Chapter1:Escape
1525 Words
Elena’s pov;
Tonight was the night.
The night he would take everything from me.
Alpha Darien, the one who had taken and taken and taken from me, that I became nothing but an empty hollow shell, and now, he’d come to take what was left of me.
They had dressed me in white, which was a cruel irony. There was no purity left in me, not after all these years under Darien’s reign. The dress clung to the bruises he’d left just hours earlier, proof that no ritual, no ceremony, could ever cleanse what he’d already ruined.
I couldn’t scream. I hadn’t been able to since I was seven. My voice had been stolen in a night of blood and fire I couldn’t remember.
Not just my voice, but my memories. I couldn’t remember anything from before I was abducted, just the image of my parents being killed, but even their faces were unclear.
Sometimes, I saw my mother as a fairy. Other times, she was human, and she looked powerful.
My silence had never stopped Darien. If anything, it made me an easier prey.
“Today! I’ll finally have you,” Darien snarled, his eyes glinting with mischief.
“By the time I’m done with you,” he smiled, letting the word hang, but he didn’t have to complete it.
I knew what would happen. He’d finally have the one thing he had wanted for so long, my body.
He had wanted to take me for a long time, but for some reasons, he believed that I carried a special blood and chose to wait until the blood moon, when he could take some of the said power for himself.
“It’s time,” the witch announced, and Alpha Darien moved to the altar, his eyes gleaming as the moon rose. The blood moon.
She smeared blood across his chest and chanted something. His golden eyes glowed with twisted pride. My stomach churned.
“Please!!” I tried to scream, but it was useless, I didn’t have a voice anyway. Nobody could hear me. Tears streamed down my face, but that seemed to even excite him the most.
“Save your tears, honey. You’d need it later in the bedroom,” he smirked.
“I’d rather die,” I tried to say, but as usual, I only said it in my mind.
The drums boomed, echoing through the trees.
Around the circle, wolves howled and danced, lost in the madness of the Blood Moon ceremony, a ceremony that was celebrated only once in twenty years.
But fate had other plans.
A cry rang out from the eastern gate. Then another. Screams followed. Not screams of pleasure or joy, real frantic screams.
Wolves shifted mid-step, confusion spreading through the crowd.
“Rogues!” someone shouted. “We’re under attack!”
Alpha Darien let out a furious snarl and barked orders, his Beta rushing to his side.
I had no idea if he was furious because such a huge event had been ruined or if it was because we were being attacked by rogues.
Either way, the ceremony shattered after that. Everything became chaotic. Everyone seemed to be growling. The warriors shifted and surged towards the gates.
“Protect the inner circle!” he shouted. “No one leaves this ground!”
But like other people, I was already running.
The first explosion came from the western gate, and I hid, seeing that the rogues were everywhere.
My hands trembled as I crouched behind the stone wall that once belonged to the old council house. I pressed my palm against the cool stone, forcing myself to stay still. If anyone saw me here, rogue or pack members, it didn’t matter because the same fate awaited me.
If Alpha Darien could successfully defeat the rogues, I knew what that meant.
But I wouldn’t wait to find out.
He thought I was weak. Just a silent little omega girl. Nothing but a broken plaything. But he was wrong.
I had survived him, I had survived his guards, his punishments, his endless cruelty. And now, on the night he planned to strip me of the last thing I owned, I would finally do the one thing he never expected.
Run!!
I didn’t look back. I couldn’t. My legs screamed as I pushed through the thick woods, branches tearing at my skin. Blood dripped from a gash on my side, but I didn’t care. I was leaving that nightmare behind, even if it killed me.
The pain meant nothing. I had lived through worse. Much worse.
Behind me, I heard shouts. Angry voices rising, someone had either discovered my absence or I the rogues had overpowered them.
Alpha Darien’s voice echoed behind me, full of rage and fury. “FIND HER!”
My legs burned as I pushed faster, weaving through the trees with the same speed as lightning.
The blood moon lit my path, casting shadows that danced and lunged, perhaps in a bid to frighten me. But I wasn’t scared of that, I was more scared of getting caught.
Somewhere far behind, I heard the sharp bark of patrol hounds and the low, guttural howls of wolves shifting mid-run. They were hunting me. I had minutes, maybe less, before they caught my scent.
I darted through a hollow log and stumbled down a slope slick with moss and rot. Pain shot through my ankle, but I kept going. I didn’t care if I tore myself to pieces. It is better to die free in the dirt than to be marked by that monster.
When I crossed the boundary, I felt it first. The unmistakable shift in the air. I have crossed the pack of alpha Darien, and I have entered into another unknown pack.
I was now a rogue.
The air seemed different, and even the soil I stepped on seemed strange. It was like someone was calling out to me, but I glanced around.
Nobody was in sight, just the thick forest and the blood moon, which seemed to glow even more.
I tried to guess where I was, but I couldn't. Behind me, I could hear Alpha Darien’s voice again, distant but growing louder. My fingers dug into the bark of a tree as I forced myself up another hill.
My legs trembled. Blood smeared my thighs. My vision wavered,
but still, I climbed.
“She’d be crazy to go in there,” I heard his voice clearly this time.
“Alpha, should we follow her?”
“This is the blackmoon territory. She wouldn’t…”
“Leave her! If she’s so desperate to die, so be it.”
I gasped, realizing where I was.
Somewhere ahead, a wolf howled, it wasn’t one from the pack, it was deeper and Wilder.
A rogue.
My heart skipped. I had heard the stories, same as everyone else. The Black Moon Pack. Where Savage Monsters who didn’t follow the laws of the Alphas. Who ripped apart anyone who dared enter their lands.
But I didn’t stop.
It is better to die by the hands of a rogue than live another night under Darien’s roof.
My legs gave out just then, buckling beneath me as the world spun around.
I dropped to my knees, gasping for air. My body screamed in protest, but I couldn’t go back.
I would never go back.
I dragged myself forward, crawling now. Each breath felt like my throat was on fire. My vision blurred. I couldn’t tell if it was the moonlight or the tears in my eyes. My fingers dug into the dirt, and my nails broke .
My body had reached its limit.
Just as I took another step forward,a rock gave way beneath my foot, and I stumbled forward.
“Arrrghhh!” I tried to scream.
My vision blurred. My skull cracked against a stone. For a moment, there was nothing but darkness and then pain, white-hot and raw, it jolted me awake.
The rogues would get to me anytime soon, but I wasn’t scared, not anymore. Better them than Darien.
But no one came.
I stumbled through the thick woods, deeper than I’d ever dared to go before. My breath came in ragged gasps, and I collapsed beside a crooked tree, the bark rough and cold against my now exposed skin.
I blinked up at the red moon, which was now fading into dawn.
I had escaped.
I was free.
And then I passed out.
I was suddenly jolted awake when I felt rough hands on my body. My eyes struggled to adjust to the sight of the men as they grabbed my arms and lifted me off the ground like I weighed nothing.
My first instinct was to fight, but I had no strength left, and I didn’t even have a voice to scream.
The faces above me were unfamiliar. Scarred. Hardened. Not Moonfall soldiers.
These were the rogues!
One of them, the tallest one, leaned close. His eyes were ice cold and sharp as though he could see right through me.
"She’s bleeding out," he said. His voice was deep and emotionless. "We take her to Kael.”
- Writer
