Chapter 182: Twitching Heart

Della stood in the shadows of the room, watching him.

Damp, dishevelled, dirty hair.

Devastated, tortured eyes.

Slump posture, shallow breaths.

Looking like someone who had nothing left to give.

She’d told him to stay away from fights for two weeks, and instead, he’d locked himself inside his room and refused to face anyone, wallowing in his own misery.

If only he had believed her. If only he’d been willing to think of her as not the villain instead of trying so hard to paint her as one.

She stood there for a long time, simply watching him.

He was a coward. Afraid to face her. Afraid to look into the very eyes he had sucked the life from. Living every second in constant regret and pain.

Thinking of his dead cubs.

Thinking about her.

That...is his punishment. His perfect punishment for the rest of his life.

But as she stared at him, a hand twitched on its own. She looked down at it and frowned. She didn’t like that one bit.

*Your heart doesn’t seem to agree with your mind,* Asteria commented.

*The same heart that was stabbed?* Della replied with an empty scoff, *Yeah, it can go to hell,*

And then, she stepped out and made her presence known. Her cold demeanour slid across the room toward him, and she watched his body stiffen as he realised he wasn’t alone anymore.

"Two weeks is up," She said to him, "Let’s go and get you back in full shape,"

Malachi stood up from the bed, staring at her once again like he was seeing her for the first time in years. The regret in his eyes instantly quadrupled, and he looked like he was about to burst into tears again.

Her hand twitched again.

Fuck it.

Her eyes moved across his wounds. He might have not left the room at all, but at least he has been changing his bandages and has been applying the right ointment.

He kept moving closer.

His mental and emotional state might still be in complete jeopardy, but his physical strength was—

Her thoughts were cut off the moment he reached out to her. His arms slid around her cold waist, gripped and pulled her into an embrace that she wasn’t ready for - one she could have avoided but didn’t.

Their chest brushed, and his arms hugged her with enough fever to almost burn her skin. She was crushed against his chest and caught, distraught for a moment.

"Moonfire..." He whispered fervently, so softly she almost didn’t hear him.

And so, she waited.

For her heart to beat. To skip. To do anything. Only her hands kept twitching.

*Why did you—*

*I do not want to hear it!* Della cut her off.

Then, she glanced up at Malachi. His face was so close she could bite it off and spit it back out if she wanted to.

She wanted to punch him in the stomach so he would let go, but she was pretty sure if she did that she would deliberately send him flying across the room, and unfortunately, Gideon cannot wait any longer.

So instead, she grabbed his shoulders and pushed him away from her.

But he pulled her back immediately, and burst into another cry. The goddamn man was crying in the arms of the woman he had misunderstood, ignored, broken, punished, abandoned and made to suffer in the hands of so many.

"I know you’re gone," He said between sobs, "And...and I won’t ask you to come back. I won’t—" He broke down again, and his arms only tightened around her.

His actions were surely contradicting his words.

"I just—" Malachi didn’t know what he wanted. No, he did. He wanted her back. He’d accepted his faults, and she was right, "I did want you to be the enemy, Moonfire. I wanted you to be the enemy so badly, but it turns out...I was the one all this time,"

She reached for his arms around her to take them off, and started to pry them away from her.

"Say something before you make me let go. Say—"

"Gideon needs us," She stated and yanked his hands away from her roughly and he stumbled back a little, "That is all there is, Alpha,"

He looked back at her, the tears still flowing uncontrollably. For a moment, it looked almost as if her eyes softened and she stepped closer and...gripped his arm.

Hard.

"Let’s go!"

And then, all he could feel was the wind on his face. He couldn’t feel the earth beneath his feet and he concluded that he might just be floating. With a little more focus, he found out that he was actually sitting on the back of something.

A... moving wolf.

The speed it was moving at should be considered otherworldly. It’s as if it was the wind itself, and its paws made not the slightest noise as it hit the earth and swept across the place.

Della.

It was...her.

He knew she was different now, and powerful... but this was simply terrifying.

Just as fast as she had transformed and gotten them out of the castle, he also suddenly found himself leaning against a wall carved with so many ruins. His knees felt a little wobbly for a moment, but he caught himself and looked around.

It was the tunnels.

They were there.

Looking up, he saw Della standing there again. She’d just finished putting on her dress back and was adjusting the long sleeves and the cap of her cloak.

Her claws and canines were retracting as she walked up to him, and then pointed at the cave.

He had no words.

She walked in front, and he walked behind her.

Everything about her was so different.

She seemed so indifferent about the world now, and as she walked...he could smell blood on her hands.

She could probably set the whole world on fire right now and watch it burn. Maybe that would finally make her genuinely smile.

But then, he caught something.

One of her fingers was twitching. It was the only part of her body that seemed to be... defying everything else.

The moment his gaze caught it, she hid the hand behind her cloak.

Then, they walked into the cave.