FERAL DESIRES PART 2 ( A Werewolf Romance)

Five Years Later

Her body ached, every last bit of her strength ebbing away as she scrubbed the floors of the dungeon clean. The smell of piss and bodily waste mixed with blood and sweat clung to the air. Her nostrils burned as bile flooded her mouth. She swallowed and tried to ignore the feeling as she cleaned. The brush moved across the hardened floor, and every inch of her protested.

Pain lashed at her. At some point, she had thought she would get used to it, but it dawned on her that no one ever got used to agony.

Every day she woke up feeling the same—weak and alone. The feeling had become a part of her, slowly gnawing away at what little strength she had left.

But the pain wasn’t the worst of it. It was the gaping hole that had taken root inside her heart. For five years, it had only grown wider. Destroying her from the inside out, taking away her will to live.

If she were human, she would’ve died under the conditions she had lived in for over five years. Being a wolf, it meant she would survive, though her life hung between life and death.

She had become frail, her very essence stripped from her. A perfect punishment, a fitting one for what she had done—for loving a prince.

The very thought of him sent a pang of pain straight to her chest. She stopped scrubbing and breathed in hard, trying to clear her mind.

She would not think of him, because every time she did, she broke. Tears streamed down her cheeks, and the space inside her chest only widened.

Shaking her head, Hazel scrubbed the floor with all her might.

Someone screamed somewhere in the dungeons, a blood-curdling scream that sent fear streaking through her. Even after all these years, she never got used to it.

She never grew accustomed to the barbaric dungeons, where authorities tortured criminals and coerced those with reservations about the crown into divulging their secrets through inhumane methods. Hence, all the blood and gore she had to scrub from the floors and sometimes the walls.

Hazel finished up, stood up, and wobbled, almost knocking over the heavy wooden bucket filled with dirty water. The dress she wore barely fit her. Her bones nearly protruded from her skin, her cheeks had hollowed, and her lips cracked from dehydration.

Grabbing the brush in one hand, she carried the pail in the other; the weight of it almost brought her down. She walked out of the stall and down the long corridor.

“Hello, lovely,” She froze at the icy sound. It wasn’t the first time she had encountered prisoners and the snarky remarks thrown at her as she worked.

It was recurring, and it chilled her to the bone every time.

Despite the weight, she hurried away. The bars were strong, but she never trusted them enough to hold some of these people. All manner of creatures occupied the cells. Werewolves, witches, vampires, hunters, and many more.

If one of them escaped and they got her, that would be the end of her miserable existence.

But then she stopped and turned around a fraction to stare down the corridor with its dim lights in the ceiling flickering on and off. What if one prisoner escaped, grabbed her, and killed her?

The thought came to her unbidden. Wouldn’t that be a much-needed respite from this torture? Shaking her head, she tried to dispel the thoughts of death and everything else.

It was better not to feel.

It was better to go through the motions of the day without having to think of her past or even her dark future. Because every time she did, it only scared her. Because every time she thought about it, the hope she held inside, that one day things would change for her, vanished, and living without hope scared her more than anything.

After draining the water from the pail, she refilled it with clean water, grabbed a brush and a mop, and walked to the other side where they kept the witches.

They cackled upon her arrival, the magic-canceling manacles binding their hands together.

“Look at you,” one witch from the cells said.

“You’re one of them, but look at you. They’re draining the life out of you.”

“You mean nothing to them, just like us.” They snickered, the sound of their laughter following Hazel. She didn’t reply; she couldn’t because they spoke the truth.

Hazel could feel it. The life draining from her.

Maybe she had months or weeks, or maybe days, before she succumbed to the torture. Still, she forged on, carrying the other end of her bargain.

She scrubbed and mopped until sweat trickled down her spine, until every inch of her body hurt so badly that for a second she collapsed against the wall, resting.

The screams continued, echoing in the semi-dark dungeons.

After the time that had passed, she knew Kieran was the king now, and she couldn’t fathom why he would let this brutality slide by.

Some of these people were innocent, but they suffered without a trial.

She had always thought that he wasn’t cruel. That he would make a fine king, but how wrong she was.

“You know his true colours to be surprised,” she mumbled under her breath.

After that time in the woods, where he had touched her, his power radiating over her skin and had seeped inside her flesh, she knew Kieran wasn’t the man she had envisioned.

He was cruel.

Someone who took because he thought he owned everything.

Someone who lied and never cared about whom he hurt.

Even after five years, she could still remember that pain with enough clarity.

Like he was doing it all over again.

Perhaps it was her fault for never listening—for fighting him. If she hadn’t, then perhaps he would’ve left her alone.

But being foolish and hopelessly in love with a man who had pretended to feel the same, she had done the opposite.

And she was certain he knew she was down here, but he didn’t care.

Hazel wiped the tears from her eyes and sighed. Gathering her strength, she got up, grabbed her things, ready to hear the witches’ snickers again.

Kieran.

Kieran stop!

STOP!

He woke up in a cold sweat. The sheets tangled around his body. Kieran groaned, wiping the sweat from his forehead, having the same five-year-old nightmare wake him up.

He had known that what he had done to her—though an accident—would haunt him forever, and it had. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw her.

He saw the pain, the fear, and he saw her trust burning until it turned to ash.

Kieran remembered taking a step towards her only to have her flinch away from him. It had killed him that he had wanted to fall to his knees then and there and beg for her forgiveness.

Yet, he didn’t. Instead, he walked away because he had to. To keep her safe, he had to let her go, the hardest thing he had ever done in his life.

And now she was safe. He had made sure of it.

She was away from his world—one that would’ve destroyed her.

The doors to his room opened, and Ryder stepped inside, looking well-presented this early in the morning. Kieran groaned again and rolled out of bed, walking towards a table in the room and pouring a glass of whiskey.

He brought it to his lips and downed the contents in one go.

“The council is waiting.”

“Oh, please,” Kieran said, pouring another glass.

Ryder tracked his movements, but he didn’t care. If he weren’t king, forced to wake up every day and perform his duties, he would’ve loved to stay in bed and drink himself to oblivion every day. He deserved it, and perhaps the pain in his chest would’ve lessened a little.

“You’ve an hour. We will be waiting.”

Ryder’s footsteps faded as the door closed. Kieran drank from his cup, then gripped his head. The strands of his hair were longer than ever before.

Sighing, he walked to the bathroom and took a shower. When he came back, he found clothes laid out for him on the bed. He pulled them on, then ran a comb through his hair.

Once done, he walked out of the room, his footsteps echoing off the walls of the hallway.

When he entered the council room, the members had already taken their seats. They jumped to their feet at once, bowing their heads.

He paid them no mind. Kieran simply sat down at the head of the table, watching as they did the same a moment later.

The meeting started, the same noise about vampires acting out in his kingdom.

As far as he knew, they didn’t want to rule. Vampires were looking for something else—a weapon, but the paranoia of the council had led to the arrests of innocent bloodsuckers for questioning.

“They don’t want to rule the kingdom,” he told them for the millionth time.

“A king can never be that sure. Every day people plot to take your position, and you act like you don’t care!” Edric Ashwood said, his loud voice echoing around the room.

Kieran realised that he wasn’t wrong.

He didn’t want to rule, not when he lived every day yearning for the one he had lost—not when he wanted to march up to her home and demand she forgive him. Not when this very position had cost him the one he wanted.

And yet he couldn’t. Even now as king, the law remained absolute. He couldn’t change it without taking some drastic measures, but sometimes the line between right and wrong blurred, and he was teetering on its edge.