The Alpha's Blood-Stained mate

Chapter 11: The Princess in Chains

The sound of my name hanging in the air felt like a death sentence. Silas was staring at me with a look of pure, unadulterated hatred. He didn't see a niece. He saw a mistake he had failed to kill five years ago. He saw the rightful Alpha of the Silver Moon pack standing in the middle of his lies.

"Kill her!" Silas screamed. His voice was shrill, the mask of the calm uncle completely shattered. He pointed his cane at me like a spear. "She is a traitor! She is a rogue who has infiltrated this Council! Execution, Kaelen! I demand her head now!"

My heart was hammering so hard it felt like it would break through my ribs. I looked at Kaelen, pleading with my eyes. Do something, I thought. Tell them the truth.

But Kaelen’s face had turned into a mask of cold stone. He didn't look like my mate. He looked like the Butcher. He stepped forward and grabbed my arms, pinning them behind my back with a force that made me gasp. His grip was like iron, and there was no warmth in his touch.

"She is a prisoner of the Iron Claw," Kaelen announced. His voice boomed through the Hall, silencing the shouting envoys. "She has committed crimes against my pack. I will not execute her until she is interrogated. We need to know who else survived the fire. We need to know who helped her."

"There is nothing to interrogate!" Silas roared, stepping into Kaelen’s space. "She is a threat to the peace! If you don't kill her, you are breaking our treaty!"

Kaelen leaned down, his face inches from Silas’s. "She is in my castle, Silas. That makes her mine to deal with. If you want her head, you’ll have to wait until the Council hears her testimony. Or are you afraid of what a dead girl might have to say?"

Silas flinched. The threat worked, but it didn't make me feel any better. Kaelen signaled to his Sentinels. They grabbed my shoulders, and before I could say a word, I was being dragged out of the Great Hall.

The journey to the dungeons was a blur of dark hallways and cold stone. The air grew damp and heavy the deeper we went. We passed the regular cells and headed for the High-Security wing. These cells were lined with silver, a metal that acted like a slow-burning poison to any wolf.

The guards threw me inside. I hit the floor hard, the silver-dust in the air making my lungs burn instantly. I heard the heavy iron door slam shut, followed by the sound of several locks turning.

"Wait!" I shouted, crawling toward the small barred window in the door. "Tell Kaelen I need to speak to him! Tell him it’s a mistake!"

The guards didn't even look back. Their footsteps faded away, leaving me in total darkness.

I slumped against the wall. The silver lining in the stones made my wolf whimper in the back of my mind. It felt like a low-grade fever was spreading through my blood, weakening my muscles and making my head spin.

I waited. I told myself Kaelen had to do that to save me from Silas. I told myself he would come as soon as the Council meeting was over. He would use the secret passages. He would bring me water. He would tell me it was all part of a plan.

One hour passed. Then two. Then five.

The cold began to sink into my bones. The only sound was the dripping of water somewhere in the distance and the frantic beating of my own heart. The mate bond felt like a frayed rope, pulling at my chest, but there was no response from the other side. Kaelen was silent. He was leaving me here to rot in a cage of silver.

The betrayal felt worse than the physical pain. I had started to trust him. I had saved his life from the poison. And his reward was to throw me into a hole and let Silas decide my fate.

I must have drifted into a light, feverish sleep, because the sound of a key turning in the lock made me jump. My heart soared. He’s here, I thought. He finally came.

The heavy door creaked open. A figure dressed in a long, hooded cloak stepped into the cell. They were carrying a small dim lantern that cast long, flickering shadows on the walls.

"Kaelen?" I rasped, my throat dry and sore from the silver-dust. "Kaelen, thank the Goddess. You have to get me out of here. Silas is going to try to kill me."

The figure didn't speak. They set the lantern down on the small stone bench. Slowly, they reached up with a gloved hand and pulled back the hood.

I froze.

It wasn't Kaelen. It was a woman. Her hair was a matted, dirty blonde, but it was her face that made me gasp in horror. The left side of her face was beautiful, but the right side was a nightmare of melted, puckered skin and red scar tissue. It was the kind of wound that could only come from an intense, magical fire.

The woman looked at me with one clear blue eye and one clouded, milky eye. A slow, twisted smile spread across her scarred lips.

"You always were the lucky one, Vespera," she said. Her voice was thin and scratchy, like wind over dry leaves. "You got to run away. I had to stay and burn."

My breath caught in my throat. I knew that voice. I knew that blue eye. It was a face I had seen in my dreams every night for five years, but it was a face I thought had turned to ash.

"Mira?" I whispered, my voice trembling. "Mira, is that you? You’re alive?"

The woman took a step closer, the light of the lantern hitting the silver branding iron she held in her other hand.

"I’m alive," Mira hissed, her voice full of a cold, poisonous rage. "But you’re going to wish I wasn't."