CHAPTER 98
913 Words
The heavy iron door creaked open, and light slashed through the dungeon’s gloom. Elise flinched, her wrists aching from the cold chains. Two guards stood there, armored and expressionless.
“Stand up,” one of them barked.
Her legs trembled as she rose. The floor was damp, the air heavy with mold and rust.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked, her voice hoarse from silence.
“Alpha’s orders,” the other guard muttered. “Public presentation.”
Public presentation. The words made her stomach twist. She wanted to ask more, but the guards grabbed her arms and dragged her out before she could form another word.
The corridor above was blinding. After days in darkness, the sunlight stabbed at her eyes like knives. She stumbled once, catching herself against the cold stone wall. The guards didn’t slow down.
They dragged her out into the courtyard.
Hundreds of eyes turned. The noise hit her like a wave — murmurs, laughter, and disgust all rolled into one cruel symphony.
“That’s her!” someone shouted. “The traitor!”
“Alpha Kai’s disgrace!” another voice sneered. “Didn’t think she’d show her face again.”
A lump formed in her throat as the guards pushed her forward. Her hair, matted and tangled, clung to her face. She could feel the filth from the dungeon still clinging to her skin.
Then came the first piece of rotten fruit. It splattered against her shoulder, cold juice dripping down her torn sleeve.
“She’s filth!” a woman yelled. “After everything the Alpha gave her!”
“Liar!” someone else shouted. “You fooled him, didn’t you?”
More rotten fruit followed. One hit her cheek, another caught her in the ribs. Laughter rippled through the crowd.
Elise stumbled but didn’t fall.
She clenched her jaw and kept walking. Her heart hammered, her body shook, but she refused to look down.
“Still acting proud?” one man spat. “Even now?”
A teenage boy threw a stone that grazed her shoulder. She winced but didn’t stop.
“Maybe she liked betraying him,” someone said from the back. “That’s what w****s do.”
Laughter again. Ugly, sharp, and loud.
Every word cut deeper than the stones.
She caught movement on the edge of the crowd — a tall figure, arms crossed, eyes dark. Lucien.
Their eyes met for a second. His jaw tightened. His hand flexed at his side like he wanted to step forward. But he didn’t.
He turned his face away.
That hurt more than the crowd ever could.
Her throat burned. The sting of tears rose, but she swallowed them back. She wouldn’t cry here. Not in front of them. Not when every laugh seemed to echo Kai’s silence.
Then someone shouted his name —
“Alpha Kai should’ve let her rot! Look at her now!”
“Maybe he’s too soft,” another sneered. “Maybe she’ll twist him again.”
“She already did,” a woman said bitterly. “She made a fool out of him — out of all of us!”
The words hit Elise harder than the stones.
Because deep down, she knew they reflected what Kai might think too.
The guards forced her to stop in the center of the courtyard, where everyone could see her. Her knees shook from exhaustion.
One of the guards turned to the crowd. “By order of the Alpha and Council, Elise of the Mooncrest bloodline remains imprisoned under investigation. Until judgment is passed, she is forbidden from pack affairs.”
The announcement only fueled the noise. People shouted, cursed, and threw more things.
Rotten food smeared her skin. Mud splashed against her feet.
She looked at them — at all those faces filled with hatred. People she once protected, healed, fought beside.
She could see mothers clutching children, warriors smirking, elders shaking their heads in disgust.
Once, she was their Luna-in-waiting. Now, she was their shame.
Her eyes flickered toward the high balcony. She half-expected to see him there — Kai. Watching. Silent.
But he wasn’t.
That hurt too.
The crowd started chanting, voices blending into one sick rhythm.
“Traitor! Traitor! Traitor!”
Elise stood there, shaking. Her heart pounded so hard she could feel it echo in her skull.
She could have broken down. She could have begged or screamed or pleaded.
But instead, she lifted her head. Slowly.
The crowd roared louder, angered by the defiance in her posture.
“Look at her! Still pretending she’s better than us!”
“Break her!”
The guards began to pull her back toward the dungeon, but Elise didn’t lower her head. She kept her eyes fixed forward, forcing herself to breathe through the pain.
Her hands were trembling, but not from fear anymore.
Something else was stirring.
A spark.
The humiliation burned, but it also lit something inside her chest — something that refused to die.
She didn’t know what strength was left in her, but she knew one thing: she wasn’t going to let them destroy her spirit too.
As she was dragged back into the darkness, rotten fruit still dripping down her arm, Elise whispered under her breath, so quiet no one heard —
“They’ll see. One day… they’ll see the truth.”
The dungeon door slammed shut behind her.
And in the silence that followed, that spark inside her didn’t fade.
It burned.
Faint. But alive.
- Writer
