Rejected While Carrying The Alpha's Twins

CHAPTER 5: Into the Wilderness

Precious’s POV

The sky broke open, and the rain came down like a barrage of icy bullets.

I stumbled over a thick tree root, crashing hard into the muddy earth. I cried out as a sharp pain flared in my ankle. I tried to push myself up, but my arms gave out.

I was so tired. The pain of the severed pack bond was bleeding my wolf dry. I was still wearing Praise’s oversized shirt, now soaked in mud, blood, and rain. I was freezing, shivering so violently my teeth felt like they were cracking.

"Just get up," I whispered to myself, crawling through the mud. "Keep moving."

But my body refused. I collapsed against the trunk of a massive oak tree, gasping for air. The wilderness was dark, terrifying, and completely foreign. I had never been outside the pack borders alone.

Crunch.

My ears twitched. A twig snapped in the darkness to my left.

I held my breath, pressing my back flat against the tree.

Crunch. Splash.

Heavy, uncoordinated, and predatory footsteps was all I could hear.

Out of the rainy darkness, three massive wolves emerged. Their fur was matted with filth and dried blood. Their eyes glowed with a sickly, crazed yellow light.

Rogues.

Wolves who had lost their minds to the wild. They had no humanity left, only the instinct to kill and feed.

The largest rogue, a disgusting gray beast missing half its ear, snarled. Spit dripped from its jaws as it caught my scent. A lone, weak, rejected female. To them, I was just meat.

I forced myself up, pressing my back against the tree. I had no weapons. My wolf was too weak to shift.

"Get back," I rasped, trying to sound fierce, but my voice trembled.

The rogues leaped.

I screamed, throwing my arms up to protect my neck. The gray wolf’s jaws clamped around my forearm. The pain was blinding. I kicked out wildly, my bare heel connecting with the second wolf’s snout. It yelped, but the third one tackled my legs, bringing me back down into the mud.

I'm going to die here, I thought. Alone. Banished. Forgotten.

Suddenly, the air pressure shifted.

A scent hit me so hard it cleared the fog in my brain instantly. It was intoxicating. Sandalwood, deep pine, and raw, crackling ozone.

Before the rogue could bite into my leg, a massive, terrifying blur of midnight-black fur erupted from the trees.

It was a wolf. But it was larger than any wolf I had ever seen, its muscles rippling with insane power under the rain.

With a deafening, thunderous roar, the black wolf slammed into the gray rogue, sending it flying ten feet through the air. The rogue crashed into a boulder, instantly dead.

The other two rogues froze, whimpering in sudden terror. The black wolf didn't give them a chance to run. In two lightning-fast movements, it snapped the neck of the second rogue and tore the throat out of the third.

The fight was over in less than ten seconds.

I lay in the mud, bleeding from my arm, staring in absolute shock at the massive beast standing over the dead rogues.

The black wolf turned slowly. Its eyes were a striking, piercing silver. It looked at me, and a strange, powerful energy washed over my broken body.

Behind the trees, a group of armed warriors ran into the clearing.

"Alpha Bruno!" one of the warriors yelled.

The black wolf shifted. Right in front of me, the beast transformed into a man. A tall, heavily muscled man with dark hair clinging to his forehead in the rain. He quickly pulled on a pair of pants handed to him by a warrior.

He didn't look at his men. He looked only at me.

"I can't trust any Alpha again" my inner voice whispered frantically. I tried to crawl away, my hands slipping in the mud. "Stay away from me!" I cried, trying to sound threatening.

Alpha Bruno held his hands up slowly, showing he meant no harm. He crouched down in the mud in front of me, completely ignoring the rain pouring over us.

Up close, his face was striking. Sharp jawline, thick brows, and those intense silver eyes. He looked at my bleeding arm, then at the torn, oversized shirt I was wearing, and finally, into my terrified eyes.

He noticed it. I saw his eyes narrow slightly as he looked at me. My wolf aura was shattered, but there was something else there, something he sensed but didn't say out loud.

"Don't touch me," I sobbed, my vision blurring as the blood loss took over.

Bruno didn't listen. But he didn't grab me roughly like Praise’s warriors. He reached out gently, his large, warm hand wrapping around my uninjured shoulder.

"No one deserves to die alone," Bruno said. His voice was deep, smooth, and incredibly calm.

Before I could protest again, my body finally gave up. The darkness rushed in. The last thing I felt was Alpha Bruno easily scooping me up into his strong arms, pulling my shivering body against his warm chest.

Grace’s POV

Back at the palace, the rain battered against the glass windows.

I stood in the Alpha’s private study, wrapped in Praise’s warm blanket. The hooded man stood by the fireplace, watching the flames dance.

I walked up behind him and wrapped my arms around his waist, resting my head against his broad back.

"She is gone," I whispered, smiling against his dark cloak. "She will not survive the night in that storm."

The hooded man turned around, wrapping one arm around me, pulling me close. He looked out the window toward the dark forest.

"The first piece has fallen," he said, his voice dripping with sinister satisfaction. "Now, we prepare for the war.”