The Rogue’s Bride..

Elvara

I caught the flash of fear in my mother’s eyes right before I turned my back on her for good.

The soldiers’ grip tightened around my arms, their nails cutting crescents into my skin as they hauled me out of the pack house. The moment the open air hit my face, voices rose from somewhere ahead, and I froze at the sight of the crowd packed into the compound.

Even from the gates, smoke hung thick in the air. Rows of male wolves stood with their jaws set and their eyes hard. A few of them were faces I recognized from my training days at the academy. They were the same faces that used to nod at me with respect.

“Cut the monster loose!” a voice bellowed from somewhere in the back, and the crowd chanted the words and spat them back louder at me. “The Alpha’s been hiding a monster among us!”

Monster. The word hit me hard in the chest. My pulse roared in my ears as they repeated the wicked chanting over and over again. The soldiers holding me went rigid, just as stunned as I was.

A monster. Who did they mean? Fangrend had always been known to be peaceful. So where had this mob crawled out from?

I steadied my breathing, ignoring the cold that crept up my spine, freezing me from within.

Fuck. Nothing about this felt safe.

I was still hugging my arms around myself when my father’s scent reached my nostrils. My mother’s, lilac and sweet, trailed closely behind him.

“What is the meaning of this?” my father barked, and the crowd instantly went silent.

I didn’t bother turning to face them, not while I was pinned from right, left, and center like a captured animal.

“I have no answer, Alpha Nicholas,” the lead soldier stammered. “We don’t know why they’re demanding that a monster be released. We have no monsters in the pack house.”

“They mean Elvara. Obviously.” My mother’s voice hit me from behind, and my chest squeezed at how easily the words left her mouth.

My vision blurred. No matter how strong I was or how hard I tried to stand, it was too much not to be affected.

How could my life be reduced to this?

I used to be a warrior worth watching. Now I was being marched out like a criminal in front of the very people I once called my family. I was already scraping the bottom, and she certainly didn’t need to grind my face further into the dirt.

How much lower could a person go?

“Say it louder, why don’t you,” I hissed at her, my eyes burning as I tipped my chin. “Go on! Tell them what a monster you raised. If I’m a monster, Mother, then so are you! You are the one who birthed me!”

“Speak to your mother like that again and see what happens,” my father snarled, siding with his mate the way he always did, without hesitation or a single thought for me. “You’ve been nothing but ill luck since the day you were born. I only wonder how word of you got out at all.” Disgust coated his every word.

With one last burning glare, He tore his gaze from me and moved toward the gates authoritatively, looking over the crowd as he snarled. “I want an answer. Now.”

The crowd stilled instantly as my father’s aura rushed over them. Even I felt the weight of his presence, but I had his blood. Unlike them, I still had some weight under its influence.

“I said,” he roared, and his Alpha voice rolled over the compound like thunder, “what is going on here?!”

The wolves shrank back, all trembling, until one man rushed forward from the crowd and dropped into a bow. “Alpha, word has spread among the pack that a cursed creature lives under your roof.”

My father let the silence stretch, staring the man down before answering. “That would be my daughter. But she’s being handed over now to the Alpha of Duskborne.”

My knees buckled. Cursed. Me?

I already knew I meant nothing to him but an item he could use as he pleased. But hearing him confess it, out loud and clear to strangers, without caring that I was still behind him, watching. It cut deeper into my heart than I expected.

The crowd erupted into gasps, and whispers suddenly spread like wildfire. “Isn’t the Duskborne Alpha cursed himself? Why hand his own blood over to a man like that?”

Each whisper landed like a blade between my ribs, and I felt something inside me break.

“But don’t fret,” my father announced, raising his voice for the whole compound to hear. “She leaves tonight, and this pack will finally be free of its curse!”

Cheers broke out at the news of my exile. I picked out familiar faces in the crowd, people who once worshipped me for being the Alpha’s firstborn and his rightful heir, yet turned against me because of a silly prophecy about my birth by some drunk seer?

Now they wanted me gone.

An icy coldness pierced deep into me, and whatever fight I had left in me finally died.

Death would have been kinder to me than this. This was shame, and it hit me in the way it hurt the most.

My lips pressed tight, tears burning in my eyes, but I refused to cry in front of them.

I only stared back at the pathetic excuse of a pack which I had thought was my people.

My father snapped his fingers, and the soldiers shoved me forward.

The crowd turned dead silent as we passed through the gates and every eye in the place followed me like I would pounce on them the moment I got the chance.

By the time we stopped, my feet ached from being dragged and pushed around. A massive black carriage waited outside, with two horses to take the lead and a rider who sitting quietly in his seat. He didn’t even glance my way at all.

“Get in,” a soldier snapped, shoving me forward hard, and I bit my lower lip, catching myself from falling.

He leaned in close to me, an evil smirk on his face as he warned. “Don’t even think about running.”

My brows furrowed sharply at him. I scoffed in disbelief, straightened my back and shot back, “Mind your tone, soldier. Don’t forget who you’re talking to. I’m your Luna, whether you like it or not.”

He gave me a silent warning and turned without another word, right as a second voice rang out timidly from behind.

“Elvara!”

I froze at the voice I knew too well.

Martina. The golden child. The daughter our parents adored as though she were born of the moon herself.

She rushed through the crowd, her blue gown too pure against the muddled surroundings as she caught up with the carriage. From afar, she had a pitiful, pained expression, but the moment she stepped right in front of me, a cold, sinister smile formed on her lips.

“Poor, poor Elvara,” she cooed, resting a lazy hand on the carriage door as she peered inside at the cramped space I’d been shoved into. “I heard the Duskborne Alpha’s a monster to look at, too. Cursed and ugly. Aren’t you just the luckiest girl alive, Sister?”

My fingers curled hard into my dress.

Same old Martina. Always circling like a vulture and waiting for the moment where I was weakest to strike. It made sense we’d end things exactly like this.

Her smirk stung more than it should have, because somewhere underneath all of it, I’d never stopped loving her. Even when she never once showed me that same love. The older we grew, the sharper her cruelty got, and while I never managed to hate her the way she deserved, I hated myself for that far more than I hated her.

“Are you happy?” I asked, cutting straight through her taunt.

Martina blinked, thrown off by the sudden question.

“…Yes,” she finally said. “I am.”

“Good,” I said softly. “Because I’m leaving now, and you’ll never have to see me again. You will never have a reason to hate me again. I hope it’s everything you wanted.”

Her smugness slipped for just a second. It was obvious that my words had landed somewhere she clearly hadn’t braced herself for.

My father’s voice reached us before she could recover, sounding cold as he approached. “You’re headed to the rogue pack of Duskborne. Behave. Alpha Asher doesn’t tolerate defiance.”

I scoffed. “And why would that concern me? Trust me, you’ll regret this.”

He let out a humorless laugh. “That’s on you.” He shrugged. “One wrong step, and your head ends up on a spike. So do your job, Elvara, give him an heir, and you’ll live just fine.”

I laughed bitterly. “An heir? You wish. He’ll send me right back to you, and then you’ll give him back everything he paid for me!”

Father’s face turned cold. “Don’t test me further, or you won’t have a head to worry about. Why can’t you be more like your sister for once?”

The comparison burned through me like always, and I turned away.

“Drive,” I told the rider, already fed up with hearing them talk.

The reins whipped and the carriage moved forward. As we moved away from the gates, the tears I’d held back for hours finally broke free.

I cried in silence, careful not to let the soldiers or the rider hear as my mother’s cold words replayed over and over in my head.

To the very end, I never got her love or her sympathy.

My parents’ cruelty made me question whether I was ever truly theirs to begin with.

Now I belonged to a beast. A rogue Alpha with a taste for blood, a man who killed just because it thrilled him. I had heard more than enough from the rumors whispered about him and for some reason, I doubted I would even survive my first day in his pack.

Three days passed in the carriage, and my lips cracked and bled from thirst. The guard was more wicked than I thought, and my body weakened from being fed nothing but stale bread and the occasional bottle of milk tossed in once or twice a day. But my pride kept me from begging the fool outside.

On the third day, the carriage finally slowed down.

“We’ve arrived,” the rider said, his eyes burning with mischief. “Welcome to Duskborne.”