"What's wrong?" Luca asked, leaning on his elbow. His face hovered over mine, eyes searching, too damn calm for how torn apart I felt inside.
"I feel… guilty." The words came out rough, like they didn't want to leave my throat. "It feels wrong, what we're doing."
God, I hated how shaky I sounded. The truth was a knot I couldn't untangle. I wanted Luca, wanted him so badly my body burned for him—but the thought of Xan… of what this meant… it shredded me. It wasn't just guilt. It was betrayal, sharp and ugly, bleeding out of me.
"Don't worry." He kissed me, soft, reassuring, as if that could erase the poison in my chest. "Soon you won't feel anything for her."
I wanted so badly to believe him. To let the warmth of his arms drown out everything else when he pulled me close. "Get some sleep," he murmured. I let my head sink against him, breathing him in, clinging like maybe he could make it all go away.
I fell asleep in his arms.
But I didn't wake up there.
Cold. That's what woke me. Cold biting into my skin, the floor hard and damp beneath me. My wrists ached, shackles.
"What the hell?" My voice cracked, panic rising like claws in my throat. I scrambled upright too fast, breath coming shallow. "Where the hell am I?"
Darkness. Not just dark, black. No walls, no ceiling, no anything. Just empty nothing pressing down on me.
"Luca?" My voice sounded small. I swallowed, tried again, louder. "Luca!" Nothing.
"Hello!" I screamed until my throat burned raw, but no one came.
I shut my eyes, desperate, reaching out the only way I could. 'Xan?' My mind stretched thin, begging for her. 'Xan, please.' Silence. I tried again. And again. And again. But the silence was a wall, cold and merciless.
I don't know how long I sat there before exhaustion dragged me under. When I woke, my body screamed, neck stiff, back aching, my ass numb from the damn floor. At my feet sat a tray. Meat. Bread. Fruit. Real food, too good to be kindness.
And the shackles were gone.
My stomach growled, but my hand froze above the plate. Poison? Something to drug me? Starving might hurt less than whatever trap they had set. Then again… wasn't this already Luca's fault? Hadn't he led me here?
I shoved the tray away, forcing myself to stand. My joints cracked, muscles protesting. That's when I saw it, a bucket in the corner. "You've got to be kidding me," I muttered, disgust twisting in my gut. Still… my body had needs. I used it, shoved the lid back on, then lay down again.
Sleep didn't come. The air got colder, seeping into my bones, and I figured it had to be night. At some point, I must've dozed, because when I woke there was another tray. Hot this time. The bucket was gone. My clothes, different. Someone had cleaned me.
I hadn't felt them. Not once.
A shiver ripped through me. Magic. Compulsion maybe. Or worse, a Shaman spell, strong enough to steal time from me.
It became a cycle. Sleep. Wake. Food. Clean clothes. Over and over. No matter how hard I fought, sleep stole me, black and sudden. Every time I woke, pieces were missing.
Then the door creaked open.
I shot to my feet, heart hammering. My body dropped into a stance, ready to fight.
But what stepped inside… wasn't what I expected. A woman. Tiny. Fragile-looking. But her eyes were sharp, and the air around her snapped with power.
She flicked her fingers, whispered something I didn't understand, my body locked. Frozen. A statue.
"Follow me," she said, voice smooth, cold. My feet moved before I told them to.
The first stab of light outside seared my eyes. I hissed, squinting, and then the truth sank in—I hadn't been in a room inside a building. I'd been in a building of its own. Dozens more stood around me. Cells.
She led me into a larger one, crawling with guards. My gut twisted, it looked like some cartel compound, but worse. Precision. Ruthlessness.
We stopped at a heavy door. Ten long minutes passed before it opened.
"Walk like a supermodel," the woman ordered, lip curling. "At the end, take your shirt off. Don't speak."
I wanted to spit in her face, but my body betrayed me. My hips swayed. My chin tilted high. Like I was strutting a damn runway.
Rows of strangers lined the sides, eyes crawling over me. The auctioneer's voice cracked like a whip, numbers flying higher, faster.
My stomach dropped. They were auctioning me.
What the hell is happening? Did Xan sell me? The thought hit hard, jagged. No. She wouldn't. She couldn't. But the doubt festered.
And then I saw her.
For a second, I thought I was hallucinating. But no. She was there. Fourth row. A scarf covered her face, but her eyes, God, those eyes, I knew them. I'd seen them before. In the portrait.
My step faltered, just for a heartbeat. I wanted to stop. To throw myself at her, to scream her name even though I didn't know it. I wanted her to see me.
But the spell dragged me forward, hips rolling, body moving like a puppet. My jaw locked, teeth grinding.
She didn't move. Just watched, steady and unreadable. The man beside her lounged back, calm as if none of this mattered, his hands folded. He hadn't bid. Not once.
Why?
The bids climbed, voices shouting over each other, the auctioneer grinning like the devil. "Magnificent! Rare! Look at the fire in those eyes!" he boomed, pointing at me like I couldn't hear.
My fists clenched until I thought I'd bleed. I wanted to tear free, burn the place to ash, rip them all apart. But I couldn't.
And still, through it all, her eyes never left mine.
The bids kept coming. Again. Again. Steady. Unshaken.
The spell forced me to turn, to pose, humiliation clawing through me. But somewhere under the rage, an ember sparked. If she was here for me, if she really was the woman from the portrait, maybe I wasn't lost.
But the question that burned louder than the auctioneer's voice was this:
Why me?
And what would the winner do with me once they owned me?
The only problem was, the man sitting beside her wasn't bidding.His chair creaked under the weight of his stillness, his arm resting heavy on the side of the chair, fingers tapping the white board absently but never lifting it. I kept watching him, waiting for even the smallest flicker of movement that would confirm he was part of the game, but nothing came. The air between us grew tighter, pressing in on my chest until I couldn't tell if the silence was deliberate or simply indifference.
The little white board dangled loosely in his hand, never lifting once.It looked almost forgotten there, as though it belonged to someone else, a prop in the wrong hands. Every time another bidder raised theirs, I caught myself glancing back at his, expecting him to finally make a move, but his hand stayed stubbornly still. The inaction gnawed at me, sharper than any words could have.
My chest tightened. Was she really here for me, or was this just some cruel coincidence?The thought clawed at me, a mix of desperate hope and bone-deep dread. My pulse thudded in my throat, heavy and unrelenting, as I studied her profile, too calm, too perfect to belong in a place like this. If she wasn't here for me, then fate had placed her beside him just to torture me, and I couldn't decide which possibility hurt worse.
"Is that the final bid for this beautiful wolfless slave?" the auctioneer's voice rang out, smug and taunting.His tone cut through the restless crowd like a whip, each word dripping with mockery. He leaned forward, smiling like a man who knew exactly how to bait his audience, his eyes never quite leaving mine. The word wolfless echoed in my skull, a brand of weakness that wasn't mine to carry, yet here it was, shackled to me by his sneering tongue.
"A little birdy tells me it might just be magic keeping him from shifting. But who will take a chance? Who will take the risk?"The room stirred, murmurs weaving between the bidders like ripples through water. My blood ran colder at the mention of magic; it wasn't just a word, it was an accusation, a question that could unravel me if anyone cared enough to look deeper. He was gambling with my life, dangling half-truths and rumors like meat to hungry wolves, and I felt the weight of every curious stare pressing into me.
His words hit me like a blow. Was he bluffing, trying to squeeze more gold out of the crowd, or was he dead serious?My breath caught, sharp and uneven, as though he'd taken something from me just by speaking it aloud. If it was a lie, then I was little more than a pawn in his performance; if it was the truth, then I had no shield left against the questions that would follow. My mind spun in circles, hunting for answers I couldn't afford to give.