how did I know if I would ever be free from it.
I had bolted almost immediately, barely registering Valery voice calling after me as I tore through the trees, the world around me was a blur but I didn’t care about that at all,and where I was going was even further off my list —I just needed to run.
To get away from here and the voices that were threatening to drown me. I heard a few voices calling out to me as I passed, a few of them familiar faces but, I ignored them. I barely registered the sound of my feet pounding against the dirt path as she fled from Valery’s home. The air was thick, the scent of damp earth and pine overwhelming her senses, but she didn’t care.
Even when I heard Vanessa’s voice rise above the others demanding something from me like she always did —I didn’t stop.
I couldn’t.
I didn’t slow down until my legs were aching and my breath rushing out of me in ragged gasps. I stumbled into an old storage shed near the training fields, pressing my back against the rough wooden wall trying to stop my vision from swimming.
My hands were trembling but it wasn’t because I was shaking from pain or sadness anymore.
No.
I was shaking because I wanted to destroy something.
The initial shock of Valery’s revelation was fading, but in its place, something uglier and even more dangerous began to rise within my gut.
Rage. Hot, blistering fury clawed at my insides, burning through the sorrow as fast as a fire through friend leaves.
Damian had marked me.
A bond that was supposed to be sacred. Irrevocable, he had made a mockery of it by rejecting me and then turning around to mark me without my consent.
I still had no idea why he had done that. Why?
What kind of cruel, heartless bastard did that to a woman he didn't love in the slightest. Now that I allowed myself to seat down I could feel the bond now, it wasn't a complete bond, it just kept thrumming beneath my skin like it was supposed to be there.
I had not noticed it before, maybe because I had been so sure that Damian had left me, and probably because I was too heartbroken about it in the first place but apparently it had not been broken, it had to be that one night when he had taken me to the meadow and made love to me but now I was more bound to him than I had been before.
He had made damn sure I could never belong to anyone else. I clenched my fists tightly my nails biting into my palms.
How could he do this to me?
How could he ruin me like this and walk away without a second thought? My head pounded as I tried to make sense of it, but there wasn’t any sense to be made, not when I wasn't in his mind. Besides Damian had always been this way—cold, ruthless, merciless. I had been a fool to think he could ever be anything else.
A sudden burst of laughter broke me from my thoughts, and I stiffened, pressing deeper into the shadows as a group of warriors passed by the shed. I really didn't want to talk to anyone right now and I wanted to be bullied by them even less.
“…Alpha Damian is back,” one of them was saying.
My breath caught, my pulse hammering against my ribs and blood ran cold and the hot in quick succession
Damian.
He was here.
“He came in late last night,” another voice chimed in.
"Don’t make a big deal about it, but you know how he is.”
“Yeah, but after being gone for so long? Wonder why he came back now, I thought he wouldn't come back after rejecting that Arielle girl”
"It's going to be very uncomfortable –" someone said their voices trailing off as they walked further away.
I didn’t hear the rest but I didn't need to because my heart was already made up.
Damian was back.
Back in the pack lands after all these months, after everything he had done—he had returned.
That meant I could get my answers, that meant he could finally explain himself to me.