Page 106 of Mated By Twilight

It seemed to go on forever, though, realistically, she knew it had only been a few seconds before Biella finally stopped. Breathing hard like she’d just run a marathon. Leah’s entire face throbbed as she felt something trickling down her cheek – she genuinely didn't know if it was blood or tears. It could have been both.

Biella ran a hand through her hair that was even wilder now, half fallen in front of her face.

“Yes. Yes. YES!” She cackled merrily. “That’s what you deserve, you human slut! For daring to touchmymates!”

Though the pain was making her shake, Leah couldn’t help but glare at the declaration. They certainlywere notBiella’s mates.

The silent contradiction didn't go unnoticed.

Biella grabbed her by the hair, jerking her head up to snarl at her face to face.

“They aremine!I warned you! You didn'tlisten!”

She slammed Leah’s head down onto the tile floor. The thud and crack made stars burst in her vision as she groaned, nauseated by pain. Luckily, that didn't seem so amusing as the slapping because she only did it once.

“You understand? You understand?!” Biella hissed, lowering her head right over hers, looking at her closely, directly in one eye. “They’remine!Get it!”

Leah nodded. Because that seemed smarter than arguing with a crazy stalker.

But Biella yelled at her. “Why do you do this?! What’s this mean, eh!?”

She grabbed her hair and jerked her head up and down. Forcing her into performing a painful mimicry of nodding.

“What is this?!” She yelled again.

It was hard to think. Her ears were ringing, her head was throbbing, her cheeks were burning. But she realized, a bit slowly, that Biella didn’t know what nodding meant. Her mates had taken the time to read the human info packet that came with her as part of their mating. She’d never needed to explain what nodding or head shaking meant. And the information quickly spread through the troupe, and she’d never questioned them knowing it as well.

But Biella didn’t know, and Leah couldn’t tell her.

Apparently, though, she didn’t have to actually explain. Biella didn’t want an answer. She dropped Leah’s head, and she just barely stopped herself from hitting the ground again.

“It’s fine. This is fine. It’s all fine,” Biella muttered, standing and moving to the door.

Squinting against the pain, Leah rolled onto her side. It looked like Biella had dropped a bunch of stuff when she came inside.

She had stashed Leah under the bed, she realized. Like she was hiding contraband she didn’t want others to find, she’d tucked her away so she could go get…

Whatdidshe get?

The lump of fabric unrolled, sending a few items rolling around. Shiny, metallic. Biella was panting as she picked up a knife and a fork.

Oh. She’d raided the kitchen. That was a plate, stained with food. There was some random cutlery. A clean, folded napkin. What appeared to be a root vegetable of some kind. She looked like she’d just grabbed whatever she could and stashed it in a towel.

“Yes. This.This!”

Biella was panting, laughing as she turned, squeezing the knife too close to the blade, causing it to cut into the side of her finger. But she seemed completely unaware of the brownish-red blood welling up and dropping down her scales. Was that what avanava blood looked like? Leah had never seen her mates bleed before.

And she had to be knocked silly, because that shouldn’t be her focus when this obviously crazy woman was walking towards her with the knife.

“I have to,” Biella was muttering to herself. “Have to… have to… they’re mine… save them… slut… humanslut!I’ll save… mine…”

Why did this moment feel so… familiar…

Leah’s eyes moved past Biella to the window of the room. The curtains were partially open, and from here, Leah could see the silvery blue, artificial sky of the station. It didn’t look like Earth’s sky; it wasn’t blue enough for that. She was also very aware that it was artificial, and as good as it looked, her eyes weren’t deceived into thinking it wasn’t.

That was a ceiling disguised as the sky.

Yet, somehow, it looked remarkably like the blue sky outside of the open doors of a church. The bindings on her arms felt just like the wedding dress she hadn’t chosen. And the end of her life was approaching her, gleaming in the artificial lights overhead.

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