“Wake up,” I hear someone whisper, something hitting my leg. I shuffle a little, feeling a tightness on my wrists like someone is grabbing me.

“Mackenzie, come on,” I hear again and I blink my eyes open to the bright room, groaning at the pain spreading throughout nearly every inch of my body. I quickly remember Alaric using his pain mark on me. I look down to see handcuffs I’ve had on before, and I don’t even need to try and use my marks. I know the handcuffs are stopping me.

“Son of a bitch,” I spit out, and then hear a laugh. I turn my head to see Miss Tinder and Enzo’s sister Stacy right next to me. There are two other teachers I don’t know also tied up with their own handcuffs on. It was Stacy who hit my leg, and she is still laughing a little.

“If I die, at least I know my brother chose a girl with a little bit of fire,” she says, winking at me.

“You won’t die,” I shake my head.

“How is Enzo? I only saw him for a few minutes the morning before he left to go after the rebels to rescue your friends, and we didn’t have long to discuss everything. He only asked that I keep an eye on you, and make sure you didn’t manage to hurt yourself while he was gone. I knew straight away that my brother had fallen for someone, and I’m happy it’s someone like you,” she pauses, “Someone strong enough to see past his dark and aggressive wall he puts up.”

“I’m not—”

“You don’t need to agree with me. I knew from my conversation with my brother how much you mean to him, even if he never said it,” she says.

“He was with you that morning? I wondered why he snuck out,” I say, thinking of Stella, the lying little bitch. He went to see his sister, of course he did. He wasn’t with her like she said, not that I believed her anyway; Enzo isn’t stupid enough to go to someone like her.

“Yes, now have you heard anything?” she demands this time, the worry for her brother showing in her eyes.

“Nothing, but I believe—I know—that he will be here to rescue us and give us a sarcastic comment about it,” I say firmly and she looks away, swallowing deeply and not replying.

“Where are we?” I ask her, trying to get her attention back, and she looks over at me with watery eyes, but it’s Miss Tinder that answers.

“Waiting to die, what else,” she snaps.

“Why does it sound like you are blaming this on me? This isn’t my fault you know, I’m tied up too,” I say, and she glares at me.

“Sarcasm isn’t going to help us with this situation, Miss Crowe,” she snaps and then looks away. We sit silently, not hearing anything as I worry about my guys, my dads, my brother, and Kelly. And my mum, as she is with my crazy father. How did everything go so wrong?

“I’ve been wondering something, why do you and Enzo have different last names?” I ask Stacy, needing a distraction and it’s the only thing that pops into my mind.

“How very random, but I’ll tell you,” she smiles, “Well you must know that it’s a marked tradition for the men to take their woman’s last name, and therefore the children the same,” she says and I nod. That’s why Ryan and I have the last name Crowe, and so do all my dads.

“My mother hated her last name, and didn’t want to go down that route. So she had DNA tests done not long after each of us was born, and then we each had the name of our biological fathers.”

“Didn’t that cause a lot of trouble between you all?” I ask. There’s a reason most marked decide to take the woman’s last name, it stops a lot of arguments.

“I don’t know. Enzo and I are close in age, and my biological father died a month after Enzo was born. My mother and two other dads, well, they lost themselves in grief and weren’t the best people or parents.”

“I didn’t know, I’m sorry,” I say.

“Don’t be, but we do need to escape,” she says, nodding her head towards the door of the classroom. I very much doubt we could, the room has no windows, no other doors. It’s empty of anything other than us, the teachers desk and a few tables and chairs. The door opens, and two rebels walk in and come straight over to me. He grabs my arm, lifting me up off the floor, and a wave of dizziness hits me.

“Your father said to tell you to behave,” he says.

“You can tell him I said fuck you,” I mutter slowly, and the guards don’t reply to me, but I hear Stacy’s chuckle as I’m dragged from the room. We walk outside to a corridor and then straight towards the hallway, and into another room with two guards outside.

“Go in,” the guard shoves me forward, and the other one opens the door, waiting for me to walk past him and into the room.

“Mackenzie, I’m glad you’re awake now,” Alaric says, sitting on a throne type seat in the middle of the small room. He has a book in his lap, which he closes and places on the side.

“I would have been awake sooner if you hadn’t knocked me out,” I spit out, and he laughs.

“We had things to do, and I couldn’t trust you to be awake. Now, this is for you,” he says, waving my comment off, and walking across the room to a small box. He opens it up, pulling out an awful white dress.

“A wedding dress? Fuck no, I have no intentions of marrying anyone at eighteen and certainly not in that ugly dress,” I say and he snaps the box shut.

“It’s not a wedding dress, it’s a ceremonial dress that our ancestors wore for the ritual many years ago,” he says, and walks over to me, offering me the dress.

“I’m not wearing it so you can use my twelfth power and then kill me,”

“I never wanted to kill you, there’s so much you don’t know, but if I have to drag your unconscious friend in here and keep hurting her until you get dressed, I will,” he warns me, keeping his cold eyes on mine, and I know he means it.

“Fine,” I snap, taking the dress from him.

“I will wait outside,” he goes to walk away and looks back at me, “Don’t do anything stupid or I will kill Kelly, and then Ryan, and then your mother. Do not test me, Mackenzie,” he says and then walks out, slamming the door shut as I try not to throw something at him. I hold the dress up, smelling how it stinks of old people and dust.

“Could have at least washed it,” I comment as I put it on the floor and try to pull my top off. It’s a lot harder than it looks but I get it off, leaving a vest, my underwear, my boots and leggings on underneath as I pull the dress on. I get stuck half way into it, with the handcuffs catching on something, and I try to wriggle out of it, and slam into a wall.

“Ouch,” I mutter, finally getting the dress on, and pulling the white lace around my ribs tighter to hold it up.

“Ready,” I shout, wanting to get out this room already, and the door opens. I walk out to see Kelly being held up by two guards and I run to her, only to be caught by two rebels myself. They grip my upper arms tightly, shaking their heads at me, which I see in the corner of my eye as I keep looking at Kelly. No one has healed her, so something must have gone wrong.

“It’s finally time,” my father claps with a large grin on his face before he walks away, and we’re dragged after him.