The beast and the blessed novel by Ashley Breanne novel Chapter 74

Seventy-Four: Natalie

Natalie’s P.O.V.

Killian had been pulled away, and I was back to being locked in our room like the helpless damsel in distress they saw me as. I was getting stronger every day. But I had a long way to go, especially with my magic.

Only a few people knew about it. I was sure that Rona would run her mouth sooner or later. The family and my immediate guards were the only ones we planned to tell about it. I had ruined that by accidentally using my magic on Rona.

Telling people was still on a need-to-know basis, and no one else needed to know for now.

They would probably have their own reservations about the matter. I feared it would become like the healers again, with people trying to capture and control me. My mother had said that she had been hunted for years. Was that to be my fate too?

Mother.

I wasn't sure how I felt about that word when talking about someone other than the woman who had raised me. But it was what and who I needed. I needed a family member, a mother, to hug, hold me close, and tell me everything would be okay.

The war in my mind between my wolf and magic was leaving me with a constant migraine, and if anyone knew how to overcome that obstacle, it would be her. She had said that I would see her again. But I didn't know when, and I didn't know for how long.

I wanted to return to visit her, but I had more important things to focus on.

My legs were crossed under me as I sat on the couch in the sitting room. George and Tobias were waiting outside, but Thomas had decided to join me inside the room. His back was against the wall, and he periodically scanned the empty room every few minutes.

His eyes would turn black as someone spoke to him through the mind link, and I grew more curious.

'How did you learn Latin, Thomas?" His eyes never traveled to me as the wind picked up outside, but he smiled softly as he answered.

'My mother taught me. She spoke it fluently. She worked with the archives and always said it was important to know the languages in which our past was written to educate ourselves and better our future. She knew seven languages, but I only picked up a couple.1'

I looked back down at the glass of water on the coffee table before me, glaring at it as I waited for it to levitate, spill, or turn to tequila. A quick inhale through my nose confirmed that I had failed. "That is very wise of her."

'It is,' He nodded in agreement, eyeing the water glass with amusement before looking away again. He took his job very seriously, and I appreciated that.

He was very young, no more than a year or two older than me, and I knew he had worked hard to get his position at my side so early in life. 'Back when the humans had overpopulated, they had put rules in place that the people and governments were supposed to live by. The original documents were written in cursive.

'Their governing body loved to distract their people with fake news and stories to keep their attention away from what was happening in the world. They enjoyed having an ignorant body to govern. It made the people easier to control. No one cared when they took something as simple as cursive from their children's education. It was a primary tool the people needed to have in their arsenal to be able to read any historical legal and governing documents." a

I nodded as I remembered hearing about that in school. We had learned cursive, but we had never been forced to learn another language in school. Now I had to question if it was a failure by my pack or my leaders.

'After that, things got worse because the people didn’t even realize how much the government had taken from them until it was too late. They lived in blissful ignorance for so long that, eventually, the government didn’t have to worry about the people. They just had to keep them entertained while they buried their secrets and bent the masses to their will. 2

'All of the different species had come out of hiding almost five years before the government announced their discovery of us to the people. That was only because they couldn't dispute the mass amount of evidence at that point and needed to control the narrative." Thomas went silent as he momentarily narrowed his eyes at the balcony doors before looking away again and shifting his weight.

His distrust of the system took me by surprise as he stood guard. I knew Tobias would have been the one in here if he hadn't just been so close to Heath and Nolan, potentially exposing himself to the dark magic. So, Thomas had volunteers to take on the role.