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Chapter Ten
Raven
Several days later, we edged closer to the brothers’ home territory and my alphas visibly relaxed. We stopped for one final night, camping out by a nearby hot spring and Wolfe assured me that we’d arrive in the safety of their central territory by early afternoon tomorrow. Alix and Wolfe got to work gathering wood and building a fire, while Ivan went off in order to hunt for some fresh meat. On my own, I wandered off to the nearby hot spring at Wolfe’s assurance it was safe here. Alix had begrudgingly let me go, only after I begged for a little alone time of my own.
“Be careful. I’ll check on you in an hour,” he finally agreed.
“It’ll make your skin soft and supple. It’s the minerals,” Wolfe winked, and I smiled.
I had once thought him and Ivan as strangers, but no longer.
Now they were my mates. It felt natural and I had embraced it to the fullest.
Having reached the steaming spring, I removed my clothes only after ensuring I was alone. Dipping my toe into the warm water, I moaned softly before slowly climbing in completely. A carved rock bench sat just beneath the surface and I leaned against it, relaxing in the hot water and allowing the cleansing steam to work its way into my pores.
Wolfe was right. This was wonderful.
Sitting back, I let go and closed my eyes, thinking about my new life. My limbs relaxed, the water lapping at my skin, and it didn’t take me long to fall into a light, restful sleep.
A twig cracked loud somewhere off in the distance and I jolted awake.
Hastily, I searched the surrounding greenery, looking for the source of the sound, but I found nothing. Chewing my lip, I sank a little deeper in the water, hoping its depths and steam would cover my presence.
After a while, it remained silent and I wondered if I had just dreamt the sound and I finally relaxed back against the rock bench, shaking my head at my jumpiness. Laying my head back against the rock, I closed my eyes once more and sighed.
Then someone grabbed my shoulders from behind and I screamed, but was quickly cut off when a strong hand pressed a cloth against my face, covering my nose and mouth so that I could hardly breathe. The soft, sweet smell of coconuts assaulted my senses and at once, everything went black.
* * *
I awoke sometime later, but I felt groggy and my body was unresponsive. My eyelids stuck together, almost like they were painted with glue. My fingers and toes hardly wiggled and my arms and legs felt like cement blocks.
I’d been drugged.
The floor beneath me was cool, like metal. I heard the sounds of cranks and chains working around me, the sound entirely foreign to the forest I’d spent the last week exploring with my alphas.
I groaned, finally willing my heavy eyelids open. I found myself sitting on the floor in a small room, only big enough for a single person. A closet really. There was a single window on the left wall, but it was barred and too far for me to stand and look out of.
Sometimes it sucked being short. Not that I could make my legs work much anyway.
A heavy metal door was locked shut to my right. At the bottom was an odd sort of slot that only seemed to open from the opposite site. The room was dark, only a little light streaming in from the narrow window. There was a single metal bench, lined with a really thick mattress of some sort. It looked like a jail cell.
I blinked, trying to figure out where I was.
I had been kidnapped. I wondered how long I had been out.
Who would want to kidnap me?
A loud whoosh echoed outside, and I whimpered, trying to make my brain work so that I could recognize the sound. After a while longer, I realized that it sounded eerily like a steam-powered airship.
It took some more time, but eventually I found the strength to push myself up off the floor. I couldn’t quite see out the window, but when I stood up on the metal bench, I could reach it.
Down below, the treetops rushed by and quite a distance away, I saw the glass dome of the city rise up into the sky. The airship was hurtling in that direction and at this speed, we’d arrive in only a matter of days.
Who else could have an airship? It had been so hard to find one when I had needed to travel outside the walls. I sat down on the bench and chewed my lip.
I tried to take a deep breath and quell my rising panic. Whoever had done this had money and had more reach than even I did as a top scientist at Genwell. I wondered if the group of men who had attacked me were connected to this abduction in some way. One thing was for certain though. Someone had purposely done this to me, and they were from the city, like me. No one on the outside had access to technology like this.
I swallowed heavily, growing more nervous the longer I sat there.
