Blooming for the Alphas

Ophelia P.O.V. The clock on the will ticked loudly, almost mocking me as I carefully arranged the last of the fresh flowers in their vase. Roses, people always pick them and yet they are always the first to wilt and eventually die. In a way they reminded me of the girl I was before my life was permanently set in stone. I would always be beautiful, but when I had all of the luxuries that my wealth- my parents wealth could buy. It made me one of the most beautiful princesses in the kingdom, my parents had suitors coming in from every corner of the world, yet they chose him. They chose someone they knew would control me, hurt me, torture me in ways that I would never survive. They chose someone that would break my spirit before I ever walked down the aisle. It’s one of the reasons that I chose to open a flower shop after finally feeling safe for the first time in years. Flowers have always been something that I related to, something that I understood better than people. I was never going to be the type of princess that my parents wanted me to be, I was never going to be a daughter that they were even remotely proud of- never. They wanted complete obedience after the death of my sister, after being beaten and killed by her alpha for disobedience. They spent the rest of my life trying to train me into being submissive, they wanted to train me into being an omega. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath in, “They can’t make decisions for me anymore,I’m free,” I whispered, it was the same mantra that I have repeated in my head for the last ten years. The truth, it was a comfort lie. Something that I tell myself so I don’t wake up in the middle of the night screaming about the hunters finding me and bringing me back to my parents to be trapped in a cold marriage. The shop was quiet, most of the time I would pray for the lack of sound in the building mixed with the scent of jasmine, lavender and some delicate wildflowers. For a small moment, I could almost pretend that everything was normal. I could pretend that I wasn’t being hunted, tirelessly. I could pretend that they weren't out there,lurking in the shadows and waiting for the perfect moment to take me. The nerves of the truth sent a shiver through my body. I knew the truth of what would happen if my parents ever got ahold of me, the way they would make me regret ever embarrassing the royal family in such an ‘undignified’ way’ There would be ‘lesson’ and lots of them. Lessons is the way my parents make whipping me until I do what they want seem okay, seem like an okay parenting tactic. The truth is that the beloved queen and king of the werewolf community found a way to make their only living and breathing daughter behave and that was through unmerciful torture. That wasn’t what scared me more though. It’s not what kept me on the run for every second of my life until I inevitably die, no that would be the other group of hunters and they were so much more lethal. My mates. I could feel that they were coming for me- I could feel the heaviness in the air that seemed to thicken the moment that the sun dipped below the horizon. I could feel the storm brewing in the air, just waiting to find the perfect moment to break. I couldn’t escape this, not anymore. I knew that they were coming and there wasn’t a place in the world I could hide that they wouldn’t find me. I tried. I tried for ten years. I ran to every corner of the world, living amongst some of the poorest people and the richest. I tried hidest in the sahara desert and when they found me there to, then I ran to the other side of the world in the wet sss forest. No matter where I tried to run, they always seemed to find me, so I made a new plan. Just keep running. Thats the only thing that I had been doing for the last ten years since they whispered those words to me. The singular word that has sent me running for longer than I have ever done anything else. I wanted my freedom, I wanted to be as far away from royal protocol as I could get because If I didn’t. If I had just for a singular moment allowed myself the possibility of being their mates, then I would have to face something even more dangerous. I would have to adhere and follow through with any punishment that my parents found acceptable, not matter if it killed me. That was always the scariest part about being the daughter to Alpha and Luna of all the Alpha’s and Luna’s around the world. If they didn’t accept my mate, or in this case mates then they could choose to mate me with someone who is not my choice.My parents were smarter this time, they waited when it came to my older sister. They wanted to see who her fated mate was, and when she did find him they didn't just let him live and find a new Luna. They executed him in front of my sister. Since that didn’t kill my sister they mated her with another Alpha instead, one that they found more ‘acceptable’ for my sister. One that would make my sister a mute puppet instead of the bubbly sister I keep locked away in my memory. So, I run. I run so that they might live and I won’t see them die. I run so I won’t die in a cold and heartless marriage. I run for all of us. But mostly, I just don’t want to see my mates die. I don’t want to watch as the executioner takes the only thing that really matters to me.I don’t want to watch my parents smirk as they finally make me submit to a life full of chains and whips.