FATED TO THE ALPHA WHO HATES ME

The Voice Within

---

The cold stone beneath me had become familiar—too familiar. Every hour felt like a day in this dark, suffocating cell. My wrists ached from the silver cuffs they no longer bothered to remove. I was marked as dangerous… or maybe just cursed.

I didn’t know how long I had been down here—maybe days, maybe a week. The only thing that kept me sane was the faint, ghostly whisper I had started to hear in the silence.

> “Aria… hold on… we’re not alone…”

The first time I heard it, I thought I was losing my mind. But now I knew the truth: it was her. My wolf. She was finally awake.

> “Who are you?” I whispered one night, curled up against the damp wall. My breath fogged the air. “Why now?”

> “Because the bond awakened me,” she replied, her voice like wind rustling through the trees. “Because Kael is near.”

I shivered—not from the cold, but from the way her name curled around his. Kael. The Alpha who was supposed to be my mate. The one who had thrown me in here like I was trash. The one whose icy eyes haunted me every time I closed mine.

“I don’t want him,” I spat aloud, surprising myself. The sound echoed through the dungeon. “He hates me.”

> “And yet your heart still beats for him,” my wolf said gently. “Even now, you feel it.”

I hated her for being right.

---

Days passed. Or hours. I couldn’t tell anymore.

Then one morning—or maybe it was night—the cell door creaked open. I flinched as light spilled in.

“Get up,” a guard grunted. “The Alpha wants to see you.”

I blinked against the brightness, stumbling to my feet. My legs barely worked, but I walked anyway. I would not give them the satisfaction of seeing me crawl.

They brought me to the council chamber—not Kael’s throne room, but the place where the elders gathered. I knew none of their names, only their eyes: cruel, judgmental, suspicious.

She was there too.

Selene.

Kael’s Beta’s sister. The girl with the perfect smile and perfect lies. She stood at Kael’s side like she owned the place, tossing me a smug look when I entered.

Kael didn’t even meet my gaze. He just nodded once.

“We’re not here to punish you,” said Elder Marcus. “We’re here to question you.”

“I didn’t do anything wrong,” I said, my voice stronger than I expected.

Selene scoffed. “You trespassed on our territory. You bear the mark. That alone is enough.”

“Enough for what? Execution?” I challenged, raising my chin.

Kael finally looked up. And for a moment—just a second—I saw something flicker in his eyes. Regret? Guilt? No. I must have imagined it.

“You said you don’t know where the mark came from,” Kael said. His voice was steady, hard. “Then explain this.”

He tossed something on the table. A piece of burned cloth from my old dress… and a small, glowing shard of crystal.

I froze. I’d never seen it before in my life. But the moment I looked at it, something inside me twisted.

> “That crystal…” my wolf whispered. “It’s part of who we are…”

“What is it?” I asked aloud.

The elders exchanged glances.

“You tell us,” Elder Marcus said.

“I’ve never seen it before.”

“You were found unconscious with it in your grasp. Wrapped in your torn clothing. It resonates with magic.”

Kael stepped forward, his presence suddenly overwhelming. “What are you hiding?”

“Nothing!” I snapped. “I don’t know what it is, or why I had it. Maybe you planted it.”

Selene hissed. “Careful, mutt.”

I turned on her. “You think you’re his Luna? Go ahead. You can have him. I never asked to be his mate.”

Silence fell over the room.

Kael’s jaw clenched. His eyes darkened. “Take her back.”

---

That night, in my cell, I didn’t cry. I couldn’t. I just sat there, holding onto the sound of my wolf's voice as she whispered things I didn’t understand.

> “We are more than we seem. More than even Kael knows.”

> “What am I?” I asked. “What are we?”

> “You’ll see… soon.”

---

Sometime later—hours or days, I didn’t know—I was awakened by the sound of footsteps. Heavy ones.

Kael.

He stood outside my cell, staring at me through the bars. He didn’t speak.

“What do you want now?” I asked bitterly.

He didn’t answer. Instead, he looked… lost.

“You said you hated me,” I said. “Why are you here?”

He sighed, and something about that sound made my heart ache.

“I don’t know,” he admitted.

That scared me more than anything.

---

The stone beneath my back had become familiar. Cold, unyielding, and constant — unlike everything else in my life. I didn’t even flinch anymore when the guards dropped the stale bread or water. I just waited… watched… and counted. Counted the seconds. Counted the cracks in the wall. Counted the days since Kael locked me here like I was a criminal, not his mate.

But today... something was different.

There was a strange scent in the air. Faint. Earthy. Old. Like soil soaked in magic.

I pressed my ear to the wall behind me, the same one that always seemed colder than the others. My wolf stirred inside me, pacing, restless. Ever since she awakened, she’d been silent… until now.

"Dig."

I blinked. The whisper wasn’t in my ears. It was in my mind — hers. My wolf.

"What?" I whispered.

"There’s a way out. He left you here, but the earth remembers who you are."

For a second, I froze. Then, something like fire ignited in my bones.

I started scraping. My nails dug at the cold wall until they bled. Dust fell. Stone chipped. Minutes turned to hours.

And then… I found it.

A hollow thud.

I gasped, heart pounding. The wall wasn’t solid — not fully. There was a seam, hidden under years of grime and moss.

My fingers traced the edges, trembling. I pulled, twisted… and the brick shifted. Behind it was a dark, narrow passage. I couldn’t see where it led, but I didn’t care. Freedom was a whisper away.

I paused only once to glance at the cell door, still locked. Still sealed. No one knew. No one suspected.

I crawled inside.

The tunnel was damp and tight, like it hadn’t been touched in decades. I could barely breathe, but I didn’t stop. My wolf pushed me forward, her presence burning in my chest.

And then I heard it — a voice.

Low. Male. Not Kael.

I froze.

“…she can’t survive the ritual. The Alpha doesn’t even know what she really is.”

I pressed myself against the tunnel wall, peering through a crack. There were two figures in a stone room beyond, torches flickering. One was Kael’s Beta — Dorian. The other… was a hooded man with a scar across his cheek.

“If the girl lives,” the hooded man said, “the prophecy begins. You know what that means.”

Dorian nodded, grim. “War.”

My breath caught.

Me?

A prophecy?

What did they mean?

I backed away slowly, heart pounding, not even realizing I was crying until the tears hit the floor.

So it was true.

They didn’t just hate me — they feared me.

---

I returned to the cell before sunrise, filthy, shaking, but alive. And more awake than I had ever been.

When the guard came later, I didn’t look up. I played the part of the broken girl. But inside, a storm had begun to rise.

Because now I knew something they didn’t:

I wasn’t just a mistake.

I was a threat.

---

That night, I dreamed of fire.

I stood in a forest, trees blazing around me, smoke curling into a violet sky. And in the middle of the chaos was a child — no older than five — with silver eyes just like mine.

“Mommy,” she said, reaching out.

I stumbled toward her, heart pounding. But the flames rose higher, swallowing everything.

I woke up screaming.

---

The next day, Kael came.

His scent hit me before the door even opened. I hated that I noticed. Hated that my wolf perked up at his presence like a traitor.

He didn’t speak at first. Just looked at me like I was a puzzle that kept shifting.

“You’ve changed.”

I scoffed. “Is that what they’re saying now? That I’ve gone mad?”

He stepped inside slowly. For once, there was no rage in his eyes. Only… confusion. And something darker.

Regret?

I turned away before I could see it.

“You were in the tunnels.” His voice was low. Accusing.

I froze.

“How did you—?”

“I can feel you,” he growled. “I don’t know why. But ever since the mating bond tried to link us, I can sense you — your pain, your rage… even your fear.”

That made my chest ache more than it should.

I stood slowly, facing him. “Then maybe you should stop locking me in the dark.”

His jaw clenched.

“I didn’t ask for this, Aria.”

“And I didn’t ask to be your mate, Kael.”

Silence.

Then he stepped closer, so close I could feel the heat radiating off his body. His eyes burned into mine.

“There’s something wrong with you.”

“I know.” I smiled bitterly. “And I’m starting to think I was made that way.”

---

After he left, the cell felt colder. But something had shifted.

Kael was cracking.

And if I played this right… maybe I could break him.

Or maybe… he would break me first.

---

---

The wind was sharp and cold that night, sweeping through the forest like a warning whispered through the trees.

I could feel my wolf pacing beneath my skin.

Restless. Alert. Angry.

It had been days since I last saw Kael’s face up close, and somehow that made things worse. The space gave me room to breathe—but it also gave me room to think, and my thoughts were far from comforting.

Because now I couldn’t ignore what I had been denying all along.

Kael felt it too.

The pull. The pain. The storm in the silence between us.

But he hated it.

He hated me.

Or maybe he hated that the Moon Goddess dared to give him a mate like me—weak, unwanted, and tethered to a past even I didn’t understand.

I stood near the edge of the clearing, moonlight bathing the forest in silver light. The full moon was rising higher in the sky, and with it, I could feel my wolf stretching beneath my skin.

She wanted to run.

She wanted to howl.

But we were surrounded. Not by enemies, no—but by his pack. Watching. Judging. Whispering.

I clenched my fists, stepping away from the watchful eyes. I needed air. Space. Freedom.

I ducked into the trees.

And I ran.

I didn’t shift—just sprinted. Fast enough to make my breath catch in my throat, fast enough to quiet the voices in my mind, the ones that whispered things like “he looked at you differently today” or “what if he touches you again?”

No. I didn’t want to think about that.

Not when the last time he touched me, I was bleeding.

I crashed through a patch of low branches, not caring when they scratched my arms. The pain was better than the numbness I carried every day.

But then I stopped.

Dead in my tracks.

There, in the center of the woods, beneath the silver light of the moon…

Was him.

Kael.

He wasn’t supposed to be here. I had heard the patrols say he was at the border, overseeing some dispute with rogues. And yet here he was. Alone. Shirtless. His body was streaked with old scars and fresh ones too.

His head was tilted back slightly, the moon casting harsh shadows across his sharp jaw and hardened features.

He looked… broken.

For a moment, I couldn’t breathe.

He turned slowly, his dark eyes locking with mine like he knew I was there all along.

I flinched.

But he didn’t move.

Instead, he said nothing.

Just stared.

The silence stretched between us like a wire pulled taut.

“You followed me,” I said, though my voice came out weaker than I intended.

“I didn’t,” he said gruffly. “But I could smell you.”

I shifted uncomfortably. “That’s… creepy.”

He didn’t laugh.

Of course he didn’t.

“I didn’t come here for you,” I added.

“Didn’t think you did,” he said.

Then why did he look so disappointed?

A few moments passed before either of us moved.

I stepped to the side, meaning to walk around him, to leave him to whatever tortured brooding he was clearly in the middle of.

But then—

“Your wolf is loud tonight.”

I froze.

“What?”

“She’s close to the surface,” he murmured. “I can feel her.”

I turned to look at him. “You feel her?”

His jaw tightened.

“I feel everything,” he muttered. “Unfortunately.”

I bristled. “You say that like I’m a disease.”

He turned to face me completely now, the moon catching in his eyes. “You don’t get it, do you?”

“Explain it to me then,” I snapped. “Because I’m tired of guessing how you feel. One minute you save me from your own guards, the next you throw me into a dungeon and pretend I don’t exist. Which one is it, Kael?”

His name on my tongue tasted like fire.

He stepped forward.

One step.

Two.

Then three.

I didn’t move.

And when he was inches from me, I could see the flicker of something buried deep in his gaze. Anger, yes—but something else too.

Fear.

“I never wanted a mate,” he whispered.

“Good,” I said, breathing shakily. “Because neither did I.”

He chuckled bitterly. “Liar.”

I looked up at him, fury blooming in my chest. “I’m not your enemy.”

“You’re my weakness.”

The words knocked the air from my lungs.

He stepped back then, like he had said too much.

But I didn’t let him go far.

“Then maybe,” I said slowly, “you’re mine too.”

His eyes widened slightly.

And then, without warning, the wind shifted.

And everything changed.

A howl split the air.

Not mine.

Not his.

But it was close.

And it was full of pain.

Kael’s expression darkened instantly.

“Back to the packhouse,” he ordered, all traces of vulnerability gone.

“What is it?”

“Trouble,” he growled, shifting effortlessly into his massive black wolf and taking off through the trees.

I followed behind him, heart pounding in my chest.

Something was wrong.

Very, very wrong.

And I had a feeling… this night was far from over.

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