9. Kinds of Darkness

Sona wasn’t familiar with this kind of darkness. Personally, at least. She’d saved many from its bleak nothingness. But the only darkness she would accept for a long, long time was sleep.
She had to awake from both.
Voices drew her consciousness forward. Her ears started to work just after her brain.
“She sure can inflict damage, for a healer.”
“She’s still a werewolf. But is it true? Are either of them dead?”
“Duko is fine, still healing—slow, thanks to the too-young healer they brought on. In my opinion, Master Auryn should’ve taught more apprentices—”
“What about Barden?”
“He was bleeding out from a gash in his neck, but I think he’s still alive. Barely.”
“I hope both of them are alright…they’re our friends.”
Sona managed to open her eyes through a layer of crust. A different darkness greeted her—not so complete, thank the goddess, with flickering candlelight to dance off water-slick stone walls and bounce off puddles on the uneven ground…and glint off the metal bars in front of her.
Sona knew exactly where she was. 
The underground prison under the Alpha’s manor.
Her sense of smell and touch returned last. Wet, seeping cold soaked through her skin and hair, chilling her to the marrow. She was already shivering, but now that she’d come to, the small spasms increased. She took in a deep, shaky breath to fill her lungs—only to choke on the dampness and rot.
Well, the *pain* returned last. The crust sealing her eyes? Dried blood. Not just from the fight—that was crystal-clear now—but from her nose that was undeniably broken, in such an angle that her super-healing wasn’t able to correct it without assistance. When she touched it tenderly, her entire hand and arm were bloody.
*I almost killed two werewolves*.
The thought alone could have devastated her.* I almost broke my oath—to only ever heal, to save, to protect others from the shadow of death*.
Not bring them to it.
Sona forced herself to start on her hands and knees so she didn’t keel over when the blood rushed out of her head. Once she achieved that, a gasp ripped out of her. “Pa.”
Her cell was small and empty. She scrambled to her feet—only to be jerked back by the chains attached from her wrists and ankles to the floor. They were just long enough for her to slam against the bars. Not much of her head could fit between them. “Pa!”
A sudden body had her reeling back. “He’s fine,” snapped the Epsilon male. He was one of the voices she’d heard a minute ago, the one who sounded apathetic to his fellows. “Don’t shout, it’s too echoey in here.”
The other male joined beside him. “By the moon goddess’s hell.”
“Del,” Sona rasped. Was it wrong that she was delighted to see him? How the roles had been reserved—her so injured, him in good health. “Please, get me out of here—”
She didn’t recognize the hesitation in his eyes that were normally so bright with mirth and mischievousness. He backed up slowly as if she had some contagious disease, shaking his head. “I—I can’t, Sona. I…”
“He follows the order of the Alpha and Gamma, not a healer who murdered our Luna,” the first male barked savagely, slamming his palm into a bar, startling her backward further. “I never thought I would want to mistreat a Goldwater female before.”
Goldwater females were known for their lithe beauty. They’d been called delicate and pretty to look at, but like their instrument of craft, they were stronger than gold.
Desperate rage burned her chill away. “*What*?! I’m not a killer, and this has nothing to do with my birth pack! Let me speak to Conri—or Arden! Del, please, you can’t think I would’ve done that! I love Amaris—”
Del chewed on his lower lip. She didn’t realize how much of a youngling he still was. “But…you made the tea.”
Sona’s mind flew through the memory of—of however long ago. The events that led up to her imprisonment. “Vallea,” she gasped. She knew it without a doubt. “It was Vallea!”
The male snorted. He was tall and broad as any Epsilon, but his eyes were gray, marking him as Leto pack. His mate must be Moonvalley if he lived here—or was orphaned just like Conri. “Vallea is the Luna’s trusted attendant. Why would she poison her?”
“That’s the same scenario,” she protested. “Lycus,” she realized with a jolt. “I never forget a patient’s face. I set your broken arm a year ago—”
“And I thank you for it,” he interrupted, looking away. “But things have changed.”
Now her mind was moving through thoughts faster than she could soundly translate. “Artem! Artem, is he okay?” she demanded, feeling another spike of terror. More often than not a mate could die of heartbreak if their mate died.
“No,” Del said before the other could reply. “But Arden is with him. He’ll be okay.”
“No he won’t! He can die too if—” Sona realized there wasn’t much she could do even if they let her go to him. She could heal many things, but a broken heart wasn’t one of them, much less preventable in this situation.
“We will keep our Alpha alive if it’s the last thing we Epsilon do,” Lycus growled.
Sona inherited her grandfather’s sharp but fleeting anger. It made her say coldly, “Then go check on him.”
Lycus’s jaw worked. “You’ve lost your credibility here, Mistress.”
“Then you’re a fucking liar.”
He roared, jamming his arm through the bar as if he hoped to grab her throat. Sona backed into the wall, torn between fear and being miffed. 
“Stop, Lycus!” Del shouted. He tried to pull Lycus away, but it was like a pup pushing a rock. Then he let go and turned on his heel. “Gamma.”
 The Epsilon retreated and faced his captain. “Gamma. The prisoner—”
“Is mine to deal with. Leave.” 
Sona barely recognized Conri’s voice. It was deep and raspy, but there was something dark in it. The first word that came to mind was *evil*. 
His broad form filled the width of her cell, backlit by the dim firelight. The moment she saw his expression, she inhaled sharply, her emotions flitting from fear to a sad kind of sympathy. 
“You look like the dead,” she whispered.
“You would know,” he growled. 
Sympathy gone. Sona moved forward and grabbed the bars, getting in his face as much as she could, and sneered, “How are you and Vallea doing together? That’s why—”
Conri snarled and bared his teeth. “I didn’t come here to be interrogated. I was going to tell you that maybe we aren’t meant for each other anymore.”
It took her a moment for her mind to even let the words register. Her voice was barely a whisper—maybe it was a plea, or maybe it was a challenge. “Because?”
“Conflicting ideals.”
*Retaliation isn’t the answer. I barely recognize you anymore*. “Did she mean to kill Artem and Arden too?” she asked. Conri’s eyes flashed dangerously. “So you could become Alpha? You’re next in line if they’re both dead.”
The words felt foul. Just the thought of either of them ending the way Amaris just did… She had to swallow the bile that rose in her throat. 
She just had to make sure she no longer cared about her mate anymore.
“Watch your pretty healer’s mouth,” he barked. “Are you suggesting Vallea and me—”
“Never to heal *you* again. She confirmed it herself that you’re fucking behind my back, you despicable bastard.”
Conri’s teeth grated and he slammed the bars with a hand. He was *furious*. She stumbled back again. “I don’t want to be Alpha,” he snapped.
“Really,” she laughed in disbelief, feeling sanity start to slip away, scrambling wildly for accusations. “Vallea thinks you do. What did you two talk about as she slept in our bed? If you killed your own family, you could finally have your war.”
*That was so morbid. Why the hell did I say that?*
“I don’t want war, Sona!” Conri roared. “I want to protect what I love!”
“But that doesn’t include me anymore, does it?”
Conri’s shoulders lost their tension, but his expression didn’t lose its venom. Mates had a special connection that strengthened over time; it was a deep understanding between their two souls. While theirs had been dimming for a while now, Sona still knew that he wasn’t arguing back because she was right, and he had no excuses to deny it. 
He and Vallea *did* share a bed. He *had* said something to her.
*“Fine day, isn’t it?”*
*“No doubt a beautiful night, too.”*
At least they both knew it wasn’t herself or Conri—they both loved Amaris Roshan too much to risk her for what they wanted to achieve. What *he* wanted to achieve.
Maybe it wasn’t becoming Alpha. But he had something he wanted. She just had to figure out what.
“You’re my soulmate, Sona,” said Conri finally. “We were designed to be together. But mates aren’t always meant to be, are they? They can grow apart, even die, and our hearts will still ache so much the pain is unbearable. I’ll always care about you.”
Sona’s jaw was clenched. Her heart was breaking, and it was *angry*. *She* was angry. “But not love.”
He kept her stare, even when he said, “No.”
“Then fuck off, Conri.”
“Goodbye, Sona. I hope you find your second-chance mate.”
“Wait,” she gasped out. She’d wanted to say something else, but his words stopped her short. “What did you just say?”
Conri started to turn away, but he glanced back, and there was nothing in his eyes—no warmth, no cold, just…empty. “Do you believe in those? A second soulmate?”
“I…I don’t know.” She never thought to elaborate on the possibility because she didn’t need to. She would have Conri until their dying day. “Do you? Do you think yours is Vallea?”
He shrugged and turned again, but she snatched his sleeve and barked, “Conri. My son—”
“*Our* son,” he interrupted flatly. “I won’t have him in the custody of a murderer.”
“I’m not the killer and you know it, you bastard! And neither is my grandfather!”
Conri shrugged her off as if she was no more than a desperate crook. “What have you to prove it, Sona? The punishment for killing the Alpha or the Luna is death by death.”
Death by death. The Luna died by whatever poison Vallea put in Sona’s tea. That meant so would Sona.
“I heal wolves,” she told him, a plea finally entering her voice, “not kill them. You know how much that oath means to me. How much that means to Auryn.”
“Oaths change.”
Sona spit in his face.
It felt good, satisfactory, if only fleetingly. He might as well be spitting on her very beliefs, everything she held dear, as if he truly was detached of feeling for her.
Conri wiped it off. “I have a say in your death sentence, you know, Sona.”
“You’d give the order to kill your own mate?”
Conri’s jaw worked, finally hesitating. He said instead, “My only goal was to protect you—and Raff, and Arden, and…and Amaris—”
“I know. You told me. I believe you, because you’re telling the truth. But Amaris is gone. Artem might die, too, Conri, of heartbreak. That would leave your brother. You wouldn’t do anything to lose him, would you?”
His throat bobbed. “Why would I harm the last of three family I have left?”
It should have been comforting, but instead Sona’s dread only grew. And it was because they both knew that Arden was not ready to be the Alpha, and if he was, he would always do what his father would have done—and that goal of keeping the peace would still be in Conri’s way.
“How far?” she whispered. “How far are you willing to go for what you want? What *do* you want?”
Conri came in close. “As far as I need to,” he whispered back. Then he straightened. “Your trial is tomorrow morning. See you in the square.”
Sona tried to keep it together. Tried to hold onto whatever was left of reasonability. But Conri—and Vallea—and thoroughly shredded it into little enough pieces that they slipped through her fingers.
She couldn’t tell if she wanted to scream or wept first as she sank to the cold floor. She settled for some ugly, strangled thing that scraped from her already-raw throat.
“Granddaughter?”
Her head jerked up, breaking the sob. “Pa?”
“Does it always take this long for me to wake my old ass up?”
Sona’s smile was so wide it hurt, and she was laughing through the tears that overflowed with relief that he was still alive. She could hear him shuffling around beside her on the other side of the stone wall. “Sometimes. Not when I made lavender rabbit in the morning.”
Auryn wheezed a laugh, and then started hacking violently. “They rattled my brain, Vinna.”