A Menace

Olivia's POV

“Get up from the hay, you lazy wench!” I heard a familiar voice scream my name. Before the voice could even register, I felt a hand on my legs, and I was roughly pulled out if where I had fallen asleep.

“You must think you will paint us bad.” my mother's voice finally became clear in my head and the suffocating gear that immediately permeated every bone in my body, threatened to leave me paralyzed.

“Are you deaf? Do you not hear your mother speaking to you?” I heard my father's gruff voice and immediately jumped up.

“Good morning Luna, Alpha.” I greeted and tried to wipe my eyes off the evidence of sleep.

“Keep your dirty greetings to yourself. You knew that it is customary for us to show our guests around, yet you chose to embarrass us like this?” my mother yelled and pushed me away.

I raised my eyes, I wasn't shocked to see the satisfying smile on Annalise's face. She was definitely the one that led the group here, everyone knew that guests were not brought into the horses stables. The horses were taken to them outside, but obviously things had changed, and I had not been aware.

“Who is she?” one of the stern looking alphas looked down at me, his eyes were filled with so much disgust that I shrieked. Even after so many years of being used to being treated like rubbish and looked upon with disdain, the eyes of the man bore into me like he wanted to tear me apart with his bare hands.

“She is my daugh...” my dad began to say.

“She is no-one. Just some slave who doesn't know her place.” my mom said and my heart broke. I had thought that I was immune to their hurtful behavior but being thrown in the open like this was the final straw.

“Oh look, she is crying, mom. Maybe you should have just had the guards drag her to the dungeon.” Annalise suggested, her voice sounding so sweet that you would not have seen the vileness in her eyes and the burning hatred in her voice.

“You should have done that Alpha Brandon. A lowlife like her should not be in places where royalty like us would enter.” The man said, his eyes locked with Annalise's and they shared a knowing look.

“I am sorry, Mom. I fell asleep last night while mucking the stables, I promise you that I was not trying to be disrespectful or…"

A resounding slap cut the rest of my words short. I saw stars and struggled to stand straight while my entire world wobbled. It took a few seconds for the ringing sound in my ear to stop and when it finally did, I smelt the fresh blood running down my nose and ears.

“Don't you ever call me mom. I am not your mother you weakling. I have only one daughter, Annalise Brandon. She is the one that I am proud of. A strong wolf, a proud representation of our pack.” my mom said, her voice dwindling in pitch in my ears, but her words still hurt more than a knife wound to the back.

“Get out of here now before I lose my temper finally.” my father hissed between gritted teeth and I rushed out of the stable. I ran straight for the room I shared with my best friend, Elana, in the servant's quarters.

I threw myself on the bed and the tears that I had held back for several weeks came rushing down. The pain of neglect and the betrayal from my family was final, even though they had treated me badly, they had never denied me before.

“You know, you cry so much I feel like your eyes will pop out one day.” I heard Elana's voice from the day and managed to look at her through the tears that had blinded my sight.

“They…they… she denied me. She asked me not to call her mom and that I was not her daughter. Everyone was there. I don't know what I ever did to deserve this.” I said and cried harder.

“Don't annoy me. They are terrible people, and they hate you because you are notably better than them. Even though they are not convinced that you deserve to be loved, I want to tell you that I love you, and you are very deserving of it. I don't want these people's words to keep having an effect on you.” Elana said and walked to me. She held my hands and squeezed it reassuringly.

“Thank you Elana. Sometimes, I don't know what I would have done if I did not have someone like you in my life.” I said, genuinely grateful for her timely intervention before I ruined my day with a headache from crying too much.

“I know you didn't eat to bed, I saved you some breakfast. The head chef put me on duty today, so I was able to sneak some bread for you.” she said and smiled.

As if on cue, my stomach growled and we both laughed. Elana was my ray of sunshine and she knew it. Even though my father had attacked her pack, taken her forcefully and killed her relatives. I've always wondered why but with how they treated me, I didn't think they needed any reason to hurt someone.

“You know, you should really leave. You've never tried leaving, it might not be as dreadful as we think.” Elana said once we were done munching on the soft bread that she had snuck out of the kitchen.

“You should steal some more bread.” I teased in a weak attempt to defuse the seriousness of the conversation that she was bringing up.

“Don't try to change the topic. Leave. Someday, this people will not stop and who knows what would happen.” Elana said and that set a tone of dread in mind. I knew she was right and the sooner I fled for my sanity, the better for me, it was.