The Alpha's Runaway Bride

Five

Something was holding her tightly. Squeezing the air out of her lungs, crushing her bones in the darkness. Lotus struggled and struggled, before her eyes flew open and her arms came free. She jerked up.

Gasping fast, her eyes darted around a darkening room and finally on the mounds of blankets pooling on her legs.

As her breathing slowed down to normal, Lotus' eyes widened in confusion and in the realization—She wasn't dead.

Immediately, her arms flew to her face. Same old face but her glasses were missing. Stretching our her arms, she squinted at her skin, smooth and spotless. Not a fur in sight. The thing hadn't taken over.

Flashes of what happened bubbled to the surface of her mind. She blinked. She had won the fight.

And the memories was a certainty that her sanity remained intact.

How? What happened?

On that question, her mind drew blank. Her arms fell to her sides and she blew out a breath, glad to be alive and to have survived the fight for control.

In her calm state, in the black depths of her soul, she felt the thing toss in a restless sleep. Echoes of sharp hunger sharp pierced her stomach. She groaned and clutched it. But she was in control and it was easy to ignore the thing and its ageless hunger and shove it away.

It wouldn't be waking up anytime soon, Lotus swore to herself.

Last night had been close...too close.

Did she need to leave?

Because if the Alpha had found her then nowhere in the village was safe.

But those wolves couldn't have been the Alpha's guards, they bore no mark and they were trying to kill her.

Alpha Vaheer wanted her back alive.

Groaning tiredly, Lotus tossed aside the thick sheets and blankets caging her legs and instantly felt a chill.

Where even was she?

Last she remembered was the pain of the thing's fury, the crazed hunger, the overwhelming tiredness and the regret of losing everything.

She shivered.

There were missing pieces in her mind.

Holding the bed for support, she willed herself to get up. But her body creaked like old wood and her legs gave out like jelly.

The blankets softened her fall. Lotus didn't get up again. She heaved tiredly and pressed her back into the wooden bedstand. Swatting hair away from her face.

Her heart banged loudly in her chest at the little fall.

That fight for control had taken everything out of her.

The sharp pangs of hunger came back again, but it was a reminder of the onslaught of pain her body had undergone. She was hungry, not the thing inside her.

Squinting around the room, she found the bedside table, the chair by the door and the long drawer, all cloaked in glitching shadows.

Lotus didn't know if she should be relieved or worried.

She had blacked out.

Who had found her? What had the person seen?

It couldn't have been the wolves that had kept her here—she wasn't bound neither was she in a cage.

In an effort to dispel the glitching shadows, she rubbed her eyes and blinked. The window directly above her was letting in a chilly wind and fading sun.

Tears brimmed in her eyes as Lotus turned her head and faced the window. Half blind in an unknown place, with memories flashing through her mind, bringing emotions that made her chest ache.

Letting out a deep breath, she wiped away tears streaking down her cheek.

The setting sun, visible from her angle on the floor, dug up a memory... It played behind her wide open eyes.

~•~•~

Tiny pricks and thorns slashed at her flesh, as her small naked body stumbled through the woods.

Fading sun rays filtered through the canopy of large black trees. Birds and branches creaked. Twigs and dead leaves crunched underfoot. In spite of that, the woods were quiet. The howls had faded sometime before dawn, the scent of her kin had faded long after that.

A pup, all alone. Wishing she had died in that fire.

Hunger gnawed at her. Weariness shook her bones but she dragged herself on. Numb to pain caused by the thorns and the gaping hole in her heart.

Her lips quivered, silent tears flowed freely down her face at the decision she had made to go back and look for them.

Her father with his kind eyes and kind words. With his warmth and laughter.

Her brother with his bright eyes and quick temper. Though older and stronger, he showed her his love and protection.

She had gone back for them. The settled dust and ashes bore her footprints. The ghostly structures and crumbled houses watched her with empty eyes. She had drifted through the wreck of dying embers and smoke.

She had gone looking — and she had found them.

Whatever was left of them.

Her loving father would never laugh again. She would never feel his embrace or hear his words. He had faded from her memories and what took it's place was a cursed sight. A head blackened and burnt, an open mouth that had screamed in terror before it froze forever, glazed dead eyes half melted in the fire. She hadn't found his body—she didn't think to look.

Her protective brother had been nothing but a heap of burnt fur and ashes. But she had found his eyes and she had known it was him.

Suddenly, her head perked up. Memories clearing like mist. Tipping her nose up, she sniffed and drew back. As though cross checking her nose wasn't deceiving her, she rubbed them and sniffed again.

Her body moved automatically, her nose taking the lead as she scrambled through bushes and slapped away low branches.

Like an oasis in the desert, a little hut stood in a clearing under the setting sun, brown like the earth, with windows softened by warm glowing. The pup had smelled the smoke wafting from the chimney. A smoke from the roasting of meat.

Her mouth watered and without caution, she threw herself into the clearing and scrambled to the front door.

~•~•~

Lotus had dozed off watching the door. When the click sounded, her eyes flew open immediately and she straightened.

Night had fallen, throwing the room into a deep darkness.

Until a single flame of light from a candle slipped into the room.

She squinted as a dark figure holding the candle, shut the door. It set down an object it was holding on the chair and moved around the room with the candle, lighting more candles strategically placed in candelabras attached to the wall.

Eyeing the figure warily, Lotus shifted anxiously. Her mind was on alert but her body laid back uselessly, not willing to entertain any movement she planned to make.

Whomever was with her, she was at their mercy.

Once the figure turned toward the chair, it struck her that their back was familiar.

Towering. With raven hair that spilled down and stopped mid-back. And silent footfalls.

Her breath caught. No. It couldn't be.

The figure picked up the object and turned to her. Their face coming into full view. Candlelight dancing in those sharp silver eyes.

Lotus was no longer breathing.

A blurry flash of silver slashed through her mind and faded like a dream.

The silent stranger. The one that had found its way into her thoughts since she first saw him.

Why was he here?

He silently walked to her, placed the object in front of her within arms reach and withdrew to sit on the chair that creaked loudly under his weight.

His eyes fell heavily on her, nothing in them.

Her mouth parted but no words came out, not even a sound.