Page 17 of Wolf Caged
I cracked my gritty eyes open and a growl almost burst from my lips as fur rippled over my bare skin.
A cage.
I was in another cage.
I sat up, the swift action jarring and making my head spin. When my vision settled, I quickly scanned my new surroundings. Not quite a cage.
It was a prison cell.
Or maybe it was more of a dungeon.
Damp dark stone made up the wall behind me and pillars between the cells, together with the wall beyond the thick metal bars ahead of me. To my left and right, more bars divided the room into more cells. The one to my right seemed to veer around a corner in an L shape and was larger than mine, with another solid wall on the other side of it rather than bars.
Torches flickered and guttered on the wall of the corridor, the only source of light.
The bed beneath me was nothing more than a sack of hay.
Not quite the bed I had expected to find myself chained to upon waking.
I glanced at the cage again.
Maybe my owner was into darker things than I had imagined and this was some sort of twisted sex dungeon.
I pushed away from that thought, because I was already scared enough without throwing dark fantasies into my panicked mind. Instead of letting fear get the better of me, I studied the barred door, seeking a possible way to escape.
Not that I knew what I was looking for.
I didn’t have much experience with cages and cells, or things beyond lighting campfires and healing and taking care of others.
That deep pining returned, but not for my bastard mate this time. My family. My pack. Did they know what had happened to me or was Lucas lying to them too, telling them I was devoted to my new pack and no longer wanted to see them?
Gods, the thought of my parents thinking I didn’t want to see them again had a heavy weight settling on my chest as my eyes burned.
I needed to contact them, warn them somehow, because my fear also returned, and this time it took the shape of Lucas doing something to them, planning something for my pack. He might have lied to my face about his feelings, but he had never concealed his feelings about my pack. He had told me once that I was the only reason the Hunt pack didn’t slaughter my own. That I was their saving grace.
But now he had sold me into servitude.
Where did that leave my pack?
My throat closed at the thought they might be in danger, panic lighting my veins and urging me to take action, to do something.
What?
What could I do?
I didn’t even know where I was, and I doubted my new owner was going to let me go, even if I asked nicely. They had plans for me too.
That panic threatened to turn into all-out fear and a meltdown of epic proportions, so I closed my eyes and drew down a deep breath, holding it for five seconds before slowly releasing it, trying to calm my shredded nerves. In. Out. Slow breaths. Calming breaths.
Harder than I imagined when voices travelled towards me, my sensitive ears picking up two sets of footsteps—one heavy and one lighter. A male and a female.
Not wanting them to know I was awake and sure I would be more vulnerable if they knew I was, I rolled onto my side on the scratchy hay bed, putting my back to the corridor, and did my best attempt at looking as if I was still unconscious, remaining perfectly still as the two sets of steps grew louder.
Controlling my heart was far harder than controlling my body as they stopped and I sensed their presence behind me, on the other side of the bars. I willed it to slow, to remain steady, trembling a little as I waited, unsure what was about to happen. Wolves weren’t the only species with heightened hearing and I wasn’t sure what kind of male had bought me. I hadn’t been able to make him out at all during the auction.
“What have you done?” The female sounded not angry, or disgusted, but perhaps disappointed.
“What was necessary.” That male voice was sword-sharp, cutting the thick, tense air, as commanding as I remembered it.
