Chapter 1 Slave

Elena POV

“Murderer.” Pack members spat at me as I busied myself with cleaning the hall.

I lowered my head further and cleaned faster, making sure to wipe away every trace of their mockery and their hatred of me.

That was all I could do though. Fighting back would only get me punished, I had learned that the hard way, a long time ago.

Our pack Wind Borne pack was preparing for a banquet to welcome the Alpha king, King Draven. And today, I was assigned to the cleaning of the hall.

It was not much of a difference from any other day in my life honestly. I was always being assigned to do something. Sometimes, it was a task the paid servants found too tiring or something no one else wanted to do.

Something too gross, too below their station. Those kinds of tasks were dumped only on me, the pack’s ever ready trash can.

“You’re cleaning so slowly.” A pack member stopped in front of me, two of his friends behind him, cruel sneers curving their lips as they watched.

The pack member smiled, assured, confident.

Then he raised his voice. “You aren’t trying to waste time in hopes you’ll manage to sneak into the selection are you?”

For a second, silence prevailed in the hall as numerous eyes turned in our direction. Then they started laughing.

I flinched as their laughter dug into my skin. Like the sharp edge of a knife in the hands of a butcher, it cut me open relentlessly, not stopping even as I bled.

“I’m not.” I said quietly.

“You’re not what?” The pack member asked, sneering as he looked at me. “You’re not interested in being the Luna Queen?”

“No.” I said, shaking my head.

“Good.” He said, straightening back up. “You’re nothing but a slave, don’t ever forget that. You’re not qualified to even mention the name of the Alpha king, let alone think about being his mate.”

Alpha king Draven was 35 already but he still hadn’t found his mate even though most wolves knew who their mate was at 16. 

At first, rumors had floated around that his mate might be dead already or maybe the moon goddess had not bestowed him a mate because of his cruelty.

He had been a warrior for his pack since he was a teenager and with sheer willpower, little by little, he transformed his pack from a mid sized pack to the largest wolf pack in the whole of North America. Now at the peak of his power, everyone expected him to take a mate in order to continue his legacy and bloodline.

Once, I had dreamt of finding my mate too. Fantasized about it countless nights as I tried to imagine what it would feel like when I met him for the first time. 

But now I knew no one would want me. To them I was nothing but an outcast. A dirty stain on the name of the pack. A murderer who killed her own mother.

“Slave, Luna Sophia is looking for you.” A maid called out to me, pulling me out from my thoughts.

I bowed my head and followed the maid quickly, grateful for the escape, yet wondering what Luna Sophia could want me for this time.

I tried to recall everything I had done recently. Had I arranged everything perfectly the last time I cleaned her room?

Had I forgotten to fold the edges of the duvet? Or had I organized her shoe closet by color instead of by brand. As I walked behind the maid, I think back to a time past. A time before I became a slave.

Ten years ago, on my 16th birthday, the day I was supposed to find my mate, my cousin Sophia had come to tell me that my mother was looking for me to give me my gift.

I went happily to her room to meet her, only to find her in a pool of her own blood with a knife sticking out of her stomach. 

Maybe I should have gone to get help from the pack members, but at that moment, seeing my mother lying there, every rational thought flew out of my head.

I quickly knelt beside her, hands hovering above her, not knowing what to do. Until I heard her voice, a low weak whisper calling out to me.

I brought my ears closer to her lips to hear her better.

"Don't trust anyone. I'm sorry I wasn't able to stay longer with you."

My heart went cold and I glanced at her, only truly seeing how pale she looked now. She was dying. While I had been blissfully happy that I was finally going to meet my mate, my mother had been dying.

I flew out the door, barely registering the dull pain in my big toe as I hit it against the edge of a table on my way out.

I had just gotten to the door when pack members suddenly rushed in, my uncle at the forefront. They sped past me, rushing straight to my mother's room. I followed behind them slowly only to hear my uncle yell in a loud voice.

"You bastard. If it wasn't against pack law, I would have broken your neck."

He grabbed me, shaking me fiercely. "How could you kill your own mother, you beast?"

I tried to explain but no one listened to me. They all shook their heads, eyes filled with judgement.

I caught a glimpse of Sophia and turned to her eager. She could defend me, after all, she had been the one to call me there but she yelped and moved backwards the moment she saw me looking at her.

My brain wasn't properly processing the scene in front of me. Why wasn't she saying anything? Why wasn't she defending me?

As I stood there under the judgement of the pack members, a sweet smell hit my nostrils. Clove, with an undertone of musk, I blinked confused but my wolf leapt up with joy ‘Mate. Go find our mate quickly. He’ll save us.’

I turned towards the direction of the smell and that's when I saw him, Alpha Carter, the leader of our pack and now, my mate.

Hope bubbled in my chest once more as I rushed towards him but he walked past me like he couldn’t see me and walked instead to Sophia. He pulled her into his arms and stroked her hair as she cried softly into his chest.

A sharp pain struck my heart and I almost fell down. My wolf Lara was confused ‘Why? Why was our mate ignoring us? Did he not see that we were in pain too?’ But I had no answers for her. I was also struggling to understand what I was seeing.

Alpha Carter cleared his throat then and started speaking “Elena Reed has been found guilty of the murder of her mother and is hereby stripped of her status as omega and demoted to pack slave. Henceforth, she’ll live separate from the pack and only come into pack quarters to fulfill her duties as slave.”

I stood there in shock and watched my mate hand me a sentence worse than death, all while holding another female to his chest. 

My wolf cried, begged me to approach our mate and make him see reason, but when I looked at Alpha Carter, I saw the warning clear in his eyes. The mate bond was the only reason I was still alive, but if I forced him, he wouldn’t hesitate to take my life.

So I stepped back, silent, and accepted my punishment. My wolf cried for days, her voice getting smaller with each passing day, until one day, I could no longer reach her.

Soon after, Alpha Carter declared he had found his mate, and took Sophia as his Luna.