The Royal Alpha's Destined Bride

Chapter 3

I was preparing to get dressed in another evening dress so that I would be presentable for the guests when the door to my room burst opened. For a moment, the only thing I saw was Iris' red face. She was furious and I already knew why. She stepped into the room holding the wedding dress from Mari's room firmly in her hands.

"Do you realize what you've done?" She shouted at me, throwing the dress down on the floor as she walked up to me. I was afraid and I wanted to move away from her but doing so would only make her more angry than she already was. Iris was a little taller than me so she was able to grab my hair in her hand and painfully pulled on it, forcing me down to my knees. I whimpered at the pain rushing through my skull and my arm, which had not yet been treated.

"It took Ven two whole days to travel up to the best tailor we could find, a significant amount of money as well, and you damage it with only one touch!" She pulled my head back so that I could look up at her. I didn't bother to resist allowed her to cause me the pain she felt she needed to inflict at the moment. She pointed at the dress on the floor with long-nailed, red finger and turned my head so that I could look at the dress.

"You're an ungrateful wench. I told you not to go anywhere near the dress because I knew something like this would happen! Why do you think we kept it in Mari's room the entire time?" I was on the brink of tears and I tried desperately to hold them back. Not even my own mother had scolded me as much as she did and if she saw me then, she would have dragged me back home. It didn't matter that I disobeyed her by deciding to marry a werewolf instead of a human. She would have locked me in the basement instead of letting me tolerate the torment I was going through.

"I'm sorry! When I saw it, I couldn't help myself. But my arm hurt so much and I made a mistake-" I tried to apologize to her to get her to give me some reprieve from the pain. All she did was release my hair and then grabbed my right arm. My elbow was bruised and swollen. I didn't have the time to go to the family doctor because Ven came into the room earlier when I went to retrieve the laces. He said that guests would be arriving soon and I couldn't be late to welcome them into the palace with him.

"Your arm? That's a problem that can be fixed in a second," she spoke as she took ahold of my arm with both hands. She rested on hand above my elbow and the other below it, and before I could object to what she was about to do, she violently twisted my arm in two directions, bringing the bones back into alignment. I bit my bottom lip to hold in my screams, but when that wasn't enough, I cupped my left hand over my mouth to muffle my voice. I failed to hold back the tears and they flowed down my face in streams.

I had only dislocated the elbow and it wasn't fractured at all, which I was grateful for. Otherwise I would not have been able to hide the injury.

"Stop causing problems for us," Iris said with malice dripping from her voice, "... You're lucky that you caused only a small tear. The tailor should be able to fix it." She walked away from me and picked up the dress from the floor. I remained on my knees on the floor, clutching my elbow with my left hand.

"As for you, you need to be punished. You have enough bruises on your body as it is, so I'll have you relieve some of the servants of their work," Iris began and I looked up at her in surprise. I would take any form of punishment as long as it didn't involve physical harm and I was grateful that I would get off from the problem lightly. It didn't cross my mind to wonder why she was being so lenient with me all of a sudden, especially after I tore an expensive dress that took almost a week to make.

"We need more servants to tend to the guests. The kitchen will need to be cleaned and the guest bedrooms need to be prepared for tonight-"

"I have to welcome the guests to the palace with Ven," I interrupted her, noticing my mistake only when a scowl formed on her face. She hated being interrupted and she did just that. The scowl disappeared after a few seconds, to my surprise, and she sighed heavily.

"Don't worry about Ven. I'll be there with him. Get going. Everything has to be ready by dinner time," she said next, walking out of the room without another word. I didn't know what to make of the situation. Should I have been glad to have received a light punishment or should I have worried about not being with Ven when he asked me to? I then realized that Iris was the queen and she was more fitted to welcome the guests than I was. That was more than enough to get rid of the feeling of worry that I felt.