Read The Half Blood Luna by The Black Daisy
Chapter 15
Klaus’s POV:
I give Joseph a nod to let Ella come to the stage. He gestures for her to move without touching her. I don’t know why Ella hates him so much and is always scared of him. Although Joseph obviously cared about her ever since last night when he caught her in the forest.
She steps into the stage and stands in front of her pack with her head held high. She looks at them without showing an ounce of fear from the upcoming punishment. Even when I told her at her cell that she will be publicly whipped, she didn’t seem afraid of it at all. It was strange, but I think it’s because she has never been whipped before that she doesn’t realize it will hurt her so much. My heart felt sorry for the pain I was about to inflect on her.
“Sit down on the ground Ella” I ordered her.
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She knelt down on the ground and sat on her legs. She swept her hair to the front to give me full access, bowed her head down, and put her hands on her knees. I was caught off guard when she swept her hair out of the way. She was either in shock or so damn brave. Joseph handed me a flogger whip and stood behind me.
“I need you to count for me Joseph” I mind linked him.
I took a few steps back, prepared to give all my strength to the whipping, and began. She flinched and gasped when the first whip hit her back. I had to make each whip count, to show the pack that I will not hold back just because she was underage. My face was devoid of any emotion, but deep inside, each lash that hit her made my heart scream in pain.
Halfway through, I began to notice traces of blood staining her shirt. What the hell?
“sh*t Klaus! You are making her bleed already. Take it easy” Joseph mind linked me.
“Just focus on the counting Joseph” I ordered him angrily.
Why was she bleeding? I didn’t expect her to bleed at all, it was only supposed to leave red marks, not cut her skin open! Were my whips that strong? Was she too fragile to handle 20 whips? I kept going at the same strength; but tried to avoid hitting her on the spots she was bleeding from, I couldn’t hold back in front of the entire pack.
“How much longer Joseph?” my heart can’t handle giving her anymore.
“Just three more”
I rushed the last three whips in a row to get this over with and threw the flogger whip to the ground as I felt it burn my hand from what I just caused her to go through. Her shirt was stained with five thin streaks of blood. Her skin was definitely cut. I wanted to hurt myself for what I just did. I felt like a heartless monster.
To my utter surprise, I noticed that she didn’t open her mouth the entire time. How did she manage to suffer through all that pain so silently?
“Stand up and turn around Ella” I ordered in a very tight voice.
It took her a second to move, as she shakily got up and turned around to face me.
When I saw her face drenched in tears and agony, I felt something I have never felt before, shame and disgust at myself filled every cell inside me. I wiped away all my emotions and focused on getting this thing over with, so I could put it behind me and never think about it again.
I took out the knife she tried to K*ll herself with, and made a cut inside my palm. For the submission ceremony, my pack needed to mix my blood with theirs and drink it. For a pack that has about 200 people, it would take forever to keep cutting my palm over and over for each person. Because as soon as I make the cut, it will start to heal in a few minutes and I would have to keep cutting over and over. So, to save time, I had a blood draw this morning. There was probably still some blood left. I don’t know why, but I wanted to do the original ritual with her.
I handed her the knife and watched as she cut her palm as well. Her hands were shaking so much trying to hide the pain she was feeling from her face. My heart was screaming at me but I ignored it. She put the knife down and held the cup that had both our blood. She cleared her throat and looked up at me. Her face hid her pain so well. She was just like me, only hurting on the inside without letting anyone know.
“I, Ella Forbes, submit myself fully to you alpha Klaus Morgan” her voice came out loud and surprisingly steady. She swallowed the contents of the cup in a single shot and put it back on the table.
“You are dismissed” I said to the pack loudly.
I wanted to see the damage I did to her back but at the same time didn’t want to. If I see the cuts I made to her back, I was afraid to break down and beg her to forgive me. I can’t have that happening. I can’t let her see how much I regret my decision. An alpha never admits to making a mistake. An alpha never shows his pain. I was so torn, I felt like screaming. I was torn between checking on her and making sure she is fine, or ignoring what just happened and act like it didn’t hurt me to see her like this and be the main cause for that pain.
Everyone was leaving the auditorium, and she was about to leave as well, when I stood in her way and involuntarily asked “Are you o…” I cut myself off cursing myself. I can’t ask her that! What is she going to say, fine? She is obviously anything but that.
“I want you to go see a doctor at the pack’s hospital, Ella. You are bleeding through your shirt. I know it will heal, but until it does, it should probably be sanitized so you don’t get an infection or something” I said tightly barely controlling myself from asking to see her back or apologizing for what I just made her go through, in public.
She was looking at me in astonishment. Making me realize she didn’t expect my concern for her at all. Ok, she definitely thinks I am a heartless monster. I don’t know why I cared, but that realization made my heart hurt a little bit more.
She only gives me a nod, and waits for me to let her through. I push myself to let her go even though that is the opposite of what I wanted. I look at her stained shirt again as she heads for the exit, and my blood starts to boil.
I was left alone with Joseph, I turn to him and explode at once.
“How the hell did she bleed so f*uc*king fast Joseph? I didn’t expect there to be blood at all!”
Joseph stares at me with his eyebrows pinched and says “Honestly Klaus, I was just as surprised as you. You were hitting her so hard, but still it shouldn’t have made these cuts with this kind of flogger”
I look down at the whip I threw on the ground and get a closer look. It was a normal flogger whip. There was no way this could have happened from just 20 lashes.
“Something is not right, Joseph. I feel it” I told him. “I wanted her to lift her shirt up, so I could see what happened to her back, but I was afraid she’d think I felt guilty about her punishment”
“Don’t you? Feel guilty? I wasn’t even throwing the whip and I felt each one cut deep in my heart at the sight of her back, at the sight of her flinching from the pain you were causing her to feel, at the agony she was feeling and they will power she was mustering to not let anyone know how much she was actually hurting. No, I bet you were feeling the same thing I did, maybe even more. Why is it so hard for you to admit that what you did to her made you regret your decision? There is nothing wrong with that. An alpha admits when he is wrong, he doesn’t put a mask on his face and pretends that everything is fine. You need to face the consequences of your decisions even when you regret them. Everyone makes bad decisions sometimes, even alphas. There is no shame in that”
“But I didn’t regret my decision Joseph. I was very fair in choosing her punishment, more than fair actually. The fact that her back was bleeding halfway through the punishment, did not make me regret what I did. She should not have bled, therefore there is something wrong, and you need to go find it. Go to the hospital and see what the doctor says to her” I order him.
What I said was true. Before I started the punishment, it looked very fair and even merciful of me to only whip her twenty times, considering what she has done. But after I saw her bleed, after I saw how much pain she was in, that was what made me ashamed and disgusted at myself.
Joseph leaves me alone and exits the auditorium. I close my eyes and let out a very frustrated sigh. That was not the submission ceremony I had in mind before I left my pack. I take the flogger whip with me and head towards the office. I shut the door behind me and hide the whip inside a wooden closet that had random uninteresting things inside it. I look around the room. It was huge with large windows. There were a lot of file cabinets.
I started looking through them, trying to p@ssthe time until I hear back from Joseph. There was nothing of interest in them. I go to the large disk that was supposedly mine now. Same thing, there was nothing that had my attention on it, not even inside the drawers. I sit on the chair and close my eyes, trying to erase Ella’s tearful face from my mind.