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CHAPTER 8: Shadows After Flames

Aвтор: Sheenzafar
last update Последнее обновление: 2025-09-13 17:00:03

I don't know how long I've been here.

Time has become something abstract, something that happens to other people in other places. There's no light through a window to mark the passage of hours. No fire burning down to ash, counting moments in the slow consumption of wood. No clock ticking to tell me that this is only an hour, or two, or five. No external markers to anchor me to the world outside this stone tomb.

There's only the cold.

It's under my skin now — not biting anymore, not sharp and immediate like it was at first. Just permanent. Like winter has taken up residence in my bones, like I was made of stone and the warmth was scraped out of me with careful, deliberate precision. The kind of cold that doesn't just touch you — it inhabits you, makes itself at home in the spaces between your ribs.

My knees have stopped hurting.

That should scare me more than it does.

Pain means circulation. Pain means the blood is still moving, still carryi

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  • Bound To The Ruthless Alpha   CHAPTER 12: Part 03

    His jaw tightened until the muscle jumped beneath his skin, and for the first time, a flash of real heat burned in his eyes—anger, not shame. Never shame."You think you're clever," he growled, rising slightly from his seat as if preparing to loom over me the way he had when I was small. "You think because Kael puts you beside him at his table, because he lets you play dress-up in silk and jewels, you can bare your teeth at me like this. But do not forget whose blood runs in your veins. Do not forget you are mine."The possessiveness in his voice, the way he said 'mine' like I was property to be claimed, made my skin crawl."Am I?" I whispered, my voice shaking with fury that threatened to consume me whole. "Because sitting in that banquet hall tonight, listening to those wolves tear me apart for sport, I didn't feel like your daughter. I felt like your bargaining chip. Your consolation prize for a war you couldn't win."My voice grew stronger, clearer, as the words poured out like po

  • Bound To The Ruthless Alpha   CHAPTER 12: Part 02

    I almost told Mira to tell him no. The words formed on my tongue—sharp, final words that would slam the door in the servant's face, that would let him wait and rot in his silence until he understood what it felt like to be ignored when you needed someone most.But something twisted inside me then—a dark, bitter thing that had been growing in the shadows of my heart for weeks. And instead of retreating, instead of hiding, I found myself straightening.My spine went rigid. My chin lifted.If he wanted to see me, then fine.Let him.Let him look me in the eye and see the daughter he had sold. Let him witness what his choices had wrought."Where?" I asked, and my voice was steadier than I'd expected. Cold. Sharp enough to cut."The guest wing," Mira answered gently, as if the words themselves might wound me.I nodded once, the movement sharp and decisive. My legs carried me forward before my mind could change, before the fury in my chest could soften into something pathetic and pleading.

  • Bound To The Ruthless Alpha   CHAPTER 12: The Daughter’s Shame

    The banquet broke apart slowly, like a beast easing back into its den after the kill, satiated and lazy with satisfaction.Chairs scraped against stone with harsh, grating sounds that echoed through the cavernous hall. Boots thudded against the floor in an irregular rhythm as bodies rose and stretched, joints creaking after hours of sitting. Wolves in fine coats and broad shoulders rose one by one, their movements languid and satisfied, voices dropping to murmurs as they gathered their attendants and began the ritual of departure.Nods were exchanged—shallow acknowledgments of shared entertainment. Farewells were offered with the casual ease of men who had just witnessed blood sport. Promises of alliances were sealed with handshakes that lingered a moment too long, each Alpha savoring the taste of power that hung in the air like incense.Kael didn't move.He sat tall in his chair at the head of the table, composed as marble, his goblet still cradled in his hand as though the entire ha

  • Bound To The Ruthless Alpha   Chapter 11: Part 04

    I stared across the table at my father through the haze of humiliation and unwanted arousal.He hadn't moved. Not really.The tremor in his hand had stopped, though the goblet still tilted precariously in his grip, crimson wine threatening to spill over the silver edge. His jaw remained locked, his lips pressed into a line so thin it was almost invisible. But his eyes—His eyes gave him away.They darted, quick and frantic, between the faces of the other Alphas, searching desperately for a crack in their laughter. For someone—anyone—who might offer him a lifeline, a defense, a moment's respite from the carnage Kael had unleashed.None did.They were all too busy reveling in his destruction, too drunk on wine and cruelty to spare him even false sympathy.And then, when his gaze flicked to mine—just for an instant, just long enough for our eyes to meet across the wreckage of the evening—I saw the truth.Not defiance. Not rage. Not even sorrow.Fear.Pure, animal fear.The look of a wolf

  • Bound To The Ruthless Alpha   CHAPTER 11: Part 03

    He thought Kael was about to speak in his defense. That his silence had been patience, not calculation. That perhaps this time—this once—Kael would recognize him as an equal before the table of Alphas. Would claim him as family, would defend the bond between them.I saw it in the way he lifted his chin, just slightly. The way his shoulders eased, as if readying to nod in agreement with whatever Kael said next. The pathetic gratitude that crept into his eyes.A son-in-law speaking for his father-in-law.A bond. A unity.A lie so beautiful he couldn't help but believe it.But I knew him.I knew the way his mind worked, the way he played with his prey before he devoured it.And I knew he wasn't going to defend anyone.Not me. Not my father.Least of all my father.Kael raised his goblet higher, his voice even and smooth when it finally came, carrying across the table without effort. Every word was perfectly enunciated, each syllable designed for maximum impact."Correction," he said, and

  • Bound To The Ruthless Alpha   CHAPTER 11: Part 02

    I felt every laugh slice across my skin, flaying me open one by one. Each guffaw was a claw, each chuckle a blade, until I was nothing but raw nerve endings sitting in silk and pretending to be whole.But it wasn't only me they laughed at.It was him—my father.Alpha Roran Vale, who had once commanded his own wolves with iron authority, who had raised me to believe strength was a birthright and weakness was death. Who had taught me that power was everything and mercy was for the conquered.Now he sat hunched at the edge of Kael's table like a beggar at a feast, teeth bared not in pride but in strain, his knuckles whitening around his goblet as the laughter ate him alive piece by piece.His face didn't redden with embarrassment. It paled, drained of every ounce of dignity, every shadow of the commanding presence he'd once possessed. The Alpha who had terrified me as a child, who had ruled with fear and fury, reduced to this—a shell of a man enduring mockery for the scraps of relevance

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