Page 52 of The Silent Mate

She blinked, confusion and horror crossing her features.What?

After it became clear that I wouldn’t die from my injuries, my father wanted me dead anyway.My chest felt tight. The scar on my neck burned and itched.He thought an alpha needed a working voice.

Aria’s eyes pooled with palpable pain and disbelief.How old were you?

She deserved the whole truth. She deserved to know the whole, morbid story. Taking a deep breath and mustering every last ounce of courage, I forced myself to relive the worst day of my life.

23

ARIA

My heart ceased beating as I waited for Malik to answer me.

He took one long, shaking breath, as if steeling himself against whatever horrors still haunted him from the past. I felt his pain and fear through our bond, as potent as thought it was my own. I’d give anything to take it away.

I was six when I lost my voice,he answered at last.

The breath caught in my throat.Six.He was six years old when he received the heinous injury that tore through his throat and cost him his voice.

My mother and I were outside. I was playing in the stream. She’d left Roman in the nursery to nap, otherwise he would’ve been there, too.He spoke slowly, every word burdened by the truth. I could scarcely breathe.My uncle—my father’s brother—had always wanted to be alpha. To do that, he had to kill not only my father, but my father’s heirs as well.

Dread curdled low in my belly as the reality of Malik’s wordsseeped over me. Hisuncle.His own flesh and blood did this to him?

The ruined skin at his throat shifted as his throat bobbed, and his gaze searched the ceiling above, refusing to meet mine.He decided to start with me and Roman. I guess he thought our deaths would weaken my father enough to make it easy to finish the job. He didn’t expect my mother to fight back so hard.

She saved my life,he continued, rasping the truth into our bond. The surface of his eye gleamed, and I rubbed the expanse of his bare chest in a pitiful attempt at comforting him.I tried to save her, too, but I was still too young to shift at will. That’s when my uncle got his claws into me.

I looked up at him, studying the scars like it was the first time I was trulyseeingthem. Malik received them from a pack member—afamilymember—who thought he had to kill a six year old child in order to rise through the ranks.

My stomach churned with sickness.

Now that I knew the truth, I saw the distinct ridges of claws marring the old wounds on his face. I saw where the flesh had been reattached and where it had been forced to regrow over time. Where two claws caught purchase on his throat and tore through the critical voice box.

“Your mother?” I whispered, my voice a hoarse husk of itself. I already knew the answer.

He shook his head.She was gone before help arrived, but she took my uncle with her.

I swallowed the lump in my throat.I’m so sorry.

Malik blinked, as if scattering the dark memories. When his eyes met mine again, they held a strange combination of grief and peace. I wondered how many times he’d shared this story with another person.

Throughout the conversation, the swelling at the base of his manhood diminished enough for me to slide off of him. I shiftedto the side, draping one leg over his hips while resting my ear on his chest, just above his heart.

What about your father?

He gave a deep sigh.He grieved my mother for several years. And when it became clear I wouldn’t heal, he renamed Roman as heir. It was for the good of the pack.

I physically recoiled at the insinuation. As if Malik’s lack of a voice somehow made himnotgood for pack, when time and time again he’d proven himself a far more worthy leader than his younger brother. I opened my mouth to tell him this when he continued.

He told Roman to kill me. Said I’d always be a threat to his rule.

My heart clenched. And yet, Malik was still here, which meant…

“Roman refused?”

Malik dipped his chin in confirmation.I owe Roman my life. More than once, he stepped in and convinced our father of my worth before he could kill me himself.

A war of conflicting emotions churned in my chest. I couldn’t wrap my head around this so-called version of Roman. The version that protected my mate rather than humiliating and degrading him.

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