Swapped Luna part 18: A fresh start

Fang steps over Maeve’s body, kicking some dirt with his hind legs at her corpse. Then he comes to me and whines as he looks at Victoria.

"Let's go, boy," I tell him. Feeling incredibly ashamed that he could see what I couldn't.

I begin the long way home, rushing while trying my best not to jostle Victoria. My steps desperate and my heart pounding so hard that it rocks my entire body.

I can't lose her. It would kill me.

PRESENTLY…

VICTORIA

Maeve looks utterly deranged.

I step away from her, dropping my bag.

She's going to kill me.

"Just let me go!" I plead. "You can have Thorne. He doesn't love me! He doesn't believe me."

"You stupid wench. I want my fucking body back more than I want him! You commonly, poor, sick whore. I want my life back!" she shouts and pulls at her hair–at my hair. "Look at me. An ill ogre. Sick with cancer. Such a pathetic illness you fucking humans couldn't evolve immunity for! I want my perfect face back."

How the fuck is she still alive? She should've died!

I can't wrap my head around it, but I can only guess that she maintained some of her healing capabilities. Although I'm in her body and have enhanced senses, I could never shift. Maybe it's the same for her. Maybe she's in my sick body, but her soul kept some of the natural gifts assigned to her at birth, like enhanced healing.

If we swap back, she will regain the ability to shift, and I'll be condemned as a sick human again. Unable to heal.

"We can't swap back, Maeve. It might kill us."

"I've got nothing to lose," she snarls. "I'd rather die than stay in this rotten corpse of a body anyway."

"But–"

She picks up my bag and lunges with a hungry snarl. I turn to run. Spinning past trees, my body vibrating as my heart thunders and rattles my bones.

Maeve is fueled by toxic adrenaline. She chases me like a hellhound, thirsty for my blood.

A weight falls on my back. I fall with a loud thud, my lungs emptying. I reach for a branch beside my head and swing.

Maeve shouts when I slap her across the face with the branch. She seems to become angrier. She straddles me and goes for my neck. Squeezing as she glares, saliva dripping from her clenched teeth.

She chokes me with all her strength. I kick my legs out and wheeze, my vision darkening as I fight for my life.

Suddenly, electricity shocks every one of my cells, and my perspective changes. I find myself in my normal body, straddling Maeve and strangling her as she weakly fights, about to pass out.

I release her neck. What the fuck? The choking made us switch back to our respective bodies.

I throw myself off her as she wheezes. She laughs maniacally with her maimed throat, and the sound will haunt me forever.

Before she can celebrate for long, the electricity sparks again, and we swap. I'm back in her body, and she's in mine. The swap only lasted a few seconds, triggered when I was near death.

She screams, her hair littered with leaves, and jumps on me again. Determined to strangle me for the last time. We toss in the grass as I throw amateur punches at her, landing a few on her jaw and chest.

She slams her elbow on my face and reaches to the left. Through my peripheral vision, I see her digging for the knife that slid out of my bag.

I reach and snatch the knife from her. I slice her thigh, but she knocks it away and returns her hands to my throat. Choking me and slamming my head against the grass with murderous rage until my vision darkens, and we swap back to our natural bodies for the second time.

Before I can even register that I'm back in my correct body, she punches me across the face. My ears are ringing as my wrists are bound in rope. 

Maeve closes her eyes and mutters words to the sky like a crazy witch in a blood sacrifice.

Hearing steps approach, I shout for help.

Metal is rammed to my side, silencing me. I don't scream. I wheeze as pain explodes through my being. Melting into every part of my body like a drop of blood does on a napkin.

Maeve twists the knife inside me, and I feel blood bubbling in my throat.

This is it. We have swapped one final time, and I'm dangling in the hands of death. I'm going to die in my body as I was meant to when I lay in that hospital bed with a cancer-riddled body.

I wanted to escape this territory. To escape Thorne. I thought the moon goddess would be gracious enough to allow me to leave. This isn't the kind of escape I had in mind.

A tear streaks down my temple as I lie there, dying. Alone in a foreign land. Staring at the smiling face of a woman who enjoys my misery. A woman who was cruel to Thorne–not kind, like me. And yet he treated us the same.

I was falling in love with him. I told him the truth. And he locked me away like a shameful woman. As if I were sinful like Maeve.

I won't forgive him. I won't give him the satisfaction.

A commotion breaks out, and Maeve curses.

I'm frozen. My body is heavy as I stare at the sky and wonder if my eyes will open in my coffin and stare at the wood until I've got no eyes anymore. Or will Throne burn me and spread my ashes like a part of his life he wants no reminders of?

"She swapped us back," I whisper, and it takes everything I have left in me. "I am…Victoria. I am…back in my body. Help."

I beg him to believe me. But deep down, I know my words are fruitless because all Thorne ever does is disappoint me. He tells me I'm crazy and wrong, and he knows best as a big, bad Alpha. He makes me feel like all I'll ever be is this poor, feeble human girl that was born to be a tragedy.

It's hard to keep track of the commotion as my senses dull and my eyes blur with tears. As the pain in my stabbed side roars louder than the voices. But I recognize Fang's growl. My one true friend in this territory.

Thorne's familiar hands come around me. I cry and manage a pained, "Thorne…"

Why does electricity still flow between us? Gentle and seductive. I am not in Maeve's body anymore. I'm in mine, and we're not mates. But the sparks say otherwise. They say we belong to each other. A human and an Alpha.

There's more commotion. More loud noises. I came to this world screaming, and I'm leaving it in noise, too.

The pain multiplies when teeth dig into my neck. I don't know why. My thoughts tangled as death worms its way through my body. Why does Thorne want to hurt me even in my last breath?

My body gives up one final time, dying. And the pain finally stops.

I see her in my death. Her, the moon. A being of light. She's got no face, no figure. Just warm light.

The last thing I remember myself telling the powerful woman is:

"Listen, lady. Go away. Let me die in peace. Go throw someone else off a balcony and into the body of some crazy Luna. I'm retired."

She fades away, and I feel happiness.

Because I did it. I freed myself.

–––

Oh, fuck.

The first thing I register when I open my eyes is sunlight, and then I get a dreadful headache.

How long has it been?

I groan and look at the back of my hand. I wonder whose body I'm in at this time. Surely, I've swapped because the Moon Goddess apparently enjoys turning my life into a soap opera.

Who am I now? Maeve? Thorne? Fang?

I look at my hand. I don't recognize it at first. It's a healthy shade and not too bony. But then I notice a small scar beneath my ring finger. It's mine. This is my hand and my body.

I turn my head to the side, and a long lock of hair caresses my neck. I lift my hand, which is free of wires, and touch my hair. It has grown. It's lush and silky, not undamaged like it was when I had cancer.

The cancer…where is it?

This body is mine, but it doesn't feel like it. I don't feel fatigued. Don't feel my bones groaning and my organs failing. I haven't felt this way since I was a child.

I open my mouth to speak but only manage a grunt. My throat is parched, and my bones are stiff from lack of movement. I must have been here for a very, very long time.

Slowly, I slide my fingers around the bed. Searching for a button to call for help. I know I'm still in Thorne's territory. I recognize the portraits that are hanging on the wall. Werewolves that lived long ago and preceded the great Alpha Thorne, who I'm not looking forward to seeing.

I press a few buttons that I find on the right side of the bed, but I'm unsure of what they are.

It doesn't take long for ten fucking people to barge into my room. Shouting orders, flipping through paperwork.

"Someone call the Alpha!"

Oh, well. Here we go again.

"How long…" I grit my teeth. "How long?"

"Months, Luna," says a doctor as he examines the machines beside my bed.

Luna? Why are they still calling me that dreadful title?

"I'm–I'm Victoria. Not Maeve."

"We know."

He believes me. After being unheard and being told I was crazy, someone finally believes me.

My eyes tear. The words struck me.

"Victoria!" I hear a roar from downstairs as Thorne rips through the mansion to get to me.

"Induce me into a coma, please," I beg the doctor, wanting to escape again.

I don't want to see Thorne. I don't want him to beg for my forgiveness. I don't want him to remind me of my days of torture.

And for fuck's sake, I don't want to feel the confusing, electric current between us that insists we're mates. 

A/N: Let the groveling begin