Chapter Four
809 Words
Alisha's Pov
The cold seeped into my bones, but I barely felt it. My back was against the damp stone wall, knees drawn to my chest, arms wrapped around them like they could hold together the pieces of me that had been breaking for years.
Mikhail was gone.
He had left me here, alone with my thoughts—the worst kind of prison.
I took a slow, shaky breath. The dungeon smelled of damp stone, iron, and something else—something older, heavier. The scent of suffering.
I had spent years dreaming of him. Imagining how he would look at me, how his arms would feel wrapped around me when he finally realized the truth.
But I had been foolish.
I had given up my voice for a man who wouldn’t even give me the benefit of the doubt.
And worse…
I had walked straight into this mess.
I was young. Too young to understand the weight of the words I had whispered into my dream.
"I don’t want him to die. I'll give anything”
One day, I was laughing, my words as light as air. The next, I opened my mouth and found only silence.
No one could explain it. I wrote the dream down, but no one saw the connection. The pack healers tried everything—herbs, spells, even rituals meant to banish curses. But nothing worked. My parents were devastated at first. But as the weeks turned into months, their sorrow twisted into something colder.
A curse, they had whispered. I was cursed.
I became a burden—a daughter who couldn’t speak, who couldn’t stand up for herself. They stopped trying to understand. Stopped looking at me altogether.
And I had stopped hoping they ever would.
And just like that, I had become a burden.
An unwanted thing.
My pack had treated me like I was broken. Worthless.
But Selene…
She had stayed.
When the others had turned away, when my parents had let me fade into nothing, Selene had taken my hands and promised that she would never leave me.
"It doesn’t matter if you can’t speak, Alisha," she had said, her golden hair shimmering in the sunlight. "I’ll speak for you. Always."
And I had believed her.
For years, she had been my voice. My shield.
The only one I had left.
But now—
Now, I knew the truth.
Now, I knew why I had ended up in the woods.
Why I had been alone when the rogues came.
Why I had run and run until I found myself on foreign territory, captured by Mikhail’s warriors and thrown into this cell.
It was because of her.
Selene.
My best friend.
The only one who had never abandoned me—
Had betrayed me.
---
I replayed it over and over again in my head.
"Alisha, can you go to the forest for me?"
Her voice had been light, casual, like she wasn’t sending me into a nightmare.
"We’re running low on the moonroot herbs, and you know how rare they are. You’re the only one I trust to find them."
I had smiled at her, nodded, and left.
I had trusted her.
And the moment I had stepped into the trees, the rogues had been waiting.
They had chased me, snarling, growling, their eyes filled with bloodlust.
I had run until my legs burned, until my lungs screamed for air.
Until I crossed the border into Mikhail’s land.
And now—
Now, I was here.
Now, I understood.
Selene had sent me into that forest knowing I wouldn’t make it back.
And I had walked straight into her trap.
A bitter, broken laugh bubbled in my throat, but as always, no sound came.
---
Helplessness, Rage, and Heartache
My fingers curled into fists, my nails biting into my palms.
How could she?
How could she pretend to care for me, to love me like a sister, only to throw me to the wolves?
Had I ever meant anything to her?
Or had she just been waiting for the right moment to be rid of me?
Tears burned my eyes, but I refused to let them fall.
I was tired of crying.
Tired of feeling small.
Tired of losing everything.
First my voice.
Then my family.
Now… Selene.
And Mikhail—
Mikhail, who was supposed to be mine.
Who was supposed to feel what I felt, to know me without words.
Who had looked at me like I was just another problem he didn’t want to deal with.
Something inside me cracked.
I was tired of this.
Tired of waiting for someone to save me.
Tired of hoping for kindness.
Tired of losing.
My vision blurred with fury and grief, and I slammed my fists against the stone floor, the pain grounding me, keeping me from shattering entirely.
I paused, hearing footsteps approaching.
- Writer
