005– Sadness & Sorrow

[~♠CORAL♠~]

I had cried myself to sleep again and when I awoke, wrapped around myself, the sun was already high up in the sky. The blinding rays filled my room and filled my senses with the same heavy sensation I’ve been carrying for a week now, locked in my bedroom.

And despite the trials of my parents to reach out to me, I just couldn’t pull myself together to communicate with anyone. My brothers— or should I say, my mates now, didn’t fail to show their turbulence as well. But I’d refused to see them either, ignoring the pounding sensation in my chest that wants me to be nowhere else but in their embrace.

My bedroom had become my solace and crying myself to sleep right after pleading to the moon goddess for forgiveness, if I had done anything to dishonor her, had become a routine.

But each day, still, I wake up with the same churning feeling in my chest and inkless inscription, that I’m still mated to my brothers.

The burning feeling, a raging evidence of the reality of my fate.

My face felt heavy and dry and my throat felt patchy and sore and it hurt from the dryness blocking it off. I dragged my body up till I’m sitting up against the edge of my bed, my head rested against the headboard with a pillow to my chest as my feet pulled against it and I stared out the window tiredly, gazing into nothingness and watching the birds flutter around joyously.

A soft knock on my door stirred me away from the scenery and I turned my head towards the door before slowly gathering myself and leaping off the bed. Mother’s holding a breakfast tray in her hands when I pull the door open— usually, she would just leave it at my doorstep after knocking and I’d wait for her retracting footsteps to fade away before approaching the door.

She stood still for a while, her cobalt blue eyes widened when she saw me.

“B-Breakfast?” Her gentle voice filled me with new warmth. The first word that I’d heard clearly, unblocked by the door, spilled out of my mother’s lips.

For a week, I’d spoken to no one, seen nor gazed at no one, answered to no one. I’d hear my mother’s soft words when she’d bring me breakfast or lunch, even dinner, pleading for me to come out. Sometimes it was father, other times, it was Aga, the housekeeper and every other moment than that, my brothers— mates, would call to me but I didn’t say a word to them either.

I blinked, realizing that I didn’t wait for her footstep to fade away before I’d pulled the door open.

But I couldn’t bring myself to shut the door in her face either when she was looking at me with those eyes and soft smile that greets me with so much warmth that it washed away the heavy feeling weighing on my chest.

“Can I come in, honey?” Her voice shook with waryness. Clamping my bottom lip with my teeth, I held her worried gaze for a moment before I found myself nodding and stepping to the side of my door. Her cloudy gaze brightened instantly and she practically rushed in like a child allowed to go outside for the first time in weeks.

Closing the door as she stepped in, mother put down the tray onto the nightstand and turned to face me. I sift on my heels with my toes crossing over the other and one hand slung over my other arm. None of us said a word but then she stretched out her arms towards me with her gentle, warm smile echoing a silent call to me.

I reach towards it, falling into her embrace in the next moment and I let it all out again. The hurt, the regret, the ache… all of it clogging my heart. I held onto my mother and relinquished the warmth of her embrace.

“I’m sorry.” My throat felt as though it’s been slit open by a knife when I tried to speak. I cried for a while and mother did nothing but hold me in her arms, whispering soft words to me as she threaded her fingers through my soft red waves till I couldn’t cry anymore.

“Don’t be,” She comforted as she offered me a cup of water from the tray she’d come in with, threading gentle fingers through the roots of my hair as she watched me gobbled down the content of my cup. “You had every right to feel as you do and I understand perfectly, my love.”

She cups my face in her hand before letting it fall to the cup in my hand, “But I wish you’d open up earlier then maybe, you wouldn’t have to carry your anguish for so long.” She states and I throw my gaze down, taking my bottom lip between my teeth.

She tilts my head up so I’m looking back at her. “But I also know you’re hurting and probably more confused than you’ve ever been in your entire life about your mates. You’re questioning yourself and a lot of things about your fate,” she says and I nod, wishing she’d provide the answers I so desperately needed. And perhaps… a relief.

Mother takes the cup from my hand and places it back on the tray beside her. She clamps my hands with hers and rubs her thumbs over it soothingly.

“I want to relieve you of your anguish because it hurts me even more to see you this way,” she starts to say, “I just… we didn’t think it’d ever come to this… we didn’t know you’d be mated to your brothers.” but there was an anxious bundle of air clinging to her as she spoke.

“W-What do you mean, mother?” I spoke softer this time but my throat still hurt from the patchiness.

She breathes, her fingers wrapped tighter ever so slightly over mine and my mind tingled from the anticipation.

“What’s wrong?” I inquire.

Mother’s full lips turned into a thin line before they moved again. “There’s something you need to know… your father and I and your mates would like to tell you,” she pronounced stiffly as though looking for the best words to convey her thoughts.

And my forehead creases with a frown, “Tell me what?”

“But first… how about you eat breakfast, it’s getting cold.” She says dismissively.

I shake my head, scorning at the food. It was the first time I’d really looked at it; poached egg, bacon with slices of bread and a cup of apple flavored tea. I would have jumped on it any other day but my mother’s anxious words were the only thing filling my head right now and she’s hardly ever anxious about anything.

“I don’t want any of it.” I say, turning back to her and she was watching me with wide eyes.

“Coral—”

“Mother, please…. I need to know. Tell me what’s wrong, you’re anxious.”

Something swirls in her cobalt blue eyes as she watches me with an uncanny gaze, “Nothing ever gets past you, does it?” she adds with a little laugh and I smile a little as well, shrugging.

Then she lets out a deeper breath, “Alright then, let’s go downstairs.” She announces and stands almost abruptly from where she’s sitting on the bed and I’m pulled up along with her.

I say nothing else as I tail behind my mother. The nostalgic smell of my home filled my nostrils as we made our way down the hallway to the landing at the top of the stairs. Half way descending onto it, we’re both stopped by the loud crash that came from something heavy smacking against the wall.

I hurried on my feet, leaving mother behind as my feet carried me without thought, down the path leading to the living room, where their scents were mixed with another homely presence.

And I halted at the doorway, my hands clamps over my mouth at the destructive sight in front of me. The walls were bashed in, furniture displaced, books knocked off from the little shelf behind the couch and my brothers— mates, laid bruised and groaning in distress over my raging father’s beating.

He stood over Raegan, huffing out angry breaths of air, his shoulders tensed, teeth clenched and eyes blazing a smoldering sliver with blooded fist. He looked just as ready to shift and devour. Father might have retired but he was still as formidable and he stood over them like an ancient oak tree.

And my brothers, as powerful as they were, didn't stand a chance against him. His arm stretched to grab Raegan and I got the sense that he was going to hit him again.

“Father… wait!” My legs carried me instinctively towards Raegan’s hanging body as father readied his punch. It didn’t matter anymore that he’d been my brother for the past eighteen years.

At that moment, all that mattered was that I didn’t want him to get hurt any more than he already was. It didn’t matter that I didn’t want to accept the reality of my fate.

Because right now, all I ever wanted was to protect Raegan from my father’s deep wrath.

“How could you three be so foolish as to lie to us?” My father’s thunderous words trapped my feet to the ground and I watched as he thrust Raegan’s body against a wall. “Because of your foolishness, you might lose your mate, forever!”

My heart stopped, “Wh-What are you talking about, father?”

The air grew thicker as I felt all four gazes at me but the one that held me captive even though I'd just asked my father a question, was Raegan's wide, haunted orbs.