I had never felt such despair in my life before, that too being in the arms of the one I loved so much. i couldn't even comprehend what was happening with me - I was well on my way to be with my parents and then Aiden had to come and ruin everything.

I felt Adrian's eyes on me the entire time my other mate had me in his arms, but couldn't feel at all what was going on in his mind as he watched Aiden talking to me and then whisking me away from all of them. I couldn't even mind-link him, something I was doing just moments ago.

It made me realise that I might still be capable of mind-linking, but Adrian could not respond.

It scared me.

"Cynthia, my love," Aiden spoke, kissing my hair as I remained limp in his arms, not able to see where he was taking me, "I'm going to take you far away from here so that those evil wolves are never able to reach you and take you away from me."

I wanted to snort.

I was breathing slowly. My hopes of ever being rescued and taken back to my parents was diminishing slowly. I knew that Aiden would never take me to them and I would die before letting him come near any of them.

I wondered if I would ever be able to get back home, and finally lead the peaceful life that I had always wanted.

I was so weak, I could only wrap my arms around his neck to prevent myself from falling - I couldn't trust him to hold on tight to me; I didn't want to fall down, break my neck and die.

He found that gesture loving while I could only think about how desperately I wanted to go back to my parents and just go home, be among the humans and live simply and peacefully. I didn't want fucking love - no loving husband, children or a white picket fence.

I could just adopt children and dogs and cats and all the animals.

I just didn't want to ever be in such a situation again. I didn't want to give my heart away to a man and get it back only for it to be in pieces.

Aiden was still talking to me, "I knew that they would try to turn you against me, against us vampires, again. Look what happened - for one night, I let you sleep alone and you managed to wreck my entire life - everything I worked for. I don't even have your love for myself anymore, despite me being so devoted to you."

I stared at his face, the only thing that was really visible to me right then. And I could see the sinister rage that had overtaken his handsome features - his hold on me tightening.

It was unbelievable I could still see the gorgeous man I fell in love with, and hated how I felt for him.

I was not supposed to feel this way. He was not supposed to still make me feel this way.

"Now, I'm not going to let you go. Thankfully for me, you were foolish enough to heal all those chained bastards and now you're weak enough for me to take you away without you fighting me off every step of the way. You don't know how much it had turned me on when I saw you fight off everyone back there. You are so beautiful, so strong and you're all mine. I thank Moon Goddess for giving me a second chance with a woman like you - you can not only fulfill all my desires but you can make me stronger with your blood."

Oh no. I hated this. Tears pricked my eyes.

"Aiden," I murmured, fire burning in my eyes.

"Yes, my love," he looked down at me lovingly.

"I hate you." I gritted out, wanting him to feel that I was not on the same page as him.

I didn't want to go with him anywhere, and if he had loved me enough, he would have let me go.

"No you don't, Cynthia." He grinned at me, "You still love me. You will love me no matter what I do because we are mates and mates love each other. Don't worry, once we complete the mating rituals, you won't be able to hate me at all. There will only be love between us."

I hated how confident he sounded, and I hated how right he was.

************************************

I had no clue where we were heading, but I had a feeling that it was quite far away because Aiden had been running for an hour, taking only a few stops in between to drink water. Every passing minute just added on to my dread, and the feeling that I would never be able to escape strengthened.

It felt like I was a doll; I could barely move on my own so Aiden made me sit, made me stand, picked me in his arms and I could do nothing about it. Each and every time it happened, I felt utterly humiliated, but not even a small part of me had come to regret healing everyone in the dungeon.

Maybe, it was because it was for a greater good.

Aiden kept on running for what felt like hours and I wondered about how large this supernatural world was. It wasn't as if Aiden was running at a human speed, and from what I had seen, we should've been out of the Vampire Kingdom - even the MoonLine - by now. A part of me wished for the situation to be different - I wished the man who was holding me was someone else, that I was stronger than I was now, and that I could look at the breath-taking sights around me as well as get an idea to understand where exactly we were heading.

I also wondered if he had been running in circles all this time just to confuse me; so that I couldn't judge the directions and manage to escape him when I was well enough.

Whatever it was, I was growing sick of it now, and I thought I'd puke if he went on more. Thankfully, he set me down after sometime and we were outside an innocent looking cottage that was surrounded by houses, but no one seemed to be inhabiting them.

"This is where we will be living from now on," he started, tenderly kissing my forehead, "We are going to have our happily ever after here. Just you and me, and our love to make this house a home. Our home, sweet home."

In a parallel world, this might have been one of the most romantic things Aiden has ever said to me.

But what he said to me was scary - and it made me wish that I healed soon. I tried to pick up scents from around me, any clue that I could send to someone for help. Any landmark that could give an idea about where I was.

But even my senses were numb for me to pick up on anything.

I thought about how convenient this all was for Aiden - not a single inch of me had the strength to protest and he could do whatever he wanted with me till I gained my energy. Before that, he would complete the mating rituals with me and I wouldn't be able to leave him after that.

Whatever little hope was left in me was now lost.

****************************

"My love?"

Aiden peeked into the bedroom where I was sleeping - well more like lying down on the bed. My body was afraid of letting its guard down in front of him and no matter how exhausted I was, I didn't want him to find the opportunity to drain me off my blood without me knowing about it.

He knew I was not letting a sound out of my throat, yet he coaxed me to speak or at least make a noise to let him know I was acknowledging what he was saying to me.

"Look, what I've gotten for you. It's food."

I didn't want to eat anything - nothing that came from him. I was not sure about him - I didn't trust him at all. He could have poisoned my food for all I knew and I didn't know where that would lead me.

My stomach grumbled at the sound of food, wanting to get some energy. I was tired of being so weak, constantly struggling to stay awake despite my body wanting to shut down.

I was sleeping on my side, facing the door where Aiden came from, and smelt the food. It's aroma tickled my nostrils and my stomach grumbled even more. My eyes forgot their sleepiness, and now my body was persuading me to accept the food, making me feel hungrier than I already was.

"I'll help you sit up, Cynthia - I can hear how hungry you are." He chuckled, keeping the food on the beside table. He then put his arms under my body and made me sit upright.

"Goddess, you look sick and pale. I'm such a horrible guy, leaving you hungry when you were so weak." He reached for the food once I was comfortable and I realised it was chicken soup.

Oh my stomach...

"I'll feed you." He smiled at me and tucked my hair behind my ears. My face was red with embarrassment - it was like I was a baby who needed to be fed and walked and helped all around.

"You don't have to be shy with me, Cynthia," He frowned at me, "It's food, you need energy. It's my duty to keep you comfortable."

And it was your duty to be honest with me, as my mate - it was you duty to treat my parents well and feed them as soon as you had me.

I wanted to cry.

He started the process of feeding me, and didn't say a word further. I had to be honest, each morsel of food made me feel better about myself. I was no longer so weak that I was numb to my surroundings. I could taste the food, smell the strong aroma, and feel Aiden's emotions that he was trying to make me feel.

He sincerely wanted me to get better and was worried. I could even feel the feeling of victory coursing through him as I ate.

It made me feel worse; he made me feel worse than I already felt. Once again, I wanted to cry, but I kept my tears at bay and let my stomach fill up with the food it needed.

Once it was all done, I did feel better about myself, but eating so much made me feel sleepy too.

Before closing my eyes, I wanted to get the answers to a few questions of mine - the ones that were fucking up with my brain because I kept overthinking about them. There were a lot of things I had found out that day - the information overload had not been an easy thing because half of the information was missing. I wanted to know, desperately, about the events that led to the abduction of my parents - the war that took place decades ago - and of course, I fucking wanted to know what Cassandra meant to him and how she died.

There were a lot of things Aiden had kept from me; had he told me earlier about them, things would've been different today. Back then he kept on insisting that I should have heard his side of things before jumping to conclusions. Well, this was me wanting answers - wanting to hear his side of things - so that I could finally know the truth behind everything.

"Aiden," I whispered, finding my firm voice in my throat.

"Yes, my love, Cynthia," he said cupping my cheek.

"What did Cassandra mean to you, Aiden?" I started, and continued because I wanted to explain my motivation to ask this, "You always spoke of her so fondly, I had thought that you were like an uncle to her. But then, I was going through your desk to find my grandma's photograph and I found the picture of the two of you, in wedding outfits. It broke my heart Aiden." My voice cracked slightly at the end. "I loved you so much, Aiden, but you clearly hid something very important from me, something I should have known. Not even a single person mentioned you and Cassandra in the Kingdom, Aiden. I had no clue at all."

He hung his head, remorse written on his face, "I should have told this about you before. You are right to feel this way. Maybe this was why you were so mad at me then."

"Just tell me why, Aiden." I was growing impatient.

"I'll have to tell you a few things before that, though." He started, "We are not pure vampires, we are 'tainted' as the others call us. This is because we drink a PureBlood's blood periodically to make us more powerful than we are. The downside to this was, that since we weren't pure vampires anymore, we didn't have mates, or the bond that most vampires shared. All we had was an incredible amount of strength and power that pure vampires didn't have.

But he had me - he had a mate, didn't he? Was it really because he might have a little bit of PureBlood genes?

"Everything was fine, until most of us started missing what we had. The sex, the kids and the bond and all. So we started mating with those vampires whom we were attracted to, and if we wanted kids, we just picked up one of those newborns that were born in the dungeon."

Horrible - that was what this was. I didn't contain my horror at all. I let him feel what I was feeling about what he was telling me.

He continued, "Cassandra had already been 25 years old when I had joined Lazarus's group that was aspiring to overthrow the ongoing regime. I was young then, and was attracted to her. She was so beautiful and strong, and I had loved every little thing about her right from the moment I met her."

He sighed while I continued to listen with baited breath. My heart ached as he talked about loving another woman in front of me, and I tried to remind myself that the woman had been dead long ago, and the man I was hurting for had betrayed me in the worst possible ways.

I shouldn't have felt jealous of her, for having him before me. It should have just been another love story for me - after all, there was no point in being possessive over a man who did not deserve it at all.

"She felt the same for me, and I was happier than anything else in the world. I had already resigned to a mate-less life, knowing that I had aspired to be just as 'tainted' as the rest of us were. But then, there was Cassandra, and Lazarus had no qualms about our relationship. Despite not having our bond, our love was just as strong and pure. It was human love and she had been just what I had wanted."

Aiden stopped for a moment and looked at me, trying to gauge my emotions by looking at my face. I didn't give away my jealousy, not at all, and still kept reminding myself that I was not supposed to feel for him this way.

"Lazarus started favouring me and soon I was the second in-command. We - Cassandra and I - were married by then, and did everything together - trained together, slept together, ate together, showered together. I had thought that I would never ever get enough of her - she had always been that special to me. After a few years, we managed to overthrow the rulers and set ourselves up as the Royals of the Kingdom. For some time, she and I still went out and caught some PureBloods for everybody to feed on.

"The war happened, and after that, a meeting was held with the Werewolf Royals, and something changed in her in that meeting. She started growing distant, she stopped sleeping with me, and a lot of things happened that made me worry about her. Then all of a sudden one day, she disappeared. We got the word that the Werewolves had her and Jaxon was seducing her."

Goddess, Jaxon. I couldn't believe this.

"She was returned to us, dying, battered and she took her last breath in my arms. I didn't know what they had done to her, but all I could see was that they had killed the love of my life and I wanted revenge. We all wanted revenge. There's nothing else much to tell about her - so I know I should have told you before."

That's exactly what I was thinking.

"Then why didn't you tell me, before? It's not like she's alive or you have something big to hide." I asked him.

"I don't know why I didn't tell you, honestly. I didn't want to lose you, I guess. I had found my second chance in you and I didn't want to take any chances with you. Losing would kill me, Cynthia. I want to be with you till I take my last breath - immortal or not."

I wondered how the situation would have been had Cassandra been alive - it made me shiver thinking that there could have been a possibility of me never finding out my parents.

"You didn't tell me about my parents. How did they end up in your dungeon? And what about the war? What was your role in it?" I asked him. Now that we were done with the easier question, I wanted to know the answer to the tougher one.

He tensed up slightly, and I could see that he was deciding if he really wanted to tell me or not. But then he just shrugged and went ahead.

"The war was all us, Cynthia. It was a well orchestrated plan that was carried out by all of us, and the Werewolves, PureBloods and Wiccans were dancing to our tunes. Since we were hunting the PureBloods, it had come to the notice of the PureBlood Kingdom that they were losing their people and they didn't know how. People just vanished into thin air and never returned. So before the PureBloods could alert anyone else, we planned to create misunderstandings between both of our strongest enemies.

"The war ensued, a lot of people died. The PureBloods and Werewolves had somehow turned against us and we had realised that they knew we were the ones turning them against each other. Naturally, we were stronger than the individuals of either of the Kingdoms and the PureBloods lost a lot of people - or that was what they thought. We had captured most of them, without them knowing and held them captive with us for years. Your parents were one of them.

"We didn't need your mother, but your father seemed to endure much more in her presence and his survival instincts were stronger with her by his side - that was exactly how we needed him, barely alive." My blood was boiling, "He had been a pain in the ass before. None of us ever knew that they had a daughter. It was quite later on we realised when Lazarus had found you and we had to trick it out of your parents. It had destroyed them to know that I was your mate."

The story wasn't very revealing and he didn't tell me anything I didn't know or guessed. This was his side of the story? He thought telling this to me was going to sway me to be at his side during that war? He said absolutely nothing to prove his innocence in the entire situation and every part of me wanted to strangle him.

"I couldn't tell you, Cynthia." He said, "You would have left me without a second thought - I can't live without you. I only have you now, and I'm not letting you go."

His eyes ran all over my face while I kept silent.

"You look tired, love, I know you can't sleep. Come on, I'll help you." He murmured softly.

Then he sat cross-legged and pulled me into his lap, stroking my skin, soothingly, wherever his hands reached me. He stayed like that until I fell asleep, whispering sweet nothings in my ears and rocking me softly so that I fell asleep soon.

Even in my nightmares, I could feel that I was pitying myself for the situation I had put myself in.

I was trapped with a psychopath and was completely at his mercy