Traded To The Lycan King (Colette) novel Chapter 151

*Kyra*

I catch myself constantly stealing glimpses of Hayes’ injury. The way the scars seem to crawl up his neck and into his cheek like a thorny rose vine creeping up a trellis. It twists and dips, spots shiny while others are dull and deep. My fingers itch to touch it, to trace the tendrils that caused him so much pain as they dance up the side of his head, burning off half his eyebrow.

It’s mesmerizing, almost beautiful. A map of his sufferings. He finds it appalling, convinced I could only feel the same way. But I don’t avoid his touch because of his injuries. I run from the sparks he seems immune to.

The explosion that rips through my body and tries to urge me to follow what the moon goddess has given me. It’s not about moving on from what I lost, but accepting what I am being offered. But I’m not sure I can or that I want to.

“Ask me,” Hayes sighs heavily, the annoyance clear in his exhale as he remains looking forward. My brows pull together, the left corner of my lip pulling down in a confused frown.

“What exactly am I asking you?”

“Did it hurt? Does it still hurt? How did it happen?” Hayes says, his voice flat and unaffected.

“Is that normally what people ask?” I watch him closely as he clears his throat and looks in the opposite direction. “Because I got the feeling people avoid you.”

“Because of my burns?” He scoffs, and I snort.

“No, because you’re an asshole now.”

Dean and Marcos chuckle ahead of us, both of them shaking their heads.

“Yeah, well, if I look like an asshole people don’t ask me annoying questions,” He grumbles.

I arch a brow and smirk up at him, regardless of how much he tries to look away.

“I didn’t ask you any questions. You demanded I ask you what you assumed I wanted to know.” I remind him and he nods, a small smile forming before he pushes it away.

“You were staring at me,” He says. “I assumed you were curious.”

“I’m not here to be your best friend again, Hayes.” I say, lengthening my strides to distance myself from him. After three steps, I spin, walking backward as I face him. “Every warrior knows what creates those burns, and I know the pain they bring the bearer of them.”

Then I spin on my toes and walk toward the front of the group. I catch up to Nisha, sliding up on her right side as she looks amused by my presence. Neither of us speaks. Why would we when there isn’t much to say?

It is obvious she hates me and looks down on me for some reason. But if we are going to be stuck together for a while, then I may as well familiarize myself with her snide remarks.

“Are you lost, Tracker?” She muses, her deep brown eyes blinking slowly.

“No, Nisha.” I tell her. “Just coming up for some air.”

I mutter the sentence, not even realizing how much I mean them until I hear them in my own ears. Being around Hayes is entirely suffocating and when he isn’t around, usually there is Marcos drowning me with his closeness and his overwhelming presence. Two entirely different men both successfully making me uncomfortable and want to hide from them.

Nisha shakes her head before she points up ahead, where Koda saunters, ducking under a branch.

“You could walk with Koda.” She offers and I admit her immediate desire to send me off ruffles my skin and my lip twitches with annoyance.

“Did I do something to offend you?” I ask, tired of the shitty attitude.

“No,” She arches a brow.

But this is the first real chance we have had to catch Ezrah, or at least get close enough to remain on his trail. So I take three seconds to breathe through my nerves and shake my hands and fingers out.

“Ty, if you were here, you would love this.” I mutter to myself before I purse my lips and exhale slowly. “This display of bravery is for you.”

I throw my hand up into the first crevices, swinging my leg until I find a footing and I push myself up. Each move is slow and methodical as I work to keep myself from falling.

It is slow and painful as rocks cut at the palms of my hands, but I push on. I am almost halfway up the wall face when my fingers slip and I cling to a rock, the sharp edge slicing into the palm of my hand.

The blood makes my hold slick as I swing my body, desperate to find anything to reach for with either my fingers or my feet. One moment I am swinging and the next my toes tap into something and I force my weight to it with a pained grunt before I try to give my injured hand a shove off the rock.

The cut is too much, my fingers tingling as they lose feeling, and I linger between a delicate balance on my foot and my flailing arms. The reality hits with gravity as I teeter back and my footing disappears and the world twisting around me as I pick up speed.

Fear climbs up my throat with a silent scream as my stomach moves into my chest. A part of me wants to let it happen, to just crash to the ground and let the rocks break open my skull and hide my pool of blood beneath them.

But then I remember why I am here, what it is I am doing and stopping. No one, not even the likes of Nisha, should have to experience the loss that I have, and until Ezrah is found, and the egg delivered, no mates are safe.

My lycan breaks out at the last moment, my nails cutting into the side as I come to a halting stop, my body swinging into the side of the rocks with a grunt making me recoil in pain.

I scramble again for a grip, pain slipping through my body like a heated knife to butter. My body slams into the ground, a raspy grunt forced from the remaining air in my lungs.

My lycan retreats, as I turn onto my hands and knees, heaving as my stomach boils over from the sheer panic and fleeting death. As I try to stand, a calloused hand wraps around the back of my neck, yanking me back enough to make my teeth clatter together.

“What the hell do you think you are doing?!” a voice growls, sending a shiver through my spine as my mouth goes dry.