Alpha Tribrid Rising

Chapter Five~ The Final Loose End

~Alicia’s POV~

The transition from sleep to the divine was seamless, a sudden shift from the suffocating walls of the pack house to a world of infinite, shimmering indigo. I stood atop a mountain peak that shouldn't exist, my bare feet pressing against stone that felt as warm as a heartbeat. Before Me stood the Moon Goddess Selene materialized not as a solid woman, but as a masterpiece of light and shadow, her presence heavy enough to make the air vibrate. "You seek to run, little wolf," Selene's voice echoed, sounding like a thousand wind chimes caught in a gale. "But the Alpha's reach is long, and your strength alone is a flickering candle in a storm.

To survive the night, you must find a darkness deeper than his."Selene reached out, her fingers trailing cold starlight across my brow, and a jagged vision of a red-clay ravine burned into my mind. "You cannot run forever on two sets of legs," the Goddess warned, her silver eyes flashing with the weight of an ancient decree. "Seek the one the pack discarded—the lone wolf who lives where the mountain bleeds. He is a ghost of the old ways, a creature of scars and silence who once looked to me for mercy. He owes me a life, and I have chosen to trade it for yours. Do not fear the teeth of the exile, Alicia; fear the 'mercy' of the brothers you leave behind. If you do not reach him by the second dawn, the trail will run cold, and the hounds will find their mark.”

My eyes snapped open, but the transition was a violent jolt, like being slammed back into my body from a great height. My lungs seized, the stale, recycled air of the pack house feeling like sandpaper against a throat that still tasted of divine ozone. A rhythmic, silver pulsing hammered behind my eyelids, keeping time with a heart that was racing far too fast for someone who had been still for hours. My skin hummed with a residual electric charge, making the fine hairs on my arms stand at attention as if I were still caught in the Goddess's magnetic pull.

Then, the urgency hit me —a cold realization that spiked through the divine hangover. A map. I had to get to my fathers office to retrieve a map for my new destination after our escape and the fear of being caught has me ready to puke but I push through and jump out of bed so I can handle this loose end before the breakfast bell. Chelsea is already awake and a little startled by the way I just jumped up out of bed but I don’t have time to explain “ Alicia what’s wrong ?” She asks concerned. “ I have to hurry and handle one last thing before the breakfast bell” as I rush out the door.

The floorboards didn't dare creak under my feet.Aries was humming beneath my skin, her power ‘magically covering our scent’ so effectively that I was a shadow moving through a house of sleeping monsters. I had three minutes before the first patrol rotated near the Alpha's study. I didn't hate my father just because he beat me; I hated him because he was sloppy. He thought his "menacing aura" was enough to keep everyone in line, but fear creates gaps in a man's armor. I found the gap.

I reached the heavy oak door of the study. My heart hammered, but not from fear-from the sheer, cold adrenaline of knowing that in one more day the Moonstone Pack would be a distant memory.

I slipped inside, the smell of expensive bourbon and old blood-his scent—making my lip curl in disgust. I moved straight for the desk. I immediately found the map I needed but I also needed the boundary bypass codes. If we snapped our links and ran, the mental shock would alert the pack, but with these codes, we'd have a two-hour head start before the "blood-colored eyes" of the pack guards realized we were gone. I grabbed the leather-bound ledger and a small, velvet bag of raw gemstones from his safe-currency for the world outside. My 5th satchel was heavy now, a weight of promise against my hip. "Hurry," Aries whispered, her silver-lined pupils flashing in my mind's eye.

"The air is changing something is wrong in the basement." A cold shiver raced down my spine. Chelsea. I shoved the ledger into my bag and turned for the door. If my father had laid a hand on her while I was up here playing thief, I wouldn't wait for my birthday to show him exactly how "powerful" a tribrid could be. I slipped out of his office unnoticed and I didn't wait for the elevator. I took the servant stairs three at a time, my "butt length jet black" hair whipping behind me like a shroud. Every instinct I had as a "tribrid" was screaming. Aries was pacing behind my ribs, her "blood-colored eyes" seeing through my own as I reached the omega wing.

The scent hit me before I even reached the door the metallic tang of fear and the lingering, oily stench of one of my father's high-ranking

lapdogs. I burst into our room, my hand already reaching for the weapon I had, another potion I had stole from my father’s office ready to kill anyone standing in my way. But the room was empty of enemies. Only Chelsea was there, slumped against her metal bed frame, her face pale and her hands trembling so hard she could barely breathe. "Chelsea!" I dropped the 5th satchel, the heavy ledger and stolen gems thudding onto the floor. I was at her side in a second, my green eyes scanning her for blood. "Did he touch you? If he laid a finger on you, l'll end him right now.”

"He... he found them, Alicia," she choked out, her voice barely a whisper. She pointed a shaking finger toward the "13th floorboard". It was crooked. Scuffed. My heart stopped. If the Alpha knew about the stolen money and the knives,we were dead before the sun came up. "He stepped on it," Chelsea continued, her hazel eyes flicking toward the door as if he might return. "He saw the bags. He mocked me. He said we were property..." She took a shuddering breath, and for a moment, the hazel shifted into a piercing blue. "I had to use Skye. I hypnotized him, Alicia. I made him forget everything." Chelsea confesses sobbing.

I pulled her into a tight hug, feeling the frantic beat of her heart against mine. She was "5'8"" and usually the one comforting me, but right now, she looked small. "You did exactly what you had to do," I hissed into her hair, my voice cold with a new kind of resolve.

"He won't remember the floorboard, but the fact that he was even here means the 'menacing, dark' aura of this pack is closing in on us". I looked down at the loose board. My plan had to move faster. I had the essentials from the study, and everything else I needed but the loyal wolves were getting bolder. I can’t wait anymore it’s too risky. "We aren't waiting for our birthday tomorrow to leave," I told her, pulling back to look her in the eye. "We finish our 'daily duties' today, we stash the last of the food, and the second the moon hits its peak tonight, we’re gone”.