Chapter 1:
Lesson One
I hear the crunch of my nose breaking before pain explode across my face. The pain is so extreme, it makes my eyes water.
Falling down, I try to curl in a a ball, but I don't quite make it before a kick meets my ribs. The air whooshes out of me that I can't breathe and my lungs are on fire. I can no longer scream and beg for them to stop. Tears, snot, and blood is running down my face.
I peep something in the line of my blurry vision. As my eyes focus in on her, I can see the expression on her face. When she notices that I paying attention, she gives a slow nod.
Let Go.
Holding eye contact, I go into my mind, box all my emotions in a chest, lock it, throw away the key, and hit the switch. Like a rubberband, my emotions shut off and with it, most of the pain until all thats left is a dull ache.
I curl into myself tighter. My lungs, no longer on fire, but a nice warmth to them, is able to take in some air. I take another deep breathe in and slowly let it out.
Another kick, but to my back feels like tiny little prickles. With every hit and kick feels dull. I've stopped crying and I'm no longer asking them to stop.
I take it.
I know not to fight back. Plus, I'm too weak and there is no beneficial way out of this, but to protect myself and wait until they're done.
Although, I can't feel the pain of their abuse, I start to feel sleepy. This means my body is shutting down on me. I embrace the darkness, hoping to never wake up again, but knowing I will in a few hours, good as new.
———————————————
My eyes pop open and I'm starring at the night sky. Breathing in a much needed breathe, I hold it for a few seconds before breathing out. I can't feel any pain and my emotions are still off.
"Good, you were able to hold onto the switch, even while unconscious. You're ready for the next lesson."
I turn my head to the woman leaning up against the tree. Nessa was my mentor, trainer, friend, and the only person to care about me. She is the Beta of Black Claw's mate. He met her on their visit to the Alpha King's kingdom seven months ago. She was an Elite, a specialized group of people from the King's guard.
I heave a sigh of relief. This was the first, longest, and the most painful lesson I had to learn. She taught me other things that took a couple of weeks to learn, but its been five months of training and we have been practicing this since day one.
"Lesson one, shut you're emotions off. Think of them as stones inside of a room. You can't just turn off the light, close the door, and walk away. Stones can still burn bright in the dark—you have to lock them in a chest where their light can't shine, then turn off the lights and walk away. Only then, when you are left with nothing but a void, can you move forward."
Learning to turn off my emotions was the easy part and only took a month to master. I actually was in the process of being waterboarded and whipped on my stomach when I turned it off. Learning how to keep the switch off during a beating took some time, but I picked that up quick. Even learning how to turn the switch back on was easy. The hardest part was to keep the switch off even after I was unconscious and waking up with it still off. It had taken me three months and 2 days to finally achieve that.
