Revenge on Alpha Damien

Chapter Five- The Princess

"Look, the princess came back today," Caleb said cockily as I jogged across the field to where Betty was standing. The other trainees laughed at his remark. "She is early this time. Are you back for another round?" he added, but I chose to ignore him. He was the least of my problems right now.

"Hey, Betty!" I waved as I approached her.

"Hey, Mia. It's good you came early today. I tried calling your phone yesterday to check up on you, but it was switched off," she said, her concern evident.

I realized that my phone had been turned off since yesterday. In my attempt to find a solution to my problems, I had completely forgotten to charge it. "I forgot to charge it. Sorry," I replied, giving her a weak smile.

"It’s not a problem. I'm just glad you’re feeling okay today," she responded, returning my smile, albeit a little weakly.

I was about to tell her to begin our training when Caleb approached us again.

"What do you want now, Caleb?" I asked, rolling my eyes. Caleb clearly had a problem, even after everything that happened last night. I never imagined he would be talking to me right now. But that was the thing about him—he always tried to make it seem like he was the good guy and I was the obnoxious one. How can someone so attractive be so full of himself? I often wondered. To think I wouldn't have to deal with this brute if I were still in my original pack, but then I would never have met Betty, who had been an incredible friend to me. I cherished that deeply.

"Are you always in an emotional mood?" he said blankly, and I felt an urge to smack him across the face. He truly didn’t see anything wrong with what he was doing. He was intentionally getting under my skin to provoke a reaction, and the others would likely think I was the one who couldn't control my emotions—all this because I rejected him.

"Caleb, please leave," I begged, gritting my teeth. I needed to figure out the best way to destroy Damien and didn’t have time to entertain Caleb's antics. I just wanted to finish this training, get out of here, and continue my research.

"I’m just trying to help, princess," he smirked.

"Don’t call me that," I warned, my voice low and dangerous.

"Caleb, you should leave. Mia doesn’t want to be bothered," Betty interjected, her tone firm.

"Shut up, Betty! I’m not talking to you, you know," he shot back, glaring at her.

"Hey! Go away!" I said sternly.

"Fine. Fine," he raised his hands in surrender, but then added in a whisper, "Your attitude is the reason why you couldn't save your parents."

I growled as I immediately lunged at him, tackling him to the ground. He clearly did not expect that from me. I climbed on top of him and landed continuous blows to his face. How dare he say that? What right did he think he had?

"Do not mention my parents’ names from your filthy mouth!" I growled angrily. By now, other trainees had gathered around us, and I could hear Betty screaming my name in the background, but I wasn’t going to stop. Caleb deserved this, and I continued to land punches on his face. I didn’t give him the chance to fight back because I knew he could overpower me easily.

"Mia! Stop!" It was Landon’s voice, but his words had little meaning to me right now. If the pack wouldn’t deal with brutes like him, I would help them. This fool should not have uttered anything relating to my parents.

Blood seeped from Caleb’s mouth, but I didn’t stop. Everything was red in my eyes; at that moment, it felt like it was Damien beneath me, and it was his face I was aggressively punching. How I wished it were Damien. These blows would have been nothing. I would have clawed at his face, ripped his throat out, and watched him choke on his own blood. I let the anger consume me and drew out my claws, reaching for his neck when a hand stopped me. The next thing I knew, I was pulled away from Caleb’s body and flung across the field. I landed with a loud thud, but I wasn’t going to calm down. I had to soothe the rage brewing inside me. Half-shifted, my fangs were out, and I had managed to ruin my shoes by extending my toes. I growled loudly and made my way for Caleb again.

"Stop her!" I heard Landon shout. Next, a few male wolves gathered around me and held me down, but I was still growling.

"Let me go! Let me go!" I screamed in anger, trying to wriggle free from their grasp, but I was clearly outnumbered.

Caleb was coughing violently, spitting out blood. He deserved it; he should have watched that cursed mouth of his.

Why did he have to say that I could not save my parents? Did he think I didn’t know that? He wasn’t there when it happened. It wasn’t his parents who died; it was mine. I was there—every day, I had to live with myself knowing I couldn’t help them, that I had been too weak to save them. The only thing I could do was watch them die. I hated myself for that, and Caleb didn’t need to remind me.

"Call Mary. Now!" Landon shouted at the top of his lungs. But there was no need; I was already calming down. The rage was passing, so I stopped fidgeting under the grasp of the males holding me down. The trainers stared at me as if I were some kind of freak. Caleb had won again; he succeeded in proving that I was the crazy, emotional one, while he was the good guy trying to help me.

Betty looked like she wanted to cry while watching me. I might have let my rage consume me, but Caleb deserved it, regardless of what anyone would say. The only thing I would admit was that I had taken it too far.

"What was the meaning of that, Mia!" Landon scolded as he left Caleb’s side to where I was being held. A frown was etched on his face. Caleb, on the other hand, was being assisted by two trainees out of the training field, most likely headed to the pack clinic—or what we called the infirmary.

"He talked bad about my parents," I defended sternly, even though I was still held down.

"You should learn to control your temper, Mia. You are a werewolf, and if your anger is not kept in check, you could kill someone out of carelessness!" he fumed angrily. Caleb should learn to control his own mouth and stay away from me. I had made that clear to him countless times, but Caleb had made up his mind. He was set on making my life miserable all because I turned him down, which was a justifiable reason. How clear did I have to make it to Caleb? It was practically impossible for us to be in a relationship when we were destined by the moon goddess to have fated mates. Fortunately for me, Caleb was not the one.

"Caleb was certain that I wouldn’t be able to defeat him. Now he’s the one bleeding," I chuckled, a hint of satisfaction in my voice.

Landon's frown deepened. It was evident he was trying his best to bear with me. "That was not a fair fight, Mia, and you know it. You ambushed him and caught him off guard. You didn’t win the fight because it wasn’t a fight to begin with," he stated boldly.

I was about to respond, defending myself on why the attack against Caleb was a win, when Landon’s words suddenly sparked an idea in my head. An ambush! I screamed internally. That was how I was going to defeat Damien. I would ambush him—not the regular kind of ambush, though. The mate dance ceremony would be crowded and busy, providing the perfect disguise to get close to Damien and strike him down. Of course, the wolfsbane would come in handy. I already had a silver dagger that Aunt Mary gave me on my first day of training. It would be enough to kill Damien if I were going for a direct attack to his heart. But since this wouldn’t be a direct attack, I would lace the dagger with wolfsbane, aim for his stomach, and let the poison spread throughout his body. With the effect of the silver, he should die.

"Mia! Mia! I’m talking to you!" I heard Landon’s voice snapping me out of my train of thoughts. He sighed, exasperated. "Let her go!" He commanded the male trainees to release me.

I stood up from the ground, brushing the dust off my body. By this time, Aunt Mary was making her way over to us from the other side of the field, and Josh was with her. It made me wonder—had he just gotten here? I hadn’t spent more than an hour in the training grounds.

I immediately felt guilt—not because of beating up Caleb, but because I was being a bother to Mary and Josh. Josh had literally just returned from his trip; he should be resting, not here trying to fix my mess.

"What happened?" Aunt Mary asked, her forehead creased in worry, all because of me. Maybe I should have thought things through before letting my anger and frustration consume me. She turned to me and asked, "Mia, what is going on? Are you hurt?" Her voice was filled with so much concern that it hurt my soul. I shouldn’t be stressing her this way; she already had a lot on her plate, and now she was here to fix a mess caused by a twenty-one-year-old woman.

"You should see the other guy. He’s the one that’s hurt," Landon spoke up.

"What other guy? What happened? Did this guy try to hurt Mia?" Aunt Mary asked, looking completely confused while Josh held her shoulder, trying to calm her nerves.

"No. On the contrary, Mia was the one doing the hurting. She beat up Caleb, and now he had to be taken to the pack clinic to check himself," Landon explained.

Aunt Mary’s eyes widened in shock.

"But I thought Caleb was the best student in the class. How did this happen?" Josh asked, bewildered.

Aunt Mary spared me a glance, and I immediately cowered away. Then she turned her focus back to Landon. "I thought Caleb was the one who won the duel that happened between them yesterday. You told me that the duel ended badly and that Mia could barely hold her ground against him," she said.

Barely hold my ground? Barely hold my ground? I wanted to scream, but I did so internally. Was that what Landon told her yesterday? I lost the fight, but I wasn’t that bad. Landon was making it sound like I was a terrible fighter when he knew I could take on most of the girls here in the training ground.

"Maybe she wasn’t giving her all yesterday," Caleb gritted through his teeth.