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CHAPTER 1

brIAR

I ’ve been trapped in complete and utter darkness for what feels like an eternity, and I feel like I’m wading through the sticky tar surrounding me, trying to smother me. There’s a faint light in the distance, but it keeps moving away, and no matter how far I trudge, I don’t make any progress. Until, suddenly, the light explodes and swallows me whole.

Hurtling through space, I slam onto a solid surface hard enough to knock the breath out of me. Whereas everything was still and silent, I’m now bombarded with sound. The humming of an air conditioner, a steady beeping that’s speeding up, and a rhythmic tapping all sound like the volume is cranked up to ten after so long without any sound.

Even with my eyelids closed, the white light is blinding. I have the urge to throw my arm over my eyes to block out the light, but I can’t get it to move for some reason. Turning my head to look at my arm takes so much effort that I consider giving up and sinking back into the inky darkness.

But I’m not a quitter.

Gathering the little energy I have, I force my eyes open. Squinting against the blinding light, I move my gaze around the room, expecting to see the Wyldhart mansion or Saint’s house. Instead, all I can see is a sea of white. Sterile ceiling tiles, harsh cinder block walls, and plain white light fixtures make the room look like a hospital.

I rack my brain as I try to figure out where I am and how I got here. It only takes a moment for everything with the Knights to come flooding back in.

The last thing I remember is forcing my mates to go through a portal. After that, I can’t recall anything, which so doesn’t bode well for my current situation. My heart starts beating harder as I panic, wondering what the Knights are planning to do with me. The beeping sound picks up with my heart rate.

Turning my head to find the source of the noise, I’m startled to come face-to-face with a guy who looks around my age. He has floppy brown hair and a boyish face. His guarded dark brown eyes stare at me with curiosity. His tanned skin hints at long summer days in the sun, and his full lips are tilted up in amusement as he watches me. “Ah, you’re finally awake.”

“Who are you?” I croak, my parched throat making it difficult to talk. Feeling vulnerable lying down, I struggle to get up. As I’m adjusting to consciousness, it’s getting easier to move. But all my muscles are weak and sore, so it takes me longer than it should to shove into a sitting position. When I’m upright, I lean my back against the cold cinder block wall, exhausted from the small effort.

Looking around the room, I’m unsurprised to find it’s a barren white cell. The floors are dingy white tile, and three walls are matching cinder block with peeling paint. The fourth wall faces out into a hallway with plexiglass windows two thirds of the way down. Peering out, I don’t see much other than the same materials seeming to stretch on forever in the corridor.

“Anson. Who are you?” His voice jerks me from my perusal of the hallway. Glancing over, I see him wincing in sympathy as he watches me from his plain cot.

I’m sitting on a similar faded-gray cot. The only other furniture here is the machine showing my heart rate that I’m currently hooked up to. I glare at it before ripping off the pulse monitor on my index finger. The machine doesn’t start screaming when it can’t detect a pulse. It just lets out a sad chirp before seeming to power down.

“Briar,” I whisper, longing and grief and regret choking my words. Waking up disoriented and feeling like I got run over by a parade of Mack trucks, all I want is to be in my mates’ arms. But I’m not. I made my choice, and I have to live with it, however long that may be.

I grit my teeth as I lock that unhelpful thought in a box in my mind. I refuse to let the Knights win. There’s no way I’m just going to roll over and accept I’ll never see my mates again. I’m going to do everything I can to get out of here. First, though, I need to regain my strength.

“How’d you end up here?” Anson asks gently, his face softens as he watches the emotions play out across my expression. He rearranges himself on his bare cot so he’s sitting cross-legged facing me. His drab gray scrubs rustle as he moves.

Glancing down at myself, I see that I’m in the same outfit. I swallow hard as I try not to think about a random Knight changing me. Leaning my head against the hard wall, I close my eyes briefly. Later, when I’m alone, I’ll think about everything they could’ve done to me while I was unconscious. Now, though, isn’t the time.

I sluggishly open my eyes, realizing I didn’t answer his question. “It’s a long story,” I rasp, not trusting the random stranger even slightly. For all I know, he could be working for the Knights. “What about you?”

He gives me a half smile. “I was going to a human college. I wanted to see what the world outside of my small pack is like. Things were pretty calm until my junior year. The Knights started attacking packs near my college, but I never thought they’d go after me. On a typical Friday night, I was out with my friends, and I was ambushed. My human friends were wounded, and I haven’t seen my two shifter buddies since I was taken. I’m sure my family is worried sick about me. I just wish I could see them one more time.” Anson’s voice breaks, and he looks away from me.

“I’m sorry.” My heart hurts from the pain in his voice. While I still don’t trust him, I no longer think he’s working with the Knights. Unlike me, he’s just a shifter who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. With how hard the Knights were hunting me, there wasn’t a place or time I would’ve been safe.

“Me too,” he whispers.

We sit in silence for a few minutes, each of us lost in our own thoughts of everyone we left behind. My eyes burn with unshed tears as I think about how devastated my mates were when I forced them to go through the portal. I don’t know if they’ll ever forgive me for taking their choice away, and I don’t blame them.

After letting the silence stretch for a moment, I eventually ask, “How long have you been here?”

He tilts his head as he thinks. “I’m not sure. Time passes differently in here. I’d guess about a year.”

My eyebrows jump up in surprise. That’s a hell of a long time to be here. Anson doesn’t look like he’s on death’s door. He’s slim and his face is a little gaunt, but he doesn’t look super malnourished. I also can’t see any scars, but his scrubs cover everything aside from his arms, hands, neck, and face. For all the evil the Knights do, I would’ve thought they’d treat their prisoners worse.

But I guess looking okay doesn’t mean Anson’s been treated well. Patrick always made sure I looked fine after beatings before he let me leave the house. I know as well as anyone that it’s easy to hurt people without leaving many telltale signs, especially shifters with how quick we heal.

“Do you know how long I’ve been here?” My voice is getting stronger the more I talk. Although, my throat still aches like I drank liquid sandpaper.

“I don’t know. You were brought in just a few hours ago, but I don’t know how long they were processing you for.” Anson shoots me an apologetic smile, which I return with a tentative one of my own.

Frowning, I wonder exactly what this facility is for. “What is it that they do here?”

Anson presses his lips into a thin line and looks away. He’s silent for so long that I think he won’t answer. “Experiments mostly. Some torture if guard morale is low. Occasional executions if we get too unruly.” His voice is monotone as he lists off the options, but his eyes are haunted as he meets my gaze.

Lovely.

Experiments, torture, and executions, oh my.

I try to ignore the way my heart jackhammers in my chest as I think about what exactly these “experiments” consist of. I’m guessing that’s where I’ll spend most of my time, since they need me to figure out how to expand the curse from just female wolves to all shifters.

The Knights are in for a rude awakening if they expect me to willingly help them destroy shifters. I doubt there’s anything they can do to me that Patrick hasn’t already done. My mates, sister, and family are all safe away from here, so they have zero leverage over me. Along with that, the Knights also don’t know that I have magic. I don’t know how my fledgling magic will really help anything, especially since it refuses to listen to me, but it’s better than nothing.

I open my mouth to ask more about the experiments, but then I hear pounding footsteps in the hall and panicked shouts surrounding us. Anson swears under his breath and turns to me. “Those are the guards. They take someone to the lab each time they come down here. They should leave you alone since you just got here.”

I blow out a sigh of relief. It’s short-lived as two guards in the typical Knights of Aeneas black tactical armor with a spartan skirt stop in front of our cell. One of the guards is lean and tall, and the other is short and stocky. Both of them have cruel smiles on their faces as they stare me down.

The tall one fishes a key from his pocket and unlocks the door. Its hinges squeal in protest as he pulls it open. Instead of coming inside, the tall one stands outside while the short guard enters the cell. He points one meaty finger at me. “You,” he barks. “Come with me.”

My eyes are wide as I glance at Anson. I thought they were going to leave me alone since I just arrived here. I’m in no shape to go toe to toe with any of the Knights. I feel so weak and out of sorts that I’m struggling to access my magic or my wolf.

Maybe if I just stay quiet, they’ll forget about me?

Anson hops up from his cot and steps between the guard and me. “She just got here! You can’t take her yet. She’s not at full strength. I’ll go in her place,” he pleads. All he gets for his trouble is the short guard backhanding him. Anson’s lip splits and sprays blood onto the wall, the red standing out starkly against the faded white.

The short guard pulls back his arm to hit Anson again. “I’ll go!” I interject before the guard can strike him again. My muscles shake as I push myself to my feet, and my steps wobble as I walk the short distance to the guard. He roughly grips my upper arm hard enough to bruise and hauls me out of the room. The last thing I see before the guard blocks my view is Anson’s terrified eyes watching me.