She's the Princess

Duncan

“I’m sorry, what?” I choked out.

“My mother. The head omega. She originally came to this pack from the Royal Pack. My father was from Blood Moon, which is how she ended up here. When he died in a rogue attack years ago, Mom asked to go back to her home pack and take me with her, but Alpha James refused. Mom didn’t push it, because she didn’t want to risk me. But lately, there have been things happening that…we’ll talk about those later. Needless to say, Mom told me a few weeks ago that she was going to try to get a message out to the queen before my friend’s birthday. She didn’t tell me she actually did, though,” Kayla told us.

“Why your friend’s birthday?” Lucian asked. So far, he’d stayed pretty quiet, but I’m not surprised he picked up on that. There must be some significance there.

“Because we were worried they’re going to kill her, or worse. And we were right to worry; she almost didn’t survive the last beating. She still may not, as they dumped her in the dungeons instead of the hospital since we’ve got this mating ball. But she turns eighteen today and will hopefully finally have her wolf and the strength to heal or fight back.”

I started pacing around the room. Now would be a fantastic time for a vision, but so far, nothing had triggered one. I was annoyed with my own abilities at times like this. I ran my hand over various items in the room—the back of the sofa, the small counter holding water and glasses—hoping that I’d get some sort of flash. Conn raged in my head at the thought of a teenager being beaten to near death and not given any treatment. That was a punishment typically reserved for rogues and traitors.

“I know it’s imposing, I know it’s a lot to ask, but Alpha Duncan, is it possible to take her with us? I truly believe that Tobias will kill her if she stays, and she doesn’t deserve that. I snuck her some food and water earlier, as they won’t give her any while she’s down there, and she was the worst that I’ve ever seen her,” Kayla continued.

I thought about what I’d seen so far, and Kayla truly looked concerned. If it’s true that Louise tipped off Queen Gwen, then no wonder she was adamant that we come. It would have been nice to have that heads up, but maybe she wanted us to draw our own conclusions. I’m still confused about why this friend of hers is so important, though.

“I don’t understand. Why was she beaten? Why is she in the dungeon?” I asked. I needed clarification here before I started trying to get someone out of a cell and potentially starting a war.

“Seren has–”

“Wait, what? Her name is Seren?” I interrupted her again. She gave me a confused look, her brows drawing together.

“Yes, why? Does that mean something to you?” she asked.

Is it possible? There aren’t many people who know this, but Gideon has a sister, a twin. He swears she’s still alive, that he can feel that she’s still alive through the twin bond, but they have never been able to find her. She was kidnapped as an infant, and they’ve never stopped looking, but all leads went cold years ago. It can’t be that, though. I’m sure that they checked with all of the packs in the area, including this one. It must be a coincidence. Even so, she’s turning eighteen today, on Gideon’s eighteenth birthday, and Seren is an unusual name.

“Uh, no. It just struck me as unusual. Sorry. Continue,” I said, Lucian and Julian both looking at me like I’d grown a second head or something. They know me well enough to see that something is bothering me.

“Anyway, Seren has always been a target in this pack, ever since I can remember. I don’t know how or why, but the Alpha always blames anything he can on her and uses her as sort of the pack scapegoat. If something goes wrong, he takes it out on her. She gets beaten by him, by his son, bullied by Amelia and her crew and other pack members. I’m basically her only friend. Mom and I try to do what we can to help her, but it’s a super fine line. It got worse when she didn’t present with a wolf at sixteen like most wolves, but…I’ve always suspected that she does have a wolf, and she just hides it. She’s able to heal from her beatings faster than someone who doesn’t have a wolf should. But I don’t know for sure.” Kayla was rambling. I don’t know if she is normally like this, or if she’s just anxious.

“The alpha gave her the impossible task of getting the suites and pack house ready for the ball, by herself, and then Amelia layered onto that, and then they found her up here on the alpha floor beaten close to death two nights ago. They dumped her in the dungeons, and she just woke up, barely, this morning. I don’t know what happened—she was supposed to meet me for dinner before she started cleaning the main packhouse, but she never showed and the next thing I knew, she was unconscious in the cell. Mom called the guard away a bit this morning so that I could sneak in some food, but I couldn’t stay long. I saw her wake up, but she’s not well.” Kayla twisted her hands together. It was clear that she was upset about her friend.

Julian squeezed her into him, clearly trying to offer her whatever comfort he could. She looked down at the floor for a moment, then back at me. “Please, Alpha. I really think something horrible is going to happen to her now that she’s eighteen if we don’t help her.”

I continued pacing around the room, trying to think this through. ‘If there is even a chance that this is Princess Seren, we have to help. And even if it’s not her, it’s what a good Alpha does,’ Conn said to me. ‘I think this is why Mother wanted us to come. There is clearly something rotten in this pack, and it sounds like this Seren is clear proof of that, if nothing else. But I feel like we’re meant to help her.’

‘I’m certainly not willing to let someone die for no reason, Conn. But this is a pretty serious situation to deal with. We’re talking about breaking someone out of another pack’s dungeon. I need to talk to Julian and Lucian.’

‘Julian, Lucian, what do you think?’ I linked them both.

‘I think we need to help, Duncan. This girl apparently did nothing wrong and almost died for it,’ Julian responded.

‘We don’t know what happened for sure. We’d need to infiltrate another pack’s dungeon, free a prisoner, sneak her out of the pack. That’s grounds for war in just about any situation. We can’t enter this lightly. I think Duncan needs to see if he can get anything from around the pack before we take that step,’ Lucian responded, ever the voice of reason. ‘But I have to be honest. I suspect we’re going to be breaking someone out of a cell. I can’t put my finger on it, and neither can Iason, but I feel like we need to help Kayla’s friend. I just want to make sure that we’ve got everything we can to back up our actions when we have to explain them to King Cian.’

‘If what I suspect is true, King Cian and Queen Gwen will be more than willing to back us.’ I told them.

‘What do you mean? You know something,’ Julian said.

‘Gideon has a twin sister. She went missing right after they were born. They’ve never been able to find her, but Gideon swears he can still feel her faintly through the twin bond.’

Both Julian and Lucian looked shocked. Kayla was just staring at the floor, waiting for us to finish our mindlink. She was picking at her nails, clearly anxious, but giving us the time to make a decision.

‘What!? Why didn’t I know that? And what does it have to do with us now?’ Julian asked, but Lucian had a calculating glint in his eye.

‘Do we know her name?’ Lucian asked. He was clearly working this out already.

‘Seren.’