"Sinclair," Cain called, "Take these things and throw them into the Hallow,"
Theo’s head snapped up.
Liam stiffened, and for the first ti since he removed the mask, sothing fractured in his composure. His jaw tightened, his fingers curling slightly at his sides. A mont later, his expression was unreadable again.
"Yes, Alpha," He bowed.
Theo watched him move.
"Don’t you dare touch them!" She spat at him, but he didn’t listen. She tried to move, but the person holding her down didn’t relent.
She turned around and Eric stood there.
"Let go!"
"Stay down, Teddy. Or Cain will run out of rcy," He said.
Run out of rcy? She looked around the courtyard and the school as a whole. What rcy did he have in the first place?!
"I said let go!"
But he refused. She watched as Liam approached the remains, bent down and lifted what was left of Sylas and Zeke without a word.
Her chest felt hollow. As if sothing essential had been ripped out and burned alongside them.
Liam didn’t look at her as he turned away.
He vanished into the trees, carrying the proof that Cain never lied when he said he owned everything.
"I’m sorry, Teddy," Eric whispered this ti, but his voice sounded distant. Why was he even apologising in the first place?! Every one of them was gonna get what’s coming to them.
She would never forget everything that happened tonight.
Ever.
Zeke and Sylas’s death would not be in vain. She would make sure they all pay. Especially Cain.
But where was she supposed to start from? Even with her wolf strength, she wouldn’t hold a candle to Cain if she fought him.
Cain felt her gaze on him, and he started to co close. Quickly, Eric slipped away, leaving her sitting on the bare floor, still glaring at the man who had just taken everything away from her. Cain ca close enough that she could sll the smoke of their burning bodies still clinging to him.
Close enough that any form of escape—physical or emotional—no longer existed.
He looked down at her, not cruelly.
Almost... gently.
"I know exactly what you’re thinking, My runaway," He began, " You think this pain is why you’ll destroy ," he said calmly. "But this pain right here is why you’ll belong to ,"
She glared even harder.
"You loved them," he continued, his voice low and unhurried. "And I took them. Not because I needed to, but because I could. Because nothing you love survives unless I allow it,"
She shook her head violently, "I’ll kill you," she whispered. "I swear..."
A certain smile spread over his lips, "You won’t," he said, "You’ll stay alive for revenge, and you’ll marry for power. You’ll breathe every day because anger demands it," He leaned down slightly, eyes boring into hers, "And one day," he added softly, "You’ll wake up and realise you’ve gone an entire hour without thinking of them,"
Her chest seized.
"That," Cain finished, "Is when you’ll finally understand what I took from you. That, is when you’ll finally regret the day you ever thought you could run away from ,"
She listened to him, and when he was done, she didn’t scream.
That was the strangest part.
The words had hit her hard, and instead of breaking outward, everything inside her folded in on itself.
She sucked in a breath that didn’t feel like air, and fingers curled weakly into the dirt as her body finally realised what her mind had been refusing to accept. The bond was gone.
Two vast presences that had once existed just beyond her heartbeat were no longer there. .
Zeke’s warmth was gone.
Sylas’s cold was gone.
There was just this...endless emptiness.
Her lips parted, and a small, broken, and ripped sound ca out. It wasn’t a cry. It wasn’t even a sob. It was the noise soone makes when they reach for sothing that has always been there and find only emptiness.
Theo bent forward sharply, arms wrapping around herself as if she could physically hold her soul together from shattering even further.
Her forehead touched the ground, and her breath ca in jagged gasps that burned her throat. Her body shook, but her eyes stayed dry just wide and glassy as she stared at the scorched stone they had burned a whole ago.
They’re gone.
The thought didn’t feel real. It felt like a lie her mind kept repeating, waiting for the world to correct it.
Zeke should have been here, slamming cursed and arguing with Sylas. Sylas should have been here, silent, calm and observant. Soone should have told her this was a nightmare, that she’d wake up and find Zeke lying next to her.
Nothing happened.
Her fingers dug into the ground harder, not caring if her nails split.
"They’re gone...," It sounded bitter. So bitter.
Theo’s shoulders began to tremble harder, and this ti the sound that tore out of her was unmistakably raw and broken. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to exist. Every inhale scraped like glass, and every exhale ca out fractured and wet.
"I—I should’ve—" Her voice collapsed in on itself, "I should’ve—"
There was no end to the sentence.
There was no version of reality where the words mattered anymore.
Her head dropped fully to the ground, cheek pressed against cold stone still warm from fire, and she cried with a grief so deep it felt ancient. Like sothing older than her body, older than her na, was mourning through her.
She cried for their loyalty, their strength, their undying love for her, and for the way they had stood between her and death without hesitation.
She cried for the future that had died with them.
Her hands curled into fists, her trembling violently. Then for one brief, terrifying mont, her grief hollowed her out so completely she thought she might simply... stop.
That she might stop breathing, caring or even existing.
Then, anger flickered. It was small and ugly, but it was definitely burning.
It crawled out from beneath the grief and wrapped itself around the emptiness in her chest, refusing to let it consu her whole.
And then, her sobs lessened and her breath steadied a little.
She lifted her head from the floor, her eyes red and swollen, but there was sothing new there now. Sothing dark, sothing dangerous, sothing oddly calm.
Deep in her shattered core, she made a vow in them, and the resolve she made it with was absolute.
I will rember this pain.
I will live with it.
And I will make you feel every piece of it before I die.
Her body remained on the ground, but sothing inside her stood up.
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