The Alpha’s Forbidden Valkyrie

Chapter 2

Freya’s POV

My consciousness returned slowly, in agonizing pain. Every breath felt like inhaling broken glass shards, and my back ached as if my spine had truly snapped in two when that animal threw me across the bar.

I tried to move my hand, but ice-cold, heavy metal bit into my wrists. A clanking echoed in the dark. Chains.

My eyes snapped open. My vision was still blurry, but I quickly realized where I was. Sitting on the ice-cold stone floor of a windowless, damp basement. Thick iron chains secured my wrists to a rusty pipe above my head. The only light source was a dim, yellowish bulb at the end of the corridor, on the other side of a barred iron door.

I started to tremble. Not just because of the rotting dampness and cold radiating from the basement, but because that scent suddenly hit me from the darkness. Pine, leather, rain, and... predator.

Footsteps thundered on the stone stairs. Heavy, measured steps. The iron door swung open with a deafening screech, and his silhouette appeared in the yellowish light. Two meters of pure threat. The Alpha.

He strolled slowly into the cell, as if he had all the time in the world. I closed my eyes for a moment and braced myself. I couldn't show how terrified I was. Even in my vampire coven, weakness meant death, and here, in a werewolf's den, that was a thousand times more true.

He stopped in front of me. His massive boots were barely a few inches from my bare, bleeding feet.

"You're a tough leech," he spoke. His voice was deep, hoarse, and full of contempt. "I thought your spine was crushed to dust."

"You would have had to throw me a little harder for that, Alpha," I spat, and defiantly raised my head to look him in the eye.

The corner of his mouth twitched for a second, as if my disrespect surprised him, but that dark, suffocating hatred still burned in his gaze. He slowly knelt before me, so close that I could feel the heat radiating from his body. My stomach immediately tied in knots. Something inside me was inexplicably drawn to this heat, even though every instinct screamed at me to run.

"Insolent leech," he growled, leaning forward. His nose flared as he slowly, disgustedly inhaled at my neck. "What the hell are you?"

"Your worst nightmare."

"Don't mess with me," he snarled, and with a single sudden movement, he grabbed my hair, pulling my head back roughly.

I hissed in pain. The blonde locks that had covered my face slipped away, leaving my pointed ears completely visible. The Alpha's eyes fixed on my valkyrie features.

"You reek like a damn bloodsucker," he continued, his voice quieter now, full of suspicion. "But your scent... it's different somehow. It doesn't have the typical stench of death of your kind. There's something underneath it... something that makes my wolf want to claw at the walls. And what are these ears? Are you another messed-up experiment?"

I clenched my teeth. I had never told anyone about my valkyrie blood. It was the exact reason I had to flee from my own family. I wasn't going to hand my only secret over to the enemy.

"None of your business, Alpha."

The man's eyes flashed yellow in the dark. His inner wolf was raging just beneath the surface.

"You're chained up in my basement. You're on my territory. Everything here is my business, leech. Answer when I ask you!"

"Or else what?" I snarled back. "You'll kill me? That's what you've wanted to do since the moment you saw me anyway! Do it, and let's end this charade!"

He suddenly let go of my hair, and his massive, tattooed hand wrapped around my throat, then my jaw. As soon as his rough, hot skin touched my face, it was as if electricity shocked us both. A scorching, electric spark snapped across my skin, shooting straight into my heart.

I gasped for air. He shuddered, too.

The Alpha's face twisted. He jerked his hand away with disgust and some deep, furious desperation, as if he had touched live coals.

"What the hell are you doing to me?" he roared, springing to his feet. He looked at me like I was an infectious disease. "Some kind of damn vampire magic?"

"Don't touch me, you i***t!" I yelled back, the chains on my wrists clanking loudly as I tried to pull back against the stone wall. "Believe me, it's just as disgusting to me as it is to you!"

"You're a nobody," he paced back and forth in the cell like a caged, rabid beast. His rage was palpable in the air. "Upstairs, my entire pack is demanding your blood. It would take one word from me, and they'd tear you to shreds. I've only kept you alive this long to extract your coven's secrets from you, but I see you're just a defective, worthless mutt. You're not even worth them knowing who they lost. A nameless, little nobody!"

The word that had been used as a weapon against me my entire life now cut into me like a knife. My own kind wanted to kill me because I was a mutt. And now this werewolf stood here, throwing the exact same thing in my face. My anger suddenly overpowered my fear.

The chains pulled taut as I lunged forward with all my might, staring straight into his eyes. The hidden golden light I had tried so hard to conceal flared to life in my green irises.

"I am not a mutt!" I screamed, my voice echoing off the ice-cold stone walls. My chest heaved violently, and my gaze practically pierced through him. "My name is Freya! Freya, you bastard!"