ENSLAVED TO BE HIS MATE

POV: Mona The square was packed. Every wolf in the Gust pack was out for the Mating Moon. I stood in the line of Omegas, my palms sweating. Most girls were giggling, hoping for a strong warrior. I just wanted a way out of the kitchens. I didn't want much. Most of the girls wanted to be claimed by highborn men so their lives would be easier. I just wanted someone who would somehow love me despite the fact that I was an Omega. As I stood, the air in the room changed. My mate was coming into the room. I could smell him. I looked up, and my eyes locked onto Ryon. He was the Beta, the Alpha’s right-hand man. He was tall, powerful, and currently staring at me with a look of pure shock. The golden thread of the bond was pulsing between us, so strong I thought everyone could see it. “Oh dear,” I muttered under my breath. Mated to the beta of the pack? The second most powerful man in the pack? "No," Ryon whispered. It wasn't a romantic whisper. It was a snarl. He stepped toward me, and the crowd went silent. I reached out a hand, my voice trembling. "Ryon? Can you feel it?" He didn't take my hand. Instead, he backslapped it away. "Don't touch me, Omega." I stumbled back, my face burning. "But the bond... it just triggered. You’re my mate. Surely, you feel the mate bond too." Ryon laughed, a harsh, ugly sound that echoed off the stone walls. He turned to the crowd, pointing at me. "Do you all see this? The moon thinks I should mate with a weakling who can barely shift. Of all the ranks in the pack, the moon with it's cruel sense of humor condemns me to be with an Omega. A girl who spends her days scrubbing grease off my boots." "Ryon, please," I whispered. "I, Ryon of the Gust Pack, reject you, Mona," he shouted. The words felt like a knife twisting in my chest. "I reject you as my mate and my equal. You are a glitch in the system. An embarrassment to me and to this pack and I will not be the one who redeems you from what you are." In the histories of rejection, this was the swiftest and most painful one I had witnessed. And it was happening to me. The silence lasted for a second before the laughter started. It began with the high-ranking warriors and spread like a virus through the pack. "Look at her face!" someone mocked. "She actually thought she’d be the Beta’s woman," another sneered. I stood there, exposed and humiliated. My chest ached so badly I could hardly breathe. I looked for my father, for anyone to stand up for me, but they all looked away. In this pack, weakness was a crime. The people who claimed to love you in secret would abandon you publicly at the first sign of weakness. Alpha Tharr stepped forward. He didn't look angry; he looked bored. He had a ledger in his hand. "Is that it then, Ryon? You’re sure?" "I'm sure, Alpha," Ryon said, not even looking at me anymore. "She’s useless to me." Tharr nodded. He grabbed my arm, his fingers digging into my skin like claws. "Well, she’s useless to the pack, too. My debts are piling up, and I have a war to fund. Since you’re nobody’s mate and nobody’s daughter now, you’re just inventory." "What?" I gasped, trying to pull away. "Alpha, you can't!" "I can do whatever I want with a masterless Omega," Tharr snapped. He signaled to two guards. "Chain her. The slave traders are waiting at the neutral border. Get her out of my sight before she brings more bad luck to this gathering." The guards moved in. One of them kicked my legs out from under me, and I hit the dirt hard. I felt the cold iron of the collar snap around my neck. The weight of it was heavy, dragging my head down. I looked up one last time and saw Ryon walking away, his arm already around another girl. "Get up!" a guard barked, yanking the chain. I struggled to my feet, my knees scraped and bleeding. I didn't cry. The pain in my chest had turned into something else. It was cold. As they dragged me toward the iron cages at the edge of the square, I looked back at the pack that had been my home. I didn't see a home anymore. How my own people had turned against me in the twinkle of an eye was still baffling. Not one person has pleaded for me to be let go. "One day," I whispered to myself, the metal of the collar biting into my throat. "You’ll all wish you’d just killed me." "Shut up and move!" the guard yelled, shoving me into the cage. The door slammed shut with a heavy clanging sound and the lock turned. I sat in the straw, listening to the party continue in the distance. They were celebrating their new matches. I was sitting in the dark, a slave. I reached up and touched the mark on my collarbone where the rejection was already scarring over. Ryon thought I was weak. Tharr thought I was money to fund his wars and pay off debts. They were both wrong. I closed my eyes and started counting the guards' footsteps. If I was going to a slave market, I needed to know how to get out of one.