CHAPTER TWO

My heart is breaking as I sit on the back of Romulus' horse and we ride through the forest. I miss my pack already, so much.

I hold onto him and hate every moment of it.

"You will learn to love me," he says. "And if you don't, I don't care."

"I will never love you," I reply.

"You will learn," he says.

I will never love him, but I will learn to do what he says.

I will learn to be who he wants me to be.

I will learn to be like him.

For now.

Until I can figure out how to survive.

But deep down, I know I can’t.

I'll never learn.

"I won’t let you do anything bad to me."

He grins.

"Try anything and I’ll kill you and then I'll take another one of your pack mates."

The thought horrifies me.

"I volunteered to come with you, and you promised to keep my pack safe."

He laughs.

He suddenly changes.

He suddenly looks like the devil himself.

That's when I knew: I wasn’t going to come back alive.

"Maybe I will and maybe I won’t," Romulus says to me, "If I choose, your pack will be destroyed anyway. That is, if you do not learn. That is, if you do not change. That is, if you do not listen."

I am horrified. He has tricked me. His word is worth nothing.

“You lied,” I say, crestfallen.

He laughs, a cruel sound.

“Of course I did,” he says.

"There is no escaping," he says. "You must learn to love it."

I listen to him.

"If you try to escape," he says, "I'll kill you. And if that doesn't work, I'll kill one of your friends. And if that still doesn't work, I'll kill your family, I'll go to their den and I'll slaughter them all. "

I listen to him.

"You will live with me. And you will be mine."

I shiver.

I am not sure what he means by that word.

"We will be together. You will be my mate."

And then, out loud, I say it:

"I can't believe I'm with you."

But I am.

I am with him.

I am going to be with him forever.

Romulus laughs.

I bite my tongue and don't say anything. But I know I must find some way out of this.

I have to.

I can't live like this.

And if I can't, then I will have no choice.

I will have to end it all.

We reach a lake, covered in mist and the horse slows.

"Can I get down?" I ask.

He looks at me suspiciously.

"You better not try to run," he says.

I nod.

But that is exactly what I am thinking of doing.

I get off of his horse.

I stand by the lake, staring out at the fog.

I wonder how far it goes.

I wonder how deep it goes.

I think of entering. Walking. Drowning.

But he holds me back.

"No," he says. "You are mine. "

I am not listening to him.

Maybe if I go to the water, to the lake, to the fog, I will disappear. I will go away to another place.

Maybe I will just disappear.

I stop thinking.

I close my eyes.

I just let myself go.

Romulus turns and heads back to his horse. He bends down to feed her.

And then I see my chance.

My chance to escape.

I run.

I run into the forest.

I run into the fog.

I run so hard I can barely breathe, my heart pounding in my ears.

"Get back here!" I hear him say.

But I don't listen.

I keep running.

Luckily, the fog is so thick that I can barely see my own two hands. Maybe, just maybe, that will help me escape.

"I'll kill you!" I hear him say.

I can hear him running, somewhere behind me, but the fog has confused him, too. His footsteps are erratic.

I can hear his growls of frustration.

It also sounds as if he is getting closer.

But I don't care.

I run.

I feel the air in my lungs.

I can feel my arms pumping through the air.

I spot a boulder and duck behind it, breathing hard.

I hear his footsteps race past, branches breaking, his cursing under his breath.

I breathe a huge sigh of relief.

I have lost him.

Then, suddenly, he appears. He grabs me with his strong hands.

My heart drops as I scream.

"You are mine!" he says.

I can’t help: I break down and cry.

He leads me back towards the horse.

“You will pay for that,” he says. “You must learn what it means to defy me.”

He is breathing hard, clenching my arm.

"Try that again, and I will kill you," he says.

He is too fast for me. I realize I am stuck. I have no choice.

There is no escape.

But as I am walking back, I see it.

A poisoned root.

It is sitting there, close to the lake.

If I can just grab it, take it with me, I can change everything.

He's a monster.

I know that now.

He's a monster and I have to escape from him.

I pretend to trip. I fall down, my hand close to the root.

I grab it. The poison. Just before he steps on my back.

"Why did you do that?" Romulus asks.

But I don't answer.

Instead, I hide the root in my pocket.

He drags me along and doesn’t see it.

My heart swells with joy.

Now, I have a choice.

I can escape. I can take this root and end it all.

I can choose to be free. I can choose not to live a life with him. Not to be a slave forever. To walk away from all that I know and love.

I made a mistake volunteering.

And now I need to make wrongs right.

I won't be his.

I won't live as his.

Soon, I will take the root.

I will end it all.

And I will be free.