Page 13 of Rhaz’s Redemption (Shifters of Valo Prime #6)

Rhaz

CW: Descriptions of DV, descriptions of violence

The journey to the valley is one full day past Axon’s cave.

It’s a long walk, but I wished it were longer.

I had no desire to return to this place.

My sire was a vile male, and many in his dekes followed in his footsteps in hating my shifter brothers and myself.

What did we ever do? We were born different and for that they’ve feared us and hated us. They-

I stopped dead in my tracks when I came upon a couple kissing in the woods. The male was Favalor, Drovo’s younger brother, but I couldn’t see who the female was. She had long white hair, but that’s all I could gather from this angle.

The way they held each other made my heart ache. I held Beatrice like that briefly when her lips met mine. It was heavenly. It was… everything.

I clenched my fists as I remembered how her body felt against mine.

She was soft and warm and…I couldn’t keep thinking about her like this.

She filled my every thought and she wasn’t even here.

If I had my way, she’d never be here. She’d never step foot in the valley.

There were dangerous creatures that lived in the forest, but none were as dangerous as Dameron and his hunters.

They had threatened our peace and happiness.

They’d even gone as far as kidnapping Taylor from Brexl.

And now I was here in hopes I’d help my sire see reason.

I pulled the leaf star she’d given me from my pack and traced the human word she’d written on it.

Protection . She’d given me a gift and I’d given her a broken heart.

You will regret the words you just spoke to me , she vowed, and she was right.

I did regret them, and I would for the rest of my days, but I wouldn’t change what I’d done.

She couldn’t be bound to a male like me, not now, not ever.

I placed the leaf star in my pocket and held my head up high as I walked through the forest to the valley.

I skirted past the kissing couple, and approached the walkway that traced a path between all the houses. People stopped what they were doing as I stepped out from behind the trees and into the light.

Drovo’s sire, along with Brexl’s grandfather, stood motionless as they took in my form.

I did not wait for their invitation as I continued to walk down the path to the Savrix’s house, my old home.

It was easy to pick out from the rest. Dameron had the biggest house in the village.

He always had to have the best. He used to say it was for my mother, but I knew the truth.

He wanted the biggest house because he felt he was owed that much.

More people came out to stare as I walked the path home.

I didn’t look at them, or turn my head. I kept my eyes forward toward my dreaded goal.

The dirt path barely made a sound as I trudged onward.

It didn’t take long before I found myself standing at the door.

It was large like the house and dark like my sire. Turning the knob, I stepped inside.

The lit fireplace illuminated the room. I’d expected it to look different from when I was a child, but my sire had kept it the same.

The same wooden table that had a moon etched in the center sat to the right side of the fire place and multiple chairs and cushions sat to the left.

The floor was covered in furs from the rarest of animals in the valley, a testament to Dameron’s ego.

My sire was sitting in a chair facing the fire when he heard me come in and turned to me with a smile on his face.

Everything about this place had been exactly as I’d left it, familiar in an almost creepy way.

But the manner in which my sire smiled at me wasn’t familiar at all.

It stopped me in my tracks and made me want to run.

Never once, had he been happy to see me.

Even as a sietling, he’d greet me with a scowl. Something was off.

“It’s about time.” His smile widened with pleasure as if I’d been a gift delivered to his doorstep.

“Time for what?” I questioned.

Dameron got up from his seat and slowly stalked toward me with his unnerving smile still on his face. “You know I’d always thought you were the most powerful one,” he began again.

“Most powerful what?” Had he gone mad? Was his mind truly gone?

“Shifter, of course.” His answer was unbothered as if we spoke about the shifting ability of my dekes everyday.

I shook my head. It was a well-know fact, even among the dekes here in the valley, that Brexl was the fiercest of us all. No one could take him down in his shifter form.

“Look, I’m here to talk to you about the upcoming offering,” I cut in before Dameron could spew any more of his nonsense.

“I’ve already got plans for the offering,” my sire smiled. “And I’m afraid they can’t be changed.”

Something was wrong here. Very, very wrong. I’d always feared my father. I’d seen first-hand what he was capable of from beating my mother to cutting out the tongue of young Jax. But as a shifter I’d always known that he could hurt me, but never kill me. No one could.

I shifted into my badger form as my sire continued to approach me with that strange grin on his face, as if he’d already won a battle that hadn’t even been fought yet.

“It turns out there is another as fierce as Brexl and nearly as unkillable as you,” he continued. “Did they ever figure it out? What your true gift is? The fact that you can’t be killed?”

I took a step back. He’d seen me die before. He knew the truth, but he’d never spoken of it.

“I think we should put that ability to the test.”

The door swung open behind him and all of Dameron’s minions poured in. Scaron was in the front of the line and ready to do his Savrix’s bidding.

“Tie him up and take him to the northern edge of the valley,” my sire commanded.

They did as he asked and tied my wrists behind me and bound my ankles in tight ropes. I could have fought against them, but despite the sickening feeling in my gut, I wanted to see what Dameron was up to.

Scaron and two others carried me to the forested edge of the village and kept walking until we were surrounded by nothing but a thick layer of trees.

A strong wind blew through the trees and with it came a new scent.

There was a large male nearby, one I’d never smelled before.

He wasn’t fully sirret. There was something animalistic about him.

Something that set my instincts on edge.

“That’s far enough,” Dameron stopped ahead of us. “Tie the ropes around this stake to ensure he doesn’t go anywhere.” He handed them a large wooden stake and they made quick work of following his command.

When he was satisfied he gave them a nod of approval. “Leave us.”

“But what if he breaks free?” Scaron asked.

“He won’t,” Dameron’s sly smile came back and it made my stomach turn. He had something planned, something sinister.

Scaron didn’t move and my sire’s smile faltered. “I said leave!”

Everyone flinched and took a step back. “My apologies,” Scaron bowed. “We’ll leave now.”

The hunters followed Scaron out of the forest and back into the valley. I tested the strength of the ropes that I’d been bound with and found them to be strong. Too strong for me to break out of even in my shifted form.

“Why did you bring me out here? What is the meaning of all this?” I asked as I struggled against the ropes again. “Is your goal to see me starve? Do you wish to watch me die over and over again?”

“You know son, not everything is about you.” Dameron purred as he stepped behind me out of view.

“You are a tool,” he began again. “One that I plan to use and discard.”

“I’d never do your bidding,” I growled.

My sire let out a long suffering sigh and was silent for a long moment. “Why do you resist me?”

“Because if I don’t I’ll end up being just like you,” I confessed.

“Ha!” Dameron barked out a laugh. “Well let me be the first to tell you how much you’ve failed. You’re so much like me I can’t stand to look at you.”

He leaned in close to my ear as if he were ashamed of the secret he was about to reveal and whispered. “Why do you think I hate you so much?”

His words made me flinch. I don’t know what I’d expected but it wasn’t his hatred stemming from the fact that he saw himself in me.

“You hate yourself.” It wasn’t a question. It was a fact.

“Of course I hate myself,” he seethed. “And you’re just like me so I hate you too.”

“I-” I wanted to deny his words but I couldn’t. Hadn’t I given the same speech to Beatrice? I was like my father which is what made me unworthy of her love.

“That’s right,” Dameron said in a soothing tone. “That rage you feel inside you. That hot anger that never seems to leave. You got that from me.”

“At least I can control my anger,” I shot back, surprised by my own words. It was as if a chip in the walls I’d built around myself had suddenly fallen.

“Have you taken a mate yet?” he asked. “Have one of the humans you’ve been hiding glowed for you?”

I remained silent. My head was too filled with contradictions at the moment to speak.

I’d fought my whole life to not be like my father, but now that I was here standing toe to toe with the male, I couldn’t see any of myself in him.

Even as he tried to convince me of our similarities, I failed to see the resemblance.

It was as if I’d been running from a ghost that suddenly vanished.

“Have you hit her yet? Have you felt that surge of power when she looks at you with fear in her eyes?”

“NO!” I growled. “I’d NEVER hit her!” And there it was, the truth I’d been running from all along.

This argument with my sire had me feeling like I was losing my mind. I was lost to a sudden fit of laughter as the irony of it all dawned on me.

He kicked me in my side which made my laughter and breathing come to a sudden halt.

“What’s so funny?”

I gave myself a moment to catch my breath before answering, and when Dameron lifted his foot to kick me again, I confessed, “It took me having an argument with you about how similar we are for me to realize I’m not like you at all.”

A new thought suddenly gripped me. I needed to get out of here.

I needed to get back to Beatrice and grovel before her, begging for her mercy.

The memory of her soft lips against mine rose to the surface and I longed to feel her pressed against me again.

I longed to bring her smiles instead of frowns.

I wanted to make her laugh. I wanted to make her moan.

I felt like a free male, suddenly unburdened by the fears of my heritage. I needed to get out of here now. I had no desire to see what Dameron had planned for me. The dekes needed to know that he had no interest in coming to a compromise. This entire thing had been doomed from the start.

“I’ve had enough of this. It’s time to put your immortality to the test,” Dameron grumbled.

“Come forth, my strong warrior!” my sire yelled, but since he was standing behind me, I couldn’t see who he was talking to.

The ground shook as the newcomer approached. His shadow loomed large over me, engulfing me twice over. I sniffed the air and recognized the scent from the strange male I’d smelled earlier. Who was he?

“You see this male?” My sire spoke, but his words weren’t directed at me. “He had a hand in killing your parents.”

“What?!” I interrupted. “I haven’t killed anyone!”

“You killed your own mother with the disease you brought with you,” Dameron snarled and all the venom he’d felt for me was clear in his voice. He truly believed I’d killed my mother simply by being a shifter.

“I had no hand in creating that disease! None of us did!”

“Silence!” He kicked me again, leaving me gasping for air.

“But how could he have killed my parents? He looks like he’s my age,” the new male’s voice was strong but cautious.

“Never underestimate him,” my father replied. “This male and all those in his dekes are capable of vile things. They were evil from birth. Even as children they were capable of killing innocent sirrets like your mother and sire.”

I wanted to shout that we’d never killed anyone but I was still struggling to breathe.

“It’s time for revenge,” Dameron continued. “Kill him and I’ll bring the rest to you as well.”

The other male said nothing. They both stood in silence hovering over me for what felt like an eternity when the ground shook again with the large male’s footsteps.

My world turned dark as his large body blocked out the sun. I looked up and up and up and saw before me a sirret shifter that was as tall as a tree, had four arms, strange round ears, and brown fur that went up his arms and down his back.

I’d heard rumors of a family who’d left shortly after their son was born, I had to guess that this was him. He looked slightly older than me, and he wore an agonized expression on his face.

“It doesn’t feel right,” the male shook his head. “Taking blood for blood.”

“Do you think they’ll stop with your parents? They have unmated females being held hostage in their mountain home. What do you think they’ll do to them when they refuse to mate?”

“We’d never do that,” I snarled.

“Don’t listen to him,” my father kicked me again.

“I’m going to get them to bring the females here so they can’t hurt them. But I’m going to need your help fighting them off.”

Dameron stepped in front of me with a snarl on his face and pointed. “Prove to me you can fight for what’s right. Prove to me you can keep those females they’re hiding safe. Kill this vile beast right here, right now.”

The big male turned his attention to me and scrunched up his face with an anger I knew all too well. He was so big that he didn’t need claws or a weapon to kill a person. All he needed were his fists.

“That’s right, Gil,” my sire encouraged. “Bring vengeance down upon him. Punish him for your parent’s death.”

Gil raised the fists of his top two arms above his head. Then brought them down upon my skull with shocking speed and force. The last thing I heard was the cracking of my own bones and then the world went dark.