Claimed By The Ruthless Alpha

Chapter Two: The Ring in the Ashes

POV Alpha Morgan Vantor

My mother's ring.

Those words hit harder than any fist my father ever threw.

"Show me," I said.

My second in command, Ronan, opened his palm. There it was. A small silver ring with a wolf carved into the metal. I would know it anywhere. I used to watch it catch the light when she brushed my hair back as a child, before she stopped touching me at all.

"Where," I asked.

"North packhouse," Ronan said. "It is burning right now, Alpha. Whoever did this wanted you to find the ring before the fire took everything."

I turned to look at the girl still kneeling in the dirt. Elara. She was watching me with wide eyes, like she was trying to understand what kind of man she had just been claimed by.

"Bring her," I told Ronan. "She stays close. I do not want her wandering my land while I am not watching."

"Alpha, we do not have time for a stray," Ronan said.

"She is not a stray anymore," I said. "She is mine. Bring her."

Elara opened her mouth to protest, but I was already walking. My men lifted her, and she did not fight them, though I could feel her eyes burning into my back the whole way.

We reached the north packhouse within the hour. Smoke filled the sky like a black scar. My men were already fighting the flames, but it was too late to save the building. All I could do was watch it die.

"Alpha," a young guard said, running up to me, his face pale. "We found something else."

He held out a piece of paper, burned at the edges but still readable. Someone had written on it in careful handwriting.

*She is alive. And she remembers everything you tried to forget.*

I felt my chest tighten.

"Who wrote this," I said, my voice low and dangerous.

"We do not know, Alpha. Whoever it was, they were gone before we arrived."

I crushed the paper in my fist.

For fifteen years, I believed my mother died the same night my father was killed. I saw her body. I buried her myself. Now someone was telling me that was a lie.

"Morgan," Elara said softly. It was the first time she said my name.

I turned to her, surprised she dared to speak to me without being asked.

"You should not use my name," I said.

"Sorry," she whispered, lowering her eyes. "I only wanted to say, whoever left that note, they wanted you angry. Angry men make mistakes."

I stared at her. Nobody talked to me that way. Nobody dared to give me advice, especially not a rogue girl I found bleeding in the forest an hour ago.

"You think you know me," I said.

"I know fear," she said. "I have seen it many times. Right now, you are afraid. You are just very good at hiding it."

For a moment, I could not speak. She was right, and that made it worse. I hated that a stranger could see through me faster than my own men, who had served me for years.

"Careful," I said. "I do not like people who see too much."

"I did not choose to see it," she said. "It is just there."

Ronan cleared his throat, breaking the tension. "Alpha, we should return home. It is not safe here."

I nodded, though my mind was still on the note. She remembers everything you tried to forget. What did that mean. What was I trying to forget.

We rode back to the packhouse in silence. Elara sat in front of me on my horse, since she was too weak to ride alone. I could feel her shaking, whether from cold or fear I did not know.

"Why did you save me," she asked quietly, halfway through the ride. "Your man said you deal with rogues a certain way. But you stopped him."

I did not answer right away. Truthfully, I did not know the answer myself.

"I do not waste what could be useful," I said instead, though even as I said it, I knew it was not the real reason.

"Useful," she repeated, and I heard something bitter in her voice. "Is that what I am now."

"You are what I decide you are," I said. "Do not forget that."

She went quiet after that, and I told myself her silence did not bother me.

When we reached the packhouse gates, my head guard came rushing out, his face grim.

"Alpha," he said. "We have another problem. The healer looked at the girl's back while she was resting earlier. She has old scars, Alpha. Many of them. Someone hurt her for years, long before she came to this forest."

I turned to look at Elara, who suddenly could not meet my eyes.

"Who did this to you," I asked, my voice cold and sharp.

She said nothing.

"Elara," I said again, stepping closer. "Who hurt you."

She lifted her chin, and for the first time, I saw real fear behind her eyes, fear that had nothing to do with me at all.

"If I tell you," she whispered, "you will not believe me. Because the man who did this wears your family crest on his ring, and he serves inside your own pack."