Chapter 4 : I Hate You

~SINCLAIR~

Sin entered the room and immediately sought the deep blue of her gaze amidst the others. Hers. His mate. The organ in his ribcage thundered as their eyes met. Sure his own could show the intense adoration that caught at his throat. He almost didn't notice her freeze.

Now that the spell wrought by the prophecy had fallen away, he could feel her down to his bones. The way he should have been able to from the very beginning. He should have been incapable of even touching a hair on her head, if not for the f*cking prophecy.

Vannie's hand went to her throat, and suddenly he could smell her rage. The emotion was as intense as it had been the night she'd tried to take her own life. Only it hadn't made his heart splinter into a million pieces then.

Gods, she was so angry.

Darkness clenched around his head, and he mentally ordered Alaric and his aides out of the room. Maeve looked like she'd stubbornly linger, but she wisely reconsidered when he released a shade of his daemon at her.

Alaric's voice came back to him through their pack bond after their exit. 'She just awoke, Alpha, and she's still recovering. Take it easy on her.'

He isolated himself from the pack's connection and concentrated on his mate. What did they think he'd do to her? He'd never hurt her again. Not when it was all he'd done since she was unfortunate enough to meet him.

Sin took a step closer, and heard her heart pound in fear. She cleared her throat and gave him a mocking smile despite the weakness and frailty written all over her. She had always been able to do that, his brave Queen. She had always been able to hide her pain behind a sharp smile.

"Good. You're here to take me back to your dungeons. I was beginning to wonder when your pack members would drop the act." Her smile died. "At least, allow me the pleasure of a glass of water before you take me."

His daemon howled and tried to claw its way out of his chest at that. She was scared. She was scared that if she didn't take advantage of the glass beside her, it would be a while before she used water again. He wanted to rip himself open some more at the thought.

Her hand extended to grip the cup on the bedside table, but even that proved too much for her weak hand. She moved to steady it with her other hand the same moment he reached out to help her. The glass crashed to the floor.

"Do not come near me."

The venom behind the words stilled him as her eyes darted around like a skittish animal. He couldn't have her scared, he had to keep a distance. He raised his hand slowly.

When she made sure that he wouldn't move, she looked at the mess on the floor, and he followed her gaze, suspicion gathering in his guts. "What are you"

She pushed herself over the edge of the bed to the floor and began to lap at the spilt water. The expertise of which she used to suck the water from the carpet brought tears to his eyes. This was the woman he was supposed to have spoiled rotten from the moment he set his eyes on her.

This woman, the reason of his very existence, was the one he had wrecked to the point where she felt comfortable drinking from the floor like she was nothing more than a common slave. He couldn't bear it.

Unable to stand still and watch the torture, he moved to get something to clean up the mess with before she could bruise herself with the glass when it finally hit him.

Time slowed and everything came to focus in his head. He turned just as she raised a splinter of the glass and was about to split her vein with it.

How could he not have realized that he could lose her again when he just got her back? How could he have been so careless?

He hadn't reassured her. He hadn't told her he would not take her back to the dungeons, or use her blood. That was why she still wanted to kill herself, wasn't it?

His brave girl. Protecting her property, even if it meant giving her life for it. He had to let her know that the dungeons would be burned to the f*cking ground, and that he'd never think of using her blood again.

In a blur, he had the glass shard out of her hand and she was pinned down by his body before she could reach for another in her desperation. Realizing that her plan had been thwarted, she began to struggle against his hold and curse him in languages he'd thought were extinct. She called him every name in the book, ordered him to do things to himself that were anatomically impossible, till her voice went hoarse and she went limp in his arms.

Clear blue eyes regarded him, those eyes he'd known would haunt him from the moment he'd looked into them. "I hate you," she whispered, then closed them. She'd exhausted herself with her struggles.

He struggled with the emotion that warred in him, trying to detach himself from how wrecked he was by those words. Cautiously, he carried her weak body back to the bed and watched as her mind struggled with her body. She wanted to fight his hands off, but had lost her strength.

Slowly, she drifted off to sleep. He covered her with the blanket, then mopped up the mess on the floor with a towel. This woman. How could he ever deserve her? How could either of them get past this?

Their relationship was doomed from the start and her hate was penance for his transgressions. Would she ever accept him as her soulmate?

Sin was wringing water from the towel when a pack cry went up in the air, filtering through the mental link the Inlanders shared. The pack cry was meant to alert the Alpha that his people required his immediate attention. He stood from his crouch, wondering if they'd already heard that their. . .Queen (that's what Vannie was, wasn't she?) was awake.

Maeve was outside the door and before he could growl an order, she was nodding. "I won't let her out of my sight."

He nodded his thanks and disappeared into the night.