The Rejected Alpha

TRIGGER WARNINGS; MIGHT CONTAIN CONTENT THAT OTHERS FIND UNSUITABLE Mirabel Everyone is excited about the coming ball, new gowns and tuxes are bought, makeup and shoes, nails are polished and lots of beautiful and colorful arrangements were made, but one person is not happy about it all. In fact, she had no reason to look forward to the party since she would not be attending the celebration and she couldn't wait for the day to be over as soon as possible so she could get back to her life of cooking and cleaning and just being the slave of the Rufous moon pack. That was what she’d ever amount to anyway. Alpha Sebastian made sure she understood that part clearly. After the party tonight, everything that is when the real work begins because every utensils would need to be cleaned and arranged back in their places. If she’s lucky, she hopes to get a few hours of sleep before getting back to the daily routine. She wasn’t not to show herself at the party and, unless she wanted to get beaten up, she wouldn’t dream of attending such a meaningless event even if she was properly invited. In two days, everything will be back to normal and life will resume as it should. These were her thoughts as she silently chants her daily mantra ‘I live when I live and die when I die’ as a means of encouragement. She has not slept a wink in one week since preparation for the ball began and it's not surprising that she was able to put everything together given the short period she had and to think she was the only one tasked with handling decorations, preparation of seventeen different dishes as well as setting up the venue arrangements for a smooth celebration. Alpha Sebastian had warned her that nothing should go wrong for whatever reason, and although a few of the pack’s troublemakers tried to ruin things for her, she was able to pull it off all the same. Knowing she wasn’t permitted to make any mistakes with the arrangement whatsoever. She did as was told and was not allowed to leave the house or show up in front of others. Her orders were clear. Cook, clean up after them and disappear, never allowing herself to be seen or noticed by others except when they want to make trouble for her or punish her for something she did or did not do. It doesn't really matter, they decide when she gets punished and when she doesn't, she tries to avoid getting noticed all her life, because that is the only way she doesn't get punished for something she knew nothing about. She has been living like this for the past sixteen years. Her parents were killed by rogues a long time ago. She was only five at the time and didn’t remember much, but alpha Sebastian had told her it was her fault the rogues gained entry into their territory the night her parents and many others were killed and, as such, she had to live the rest of her life to atone for the sin by cleaning up after everyone. She didn’t remember, but she believed her uncle was right, he would never lie to her. No matter how much she thought about it though, something is very clear, she didn’t cause the attack but nobody cared about the truth, no one even wanted to listen to what she has to say. To them she was just a murderer. After unsuccessfully trying to tell everyone her side of the story, she gave up trying to explain. No one would believe anything she said anyway. When a lie goes on for too long, it eventually becomes the truth. As she grew older she began to revisit the events of the night her parents were killed and thought she might have been responsible after all, resigning to the fate of spending the rest of her life in atonement for the sin she thought she committed against everyone. Although Alpha Sebastian is her uncle, he never treated her as his relative, he kept blaming her for everything and when he had a bad day, he takes it out on her, reminding her over and over that she caused the death of his brother and never hesitated to show how much he disliked her every opportunity he gets. She wondered what she ever did wrong and why the kind and caring uncle she once remembered became so cruel. After spending years trying to figure out what went wrong with no success, she gave up trying so hard and decided to just keep living, since that was the one thing she was allowed to do. Oh yes! She tried to run away a few times before, but every attempt was thwarted, like they already knew what she would do even before she thought about it, and then she tried to kill herself, twice, thinking she would end all her misery at once, but like all the other times, she was found and wasn't allowed to die easily either, so live, she must. Seven years after the death of her parents, in a drunken stupor, Alpha Sebastian revealed the whole truth, although unaware she was listening. He said a lot and she finally understood why things were the way they were. Apparently, she was just a victim of his well-crafted twisted game of pathological egotist. He was too drunk that night and boasted about how easily he managed to achieve his long-term dream of becoming an alpha, he kept talking while she listened quietly. He wasn't talking to her directly, he was just too drunk to notice she was there. He talked about the life he led and the truth about why he did what he did, everything that happened the night the pack was attacked. In his own words, he orchestrated the attack. It took him years to perfect the plan and execute it to his satisfaction, but he did it. Her uncle, Sebastian Hiddlefield, is truly a despicable man. Sebastian hated her father, who also happened to be his own brother, not only because he was the true heir of the alpha, but he also got mated to the most beautiful she-wolf in the pack at the time, who happened to be Sebastian’s long-time crush. He felt that since he saw and liked Marie first, he needed to persuade his brother to give up on liking the same girl as he had, but this was before they even knew that both Cedric and Marie would be fated mates. Cedric tried to keep his word and keep away as promised but there was just something about the mate bond. Even if they are not of age to recognize each other, the bond keeps pulling them together. After Cedric’s eighteenth birthday ceremony, there was no going back because he knew right there and then that he was indeed mated to the one woman that made his heart race. The one he couldn’t keep away from despite making a promise to his big brother. It was his turn to warn his brother off his mate. Although Sebastian readily agreed to stay away. He did not keep that promise, he kept harassing Marie whenever he could get her alone and away from Cedric, confessing his undying love for her and asking her to reject her true mate and be with him instead, because he liked her very much and would treat her better than her true mate. Of course, Marie outrightly rejected his advances and chose to be with her mate instead. This only infuriates Sabestian further, who thinks Cedric got everything he ever wanted without any effort. First, he wanted to be the alpha but couldn’t. Then he wanted Marie at any cost, yet Cedric got mated to her. Sabestian hated Cedric and their parents so much, he blamed them for everything and wanted to end their happy little lives. He was crafty about it and never let his hatred towards them show. He acted as if he was happy for them but secretly swore to tear them apart by all means necessary. If he couldn’t have her, no one should. When Cedric became the alpha, despite being three years his junior, Sebastian knew he had to find a way to snatch the title from his brother one way or the other, even if he wasn’t of alpha blood. Their parents had waited until his eighteenth birthday, when he could not shift like the others, before telling him the truth. He always knew something was wrong but just didn't know what it was. They had then apologized for not being his real parents, but they loved him all the same. Wouldn't it have made more sense if they had told him this truth sooner? But they allowed him to humiliate himself. He was just an adopted child who spent his whole life acting and parading himself like an alpha, only to be crushed on his birthday. He was strong, no doubt, but not as strong as an alpha should. He felt cheated that his whole life was a lie and that was why he knew he had to do something about them all. They told him they found him one day roaming in the forest close to the pack with no clothes on. All efforts to find his real parents proved abortive. Sarah, their mother, and Luna at the time did not have a child of her own and, because she is fond of children, she begged to look after Sebastian until his real parents showed up, but after several years of looking after him, no one came to claim him. The Alpha parents wanted to tell him for a long time that he wasn’t their real child, but they didn’t want him to feel out of place or begin to feel inferior to his younger brother. They treated him like their own child, no matter what anyone says, Sebastian is their firstborn child and it will stay that way forever. Alpha Dominic was ready to make him alpha if he got an alpha wolf too, so until they got their wolves, nothing was decided. Naturally, werewolves shift on their eighteenth birthday. An alpha is different, however, because they get their wolves earlier than the rest and shift at the sixteenth or seventeenth birthday, depending on how strong they are. This didn’t happen for Sebastian, who couldn’t shift until his nineteenth birthday. Although he was strong and exhibited the aura of alpha, when he shifted his wolf was just an average brown wolf, he knew then he could never be the alpha. Although no one said anything about it, no one made him feel any different, he just couldn’t take it. He began to slowly poison their parents and when they began to fall sick, he was the one that showed the most concern. When their parents died one after the other, he began to plot the destruction of his brother. He wanted to make it quicker but the rogues wouldn’t cooperate, knowing how strong Cedric was. He took his time to gain the trust of the rogues and traded some valuable pieces of information with them, making some of Cedric's most trusted warriors the scapegoat for the leaked information. Cedric began to wonder why his warriors were suddenly betraying him one after the other. In all of this, he never once suspected his dear brother. Sebastian wanted to take everything away from him one by one so that Cedric could feel what it was like to be deprived of what he wanted the most. He revelled in his brother’s misery while also showing fake sympathy. When Marie became pregnant with Mirabelle, he hated them even more. That child could have been his, she should be having his daughter, not Cedric’s. He could never forgive them for choosing to be together and that was why he enlisted the rogues to kill the alpha and his wife so that when he becomes the next alpha no one would question his authority. He’s still the alpha’s first son, ruling over a pack takes a lot of training and dedication. Fortunately, he had both.