I was able to notice how my head was resting uncomfortably on my shoulder once I finally freed myself from an induced sleep, my neck a victim as it was stretched awkwardly on one side and scrunched tightly together on the other side. Gently, I slid my hand out from under the weighted cover and placed it on the currently cramping side of my neck before craning my head up straight. The low cracks could be heard loudly against the emptiness of the candlelit room.

The smooth tips of my fingers skimmed across the delicate skin of my neck, and found only a slightly lifted mole near the base on the right side.

A relieved sigh escaped my lips.

"It will be easier on you if you don't waste your little amount of energy trying to get up from the safe bed."

There was no forgetting what I saw. Annora. And, the blood. Maybe he thought that I would have missed seeing her altogether, or that I wouldn't have remembered. My body refused to move at the sound of his voice, out of spite mostly, because he knows that I would have tried to escape from wherever he forcibly dragged me off to. I didn't flinch. I didn't jump. I didn't run. No, I wouldn't give him the satisfaction.

"You're extremely weak, Emery. It's probably from stress, a lot of it." A glass cup was then held just above my stomach, practically calling out to me, and attempting to edge me forward with its content. Instead, I followed the large hand that was wrapped around the cup with my eyes, tracing the path back to Johnny's concerned yet guilt-free appearance, and I decided that he was definitely the culprit at the end of the line. The corners of his lips lifted up into a once contagious smile, "Orange juice, for energy."

A mixture of betrayal, confusion, and sadness swirled around in my chest.

"It's just orange juice. And, it's mine. So, there's no need for you to worry about it being poisoned or anything. It's good, here-" he placed another hand on the back of my head and pushed it forward until my lips touched the edge of the brim, and he tilted the cup towards me.

The signature sweet smell of oranges filled my nostrils, the encouraging citrus woke up my senses as the tangy liquid rushed down my dry throat. "See?" Johnny took the cup away as all that was left was barely a drop coating the inside. "It's good for you."

I shook my head as I asked breathlessly, "How could you?"

Johnny placed the cup to the side, and latched onto my arm that was resting straight on the bed, holding on as if I was going to rip it out of his clutch. "Please, Emery, I can explain everything to you. I promise you that I can. You just need to listen."

Listen? There's always more to it than just the one story, and maybe I've just discovered another side.

"Okay, Johnny."

He squeezed my arm with both of his hands. "Thank you, Emery, thank you. You mean so much to me, do you know that? You're one of the only people I truly have left. You became my loving family, and I can't think of you as anything less."

My hand lifted up to hover over his face, we have always tried to fill a missing gap within us with each other, booping his nose as I spoke, "I know."

Johnny's body was practically sharing the king-sized bed with me as he leaned far over his knees, his elbows resting on the cushion as he enclosed us in a small, nonexistent bubble of intimacy. After what felt like an eternity of anxiously waiting, he eventually confessed, "I found my mate."

"You found your mate?" My words came out as a surprised whisper that sounded more like a yell; exclaimed. "You found your mate!"

Johnny quickly shushed me, the cheeks of his face reddening as his smile expanded. "Quiet down! They will want to speak with you as soon as possible, so I have to explain everything as fast as I can before they show up, okay? I want to be the first one you receive information from."

I nodded with an encouraging hum.

Johnny began, glancing towards a nearby door before looking back at me, "When you found your mate, I didn't want to bother you, but it was getting really hard to be without you. I know that you didn't feel the same way in the beginning like you do now; it's natural for humans and I knew that because of the way your father feels towards my kind that you wouldn't run into your mate's arms just like that. I didn't expect you to be like Viviana, or to be like me.

"However, I understood how important it was to be able to find your mate, even if I didn't have one to call my own, and when you didn't share the same feelings as our Alpha did, I knew that I wasn't helping by taking up your time the same way I usually would. So, I stayed away. I was alone constantly; Max and Viviana had each other, I no longer had a roommate, and spending time in the public areas could only do so much. I was suffering, especially at night. I asked Max to place me on night watch, and with the sudden panic, they needed more guards than usual to be able to cover every area, which meant that I was able to be outside every night with a partner."

There was a purposeful pause before he continued, allowing me to soak up all the background information, "But, one night, something different happened. That morning, I woke up and I could feel it. The bond. It was like something was trying to claw its way out of me, I was on edge and couldn't stop looking over my shoulder the entire day because of it. I didn't know at the time what it was. It wasn't until I stepped over the territory line that I was able to realize what it actually was. He was calling to me, Emery. He was begging me to find him. I left my partner where they stood, and without even a look back, I booked it. I wasn't afraid anymore. The darkness didn't scare me. The loneliness didn't scare me. I ran until I found him."

He emphasized the main point again, "Until I found my mate."

"What happened next?" I asked, invested. And, like someone in a movie theater, I witnessed the story unfold.

"I started to sleep during the day. I asked Max to take me off night shift. And, I began disappearing as soon as the sun went down. All so that I could spend my nights with him. He would take me to hidden caves along the mountains, to abandoned buildings in the old forgotten towns, to unused underground tunnels, to everywhere I dreamed of being able to see." The look in his eyes dulled as he said the next few words, "But, when the morning came, he had to leave and I had to go back to the pack. Max must have known that I had found my mate, because he allowed me to sneak off even when restrictions were put in place. But, he wouldn't have if he knew who my mate was, and I couldn't bear telling him, so each time before going back to the pack I cleaned myself raw until his scent was gone."

"Why?" I dreaded the answer, for I already knew.

"Because he isn't like me, Emery, and he isn't like you either."

A thought crossed my mind. "Did you bring me somewhere dangerous, Johnny?"

Johnny treated my innocent question like a slap in the face, as he gasped shockingly and sputtered out, "No! I would never. You're safe here. Please, believe me when I say that. We're in his home, a long abandoned manor. Away from danger."

Away from Morpheus.

However, there was something that I couldn't understand, that wasn't being answered. "Johnny, what did you do to Annora? Did you hurt her? Or, was it your unnamed mate?"

He rolled his eyes, catching my subtle dig. "He would find it rude if I told you his name before he introduced himself to you, but he would mainly be disappointed, I've spoken very highly of you and he wants to make a good impression. But, please, we didn't want to hurt Annora. She wouldn't have listened to us, and we had to deal with her before we tried to take you or else the plan would have fallen apart. I would know, because we're all like that to an extent. I would have attacked first, then talk later. We couldn't risk it, especially since she's been trained to protect you and only you. You don't need to worry about her, she should have been found by now, and we only hit her head just enough to knock her out. It's a human injury, one that a wolf could easily survive."

Questions. "Is she okay? Not in pain, at least?"

He reassured me, "Of course. Her head was in the process of healing when we took you, definitely nearing the final stages. She's meant to withstand hits. She can heal. We made sure of it."

Questions. "Why did you take me?"

"Because, like I said, we always attack first. But, you, you'll listen. And, what my mate has to say will help your mate more than you know. More than I know."

Questions. "What is it?"

"The vampires. Many of them are forcibly and violently turning more and more humans every day. But, the torture doesn't stop there. They're starving them until they're feral, until they'll attack anything that breathes. Even themselves."

I was simply a huge ball of questions. "What does that mean?"

"A vampire is dangerous on its own, but a feral one is more than reckless. They don't make precise decisions, they don't think as much as a healthy vampire would, and they certainly don't feel remorse."

My chest tightened, and I had only just settled down. "You brought me to a vampire's lair! You brought me here, knowing that that's what they're doing to-to humans!"

In response to my frightened attitude, he edged closer towards me, letting out a whine like a little hurt puppy. "Emery, please, calm down! That's not what I did. I would never put you in harm's way. My mate is not like that. Nothing like that. It's a powerful master that is doing all this damage, one of the first vampires ever made, this is all her doing! She's the leader. But, she's gaining more power with each day that passes and soon she'll be more powerful than all the other masters combined. There's only three of them left. She'll destroy everything. This war would be endless, just like the first one, but there would be no hiding it."

I connected the dots right away, looking away from Johnny to stare at my tightly entwined hands and to imagine the horrors that could come if she wasn't stopped before it became too late. The pain. The separation. The death. "The effects would be out for everyone to succumb to."

"Precisely. And, despite the general consensus that Master Kovina and her followers support, not every vampire is disgustingly monstrous." The slight hiss for an accent came from the other side of the room, in a darkened hallway where a tall, slim figure stepped through, and revealed the man behind the brand new voice.

💕