Cassandra

"How did the search go?" Cassandra asked softly as Silas walked into their bedroom looking ragged and out of breath. She immediately 'floated' to his side with elegant steps so that she could help remove his regal jacket that looked to be torn.

The onyx-haired beauty looked down to it and frowned before she suspected that once more, Silas was pushing himself far too hard just for her father's approval. A father she did not love, and only feared. To see someone else look for the acceptance they'd never find broke her heart.

She actually loved Silas, though. He was handsome, and really sweet behind closed doors. For whatever reason, Cassandra found the blonde male exceedingly attractive, even when he came off as 'weak'. To Cassandra, it just felt like he trusted her to let down his guard so easily.

"I'm going back out after I have a look at a few of my notes, and grab our best tracker. I think they're somewhere around the river, but I can't figure out where. Their trails go all over the forest, over the river for both sides, and sometimes their scents stop at the boundary lines," Silas lamented in disappointment.

"Silas, I understand you want Harbinger's approval - but you're pushing yourself too hard. Look at this tear in your clothing -- you tried to shift half-way again, didn't you?" Cassandra asked with furrowed brows.

"No-" he lied quickly.

"You're an idiot, Silas...but I love you regardless," Cassandra mumbled and went to a nearby wardrobe to search for her sewing kit.

"If I can just get rid of Metas, I know my dad.....Harbinger will finally see my full worth, you know?" Silas replied with desperation in each word.

"Silas, honey - I really think you need to stop caring what someone thinks about you. Why don't you focus on who you want to be - and not what the General wants?" she tried to coax him towards thinking rationally.

"You don't understand, Cass. You said your parents were really supportive. I don't know what that is like," Silas snapped a little at the female who he had no idea understood perfectly.

She wanted to say something to him, so so badly - but she knew that if she said anything to him, someone would rat her out - or Silas wouldn't believe her. Maybe he'd even shun her because he'd start thinking of her like a sister instead of the mate he was blessed with.

"I'm sorry, Cassie. I just... I don't know what's wrong with me lately. I feel like my brain isn't functioning right," Silas followed up as he sat on their bed and sank his face into his hands.

'It's that damn potion father keeps putting in your tea. Don't worry though, my mate. I've got a plan for that,' she thought to herself.

It felt so weird not being able to tell her own mate about her father's doings.

Paper left trails. Loose lips sank ships, and she had no idea who was loyal and who was just going with the motions of the rules of the colony. She felt like she had no way out, other than to do things quietly and calculatedly.

"Why don't you let some of that stress out with me? Try for another pup, maybe?" she questioned him with a devious grin as she put the sewing kit and jacket down on the nearby bedside table.

"Cass, I don't think now is the time for that," Silas replied sullenly.

"Oh, come on - please?" she gave him two big, round eyes, and blinked a few times to get him to crumble a little bit.

Silas looked at her with a convoluted face. He had no idea what he wanted - well - he did... but how would Harbinger react if he were to appear as though he was slacking off.

"Please, my handsome alpha?" Cass repeated and straddled his lap. She even put her arms around the back of his neck and got super close to his lips. "Pwease?" the female tried one desperate time.

"I really, really want you..." she added with a whisper in his ear.

Silas so desperately wanted to, he really, really did - but the fear of having to deal with the repercussions of Harbinger was just too terrifying for him.

"Later, okay? I promise..." he rebuffed her gently and pressed her into his chest as he stood up, and then he gently put her back down on the bed.

"I love you, Cassandra - but I can't just goof off on this. The General would hate me forever," Silas added and then kissed her forehead.

Without waiting for a reply, he walked off stiffly, but quickly out of the room with an unreadable expression.

She waited until she could no longer hear his boots clunk against the lightly carpeted floor in the hallway before she started to cry into her hands.

Cassandra had friends, and professors at school that had been like family - but once graduated, Harbinger made sure that they could not contact her. For anyone to know who his daughter was, was a huge risk for him.

'It's because I love you, I don't want my enemies using you against me' - he'd say as an excuse. It may have been true, but it wasn't a good or healthy kind of love, and it left Cassandra miserable and alone.

Even now, when she had finally found the one meant for her - she couldn't get close to him as much as she wanted. Her father had orchestrated such an elaborate plan to control Silas, that it ended up affecting her, too.

Silas had apparently really loved Syrana - for one reason or another, he did. At first, she wanted to just leave well enough alone, but once more (as always) her father used the beauty of life as a weapon the moment that he discovered she was Silas' real mate.

'You should sleep with him, lure him to your side. Then he'll stop loving Syrana,' he had told her.

'You'll never find another, and they aren't really paired anyway. You wouldn't be doing anything wrong,' he mentioned /constantly/.

Honestly, she felt terrible about sleeping with a mated, and accepted male. She still felt just as bad as she had previously. Cassandra was just a pawn like everyone else. She hadn't meant to hurt Syrana - she hadn't wanted to, either. It was that, or face father's wrath.

No offense to Syrana - but Cassandra just couldn't handle another night in a closet tied up, or waterboarded again, she didn't have the stomach to be force-fed something disgusting, or threatened to be 'of use' to the soldiers should she disobey him (although twice now she had challenged him to just do it, and he never did - so it was more than likely a bluff at the time).

Cassandra had no idea it would lead to Syrana's sickness.

As penance she did her best to keep Syri safe and out of the hands of her father. It took a long time, but she finally convinced him it wasn't even worth it anymore, and instead focused him on the problems of the colony: their food supply.

Each day that passed, she tried to do the best she could to pay for the crimes she was pushed into committing, but it never felt like anything she did was enough.

Sometimes, she dreamed of throwing herself out of the high tower of the castle that actually looked over the mountains and into the thick forest - and just letting it all go. No more being a pawn in someone else's plans - but to be able to fly free and return to the sky through air.

If she did that, though - then Silas would be left alone, and she knew far too well what that felt like. It would just be one more sin to add on to the pile of everything else she had done wrong in her life.

'I hope you're okay out there, Syrana. I'm keeping your daughter safe, I promise. I hope we can meet and you can forgive me when I explain everything...' Cassandra 'prayed' quietly. When this was all over, and if Metas was restored as Alpha, she would be sure to repay Syrana in anyway the female asked - even if she asked for Cassandra to burn herself alive on a pyre, she would.

Since she was here in this situation now - the only thing to do was to use her position and the trust of her father to help restore the real order -- not the order her father thought he was preserving.

Harbinger would go on and on about how the food supply would be gone, and 'what's the harm in throwing a few invalids into the forest to feed the enemies knocking at our door?'.

'If it keeps the colony safe as a whole, then it is what must be done. One cog missing in the machine, and everything breaks down, Cassandra. Everything always breaks down with out maintenance and order. Keep the status-quo, and don't jostle the foundations of our society.'

"You're just a selfish, old fool too terrified to deal with a problem that won't go away," Cassandra hissed out as her fingers clenched into the bedspread.

"You can't cover up a problem. It must be dealt with. Why can't you just see that?" she complained to no one as her eyes stared at the powder blue wall adorned with golden framed pictures. "Well, I'm not afraid. When a structure is too broken to be fixed, sometimes you just need to knock it down."

Cassandra was going to help Metas knock it all down, and hope he would let her rebuild it with the rest of the pack when Harbinger was finally, and completely dead. It's not her fault she was born from such a coward of a male -- no a man. He was as cowardly as those humans were when they built their weapons, and hunted down her kind to 'cleanse' the world of evil like Lycans and Vampires.

Going straight to killing instead of at least thinking about having a conversation - that was what Harbinger was doing - and if he was wise enough to learn from human history, he would see that he was making everything worse.

...but how do you tell someone who thinks they are doing the right thing, that they are doing the wrong thing? Especially when it was your own father.