Taken Over (Book 2 The Ravening Series) (50 page)

  
“I
’
m
sure that you are fine Bethany
.
I would see the difference already, I would
feel
it.
He would have wanted to draw out the torture, extend it for as long as possible. In order to do so he wouldn’t take much from you.”

   “So he said,” I muttered bitterly. “He wanted to punish me, but mostly he wanted to punish you.”

   Despair twisted
his features. “
I promise you that
no
one will
ever
touch you like that again.
”
I tried to find solace in his words, but I was terrified
,
and I was suddenly very cold.
“Let’s get you out of here. You’re freezing.”

   He helped me to my feet, but it was not the chilly air that was causing my shivers to increase.
It was t
he icy chill that encompassed
my
bones
,
e
ncompassed my soul.
E
ven now
there may
be
something
growing inside of me
,
twisting me,
changing me
into someone that I may not know
.
I couldn’t even trust my own body, couldn’t trust myself anymore.
I tilted me head back to look up at him, his jaw was locked, his gaze focused ahead as he led me through the forest. He was beautiful, nearly perfect, but that beauty hid something dark, something hard and cold
that I had never know resided beneath that magnificent exterior
. Something that warmed
only
to me.
Abby had
told me once that I was the only one Cade warmed to
;
I had
wanted to tell her she was wrong that he was not as cold as he appeared, but I’d never lied to my sister and I hadn’t then. She’d been right, I’d known it, but
I hadn’t truly
got
ten
it
until
now.

 
The only thing human about Cade was me.

   Without me he was just as harsh, brutal, and volatile as the rest of his kind. A fact that he had proven with his swift and unremorseful slaughter of Ian. The good in him was really good, but the
viciousness within him was just as engrained and just as encompassing. I shuddered to think what he would become, what he would
do
if something ever did happen to me. It would be horrible. 

   “Can they be defeated
?”

   He shook his head, sadness crept over him. “I don’t know Bethany. The way we stand now, no. If we could find a larger group of survivors we may be able to put up a bigger fight
, but I’m not sure if that’s going to happen
.
For now, it’s probably best if we lay low;
try to survive
until we find a safer place to stay
. They normally don’t stay in one place too long,
they tend to get bored. T
he other planets they’ve taken over did
not possess human intelligence
.
” He turned to me, his eyes slowly scanning over me.
“Or your fierce survival instinct.
They’ve known all along
humans would
be their biggest fight.”

   “Good,” I replied forcefully. They may be kicking our asses, but I took pride in the fact that they were also afraid of us. They’d had to
decimate
our
population
in order to
cripple
us
as badly as they had
. “What are those
creatures that are hunting u
s Cade? Are they like you? Are they pets? What
are
they?”

   He sighed softly, his arm wrapped around my shoulder as he pulled me closer to his side. “They were genetically engineered
for another planet, one that my kind
could not survive on du
e
to
the air being inhospitable
for them
. They were set loose to collect blood and bring back survivors
in order to harvest
the souls. It wasn’t until
E
arth
, and the large population it possessed
,
that the victims were
frozen
first
to keep the resistance down
. An ingredient to wake the people was added to the creatures.”

   “Why
did
they do that though?
Why do they want them to reawaken?
”

   “Because they enjoy the suffering.”

   “Of course they do,” I muttered bitterly.

   “It is only
extreme
pain that will wake people from The Freezing
, only those things
.
It’s why I never told you about it, why I never tried to have your mother
reawakened.
”

   “I would have lost her either way.”

   His hand tightened on my shoulder, he hugged me tighter against him. “I’m sorry Bethany, if there was something I could have done…”

   “It’s ok, I know. She’s not in pain now; she never had to know that kind of pain thankfully. Was she aware of her death?” The words choked out of me, I had asked the question but I wasn’t sure I wanted the answer.

   “No, they aren’t aware of what is happening to them.” Relief filled me; tears of joy filled my eyes. She hadn’t suffered, she hadn’t known. It was more solace than I’d ever hoped to find in the senseless and malicious death of my mother. “Their brain is immobilized also. I’m sure if there was a way for them to figure out how to shut everything down, and keep the brain running they would, but thankfully they haven’t conquered that bit of cruelty yet.”

   I shuddered at the thought. “Thankfully.”   

“
It is a new technology, one that they haven’t mastered yet, but they
wanted
to make sure that their creatures, or pets if you will, were at the very least a
ble to reawaken the humans
and they wanted to make sure they suffered in the awakening
.
They also had to make sure that the humans that were awakened again were kept immobile until they could be brought to a holding area.”

   “And that pain de
finitely keeps someone immobile.”

   His hand tightened on my arm. “I wish I could take that from you.”

   I shook my head, brushing back a loose strand of hair.
“I’m glad I know, I suppose.” I wished that I could forget, but it was something I was stuck with, and I was glad I knew what those other people were going through. “You knew that when you hurt Peter though.”

   “I didn’t burn Peter
;
he wasn’t a bad
old man
I wouldn’t hurt him for no reason
.”

   “But I smelled hair…”

   “I heal fast.” I gaped up at him. He hadn’t hurt Peter after all, even if it had been only to make us realize that normal pain wasn
’
t enough to help them.
Maybe there was a little more
human in him than I had thought
.
 

   “Those things don’t drain the soul?”

   “No. That’s only us.”

   “Have they always been able to mimic a human being?”

   I didn’t like the dark look that crossed his face, nor the tight set of his clenched jaws. “That is a new talent,” he said slowly. “One that I didn’t even know about, but the leaders d
on’t share all of their secrets, e
specially not with the ones of us that have been put on Earth.”

   “Why not?”

   He shrugged absently. “We’re not p
rivy to
the inner circle, not once we’re placed here. Our main duties are to infiltrate and report our findings. The politics that play out amongst the leaders have little impact on our lives.
I was only told when the invasion was going to happen a month before graduation.
”

  
“I see.”
I frowned
as I thought o
ver his words. “If this hadn’t happened, you never would have come for me would you have? You would have let me stay with Bret.”

   His hand tightened on me, he was silent for a long moment. “I hated you with him, I truly did, but yes I would have left you alone to live your own life. If I thought they would have allowed me to be with you, to marry you, I would have come for you in a heartbeat but
though we do not have children with them we are only allowed to marry influential and powerful people, if we marry people at all. I was to marry one of my kind, she was adopted by couple who possessed old money and lots of power. It was a match that was made as soon as I was placed with the Marshall’s, we were going to meet at college and marry after graduation. I’ve never met her.”

   Pain flashed through me, I could only gape at him. He was so cold, so analytical about marrying a girl he’d never even known. And he would have, I was certain of it. “
If I’d ever hinted that I wanted
to marry you, wanted to be with you, they would have killed you. If I’d tried to deny the arrangement they would have killed me.”

   “You would have married her.”

   “And I would have known where you were every moment of it. When they decided to invade I still would have come for you. I would have taken you, Bret, your children…”

   “Cade...”

   “And I would have saved you all if it made you happy Bethany. It would have destroyed me to let another man have you but I never would have put your life in danger.”

   “You could have come to me, you could have explained,” I breathed. “I would have listened to you, I would have believed you; I would have run away with you.”

   “And left your family behind?” I opened my mouth to say yes, but the word froze in my throat. “They had already known the loss of your father; would you have left them still?”

   “I would have loved you.”

  
His head tilted, a single strand of midnight hair fell into the corner of his eye. “I know you would have and it would have gotten you nothing but a life of secrets, pain, and misery. It may have even cost you your life. I wasn’t going to let that happen, no matter how badly I wanted it to.”
   

   My heart swelled with love for him, tears slid silently down my face. “
What do
you
take
your souls from
?”