Natalia’s P. O. V

I walked out of the holding room to meet Kaesha, Hailey and Tim leaning on the opposite wall, waiting for me with crossed arms and disturbed looks. Their faces screamed questions and concern but they only stared.

I couldn’t blame them.

My hands were coated in dried blood. There were some burnt stands of hair stuck to them and some of the blood had soaked into my clothes too. Plus, I probably still had a look of revelry in my eyes.

Thank goodness I’d dressed to get dirty.

Hailey was the first to break the silence, “How’d it go…?”

“She looks like a serial killer, I think it’s obvious how it went.” Kaesha quipped before I could speak.

I tried to reassure them with a smile, but that only served to give Hailey a look of horrified worry and make Kaesha’s already narrowed eyes judge me harder. Only Timothy’s expression remained largely unmoved.

“Is she…?” Hailey trailed off, unable to say the word.

“Dead? No, that would be too good for her.”

Kaesha looked at my hands then back at my face, “What’re you gonna do with her?”

“I’ll return her, of course.” I took my phone out of my pocket and checked the date, “There’s supposed to be a full moon tonight. I just need to see if the scar stays on her after shifting.”

“And if it doesn’t?” Hailey asked in a tone that said she really didn’t want to know the answer.

“Then I guess I’ll just have to do it again till it sticks.” I shrugged.

Hailey and Kaesha winced.

“Ari…” Hailey took a step towards me and took my hand, gingerly, tentatively, like she could barely bring herself to touch it, “I know I said I’d help, but I didn’t think you’d actually torture someone.”

My brows drew together and I looked at her, confused, “What did you think I was going to do?”

“Definitely not this!” She sputtered, looking at me like I was insane, “Kirstin gathered all that evidence! You even sent her to the Royals to report them. They’re gonna be arrested anyway, why are you doing all this?”

“Why am I doing all this?” I laughed, my shoulders shaking with the hilarity of it all.

Why was I doing all this?

Why did I breathe? Why did I eat? Why did my heart beat?

“Because I need to.”

She let go of my hand, rendered mute. Timothy stepped up to place his hands on her shoulders and Kaesha simply shook her head.

My skin started to prickle with rising heat.

Why were they looking at me like that?

“They did this to me for years!” My face felt hot, “What did you expect me to do? Rise above it? Be the bigger person?”

They said nothing, but their eyes said everything.

“Well, I won’t- I can’t.”

“I’m sure it’s cathartic for you,” Kaesha sighed, “and I won’t say I don’t understand. But I can’t let my magic be used like this.”

I scoffed, “Aren’t Witches all about keeping a balance? This is just their karma.”

“That may be so, but I just can’t. I’m sorry. I’ll still be your pack Witch and help out here, but I won’t be using my magic to facilitate things like this, Ava.” The judgement in her eyes was gone, and in its place was pity.

Overflowing, demeaning pity.

“Fine.” I sneered. I’d tried my best to keep her out of harm’s way, and hadn’t intended to take her with me to the Lightwood Pack in any case, “I wasn’t gonna ask you to come anyway so if this is what you choose, it changes nothing.”

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“Okay.”

I spun on my heel and left, stalking out of the dungeon and back to my office.

As I reached my office door, my phone rang with a call from Kirstin.

“Any news?”

“Yes, Alpha. The council finished their investigations and have come to a guilty verdict.”

My heart picked up, and I brought my other hand to steady my phone on my ear, “Have they decided what to do with them?”

“Yes. They’re going to the Lightwood Pack in three days to arrest Harry, Callum, Kylie and Brittany, along with the groupies that committed crimes with them. Then they’ll disband the pack. They also said that due to the nature, severity and longevity of the crimes, they’re not going to send them any notice of arrest, so they won’t be able to resist or evade capture.”

I was already behind my computer, my fingers flying over the keyboard as I formulated a message for the Alphas of the previously targeted packs and the Claw Moon Pack. I had three days to carry out my plan. Three days till their demise was taken out of my hands by the authorities.

“Um… Alpha?” Kirstin called in a small voice.

I paused, focusing my attention back on her.

She remained silent for a while, and I followed suit, not sure if I was going to like the words that hung in her throat.

“Showing mercy is out of the question, right…?” She said wobbling voice, an entirely redundant question.

My voice came out monotonous, unfeeling, and wholly uninterested in entertaining the topic she was trying to broach, “I believe you already know the answer to that, Kirstin.”

“Yes, Alpha.” She squeaked.

“Then why are you asking?”

“I-” She sniffled, “I’m sorry, Alpha.”

“Have you made your choice?”

“Yes, Alpha.” She hesitated, tremors and tears in her voice, “His tail… Take his tail as your pound of flesh.”

My cheeks felt tight as my lips widened in a twisted, sour smile, “Good.”

The call ended.

‘Nat…’ Candy called, full of apprehension.

‘Yes?’ Whatever she wanted to say, I knew I wasn’t going to like it.

‘I understand your anger, but don’t you think you should be a bit gentler with Kirstin?’

My anger?

Anger was such a small word. Anger was what you felt when someone shoved you on the street.

This was rage.

This was fury.

This was wrath.

This was every thread of my existence being radicalized for the sole purpose of raining down fire and brimstone.

She probably sensed my personal thoughts, cause she immediately backtracked, ‘It’s more than just anger, I know. You suffered and you want to make them suffer in return, and that’s completely justified. All I’m saying is that you shouldn’t let anyone else suffer. What Clark did to her was enough…’

My thoughts screeched to a halt and returned to that moment in my living room, listening to her story in horror before my fireplace. To listening to how she’d been unable to escape the singular nightmare I’d been saved from. To the way my body had flooded with heat and the fire had swelled in response.

She still hadn’t fully recovered.

I deflated, my head falling into my arms on the desk.

Candy remained silent, satisfied that her message had gotten across. She’d once told me that I needed to be better than them, to which I’d thought that I’d wanted to drag them to hell.

And I did, to the pits of it.

But as much as I wouldn’t let anyone get in my way, I had no intention of dragging anyone else there.

I called for Timothy, and within the next few minutes, he was at my door.

“Come in.”

“You called?’ He said as he stepped in.

His eyes went to my still red hands clasped on the table, then back to my face, his expression unchanged.

“Do you still want to slay the bastards right alongside me?” I said, invoking the words he’d said to me when he first joined us.

His face was pensive as he rolled the offer in his mind. Then he replied, “I need to see them fall with my own two eyes.”

I raised a brow, “You just want to see it? Are you telling me that you won’t want to do anything when you see the one responsible for everything terrible that ever happened to you? That you won’t want to strike Clark when you see him?”

“I don’t know for sure what actions I’ll want to take when I’m face to face with him.” He spoke frankly, “But I do know that fear drove my every action for years and I want to see the object of my fear be brought down.”

“What about everything they did to you? To the people from your old pack?”

He lowered himself into a seat, sighing, “I want them to pay for what they did, but now I know it doesn’t have to be me that delivers their punishment.”

I sat back in my seat, looking at him like he was some sea creature pulled out of the ocean; foreign and entirely alien to me, “What changed?”

He got a faraway look in his eyes, and his lips quirked in the softest of smiles, “I guess I’m just content now. Fear no longer controls me and I’m not saying any of the things that happened to me was necessary or justified, but I never would’ve met Hailey without it.”

I blinked at him.

“I know the desire for blood – the need to have their heads on a platter. Don’t get me wrong, I still have some of it in me too. So I understand everything you’re doing and I’ll continue with you till the end. But I don’t need it for myself as much as I used to.”

How could he be content with just watching them suffer?

How could he not want to be the one delivering the blow?

How could he be happy?

I sighed, “Okay… Well, if you want to watch, we’re leaving tomorrow morning. We should get there by evening.”

He nodded, “I’ll go pack my bags then.”