Silent Strength: The Female Alpha Leads the Purge

Chapter 6

Kristi

I could have kicked myself for being nieve as I walked toward the dark looming figure at the edge of the woods. I couldn’t help thinking back to the night I first met him. A night I wished a thousand times to forget, to wipe from my mind. But no matter how hard I tried, that never manifested. He was both my savior and my warden, and I wasn’t sure which of those roles disgusted me more.

I was twelve when he came into my life. I was in the woods, trying my best to train with logs and dummies crudely made by stuffing old shirts with leaves. I used to push myself harder and harder each day, praying it would allow me to prove myself to my father, but he never even gave me a chance to impress him. An audience was strictly forbidden. My only chance, I thought, would be showing up to training and beating one of his warriors. This a task not to be taken lightly as women were denied the right to train in our pack.

I had fallen again, ripping open the skin on my leg against a fallen branch. I sat, under the canopy of a tall pine and pulled my knees to my chest, bawling my eyes out. That’s when a hand landed on my shoulder. I jumped, hitting my head off a low-hanging branch as I turned to face the male towering over me with glaring eyes. His mouth moved as he attempted to speak to me, but I just stared. That’s when he hit me, hard against my cheek, for not speaking back. I fell to the ground, digging my nails into the soft earth as a tear fell. Why was this the response from everyone I came across in my life? Would my mother’s arms be the only place I was accepted?

I lifted my face to him, growling as I pointed to my ear. Thankfully, he understood. He almost looked ashamed as he tucked his hands into his pockets and relaxed his large frame, nodding his head. We stayed that way for a long time. I was scared to move, not knowing who he was or what he wanted.

Finally, he crouched down, grabbing a stick and snapping it in half before brushing away the loose needles laying on the ground.

Who are you? He wrote. I raised my eyebrows, pointing to the question and willing him to answer first. He laughed, sitting the rest of the way down and propping his arm on his bent knee.

Gabriel. He wrote.

Kristi.

Why are you in the woods playing?

I wiped away his question, glaring at him as I wrote my response.

I’m not PLAYING I’m TRAINING.

This made him laugh again. He threw his whole body back, lifting his head to the sky. I failed to see the humor. He had no idea the predicament I was in.

Okay, why are you TRAINING in the woods?

So I can beat my father’s warriors.

He raised his brow at me.

A tiny thing like you wants to take on warriors? One’s that belong to your father?

A sick grin crossed his face. It should have been a huge red flag, but his next message canceled it out in my mind.

Want my help? I am a Gamma.

The idea of having my own personal trainer, one who knew I was deaf and didn’t seem to care, was exhilarating. I quickly accepted his offer, meeting him daily, and paying him in the food I would sneak into the woods. It was an exchange I believed to be in my favor. At least until about three years into it when our training sessions became more intense and he became obsessive with the timing in which I would challenge my father. I wasn’t sure how we had gone from securing a place within the legion of warriors my father commanded to challenging my father himself, but Gabriel had made up his mind. I wasn’t sure I would be going along with it, but I had become too scared to stand up to him, worrying that I would once again be training alone. Or maybe I was scared of what his reaction would be…

My fears became reality on a cold autumn day. The grey sky threatened to unload snow as the air sent chills up my back. I met him in our familiar clearing, but he wasn’t alone this time. He stood next to a younger male, one who kept his back turned to me. I stopped as I made eye contact with Gabriel before apprehensively moving forward.

“You don’t need to be scared. I trust him, so you can too.” He signed. He had picked up quite a lot during our years together. I vowed that anyone who wanted to be part of my life would prove themselves that way.

“Then who is he?” I replied, standing infront of him now. “And why is he not facing me?”

Gabriel smiled, not in a way that brought me comfort, but in a way that had my stomach churning.

“Your mate. You’re future Alpha.”

I stepped back. He couldn’t be serious. After all this talk of me challenging my father, taking over the pack and proving my worth, he brought some male I had never met and was trying to force him on me?

“Absolutely not.” I replied.

Anger settled over him.

“How dare you. I have not wasted years of my life training you. You will be of age soon. Let him mark you, then you can challenge your father together. You’re too weak to do it on your own!”

I stood for a moment, weighing my options, before shaking my head.

“No.” My three fingers made the motion and there was no turning back. Gabriel started walking toward me, but I knew what I had to do. I knew my only option was to run and try to escape back into the heart of our pack territory. I ran with everything I had, hoping to find refuge in a place that brought me nothing but turmoil. I knew it was nearly fruitless. I didn’t have my wolf yet. I couldn’t shift, and he could. Still, I let my feet pound the ground as I attempted my escape. My hero arrived, leaping over me and tackling Gabriel to the ground. I fell on my back and started crawling backward, looking on with a terrified expression as my father’s large wolf bit at Gabriel before turning to me. He allowed the rogue who had trained me for years run away, too angry with the sight of me to even finish the job. Instead, he stalked my way, biting the collar of my shirt and dragging me back toward the pack. Only it wasn’t the pack house or the bunk house in which I lived that he went. It was the training ring where he deposited me before starting to slowly circle my body in front of all the onlooking eyes of his warriors and my own mother who stood petrified by what was inevitably about to happen.