Chapter Ten.

Raya’s POV

Sleep didn’t come as fast as usual.

Something around me didn’t feel right.

The suffocating silence wrapped around me like a blanket, yet I could breathe. My lungs burned for air that I didn’t need. I was drowning, suffocating beneath an invisible weight, but there was nothing to hold me down. My body ached as if I had been submerged in a cold ocean for too long. But there was no water, no deep abyss—just an emptiness that pressed on my chest.

I felt eyes on me. Heavy, predatory eyes. I couldn’t see them, but I could feel them, dark and knowing, pricking my skin like a thousand unseen needles. My breath quickened, each inhale sharp and shallow. It was as though the weight of centuries was in the gaze that followed me, creeping through my veins, entwining with my blood.

Then the whispers started.

"Welcome home."

The words were soft, like a lover’s breath, yet the meaning hit me like a blow to the gut. Home? I was already home. Wasn’t I?

Something grabbed me—icy fingers brushing my soul—and for a moment, I wondered if I was slipping back into the void. I tried to scream, to fight back, but my body was locked in place. My limbs wouldn’t move. My mind swam in a pool of confusion, and the coldness deepened.

Then, as suddenly as it began, it stopped.

I gasped, the world around me snapping back into place with the jarring reality of consciousness. My eyes fluttered open, blinking against the dim light creeping through the drawn curtains. The room felt... strange, out of sync with itself. My breath steadied, my pulse beginning to return to a rhythm I recognized. But the sensation of drowning, of sinking into something darker, still lingered in the back of my mind.

It was early—too early.

I sighed, my fingers brushing through the tangled mess of my dark hair. What was it about this place? I’d been here for centuries, yet it felt like the walls were closing in every time I woke up. The Alpha Queen of a kingdom that no one truly understood, bound by duties and desires that could never be fully explained.

The garden beckoned me as always, its lush colors offering a fleeting promise of peace. I rose from the bed, the cool floor beneath my feet sending a shiver up my spine. My body was heavy with an unfamiliar restlessness, the air inside the room thick with the residue of dreams I didn’t want to remember.

Stepping outside, the early morning breeze caressed my skin as I walked across the grounds. The garden was calm, but the fountain at its center always seemed to hold something deeper. A place where I could think—or forget.

I knelt beside the fountain, gazing into the water. My reflection stared back, but there was something wrong with it. A flicker of shadow—too many shadows—darted across the surface, distorting my image. Was it the light? Or was it me? I leaned closer, studying the ripples, trying to understand what I saw.

Then I heard them.

Moans. Low, guttural, like the whispers of men lost in their most private of pleasures. My hands clenched at my sides as the sounds wrapped themselves around me. They were familiar. Each one, a fragment of memory tied to a face, to a body I had once held in my arms.

One by one, the men I had taken, used, and broken. The moans were almost a melody—drowned by the weight of their deaths. Each one had died in my arms, their bodies quivering, succumbing to the pleasure of the night I gave them. My power—my essence—had taken their lives as easily as it had taken their souls.

Each death had been a pleasure unto itself, each one a part of me. I didn’t feel regret. I didn’t feel sorrow. They had come to me willingly, and they had all been mine to do with as I pleased. The last one, though, his name stuck in my mind like a poisoned arrow.

The rogue wolf.

I stopped breathing, my pulse quickening. His image flashed before me. He was different from the others. Stronger, wilder, yet more... broken. I had never seen a man like him before.

He had lasted longer than any man I had ever taken, surviving my moans, my power. Most had crumbled in moments, their bodies surrendering to the intoxicating pleasure of being with me. But he had resisted, held on. And in the end, he had begged me for more. I could still hear his voice—low and commanding—whispering my name as I had taken him.

But the question I have for myself is—why are men dying in my arms when ever we fuck,especially when I moan. I mean other Alpha Queen’s do it, why can't I? I mean,I haven't found my so-called mate yet,so in the meantime why can't I enjoy myself.

No one told me that being an Alpha means pleasure would be restricted till you found your mate. Then I remembered him again.

He was the only one who had not died in my arms.

The memory of that night came rushing back, flooding my mind with its intensity. His lips, hot against my skin. His hands, strong and possessive. The way he had kissed me with a ferocity that mirrored my own. He had been so wild, so different. I had never been more alive than I had in that moment. But now, I felt nothing but a strange emptiness. He wasn’t supposed to be a part of this. He wasn’t supposed to be more than a fleeting distraction, a game that was now over.

But the memory of him lingered, haunting me. I felt it deep in my chest, tugging at me like a chain.

The breeze picked up, carrying a chill that snapped me from my thoughts. I shivered involuntarily, the cool air rushing through me. A shiver of recognition washed over me as my senses sharpened.

A howl.

A long, mournful cry that echoed through the day. It was the rogue.

I could feel it in my bones—the call, the challenge. It was him. My body tensed, the sharp edge of instinct rising within me. The howl was a summons, a call that only I could answer. A promise. A bond, though I had never agreed to it.

I stood, my heart racing in my chest. The fountain’s water shimmered beneath the rising sun, but my mind was no longer on it. I was focused on the sound—the rogue’s howl that echoed like a defiant flame in the dark.

Why did he survive? Why did he resist me when no one else had?

I knew the answer.

Because he was like me.

And he would never let me forget it.

I turned, my steps swift and deliberate. The breeze whipped around me, but my mind was elsewhere. He was out there, somewhere, watching me, waiting for me to come to him.

I couldn’t fight the pull.

It was time to face him.