Filed to story: The Chosen Saga Novel PDF Free
“I have only had one boyfriend, and even he couldn’t love me. Do you think if something happens against your wishes it stains your body and soul?”
“Darling, no not at all. Why?”
“He started it when I was young. I was seven when he started watching me. A few years later he started touching. I was too small to fight back.” Araiya sobbed harder. “I tried to fight every time, I swear it. He told me he would kill my mother if I told her. So, I stayed quiet. I started hiding at night so he couldn’t find me. It took so long to get strong enough to fight him off.”
“Oh, my sweet girl. Did he?” Araiya shook her head. Her sobbing slowly subsided.
“He thankfully wanted to save that for a deal. A whole unsullied woman would fetch a better deal than one used up. There were other things he used to do instead though.” She wiped her face and shuddered. “By the time I reached my thirteenth cycle I had started to fully develop, and he got stumbling drunk one night after a deal fell through. He came into my room in the dead of night, and he wasn’t going to stop. I panicked and was fighting again. This is the one thing I wasn’t going to give him. He had me pinned, sobered up a little, and whispered that he wasn’t going to break my womanhood, but there was another hole he could fill.” Sobs shook her entire body as she relived her worst secret. “He held me down and he was so close Brooke. I started bleeding. The pain was so intense that I can’t even explain it. Earlier that day I decided enough was enough and hid a knife under my pillow. I kept fighting so he couldn’t enter me, and he started beating me instead. He hit me so hard I had broken ribs. He broke my nose and eye socket. I managed to grab the knife right before he fractured my skull. I almost dropped it as I went limp, and he got the upper hand. He almost won before I got my wits and slashed his arm. He jumped away from me right before the stable hand had run in. The young man helped me get away from him that night and to Elder Tobias to heal. The stable hand, he went missing a week later, but I was never touched again.”
“Who could do that to a child?” Brooke was so disgusted she was nauseous.
“My stepfather was not a good father to me.” Araiya wiped her face again and stood up, showing her body to Brooke. She had noticed a few scars last time but now she looked closer. Araiya’s pale skin hid most of the scars that riddled her body. Her body held slightly silvered scars in all the areas she could hide with clothes. Her back was riddled with long thin stripes, her stomach covered in slices. Brooke’s hands fluttered to cover her mouth when she saw the cuts on her breasts, then one clear suicide attempt to escape her tormentor. “How will anyone ever love me with this body when they can’t even give me a chance before they even talk to me?”
Brooke shushed Araiya and helped braid her hair and get into bed before leaving the room. She made it outside the door before she broke down. She sank to the ground in front of the door and silently cried.
“Brooke? What are you doing on the ground?” River helped her up from the ground as she wiped her face. “Are you okay?”
Brooke looked into the eyes of the man before her. More tears spilled over, and she grabbed his face. “I love you like my own son, you know that right River?”
“Brooke I am older than you are by thousands of years.”
“Yes, but I need to know that you know I love you like my own babe.”
“Yes Brooke, now tell me what is wrong.” River held her shoulders as she caved into his body. He never noticed her aging, but here was this little old woman where a fierce Chosen once stood. When did this happen?
“That poor girl was abused, my boy. He beat her and cut her. He touched her when she was weak. She survived all that to come here, to have her mate kill her. To have another berate her and call her names. She was supposed to be safe with us here. We promised that to her the last time we fixed her up, yet we couldn’t protect her then or now. What does that make us? Are we no better than him?” River felt like he was slapped. He looked down at his caretaker-turned-mother figure, and for the first time her eyes held shame. Shame for herself, him and the others she helped raise.
“What did you just say?” A voice came from behind them.
River and Brooke turned to see the other three men standing at the top of the stairs down the hall. Of course, with dragon hearing they heard everything that was just said. River felt Brooke stiffen in his arms. She pulled away and stormed up to his three closest friends.
“I helped raise you boys for the last thousand years, and in my very long life this is the first time I can say I am disappointed in you. Actually, I am past disappointed, and I am currently downright disgusted by your behavior.” She looked at Mac and he took a step back.
“Miss Brooke-” Mac started.
“Do not Miss Brooke me young man. You spent many a day talking my ear off as I cooked about how you would treat your mate like a queen. Then your queen comes along, and you steal her power and life. Your parents are rolling in the ether watching you mistreat that girl. She has been through enough and you broke that girl.” She wheeled to Zephyr. “You! You have changed young man.”
“Miss Brooke, I am older than you by several hundred lifetimes. I do not need a lecture from the likes of you.”
“Get out right now.” Brooke never broke eye contact. “You don’t have the time or the need to listen to my lecture on your treatment of your mate, then I do not have to look at you.” Brooke turned away.
“You can’t tell me to leave.” Zephyr rolled his eyes. “You are an unmated Chosen and I am the Air Enforcer. I do not take orders from you.”
Brooke wheeled to stare down the dragon. Anger thickened her accent as she went on. “You think you have power here Air Dracoy? You think you don’t have to listen to this old unmated Chosen do ye? Lowly servant like myself has no sway here.”
Zephyr just stared down his nose at the Chosen. He didn’t notice how the other three stepped up behind the Chosen.
“You do not get to dictate orders to a superior. Since I am clearly your superior in age, power and standing you do not get to tell me to leave.” Zephyr dismissed the Chosen and went to move past her. She put out her arm. He was going to push past when he registered the warning growl. He looked past the Chosen in front of him to his longest friends. All three were standing behind the pathetic Chosen. All three were pissed, smoke coming off Mac. Zephyr took a step back.
“And here I thought the disgust was just for me, but now
I see the truth. Not only are you a pathetic excuse for a mate but you’re a garbage person and leader. Congrats, I will let your dad know he should be so very proud, next I speak with him.” Everyone in the hallway froze at her approach. “Zephyr. The great Air Enforcer, leader of all the Air dragons and Chosen. Enforcer, like someone who should uphold standards and law in their land. Am I correct in assuming this Brooke?”
“Yes, these men are the leaders of their clutches and Chosen. They uphold the rules or laws the Goddess has passed down, and punisher of the oath breakers.” Brooke looked past the men, who still seemed frozen in place. “Why do you ask little one?”
“Who holds these men to the same standard?” Araiya questioned as she leaned against a column at the end of the hallway.
“It was the Al’ta Moir Dracoy, the Dragon All-Mother. Now it is each other.” Araiya snorted and shook her head.
“No wonder…” She trailed off-snarls from all four males at that. “I’m sorry. Did I hurt your feelings? I expected better from the Enforcers of the clutches. I may be new to this life but even I understand that no one, and I mean absolutely no one, is better than anyone else. A true leader rallies behind his people, stands up for the weaker clan members and upholds him or herself to a higher standard than they hold their people. What I just witnessed was as far from that as possible. I see the other three do not agree with Brooke’s treatment, and they would have said something to your big ass head. I also see that it wouldn’t have made a difference. Zephyr you are a shitty leader, a disgusting protector, and an even worse mate. I am happy that I have chosen to reject the mate bond.” Zephyr whipped his head around to glare at her.
“What did you just say?” The wind started to whip through the hall. River grabbed Brooke, and Mac and Terran stepped in front of Brooke to protect her.
“Oh, did you not like that?” Araiya grew annoyed.
“You reject me? No, I don’t accept that. You are beneath me not the other way around.” Zephyr raised his voice over the howling of the wind. As he gave in to his rage, his face became darker by the second.