Fin's Claim

Standing Still, Moving Forward

Finian's POV

Relentless pictures open my eyes the same time every morning.

A tidal wave of memories, breaking over my walls, flooding my mind with Victoria's history. It's not a comforting consistency when my eyes open only to focus on my demon's face who's blacken orbs never sleep.

"Good morning beautiful I've been waiting for you to get up." The serpentine voice slip-slides quietly in the predawn stillness; nothing else is up except for us. The tip of his blacken claw brushing the hair off my forehead so I can have a better view of him. Laying down on the pillow next to me with his eyes constantly open is unnerving to sleep with at night.

I'm always being watched.

A memory of Victoria flashing hard at me.

She's watched now, always being followed by her father's most trusted wolves in the shadows but they forget that Victoria comes from the shadows. While they are watching her, she has her wolves watch them, learning their movements, their weakness. She still doesn't have enough of her own force to cut off the head, so she lays awake at night thinking of ideas on how to separate the head from the body.

That's how Victoria learns her father's plan for her if Grey doesn't accept her as a mate, she's to become a Breeder like Elliot's mother. Becca running up to Victoria out of breath, cheek tore open, chest bleeding with the gashes from claws intending to tear out a throat of life. She can hardly stand, Victoria cradling her in her arms while she heals. Kissing her forehead, I killed him Becca's shaky voice wobbles out; she can't hide the emotion pouring from it. I had no choice, he saw me after their meeting I had to do it or else he would have told your father I heard everything. He's going to breed you out; he has contacts that are interested in you.

The fury trembles my body, hands squeezing into fists, raging waves of dark violence threaten to consume me. The demon excited by my emotions, feeding off the wickedness of my desire to seek vengeance. I want to go to the East, my mind trying to shift through her memories of the wolves who have wronged her, trying to memorize the faces. The demon's deep-belly rumbles make his ribs expand outwards. The laughter, feminine iron in pitch. 

"She's killed every one of them that sat at her father's table. The only wolf left is you, her mate. You're the only one that she has ever let live." It's this moment I look up into the dresser mirror, my own eyes staring back hard at myself.

Ugliness at it's finest.

All those years of hating her, wishing her death so I could move on with my life only made me stand still as life passed me by. So consumed in my hatred that I allowed myself to remain stagnant in a cesspool of filth, that only grew dirtier with each passing year.

Self-realization is disturbing when you see things about yourself that are hard to witness. Who you are is not who you want to be. How do you fix it? How do you repair the damage you've caused?

Opening the door, the frostbitten morning nips at my exposed skin, winter marching in, while the fall fades away with each passing day. The sun is now unable to melt the snow that fell in the night sticking to the ground like a second skin covering everything in a veil of white.

Breath is coming out in great puffs of vapor before disappearing behind me. The snow, clinging to the soles of my shoes while running through the pristine snowfall that has no one else's trail on.

Cutting a path through the deep snow, my steps are the only thing that shows that someone has been out this early; everyone else has to follow my tracks into the training facility.