The Ashes Of The Cold Bond

“Sophia, you dare not take advantage of an Alpha asleep, you dare not!”

I can see Lucian’s eyes blaring hot as he pointed his index finger at me. The air in the room felt like it was catching fire, thick with the smell of his rage and the scent of the forest after a storm. His chest was heaving, his muscles tight and jumping under his skin like he wanted to reach out and break something. He looked at me with so much disgust that it felt like he was splashing ice water onto my naked soul.

Oh, it hurts seeing someone you had wished for forever with seeing you as an enemy. It felt like a thousand tiny needles were stabbing into my heart all at once. My eyes never left his but I fought so hard not for him to see my tears. 

I had spent years building a wall around myself in the human world. I had built a luxury empire where I was the boss, where people looked at me with respect or fear. I had vowed I can’t be stepped on, that I would never let anyone see me bleed or beg again. But this time it’s really coming from a man I never thought I would share a bed with. It was coming from the boy I used to sneak away with to watch the stars before everything turned into blood and betrayal.

“Lucian, you don’t know what you sound like, do you?” I asked. My voice was steady, even though my insides were shaking like a leaf. I pulled the silk sheets up to cover my chest, but I didn’t look away. I couldn’t let him see me blink. If I showed weakness now, he would use it to crush me.

Lucian responded almost like he didn’t understand what I was saying. “What?”

The word was a bark, a sharp sound that echoed off the cold stone walls of his bedroom. He looked around the room as if he was trying to find a weapon or a way out. He looked at his discarded clothes on the floor, then back at me, his face twisting into a sneer that made him look like a total stranger. The moonlight from the window hit the scars on his chest, reminders of the hard years he spent in exile, and for a second, my heart softened. But then he spoke again, and the softness turned to stone.

“You think because the Goddess spoke that I would just fall at your feet?” he spat. “You think because you are standing in my room that you are special? You are Harvey. You are the daughter of the man who stole my family’s life. Every time I look at you, I see the blood on the floor of the hall from fifteen years ago.”

I sat up properly as I hit my back softly on the headboard without minding his curious and fumed face. I wanted to show him that I wasn't afraid. I wanted him to know that even if he was the Alpha, I was the one holding the cards in this room. I wasn't that scared little girl anymore who used to hide in the shadows. I was Sophia Harvey, and I had earned my place.

“You’re my mate, Lucian. You don’t tell me when and how to meet with my mate,” I said almost like a chuckle. It was a dark sound, a little bit crazy and a little bit sad.

I could see Lucian swallowing a lump as he avoided my eyes. He turned his back to me, grabbing a robe from a chair and swinging it over his broad shoulders with a violent jerk. Even from the back, he looked like a god made of anger. 

The silence stretched out between us, heavy and suffocating, until the only thing I could hear was the clock ticking on the wall and the sound of my own blood rushing in my ears. The tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife. He was fighting the bond, I could see it in the way his shoulders were shaking. His wolf wanted to come to me, but his pride was holding it back like a leash.

“Listen, Sophia,” he said, his voice dropping into a low growl that made the hair on my arms stand up. “This mating was never supposed to happen. I made my choice clear in the hall. I rejected you. I rejected everything you are and everything your family stands for. But it seems your mother and the elders have won.”

He spun around to face me again, his eyes glowing with that dangerous wolf light.

“They trapped me! They used that ritual and that wine to cloud my mind. They knew I wouldn't touch you if I was in my right senses. They knew I would rather die than seal a bond with a traitor's daughter. But you don’t touch my body like you owned it, Sophia! You don’t ever get to act like you have a place here!”

I could see anger in his voice, in his eyes. The past hits him differently whenever he remembers, I think. He was looking at me but he was seeing my father. He was seeing the blood on the floor from fifteen years ago. He was seeing a traitor instead of the girl who had spent her whole life loving him in secret. It didn't matter to him that I had built something of my own. It didn't matter that I was the one who had stayed and watched the pack rot while he was away.

But I don't care because this wasn't the Lucian I know. The Lucian I knew would have seen through the lies. The Lucian I knew wouldn't have used his power to crush someone who was already down.

“But Lucian, I owned your body now and you owned mine,” I said, leaning forward. My voice was like velvet, soft but dangerous. “The bond is finished.” I rolled my eyes away from him. ”You can scream and you can hate me until your lungs give out, but the Moon Goddess has already signed the papers. We are tied together by more than just words now. Every time your heart beats, it’s going to echo mine. Every time you are in pain, I will feel it. You wanted to be a strong Alpha? Well, this is part of the job.”

Hearing that, Lucian staggered backward in confusion. He looked at his own hands as if they were dirty. He looked at the bed, then at the window where the morning sun was starting to peek through. The reality of what had happened was finally sinking in, and it looked like it was killing him. He was realizing that he couldn't just walk away from this. He couldn't just ignore me anymore.

He stopped moving and a strange quiet came over him. It was scarier than the shouting. He finally looked at me and smiled wickedly. It was a cold, sharp smile that didn't reach his eyes. It was the smile of a man who had decided to be cruel because it was the only thing he had left.

“I know what you're trying to do,” he said, his voice coming out like a hiss. “I see it now. You think you’ve won. You think you can use the bond to chain me to your side so you can play the little Queen of the Raven Pack. You think you can make me forget what your father did just by being in my bed. You are just as twisted as the rest of them. You just want to manipulate me just like Hannah, your mom, to manipulate me just like she did to your father!”