Rem triedto open her crusty eyes, a few eyelashes sticking together.
What... What happened?
The smell of dirt became clear, and with that, she realized she was lying on something hard.
Why is it so hard to focus?
She opened her mouth, a small groan escaping. When she went to wipe her eyes, her arms wouldn't move.
She gently wriggled, only to realize she was bound. Rem stared ahead until she recognized what she was looking at: the night sky, bright moon and all. Her delirious gaze focused on a black part of the sky, near the ground where the stars didn't seem to exist.
The silhouette of the mountains?
The mountains.
If that was true, then she wasfaroutside the witching border.
How did she get there? Why was she bound? And when did it become night? She furrowed her brows and racked her brain... The last thing she remembered was cleaning the kitchen and getting ready for dinner.
Her heart sank as it did back when she got word her gran had succumbed to a fever: the kitchen, the stranger, and the eyes of a shifter.
In my home. There was ashifterin my house.
A guttural groan rolled out of her, her head delirious like she consumed too much sleeping tea. She breathed deeper and tucked her chin in to see her feet. Rope bound her entire torso, now aware that she lay flat on a plank of wood. The moon gave Rem her only source of light. The board she lay on jolted and began sliding on dirt, as if attached to a wagon that had stopped.
"Wha—" she aimlessly looked around again.
Even though her arms were bound, she didn't seem strapped to the board. It was as if they just bound her and tossed her there. She craned her neck and spotted a horse pulling her, its tail swaying. Next to it was another horse and a man on it.
She screamed and unintentionally rolled off of the wooden plank, hitting the dirt with a thud.
"Skítur. Hey! What are you doing?" the man yelled.
She rolled onto her stomach, trying to figure out how to stand with bound arms.
"Who are you?" she slurred, heart palpitations stealing her attention as she tried to calm down. She felt drugged.
"Well, we are sort of in the process of taking you back to the pack," the male casually replied, his feet hitting the Earth as he dismounted. "It's just me, right now. Deacon, you remember? We thought it best if you just woke up to only one of us.ThoughtI heard you stirring... Just moved the horses too soon."
She rolled on her back, unable to breathe.
"Excuse me?"
She stared at him as he walked over, the bleak moonlight casting harsh shadows on his face. He shrugged his shoulders. "I mean it can't get more obvious than this. Surely, you've heard the rumors of shifters taking Silvers?"
Nausea erupted in her stomach, her jaw shaking as a cold sweat consumed her. She couldn't remember anything past seeing him in the kitchen.I've been drugged and kidnapped. My gods. It really happened. I was so close to getting to the hunters. Mother, father...
"Where is my brother? Did you hurt him?" she yelled. “And my parents?”
"The boy is uninjured," he stated, running a hand through his chin-length, blonde hair. "Your parents both got the quill, and will be waking up at any moment. They’re still home. No harm was brought to them, although your father put up quite the fight."
No…
“Why did you grab Oliver, then? Why was he in your arms?" she managed out, suppressing a cry at the thought of her father being injured.
“Just collecting the bodies, to make sure none would follow."
She groaned again and decided that she couldn't stand to look at him. She rolled off in the other direction, stopping when more dirt got in her mouth, her teeth crunching.
