XADEN’S POV
"Xaden, Xaden, wake up." A familiar female voice stirred him awake. "Wake up, my love."
He stirred in his bed to face where the voice was coming from, and then his eyes fluttered open, and he saw his mother looking up at him, seemingly sad.
"Mummy, "Mummy, what’s wrong?" He asked.
"We have to go," she told him.
His sister Anna was on her hip, her hand still on her thumb.
"I want you to be a good boy. Be the brave young boy you are." She said, tears filling her eyes. "Mummy loves you. Take care of Anna. I love both of you."
"What’s happening?" He asked her, confused.
His mom always told him that she loved him.
Even his dad. Dad. Why was she saying it? It sounded like something was wrong.
There was shouting and shouting and loud noises outside.
Why was there such a lot of noise? Wasn’t it just bedtime?
He looked out the window and saw that it was still dark.
Or was there a festival happening?
She dropped Anna on the bed.
Anna was sound asleep.
"I need you to wake up." She said. "I want you to protect your sister. She won’t be awake. I gave her something to knock her out."
Anna wrapped herself around his neck. She was only two years old.
"Where is Daddy?" He asked, hearing a familiar voice.
"Your daddy is trying to protect us." She said. "And I’m going to protect you. If anything happens to me, I want you to run. Run as fast as you can."
There were more noises, and they were getting louder. As if they were getting closer,
There were tears now on her cheek, and she hurriedly wiped them.
Some footsteps were approaching before he could reply or ask any more questions.
"Hide," she said, pulling him up.
His sister clung to his neck.
"Don’t open the door, " she told him as she shoved him into a closet.
"What about Daddy?" He asked. "Where is Daddy?"
She went quiet, and her face went ashen.
"Your father is protecting us." She assured him.
He wanted to ask more questions, like what was happening.
He wasn’t a baby like Anna. She could tell him, and he would understand.
But she cut him off.
"Don’t come out." She said. "No matter what, Stay inside. Do you understand me, Xaden?"
He nodded.
And then she kissed his forehead and his sister’s.
She looked at them slowly for a while and finally stepped away.
Then she closed the door.
The main doors were flung open, and he could hear Uncle Bale’s voice approaching.
Uncle Bale! He was here to save them! Now, whatever was about to happen, he would save them.
He wanted to jump out, but his mother’s voice stopped him.
"How could you betray us?" She said. "How could you ambush us after everything?!"
"You betrayed me the day you married Orion!" Uncle Bale snapped.
Little Xaden was confused.
Why was Uncle Bale shouting at his mother?
"Is that what this is about?" She asked. "Is that why you’ve done what you just did? Because of me?"
He heard someone spit.
"You were supposed to be mine," Bale said. "But you went to him! You left me knowing that I loved you. I’ve always wanted power. Orion was more powerful than I am. I had to eliminate him, or I would never be the strongest Alpha."
Then he said, "But about you and me, I can still forgive you. If you come with me, I will spare the lives of your family."
"You liar!" She snapped. "I know you, and you will never turn away from blood! Not after what you’ve done!"
"You can spread your legs for Orion, but not for me?!" He demanded.
There was a hefty slap, and Xaden knew his mother had given it.
"Don’t you ever! Ever! Talk to me like that in your life!" She snapped at him.
There was a loud slap, and it was like a thud, and Xaden heard his mother cry in pain.
She had fallen.
He held onto Anna, scared. He was a little boy and didn’t know what to do.
"You just have to make it tough, don’t you?!" He demanded. "Your husband is dead. And now I’ll have to handle you the hard way."
What sounded like the tearing of clothes and then things breaking, his mothers weeping.
More slaps that Xaden knew were given to his mother.
"Don’t touch me, you bastard!" She screamed in the struggle.
After what sounded like more struggles and screams, Xaden started to hear some weird noises.
His mother was weeping and making weird noises while hearing a man grunt over and over.
Xaden hugged his little sister in the cabinet tightly to his chest and put his hands over her ears so she wouldn’t hear.
He didn’t know what the noises were, but his mother was crying, and he couldn’t do anything.
After a short while, it stopped.
His mother was still weeping.
"Filthy prostitute!" Uncle Bale’s voice said. "Join your husband!"
And then there was the sound of a sword entering somewhere.
Xaden didn’t know what prompted him to do so, but he flew out of the cabinet.
Right in his very front was his mother’s dead body, her dress hitched up and her thigh exposed.
He froze.
"There is the brat." Bale’s evil eyes gleamed, and as he approached, the little boy shook, and everything went.
"Xaden!" A feminine voice startled him awake.
He looked around and saw that he had fallen asleep in his office.
He had even spilled the quiz and ink on the floor.
He rubbed his eyes and massaged his temples.
They were filled with sweat.
Those nightmares again. They had come back to haunt him.
The knock at the door continued.
It was Aurora.
"Come in," he said.
The doors opened, and she walked up to him.
"You need to tell me why you brought that enemy’s daughter to our pack alive after what he did to all of us!" Aurora demanded.