Chapter 73
Shock couldn't even begin to describe what I was feeling. My mind raced and I felt like I was just looping around in my head. All my thoughts were jumbled. Putting together everything that they were doing to me, it didn't make any sense. They healed me, made me stronger, continued to experiment on me but it had done nothing but really build me up.
"Why...why would you even bother doing that to me?" Hector seemed to have the same swirling confusion.
“Honestly, immortality is lonely. It was a gamble, sure, but now you two have each other for forever. Aren't I nice? You call me a monster but here I am, saving your love life and an impending doom of the death of your mate."
My head started to shake and I looked over at him. "All this, why all this, Oran? It doesn't make sense. None of it does. You've built me up. Your experiments, replacing the things I lost, healing abilities, giving me my voice and my eyes, immortality..."
"Don't forget your power."
My brow furrowed.
“Oh dear, your Alpha King power was being stifled. Shoved down over your title of Luna Queen. You were always Luna Queen first. While it gave you some power it was the power of the Alpha King that is your greatest strength. My dear protege, my apprentice, my adopted son, he wanted to create a more power Alpha King and swoop in and raise him. His plan may have worked, if you hadn't been in the picture. Before severing the connection between Logan and the Alpha King power, he tripled that power. However, you were barely accessing a third of it because of that stupid Luna Queen title."
"So you had the connection between Logan and I severed, removing me as Luna Queen."
He smiled. “Exactly! Once that was done, you now have full access to your power, a power that needed to be nurtured. You, Auri, are my greatest creation between Micah and I."
I still couldn't understand why. Oran seemed to read this in my face because he started to laugh. His pacing picked up, walking the entire length of the room.
"You see, Micah broke you down to your very core. He wiped you clean and built you back up. Built you up into what we wanted. Even popping in your life every so often to give you extra pushes in the right direction. Though sadly, my son got too greedy and he paid for it. But what he left behind for me was his creation, you."
Hector growled but I put my hand on his chest. I would love to reassure him that Oran was wrong but I would be lying to my mate. Oran was right. It was something I struggled with early on, that Micah, the whole BloodHunter Coven built me and I was nothing but what they created. Originally, I thought that would end when I killed Micah. After that though, I came to realize that was not the case. All my decisions and my feelings were based on the things I had gone through in my life. The things they had done to me, for better or for worse.novelbin
"But why..."
"I finished our work dear. You were never supposed to leave his grasp. Especially not after he found out you were the Alpha King. He realized how much he fucked up. I stepped in to help finish his work. Building you into a force that no one could stop. Our champion, my champion, the King Killer.” Hector growled. "In what world would you ever think she would do your bidding? That she would ever listen to you? Micah built her into his perfect demise. You've done nothing but repeat his mistakes."
Oran shook his head. "One of these decades you will understand what it means to look ahead past this century." He sighed. "I don't need to ask her to do anything, you silly wolf."
"Because you've already instilled the principals and prejudices in me by Micah breaking me. All you did was give me more power to enact them." My voice was quiet and I didn't look up at him.
"Exactly! Now she gets it! Bravo! You will always be our champion because of what we have done to you. I don't need for you to do anything. Even if it ends my life, even if I have created my own reaper, you will always be what we wanted you to be. You will continue on and take action against those injustices you feel strongly about. Now, you have the power that not a single fey, vampire, witch, or werewolf can stand in your way."
Burying my head into Hector's chest, his arms felt like a safety I needed right now. I thought I could fight Oran, fight whatever the hell he was doing but he was seeing the full picture of my entire life. I had already lost. He won years ago and was only completing his work. My fear, that I would never feel the same autonomy that I felt before being captured by Micah, was justified. Worse, Hector was pulled into this stupid fucking clownfest of my life.
"So what now? You just going to let us go?" Hector was livid.
"Not quite. I need to get some things done before I let you loose on this world. I have to go for a few months but I will be back. They will do a few more additions because it never hurts to be a little more powerful. Once I am back, we shall see if I just let you walk out the front door. Or if I need to test you a little before you go."
He smirked and shrugged. Waving to the lab coat behind him, he nervously stepped up but in a flash I felt a needle prick my skin. Hector swiped at him and his coat got shredded but I could feel the burn of the liquid.
"My parting gift. It's not fair that Hector got to go into heat. Especially since he will be the one to go into heat again. Let's let him get a taste of his new mate's pheromones, shall we?"
Oran laughed as he followed the doctors out and the door slammed shut behind him. We were quiet for a long time and I didn't move my head from his chest, nor did he remove his hands from holding me.
“Auri, you can't believe him. You can't take his words to heart."
"How...how can I not when I know they are true? He's right. He's absolutely right."
Hector pulled my chin up to look at him. “Astra is gone, my love. You shed that skin. You have loved and cared. You have become the woman you are not just from your experiences with them but having children. Growing into the woman you are today. Don't think for a moment they had anything to do with those memories, that kindness and love."
I smiled up at him. He brushed his hand across my cheek, down my neck and shoulders. His eyes were far away as he watched his hand brush over me. It was such a featherlight touch but still the connection raced the sparks between us. As he moved back up, his emotions twisted. Hector's hand covered the mark on my shoulder and his lips contorted in a grimace.
"Whatever you're thinking, stop." His trance was broken but the grimace didn't leave. "You know I can feel what you are, right?"
"I never wanted it to be like this."
Chuckling, I shook my head. "What? Didn't want to be captured by the monster of the BloodHunter Coven himself? Didn't want to be tortured or cut open? Didn't want to be taken from our family?" His eyes widened but I touched his shoulder where I had marked him. "This is the only good thing that's come of this situation, Hector. You are my only good. I never wanted you to be stuck with me, but I would never change this. Change you and I. You're kinda stuck with me for now."
A smile wove its way on his face finally. "If there is anyone I'm stuck with, it's Rydere. You're the better one."
Laughing, I closed my eyes. His fingers brushed my eyelids.
"What about these? You can see for yourself; for the first time since you were four right? First time you could see since Kai passed."
"The cost was too high. It's never worth it when it costs someone's life."
My eyes opened slowly as I looked at Hector. I kept the smile on my face. "It's nice seeing you though. Seeing the man you've become."
He shook his head. "Not with this scratchy ass beard. Goddess what I would give for a razor. How Ezekiel and Bryan maintain it blows me away. It's a fucking..."
"Flavor saver?"
Hector fake gagged. "Don't say that. It's disgusting. I don't need to look anymore manly than I already am. I don't have a problem in that department."
I laughed and shook my head. “No, no you don't.”
His eyebrows rise and he chuckled. "Is the serum kicking in?"
Glaring at him, I sat up and just barely touched my lips to him. "Do I need a serum to be attracted to my mate?"
Breathing against him, my lips teased his. Finally, his hand grabbed the back of my neck and he pressed his lips to mine. They were hungry and I smiled against him.
"Don't tease me, Auri."
"Why not?"
His eyes met mine. "Because you make me forget where we are. Years, I was afraid to even dream of your lips on mine. Don't tease me with that notion."
"I'm yours, Hector. It's not a dream, not fake. I'm here, you're here. Whether or not Oran made it happen. You can't keep pulling away just because you imagined it going different."
Before he could answer, I tensed and my nails dug into his shoulders. My temperature started to rise and my skin felt like it was on fire. Oran was right, this was nowhere near the intensity of a normal heat but fuck if it wasn't familiar. Breathing heavy, I let my forehead fall to Hector's chest, trying to calm my hammering heart. What's worse was that my control was slipping and more power was funneling through me than I meant to allow. "My love, you're okay. Calm down. I'm here." Hector's voice soothed the storm in me. He must have felt the spike of my emotions as I tried to reign the power back down.
"I'm sorry. This is my fault. All of this. If I would have just died in that explosion. Before Micah ever got ahold of me. I should have gone with Kai, I should have..." My hands gripped him harder but his stroked my back.
He pressed his lips to my head. "Don't say that. Please. All these years we've had side by side, those are moments I cherish. You wouldn't have Vale or Týr or Syf and Freya. Think of everything you've done and built.”
"And tore down. I've lost my family, Hector. I lost my babies, thrust a war on Vale. Goddess knows Logan and I were a shit show. I tore you from your pack, you and Bryan. Everything bad has my fingertips on it. Some way I've forced a war into this world."
"Stop it, Auri!" His hands moved to squish my face and pull my eyes up to meet his. "Stop this now. You have saved far more. Without you, I would have died. So would have many. So just stop. I love you, Auri. Even if it's fucking eternity I will always love you and you will not leave me. Do you understand?"
I chuckled as he swiped a tear off my cheek.
"You are my everything, Auri. With or without the bond. You will not talk like that. Not in front of me. If you need me to show you how much I love you, then damn it Auri, I will."
Hector flipped our bodies so he was on top, shivering between the coolness of floor matched with the touch of his skin. His lips touched my collar bone and his tongue dragged down the valley between my breasts. My heart beat erratically and I squeezed my legs together. He wasn't having it though, as his knees spread my legs apart. For a moment, he rested his head on my sternum.
"Goddess, you smell divine, love. Who needs a forest when I can just bury my face in you."
“As much as that sounds like heaven, I don't think I can wait. I..." my breath turned ragged. "...I need you. Now."
His lips kissed and tugged at my nipples, making me arch. The pleasure was still a level I hadn't felt in decades. Every part of me was sensitive and as he teased his head at my entrance I was fully prepared to come just from that. Hector slammed into me without warning and I screamed his name, my back arching up off the floor. After the first orgasm, Hector continued, his eyes blackened and lust pouring through the bond. It wasn't the second or the third that made me lose consciousness but as we came together on the fourth, I slipped into the darkness of the stars.