The Defiant Claim - The Claim: Book 2 [LGBTQ+]
Chapter 19 - Mik (Part 1)

The stench of silver and blood surrounded him in the dark, dank cell. Out in the middle of nowhere, guarded by a single wolf, the concrete basement was built under a secure building smaller than the cabin he and Sam lived in together. Long thin grates ran the length of the floors for blood, water, urine, and excrements to drip down and run off into a drain in the back corner. There were no windows to let in light. Only a single light bulb dangled from the middle of the space comprised of four cells. The air was stale and damp. No life had existed in this place for years—until now.

Fire burned his back, his flesh torn open from the lashes of Noodin’s silver-tipped whip. His wrists were raw from the silver chains digging into them during the lashings.

Not only did images of Sam over the last couple of months flash through his head, but so did his father. Every strike was worse than his father’s fist.

To make matters worse, he was informed that there would be no one to tend to his wounds for a long time as they were all working hard to save Sam.

Before Noodin began his punishment, Mik asked him as he clutched the wooden post, “Why did you bait me?”

“I didn’t. I told you, I had eyes everywhere. Everyone reported back to me if you stepped out of line. It didn’t surprise me that you would make a move on our highest ranking non-mated female warrior. Nikki just happened to be our best baiter. If she had free reign, she would have enticed you to mount her immediately.”

Mik groaned as Noodin tightened the chains securing him to the post, his wrists already rubbed raw.

“Never underestimate your adversary,” Noodin told him as he stepped back and grasped his whip. “Even if they are the mate of someone you care about.”

The chill of the cell’s cold grated floor was comforting against the heat of his body. His temperature was already climbing, fighting off the infection brought on by the silver. He was going to be delirious with fever by the time anyone came to him, but Sam needed their care and attention more.

Sam had to live. He had to. Mik had to see him smile again. Hear him laugh again. He had to see those robin-egg-blue eyes gaze at him again.

'He won’t ever look at you like that again,' his father’s voice whispered in his mind. 'And even if he did, you don’t deserve it. Look at you. Pathetic. You were never strong enough to take it all back. And you never will.'

Does that even matter now? Mik thought to himself.

Becoming Alpha... Taking back his inheritance...

Look what it cost him.

He deserved to be whipped. He deserved to be locked up. He deserved to have everything taken away from him.

But Sam didn’t deserve any of it.

He was surprised, actually. That he had been able to get away with as much as he did. Noodin knew he was a threat. He was responsible for attacking the pack and trying to kill others. Did he succeed? No, and he should have been killed immediately. Instead, he was spared. Instead, he was given a chance, a little bit of freedom in exchange for cooperation. To make Sam happy.

'They all knew you’d fail,' his father’s voice sneered in his head again. 'Because you’re weak. Because your mate is male.'

'Because your nature is wrong.'

He squeezed his eyes shut. His head felt like a hot iron was pressed against it. Everything burned with an invisible fire pressing down on him—like he was buried under a pile of smoldering coals and he couldn’t move. He could barely breathe.

If he died here, could Sam live on with joy?

Or would he become like Mik’s father after the death of his mate?

All around him was darkness. Water dripped somewhere in the inky blackness, a steady drip, drip, drip.

Mik looked around him, unable to see anything. It was hot and muggy. Sweat poured down his face and it didn’t matter how many times he tried to wipe it from his brow, there was more there in its place.

Steam sounded behind him and he whirled around to see the rush of mist, hot and heavy billowing out from a hole in the ground. When it stopped a few seconds later, he saw what appeared to be a tunnel on the other side.

Not knowing where he was or how he got there, Mik tromped to the tunnel. He’d never find his way out of the darkness if he didn’t try to find a way out.

His senses were useless. He couldn’t hear anything or smell anything. All he could feel was the intense heat everywhere, bearing down on him, the sweat pouring off him. No matter how long he trudged through the darkness, the heat did not lift and there was no light or sign of an exit.

Hours drifted by and Mik’s marching slowed. Thirst gripped him but not as fiercely as the heat. He could hardly get enough air into his lungs as he doubled over in the darkness, panting. Pressure pushed down on his body as if the walls of the rocky tunnel were caving in on him. His lungs constricted, unable to expand to their fullness and deliver the much-needed oxygen to his heart to pump throughout his body.

He struggled to move, to straighten up and keep moving. He had to find an exit, a source of air, an escape from the ever-increasing heat sucking the life out of him.

Legs wobbling, he reached out to the rocky wall for support, leaning his weight on it as he pressed forward with one hand clenched in a fist against his chest.

One unsteady step before the other, his breath coming in haggard gasps, he struggled forward until the rock in the wall he leaned against gave out.

With a cry, he tumbled through the wall. A blast of heat struck him as he fell through the air toward a bubbling pool of lava below. Screaming. Screaming with the momentum of his fall as his back struck the lava.

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He woke screaming, face-down on a grated floor as fire seared his back. He thrashed about, but his arms and legs were chained down to the floor and the most he could move was an inch. Sweat blinded him and his entire body burned with an invisible fire with no escape.

Beside him, a voice shushed him, a sound to soothe but offered no comfort.

“It’s me,” the pack doctor told him in a comforting tone. “I’ve come to treat your wounds.”

A long strip of icy-cold material was placed on his back and Mik roared out in pain again. The cold-fire was unlike anything he had ever experienced. It was worse than falling bareback into a pile of snow or nice. It was so cold, it shook his entire body with searing pain.

The doctor waited for him to recover a minute before placing the next strip of material slathered with some kind of healing salve to his back.

Mumbling under his breath, the doctor worked under the light from the single bulb dangling from the ceiling behind him and an oil lamp burning next to him. Disgust rolled off him and it wasn’t until Mik had calmed himself down the third time that the doctor apologized.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t get here sooner. Sam’s injuries took all day to fix. Surgery. Stitches. Plaster. Infection. I left the stitching and plastering to the nurses so I could come here. You have a severe infection. The worst I have ever seen. It may take you weeks to recover from it.”

“Sam,” Mik croaked out, his mouth desert-dry. “Sam... okay?”

The doctor heaved a sigh. “Hard to say. He’s alive for now, but whether he will pull through or not...”

He trailed off as Mik’s heart clenched within. His chest constricted tighter. Air rushed in but caught in his throat. Coughing, gasping, he couldn’t remove the block. Tears leaked out from his clenched eyes as a strangled sound of pain escaped him.

The doctor put a straw to his lips and ordered him to drink. “You’re severely dehydrated and burning up. Stay calm. Getting worked up won’t help you. Save your energy.”

Mik sucked back the liquid. It had an herbal taste sweetened with honey that coated and soothed his throat while the rest of his body burned with fever.

It took another thirty minutes for the doctor to finish treating his back, but it felt like hours. There must have been something in the drink he gave him because Mik struggled to keep his eyes open. Sweat continued to pour off him while tears continued to stream uncontrollably down his face. His nose was so plugged up he had to breathe through his mouth, which was fine because the salve on his back stank and made his stomach churn.

Sam standing on the edge of the cliff, his back to him, was the last thing Mik saw in his mind before darkness took him.

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