Page 8 of Wolf Caged (Bound to the Shadow King #1)

SAPHIRA

P ain was the first thing I was aware of as the world slowly dawned on me again, the darkness receding in my mind but not in my heart. My wolf side bayed mournfully and instincts pulled at me to return to my fated mate, neither understanding that he had rejected me.

Not like the human part of me could.

The rage burning within that side of me didn’t stop the pain from tearing into my soul, shredding it to pieces, or the crushing sorrow from threatening to devour me whole. I wallowed in it, drifting in the lightening night that enshrouded me, not ready to return to the world yet.

I wanted to remain here, far away from it all.

Far away from reality.

Nothing good awaited me on the other side of this soft darkness I clung to, too afraid to let it go and break to the surface. I wanted to stay here forever, where the pain was muted, because I knew when I woke, it would get worse.

So much worse.

I pined for the bastard who had crushed my heart and soul, and then sold me.

I fucking pined for him.

And it sickened me, angered me so much that the black smoke around me became tinged with crimson, with the colour of my rage as my instincts did a one-eighty, flipping around to despising Lucas as he deserved and making him want to pay.

I wanted him to suffer just as he had sentenced me to suffer.

I wanted to watch him beg and break as I had in that cage.

I had been so stupid. So blind.

The potential mate-bond had made me weak to Lucas and I had fallen in love with him, and all he’d had to do was smile and tell me I was beautiful and pay attention to me. It had all been an act.

He had only been acting how people had thought he should—his parents, our packs, the world.

He had been pretending and I hadn’t seen it.

I had been blind to the truth, so eager to believe he meant every look and every word.

So eager to have my fated mate and that foolish dream of a perfect future with him.

Through the endless night, I smelled a faint hint of storm, like snow or windswept mountains.

It transported me back to the cage, and for a moment, I thought I was back there, under that spotlight, exposed and vulnerable.

I knew that scent.

It had been there, muddled among the others, had caught my attention the second I had smelled it and I had tried to pinpoint who it was coming from, but then the auction had begun and it had all been a blur of terror and despair, and rage. So much rage.

I had never felt anything like it.

If someone had opened my cage, I would have launched from it to kill every person in that room.

And that shook me still.

It wasn’t like me to want to harm anyone. In that moment, it had felt as if someone else had been inside me, in control, a person I didn’t recognise. A person who had craved violence and bloodshed, and wouldn’t have felt an ounce of regret in the aftermath.

I wasn’t that person.

I wasn’t.

I curled into myself, slowly realising that I was on my side on a scratchy surface, and things were jabbing at my bare flesh. Things that itched and pushed that comforting darkness further away from me, pulling me up towards the world I didn’t want to face.

Together with distant voices.

I tugged the blanket over my shoulders, warding off the chill, and huddled into it, hoping I might disappear and whoever was coming wouldn’t see me.

Anger at Lucas morphed into anger at myself.

I was stronger than this. If I had to face my owner , I would face him knowing where I was and all possible escape routes.

I cracked my gritty eyes open and a growl almost burst from my lips as fur rippled over my bare skin.

A cage.

I was in another cage.

I sat up, the swift action jarring and making my head spin. When my vision settled, I quickly scanned my new surroundings. Not quite a cage.

It was a prison cell.

Or maybe it was more of a dungeon.

Damp dark stone made up the wall behind me and pillars between the cells, together with the wall beyond the thick metal bars ahead of me.

To my left and right, more bars divided the room into more cells.

The one to my right seemed to veer around a corner in an L shape and was larger than mine, with another solid wall on the other side of it rather than bars.

Torches flickered and guttered on the wall of the corridor, the only source of light.

The bed beneath me was nothing more than a sack of hay.

Not quite the bed I had expected to find myself chained to upon waking.

I glanced at the cage again.

Maybe my owner was into darker things than I had imagined and this was some sort of twisted sex dungeon.

I pushed away from that thought, because I was already scared enough without throwing dark fantasies into my panicked mind. Instead of letting fear get the better of me, I studied the barred door, seeking a possible way to escape.

Not that I knew what I was looking for.

I didn’t have much experience with cages and cells, or things beyond lighting campfires and healing and taking care of others.

That deep pining returned, but not for my bastard mate this time. My family. My pack. Did they know what had happened to me or was Lucas lying to them too, telling them I was devoted to my new pack and no longer wanted to see them?

Gods, the thought of my parents thinking I didn’t want to see them again had a heavy weight settling on my chest as my eyes burned.

I needed to contact them, warn them somehow, because my fear also returned, and this time it took the shape of Lucas doing something to them, planning something for my pack.

He might have lied to my face about his feelings, but he had never concealed his feelings about my pack.

He had told me once that I was the only reason the Hunt pack didn’t slaughter my own. That I was their saving grace.

But now he had sold me into servitude.

Where did that leave my pack?

My throat closed at the thought they might be in danger, panic lighting my veins and urging me to take action, to do something.

What?

What could I do?

I didn’t even know where I was, and I doubted my new owner was going to let me go, even if I asked nicely. They had plans for me too.

That panic threatened to turn into all-out fear and a meltdown of epic proportions, so I closed my eyes and drew down a deep breath, holding it for five seconds before slowly releasing it, trying to calm my shredded nerves. In. Out. Slow breaths. Calming breaths.

Harder than I imagined when voices travelled towards me, my sensitive ears picking up two sets of footsteps—one heavy and one lighter. A male and a female.

Not wanting them to know I was awake and sure I would be more vulnerable if they knew I was, I rolled onto my side on the scratchy hay bed, putting my back to the corridor, and did my best attempt at looking as if I was still unconscious, remaining perfectly still as the two sets of steps grew louder.

Controlling my heart was far harder than controlling my body as they stopped and I sensed their presence behind me, on the other side of the bars.

I willed it to slow, to remain steady, trembling a little as I waited, unsure what was about to happen.

Wolves weren’t the only species with heightened hearing and I wasn’t sure what kind of male had bought me.

I hadn’t been able to make him out at all during the auction.

“What have you done?” The female sounded not angry, or disgusted, but perhaps disappointed.

“What was necessary.” That male voice was sword-sharp, cutting the thick, tense air, as commanding as I remembered it.

My new owner.

The female huffed and I felt her gaze on me, the weight of it heavy and immutable, before carefully chosen words reached my ears. “He will not forgive you for this.”

Who? I almost said that aloud. Who wouldn’t forgive this male for purchasing me?

“He will understand.” Such confidence from the male.

The female didn’t sound so sure, her tone taking on a hard edge as she bit out, “How convenient that he departed on business for you just yesterday and will not return for some time.”

A smirk in the man’s voice. “Yes, it was rather.”

“You cannot leave her in that cell. It is not right. None of this is right. Are you sure this is necessary?” Whoever this female was, I already liked her. This male clearly outranked her, might even be her master, but she stood up to him, and was standing up for me, a stranger.

Maybe this all wouldn’t be as terrible as I thought it would be.

For the first time since Lucas had drugged and rejected me, I felt a small kernel of hope take root in my heart.

This female sounded as if she was against whatever this male planned for me, and perhaps I could turn her into an ally, one that might keep me safe from him.

But hope could be a dangerous beast.

One I might be better off killing now in case it only savaged me later.

“It is necessary.” His tone could have cut iron and stone. It was as hard and unyielding as both, his words almost a silent order to the female to let it go as he added, “Everything I do is necessary, or did you forget that?”

Tension simmered between them and I wanted to burrow deeper into the velvet blanket.

Anger radiated from the female, and I swore she wanted to snap at him, that she wanted to fight him, but then she calmly said in a resigned tone, “At least do not treat her like an enemy. She does not belong in a cell.”

No response.

She sighed, as gentle as a summer breeze, and her voice softened further.

“This is wrong.” Those words were met with silence that felt tighter—thicker— heavier . “Is she human?”

“No.” His voice had grown colder, deeper, and more commanding. Sharper than a blade. Although I wasn’t sure how that was possible.

“Return her to her world.”

I braced, sure the female had pushed too far by issuing an order to this male and he would put her in her place, as a wolf male in a position of power would have.