Star Cursed (Zodiac Wolves #2)(20)
It didn’t take too much longer for the pain to become too much. As they continued beating me, I slipped gratefully into unconsciousness.
A part of me hoped I would never wake up at all.
Chapter Nine
I woke when one of the guards who had fun connecting his feet to my ribs slapped me across the face. I sat upright—or tried to. Every inch of my body hurt like I’d been run over by a freight train. I groaned and tried my best to curl up, to make myself a smaller target. How long would this beating go on? But instead of hitting me, the guard shoved some sheer fabric into my hands.
I looked down at it. “What the fuck is this?”
The guard slammed the cell door shut and locked it, then looked at me through the bars, his dull eyes glittering with malice. “Your dress for the ritual, princess. Alpha said to strip down. Completely. Then put that on.”
His eyes lingered on my body, and I hugged my hands around myself. I’d gotten used to being naked, but nothing could desensitize me to being leered at like that.
“Hurry up,” he added, turning around as if I’d suddenly lost all interest to him. It was jarring, but at least he wasn’t looking at me anymore. “I’m supposed to bring you out in a few minutes.”
Shit. Not only had I passed out for hours, but I’d only been awoken a few minutes before the ritual. I didn’t appreciate the thought of being dragged out of the cell while I was still half-groggy and all kinds of sore from what they'd done to me.
I stripped down, every movement agony, and if I’d been any more lucid, I would have thrown a fit about the dress. As I put it on, I noticed it was extremely revealing, low cut in the front, and almost completely backless. When I moved, my legs slid out from the fabric, all the way up to the spot where my thigh met my hip. The fabric itself was almost see-through, so sheer that if someone looked at me in the right lighting, they’d see everything. The bruises showed through, dark splotches against my light skin. On the front of the dress, plastered on my stomach, was the Leo pack symbol, big and gaudy. I’ve basically been marked, I thought. I looked at the Ophiuchus pack mark on my arm, wondering if this was one of the last times I’d see it.
This is it, I thought, as I realized what this dress meant. I’d thought about mating with Jordan before, of course. The mating bond wouldn't let me not think about it, but the thought of having sex with him hadn’t carried the same weight as it did now. Tonight I knew there would be no escaping it.
The guard opened the door, and two shifters entered. I didn’t flinch, but held my head at a contrary angle, daring them to beat me again. Both guards just grabbed me by the upper arms and practically lifted me off my feet so they could drag me out of the cell.
They walked me all the way outside to the garden where the gazebo sat. Hundreds of Leo shifters were there, as well as at least a dozen Sun Witches. The garden was overflowing with shifters, packed so tightly I could hardly see the ground, and there was a long stone altar positioned in the middle of the gazebo. Jordan stood at one end of it, wearing only a pair of black slacks, his muscular chest gleaming under the moonlight. I felt a roil of desire and disgust go through me, equally as strong on both counts.
I looked up at the night sky one last time before they dragged me under the gazebo, fixing my eyes on the full moon. At least I’m not packless, I thought, trying to find something, anything, good about this situation. I’d be well into the mating frenzy if that was the case.
The thought didn’t bring as much comfort as I’d hoped. Instead, it made me think of Kaden, about how I should be with him tonight instead of my asshole mate. But fate had never been kind to me, and it wasn't about to start now.
As the Sun Witches parted, I realized the stone altar was human-sized, and the way Jordan stood over it meant he planned to mate with me right there in front of everyone. I almost threw up at the thought, but below my disgust, the ever-present burn of desire made itself known too. I tried to shove it down, so horrified by my base animal reaction I could hardly stand it, but it wouldn’t go away. I hated how helpless both my mind and body were against the fucking mate bond.
It didn’t help that Jordan was standing there, his perfect body on display. I found myself tracing the planes of his muscles before jerking my eyes back up to his face. He smirked, as if he knew what I was thinking about, and motioned for the guards to bring me up to the altar.
The Sun Witches moved closest to the altar as well, a sea of warm-hued colors in the pale moonlight. I struggled as I was brought forward, but I was still hurting, and as I looked wildly around, I saw a half-conscious Mira slumped between two other guards. She was back in human form, but that didn’t seem to be helping her any. She looked pale and listless, hardly able to keep her eyes open. Whatever the Sun Witches had done to her had stuck, and I wondered if they’d used the same spell on her that they had on me to keep her wounds from healing. If I fought back, Jordan would have her killed. There would be no escape for me tonight.
The guards forced me to sit on the altar, and I slumped, unable to find the will to fight with all these odds against me. I didn’t help them as they shoved me down on it, and when one of them reached for my ankle, I jumped. I tried to tear it out of his grasp, but the shifter held on tight and yanked my leg out to the side.
A wash of shame went through me as I realized they were tying me to the alter, my legs spread apart like a fucking offering, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. Jordan loomed over me, the hunger in his eyes turning his face sharp. My arms were tied by the guards next, and then they stepped back, leaving me bared for all the world to see. And in this skimpy dress, they saw everything.