BEARING THE RUTHLESS ALPHA'S HEIR

Fated to me

Blair's POV

Reports were all around me, territories subdued, borders redrawn, spoils tallied and catalogued. Men bent their heads as they spoke, their voices respectful, fearful. To them, I sat as a conqueror: broad-shouldered, cloak spilling over the throne like shadow.

Yet behind my eyes, I was elsewhere.

My mind was so far away and I had zero interest in what was going on right now. The victory I longed since now lost its flavor. The revenge I spent years grinding my soul to achieve now lay behind me like burned fields. The men I hated were dead, their lands mine, their lineages ground into ash. The satisfaction had been quick, intoxicating for a time… but already it was fading, replaced with the same emptiness that haunted me since boyhood. The silence that comes when there are no more left to chase.

One of the advisors cleared his throat and disrupted the train of my thoughts.

"Yes", I retorted.

"Your Majesty," He began, "a question remains about… the girl. The daughter of Harlan. She is of his bloodline, the very enemy who sought your destruction. Why leave such a threat alive?", He went on.

A ripple of agreement passed among them. I caught the flicker of unease, none of them understood why I spared her. They thought mercy, weakness, or perhaps some darker indulgence but they were wrong. And to make matters worse they didn’t know that I even had the second daughter of my enemy.

"It is a risk, keeping her breathing. The pack won't accept her as their luna, so its useless", Another advisor spoke.

I let them murmur among themselves before I answered.

I turned my gaze on them, slow and cold. They all stopped talking as if my eyes had drawn the air from their lungs.

"How I dispose of my spoils," I said coldly. "is not your concern. Her fate is mine to decide."

The last words rang through the room harder than I intended. Mine. It lingered in the air, a possessive claim I hadn't meant to make aloud. I hated the taste of it. Even more, I hated the flicker of truth buried inside.

They lowered their eyes and the reports droned on. But my focus was already off.

In the back of my mind, I knew they were saying the truth. Her presence was buried below in the dark. Her anger, her despair. Her stubborn defiance. No matter how I tried, I could not cut the bond cleanly.

"End of this, we shall meet another time", My command was enough for them to stand up.

When they walked out, I found myself restless, unable to focus on maps or treaties. My senses stretched unconsciously toward the dungeons, clawing at the thread I tried so hard to sever. Her emotions, defiance, grief, pain brushed against me like whispers I could not shut out. The bond, that cursed bond, gnawed at me, insistent and merciless.

My hands curled over the edge of the table until wood cracked beneath my fingers.

A knock on the door immediately annoyed me but I let whoever he or she was enter.

"Alpha… the prisoner has refused food again", The guard informed me.

Something in me stilled, then anger rose up again in my body.

So, little Mia sought death by starvation again, even after threatening her that she will lose her sister.

Perhaps she believed death would free her this time. Foolish girl. Did she think I would grant her such an escape? Starvation was a mercy she had not earned.

"I will go myself," I said, rising. My voice left no room for argument. Cloak sweeping the floor, boots echoing against the floor, I left my quarters behind then headed to the dungeon.

The dungeons greeted me with their usual perfume of damp stone and rusted chains. Guards fell silent at my approach. My boots echoed down the passage like a metronome for their fear.

"Majesty," One murmured carefully, "Leo still rages in his cell. Would you have us silence him again?"

I halted. My uncle. The betrayer. The coward who opened our gates to Renne's father and Damien, who watched my parents burn. His voice had been a thorn in my skull for years. Perhaps tonight I would remind him why I allowed him to rot instead of granting him the quick death he begged for.

"Open it," I ordered.

The iron door groaned, revealing the husk of the man who once strutted through my father's hall. Leo crouched in chains, eyes fever-bright, hair filthy and matted. Yet when he saw me, he laughed a rasping, broken sound.

"So hell still refuses you, Leo," I said flatly.

"My dear nephew," he crooned, mocking through the ruin of his teeth. "Come to visit your only blood? Or… to finish me yourself?", He laughed.

"Your blood disgusts me." I Spat out.

His laughter cracked into a cough, but he grinned wider. "Betrayal? No. Salvation! I saved this pack from your father's weak dreams. He would have led us all to ruin. I chose strength. Survival."

"You opened the gates like a dog begging for bones," I snarled, voice flat. "You watched them burn my parents alive. That is your strength? Pathetic."

"Necessary sacrifice!" he shouted with his eyes wild. "A new age demands blood! Without me, you'd be ash. You should thank me, ungrateful pup!"

His words irritated me that I stepped closer until only iron bars separated us. "Letting me live was the last and deadliest mistake you ever made." I hissed the words but I felt like killing him right now.

For a moment, something like fear flickered in his gaze. He yanked against his chains. "You can't kill me. I'm your blood! Family means nothing to you, monster?!" He questioned.

I crouched, meeting his frantic gaze. "When your heart finally stops, Leo. I'll feed your corpse to the lowest hyenas. Your blood and bones aren't worthy to taint my family's ground." My voice dropped to a whisper colder than steel.

His face twisted, rage and terror warring as he spat curses. "Curse you, Blair! Hatred will devour you! You will die alone, the moon will never give you peace!"

I turned away from him without another word. His shrieks clawed at the stone as I left, a storm breaking behind me.

The headache came as it always did after him, sharp and pulsing but my steps never faltered.

My boots struck the ground in cold rhythm as I pushed on deeper into the dungeon. His voice had stirred old wounds, but I would not bleed for him again.

My mind had already shifted to another prisoner.

Her.

The guards' whispers of her starvation replayed in my mind. My jaw tightened. If Mia thought she could escape me through death, she was wrong. Tonight, she would learn that her defiance carried a price.

At the end of the corridor, the torchlight flickered against a heavy door.

Beyond it, I could smell her scent, faint but unmistakable. Weak, trembling, but burning still with that stubborn spark.

I put my hand to the iron and pushed it open.

And there she was.

"Bring her," I told the nearest guard. "She needs to watch her sister as she dies"