Wake up

Chapter Eight.

Wake up.

Cadi's p o v.

How do you force yourself to wake up from a dream? I've told myself to wake up hundreds of times, I've tried to bully and even threaten myself into waking up. I've even gone as far as causing myself bodily harm, perhaps that will force my brain to wake up. I've got to wake up and snap out of this ridiculous dream I seem to be stuck in. I won't delude myself into thinking it's real. It has to be a dream, that's the only reasonable and logical explanation. It would be extremely ridiculous to think of the happenings of the past few days as reality. If not a dream, pray tell me how is it possible that my sister, my twin sister, the person I grew up calling my better half has turned me into chattel, she has turned me into a souvenir and given me out as a gift to her guest, how? Just how? A week ago the whole palace and even the whole of Great lake pack was thrown into turmoil when Fera informed us that the newly crowned Lycan king and his first mate were coming for a visit. The whole pack was thrown into uproar and everyone went into a frenzy of cleaning and preparations. They were to be specially received in a spotless environment. They may have visited the pack before, during the ascension ceremony, but that was only as one of many guests. And besides he had been a Lycan prince then, now he was the Lycan king, the most powerful wolf in the entire Lycan empire. This visit was of utmost importance. Dozens of events were organized and arranged solely for their entertainment. Everyone, from the oldest wolf to the youngest wolf, was excited about their visit, and determined to impress them. With the exception of yours truly of course. For apparently obvious reasons. The entire pack was supremely overjoyed because they felt that this visit meant that the new Lycan king was ready and willing to continue the friendship between his father and Alpha Ryker, Zita's father, to the next generation. For the life of me I couldn't figure out how I felt about the visit, for some reason the thought of seeing "him" again boiled my blood, the thought of his voice and his hands on me sends shivers down my spine, and on the other hand I'm was scared to look into those mesmerizing silver again, not that I had any chance seeing either the eyes or their owner, Fera wouldn't let me within a hundred yards of them. Fera worked me and all the other workers to the bone to clean the entire palace from top to bottom. She made me spend two whole hours brushing her fur. The last three days before their arrival was hell on earth. I spent the whole time on my feet. As soon as I finished one chore and tried to take a nap or something, Fera came to find me and gave me another chore to do. It was almost like she couldn't bear to see me not working. Everyone went to the reception ceremony, except me, I had worked so hard for the past few days and was so happy to finally be able to rest that I fell asleep as soon as my head and ended up sleeping through all the hullabaloo of the reception ceremony and the welcome dinner, waking up in the middle of the night to sneak to the kitchen and gorge myself on leftovers before going back to bed. Delia told me earlier this morning that the king's mate Megan and Fera had appeared pretty chummy during the welcome dinner and had spent a considerable amount of time with their heads together in close conversation in the study after the welcome dinner, talking and eating cheese cake. If I had to hazard a guess, I would say that was when the plan to give me to her as a souvenir for her visit was hatched.

I was in the kitchen this morning, helping Delia tidy up the kitchen- since I've become the Jill of all trades servant, care of my darling twin sister, when the " evil witch of the west" alias Fera came in.

" Cadi," she called in that annoying high pitched squeaky voice she uses now. " Go, get yourself ready, you're leaving with our guests, Megan and her co-mate could use you. She doesn't even mind you having your bastard baby in her home, if you're good, maybe they'll let you keep it. So long sis," she wriggled her fingers at me and sauntered out.

It's a good thing Delia was holding my hands to help me put on my protective gloves or I'm quite sure I would have jumped her and clawed her eyes out. Her announcement left the whole kitchen in shock, it was quite some time before everyone was able to regain their aplomb and get back to work. Not for me though, infact I still don't believe I've managed to regain my aplomb or whether I will in the very near future. I was so shocked I almost fell, I would have surely landed on the floor if Delia hadn't grabbed my arm, walked me to a chair, sat me down and forced a glass of firewhiskey into my shaking hands. It's a wonder I didn't slosh it all over her. She left me there and went back to her work without saying a word. Everyone else ignored me, it was like they hadn't just heard my sister tell me, she had given me out as a souvenir.

I sat there with my mind in turmoil, it was like they were two warring factions in my head.

" Run away," one said. " Get up now, and start working."

" Where would you go?" The other asked. " You know you don't have any skills, you can't survive as a lone wolf."

" So you would rather go and be a slave to the king's mates, run away now, you could get some help," the first voice insisted.

" From who," the second voice retorted." Everyone in the pack is scared of Fera, do you really think any of them will risk her wrath by helping you. Besides you don't know how the king's household is going to be, perhaps it won't be as bad as you think. And besides, your baby will be close to his or her father, despite the circumstances.``

" Really," the first voice interjected. " You're really going to trust your baby's safety to maybes in a strange place. And you know you're never to be able to claim the king as your child's father."

" God," I sighed, holding my head in my hands, "just how unpredictable can life get."

I laughed bitterly. This has to be a dream, just sit here for a while and you'll wake up and find that this was a dream, maybe if you're really lucky everything will be a dream and you'll wake up in your bed and tell Fera all about the crazy dream you had over breakfast.

I sighed heavily as I got up, might as well stop deluding myself and go get my meager belongings and their owner ready.