Chapter 5
962 Words
The asylum.
The second I heard the word, every drop of blood in my body froze.
I thought of Lyra eight years ago. After she lost her mind and broke into my villa, Kael ordered them to chain her up and throw her into that same lightless asylum like she was a piece of garbage.
I stared at Kael, unable to believe what I was hearing. He was actually going to send his Luna to a place like that. For Faye. For a pup that wasn't even born yet.
Run! Run now!
The survival instinct of a wolf hit me like an alarm bell. I didn't even care about the torn dress anymore. I scrambled up onto my hands and knees and stumbled out the door.
Behind me, Jace asked quietly, "Alpha. Do you want me to take a team after her?"
Kael's voice came back ice-cold and flat. "No need. Freeze all her secondary cards and her pack permissions. She'll come back on her own."
I don't know how long I ran. All I knew was that I needed to get as far away from that cruel Alpha as I could. By the time I was completely out of energy, I had collapsed into the mud at the edge of the territory.
That was when my phone rang.
Seeing the familiar number on the screen, the tears almost dropped instantly.
"Elara? Why are all our cards getting frozen? I had a whole couture jewelry set on order, final payment's due. Your father's company was bidding on a piece of land, Kael's people just snatched it out from under us.
"And your brother's limited-edition sports car got held at customs today. The vacation he had planned is off now."
Of course.
Of course Kael was so certain I would come back on my own. He knew exactly which buttons to push to break me.
My throat was so tight I couldn't make a sound.
When my mother didn't get a response from me, she finally noticed something was off. "Elara? Hello? What happened?"
I clenched my teeth, and after a long moment, I finally got the words out, my voice shaking. "Mom. Kael... He's got another woman. I don't want to be Luna anymore. Let me come home. Can you send a car to come get me?"
The line went silent for a full thirty seconds.
"You silly child, what kind of nonsense are you saying!"
My mother didn't comfort me. Instead, her tone got lighter, almost relieved. "Kael keeps the woman on the outside, doesn't bring her home. That means he still cares about you."
My father grabbed the phone to back her up. "Exactly. What top-tier Alpha doesn't have a few mistresses on the side? Once that woman has the pup, you take it as the Luna and raise it under your name. Problem solved."
"It's not the same! It's not the same at all!" I screamed into the phone, beyond my own control.
My father waved it off completely. "Darian and Elowen aren't yours by blood either, and didn't you raise them just fine for seven years? What's one more pup going to hurt?"
My brother's voice cut in from the side, every word a dagger. "Sis. I'm not going to sugarcoat this. Do you have any idea how hard it was for you to climb up to where you are now? You took Lyra down. You can't endure this little bit of inconvenience now?
"And even if you can't endure it for yourself, can you think about our whole family for once? Do you want us all to go bankrupt?"
"Endure".
They wanted me to endure. Again.
When I first became Kael's hidden mistress, climbing on the back of his power, they told me to endure. When Lyra broke in and slapped me across the face, they told me to endure. When Kael brought me that bowl of abortion herbs and killed my pup with his own hands, they still told me to endure.
And now, when a low-class Omega was literally taking a dump on my head, they wanted me to endure that too.
"Endure, endure, endure! I've had it with enduring! You parasites, you bloodsuckers, why don't you all just go die?! What have any of you ever done for me? When have you ever given me anything besides treating me like an ATM for your lifestyle?!
"You know what? Kael is going to throw me into the Tower for that b***h! Your luxury life is about to come to an end!"
I completely lost it. I screamed into the phone, hysterical, and to hell with Luna decorum and dignity.
A downpour was hammering down on the border checkpoint. The couture red dress I had been so proud of was soaked through with mud, hanging on me like a piece of rag.
"Open your eyes! I'm the Luna of this territory!" I clutched the gate and shouted at the patrol. "Open the gate! I need to leave!"
But the guards who used to wag their tails at me were looking at me now like I was a stray dog who'd lost its home.
"I'm sorry, Ms. Elara." The captain's voice was cold. "The Alpha has issued a full territory lockdown. Without the passcode, you can't get out."
"Move!"
He waved his hand and sent me flying. I crashed into a mud pit. My knees split open and started bleeding. My face throbbed, swollen and hot.
That was when a convoy of luxury cars with the Silver Moon Pack plates pulled up to a stop. A black umbrella opened. A pair of immaculate high heels stepped down and stood firmly beside the puddle in front of me.
I looked up.
And my breath caught in my throat.
- Writer
