The Alpha King’s Obssession

Chapter 6: Where are they taking me?

The wooden gates of our pack manor were slammed back against the stone walls by royal guards who hadn’t even bothered to dismount.

They had come to finalize the silver-oak border treaty that Uncle Mordecai had been bragging about for months.

But the atmosphere shifted from political business to a crime scene.

Kaelen explained that I had been marked by a rogue and I was a betrayer of their pack, and the head of the guards just stared at me without saying a word or making an expression.

"We cannot sign a crown treaty while your lands are harboring rogue spies, Alpha Thomas," Captain Vance said.

He sat high on his black horse, glaring down at my uncle and the pack Alpha.

"A rogue marking a she-wolf within a mile of the royal border is a breach of security."

"We knew nothing of this, Captain! I swear it," Alpha Thomas said, his hands raised in a display of submission. He didn't hesitate to point a shaking finger straight at me.

"The girl went missing in the Dead Woods last night. She brought this filth upon our land herself. The Silver-Oak pack is entirely clean of her treason."

Uncle Mordecai stepped forward, his face changed into panic, desperate to save the treaty and his own standing.

"She is an orphan, my Lord. A parasite we took in out of charity. She likely begged for a rogue to take her just to humiliate our family after Kaelen rejected her for his true fated mate."

I stood a few feet away, my hands already bound in heavy iron chains.

The cloth around my neck felt hot and sticky, hiding the jagged tear from the mark the rogue left for me. The beginning of all my problems.

I watched Kaelen, who stood tightly pressed against Seraphina, his arm anchored to her side. He didn’t even look in my direction.

"I do not care about your domestic dramas," Captain Vance interrupted.

"The treaty is postponed and the High Council demands a full investigation into how a rogue breached this close to the capital. This girl will face a royal trial in Onyx Crag."

Seraphina let out a small, satisfied gasp, but it was cut short as Vance pointed his armored gauntlet at the rest of them.

"And you, your Beta son, and the girl’s family will accompany the escort to give your testimonies," Vance commanded.

"If your pack is clean of treason, you will prove it before the judges. Secure the prisoner." He ordered his men.

The color completely drained from Kaelen’s face. Seraphina’s jaw dropped in genuine horror. They weren't the untouchable royalty of our small village anymore, to the crown, they were now suspects.

Two soldiers dragged a rusted iron cage on wheels toward me.

The guards hoisted me up by my chains and threw me onto the cold, hard floor of the wagon. The heavy door slammed and sealed me inside.

The journey to Onyx Crag lasted for an entire day.

From the floor of my cage, the world was just a blur of passing black stone ridges. But my eyes rarely looked at the landscape.

They were fixed on Kaelen. Every time the caravan paused, I watched him attentively tend to Seraphina.

He adjusted her cloak against the biting wind, handed her his water canteen, and whispered soft assurances to quiet her whimpering.

It was a dull ache.

For years, I had craved that exact gentleness, I had spent my teenage years trying to be quieter, better, and more useful just to earn a fraction of his attention.

Seeing it now through the iron bars, it didn't hurt as much as it disgusted me.

By nightfall, the caravan camped in a deep, shadowed canyon.

The guards stayed by their fires fifty yards away, leaving my cage isolated in the dark. My body was completely exhausted, and the bite on my neck caused a feverish heat that made my skull pound.

I opened my eyes to find Kaelen standing right outside the bars.

He had his hood pulled up, his eyes darting anxiously back toward the guards before he stepped closer to the cage.

"Elara," he hissed,

I didn't move from the floor. I just looked at him, my expression completely flat.

"What do you want, Kaelen?"

"Are you completely out of your mind?" He gripped the iron bars, leaning in so close I could smell the faint herbal tea he’d been sharing with Seraphina.

“Look at what you’ve done to us. You dragged my entire future into a royal tribunal. Do you have any idea what the High King does to families suspected of treason?"

There was no worry for me in his eyes, it was just the panicked rage of a man watching his comfortable inheritance slip away.

"I didn't drag anyone anywhere," I whispered, my voice hoarse. "Captain Vance ordered you to come."

"Because of you!" Kaelen’s knuckles turned white against the metal.

"Who was he, Elara? Tell me the truth. Was it a rogue spy? Did you sell information about our border patrol just to get back at me for rejecting you?"

A dry laugh caught in my throat.

“You think I destroyed my own life... just to get back at you?"

"Why else would you do it?" He leaned closer, his voice shifting into that soft, patronizing tone he always used whenever I was upset, which used to make me believe everything was my fault.

"Elara, think about it logically, I always took care of you after your parents died. I kept you fed and even pitied you, Elara.

I really did, I knew you were weak, and I tried to make things easy for you.

But the moment the Goddess chooses my true mate, you run out into the woods and give yourself to a monster just to spite us?"

The words didn't break me the way he wanted them to, they just cleared away the last of the fog.

‘I pitied you.’

It was the ugly truth he had hidden behind years of half-promises.

He had never loved me, I was just a charity case that made him feel important.

"You're right," I said quietly, looking him dead in the eyes.

"You pitied me, and I was stupid enough to think it was something else. But you don't have to worry anymore, Kaelen."

"What is that supposed to mean? Just give me the rogue's name so I can give it to the Council and clear my family!"

"I don't know his name," I said, leaning my head back against the cold iron.

"And it doesn't matter because they are going to execute me anyway. The Alpha King doesn't let rogue-marked females live. So go back to your true mate, Kaelen. You have nothing left to take from me."

Kaelen stared at me, his mouth opening slightly. He looked completely unsettled by the absolute quiet in my face.

He was used to me crying, pleading, and trying to fix things for him.

"Kaelen?"

A furious voice said and Seraphina stepped out from the shadows of the boulder, her expensive cloak dragged through the dirt.

Her face was twisted in a mixture of rage and raw jealousy.

"What are you doing over here? Why are you talking to her?”

Kaelen immediately let go of the bars, stepping back with his hands raised defensively.

"Sera, wait. I was just trying to get information out of her for the trial, to protect us."

"By whispering to her in the dark?" Seraphina came closer and shoved his chest.

The fake sweetness she usually flaunted around him was entirely gone, replaced by an ugly, frantic insecurity.

"You're still obsessed with her! You’re going to get us killed because you can't let go of your little orphan servant!"

"That's not true!" Kaelen grabbed her hands, his voice was desperate as he tried to soothe her.

"She’s nothing, Sera. You’re my fated mate. I’m doing this for our future. Look at her, she’s a criminal."

"Then come away from the cage!" she snapped, ripping her hands back.

"The guards are watching. If they think we’re conspiring with her, we won't even make it to the throne room."

I watched them bicker, their voices overlapping in a hurried argument as Kaelen practically begged her to believe him.

The sacred fated bond between them looked incredibly fragile, held together by nothing but fear and social ambition.

"Move," a heavy voice boomed.

A royal guard walked up with his iron spear. He didn't even look at Kaelen or Seraphina; he just pointed the weapon toward the main camp.

"Back to your tents. Now."

Kaelen didn't say another word, he grabbed Seraphina’s arm and hurried away into the dark, leaving me alone with the freezing wind.

By the next day, the caravan rounded a cliff face, and Onyx Crag was just ahead.

The fortress city was carved directly into the black volcanic rock, looking less like a home and more like a giant beast waiting to swallow us whole.

There were towering gates of solid iron on the road that I’ve never seen before.

As the iron carriage rolled through the shadow of the massive gates, fear finally pierced through my numbness.

The air here felt thick with a crushing pressure that made it hard to draw a full breath.

The carriage wheels groaned to a halt inside the dark stone courtyard. I knew, with absolute certainty, that I was never going to leave this place alive.