CHAPTER TEN

A Hollow Alpha

Silas’s POV

I sit behind the dark mahogany desk in my office, staring at the stack of map border reports sprayed across the wood. The ink on the partners seem to bleed together under the dim glow of the dim desk lamp but I don’t read words, I already know what every single page says.

Two years.

Search party sector seven: negative.

Search party sector of nine: negative.

Twenty-four months of stifling silence.

Search party  borderland: no sign.

I don't care. I pick up the pen and sign the requisition forms for four more search units, signing and stamping the Silver Moon seal, ready for the other neighbouring Pack lands.

“Silas,” Matthias's voice breaks the silence. He stands in the doorway, his shirt crisp, his face drawn tight with weary frustration that has become permanent over the last two years. He carries a thick folder under his arm, refusing to look at the fresh stack of others on my desk.

“The Elders are waiting in the main hall. Nero is threatening to call a formal council vote if you don't address Prince Cassius’s ultimatum tonight. We’ve managed to avoid directly making any promises but we’re running out of time and the Prince is getting impatient.”

“Let him call the vote,” I say without looking up while signing the next document.

“Silas, listen to yourself!” Matthias steps further into the room, slamming the folder onto the corner of the desk spilling the documents across the surface.

“It's been two years. The old king has been missing for longer than we've been alive and is now pronounced dead. The Prince is running some campaign for his appointment as King and marching legions across regional borders! Decrees demanding our immediate submission or total annihilation. And instead of preparing our defenses or securing a political alliance, you are running this pack like a military fortress while funding twelve separate teams into the other Pack territories for a girl who-”

He stops himself, clamping his jaw shut.

My hand freezes over the document. Slowly, I raise my eyes. The golden glow of my wolf's eyes burns cold and dead behind my irises.

“Finish the sentence, Matthias” I say softly, my voice devoid of any warmth.

He swallows hard, his Beta instincts forcing his gaze down for a fraction of a second before he holds my eyes.

“For a girl who stepped off a cliff into the Black Ridge. Everyone knows she's gone, Silas. The pack needs a Luna to form a proper alliance with or against the Prince. You need to move on. You can't spend the rest of your life executing search missions for a dead body while a war arrives at our gate.”

“I am the Alpha of this pack.” I say, my tone flat, cutting through his words like a knife.

“I will fortify our northern borders. I will crush Cassius’s bullshit vanguards if they cross into our lands and he knows that, that is why we haven’t been bothered like other Packs. I will maintain order, but I will not submit to a tyrant and I will not take another mate. Tell Nero if he brings up the decree or a match candidate into my halls again, I will challenge his  authority as Elder.”

Matthias  closes his eyes, letting out a long, exhausted breath.

“You're punishing yourself.”

“I am doing my duty," I reply, standing up from the chair and picking up the iron key resting against the lamp. “What is the status on the lower cells?”

He steps back to let me pass.

“The spells used on Noel cell were reinforced this morning by the pack witch. she hasn't been able to use her voice but she refuses to eat the rations.”

“She’ll eat when she's hungry.” I say walking out into the corridor 

“I'm checking the seals myself.”

The dungeons are cold. My heavy combat boots strike the flagstones in a slow rhythm as I descend into the deep dark.

Two guards posted at the end of the corridor bow their heads and expose their necks as I approach, stepping aside to let me reach the heavy iron door of the solitary unit. There are silver runes carved along the door frame and they hum with a faint blue electrical charge.

I fit the key to the lock and push the heavy door open. 

Noelle is on that stone bench again, two years in total darkness has stripped her of her former vanity. She had changed clothes a while back now and is now in a dirty shirt and tattered jeans. 

The thick leather gag remains strapped securely across her mouth.

When the torch light hits her face she blinks against the brightness, her eyes locking onto mine. 

After she's ungagged she flexes her joy again, her dry, cracked lips curling into a slow, bitter sneer. She doesn't try to use her powers, she knows the silver runes carved into her skin will choke her before she could project her siren howl.

“Two years, Alpha,” Noelle rasps, her voice rough and hoarse from months of disuse.

“And you still come down here to look in on me. Is it because I'm the only thing left in this territory that reminds you of her?”

I stand motionless before her. My arms crossed over my chest watching how with total indifference.

 She moves as far as her chains allow, her eyes gleaming with malice.

“I hear the guards talking, Silas. Prince Cassius is bringing fire to your borders, isn't he? You are going to lose everything and do you know what my favorite part of all this is? It wasn't making you reject her. It was watching her face when you said those words,”

 She lets out a low, raspy laugh that echoes off the walls.

“She didn't just jump because she was afraid of the enforcers.” Noelle leans closer.

“She jumped because the man she waited her whole miserable life for looked her in the eyes and called her a mistake. She died believing you hated her, she died knowing her mate despised her existence.”

She pauses, waiting for me to snap. She wants me to yell and grab her, to lose my temper like I used to. She feeds on the emotions, desperately seeking any sign that she still holds power over my mind.

Instead, I just look at her. 

My face doesn't twitch. The golden glow in my eyes die completely, leaving behind my normal silver eyes. 

I step closer, leaning down onto my face is inches from hers.

“Is that all?” I ask softly. 

Noelle’s sneer falters. The smirk on her face dissolves and is replaced by a sudden flash of terror. She pulls back against her chains, her breath catches in her truth as she looks into my eyes. She doesn't see the angry Alpha, she sees something completely devoid of humanity.

“You think your words hurt me, Noelle,” I whisper, my voice chillingly calm.

“They don't, because every word you just spoke is a sentence I execute on myself every second I am awake. You didn't ruin my life. I did.”

I reached down, picking up the leather gag from the floor.

“Muzzle her ,”I tell the guard, my voice completely flat.

“Check the seals daily. If she stops breathing, revive her. She doesn't get an easy way out.”

I turn my back and leave.

I walk until I reach the northern watchtower stepping out into the open stone ledge that overlooks the vast expanse of the territory. The full moon hangs high in the dark sky casting a pale silver glue over the forest canopy below.

I pull the small hand-carved wooden wolf from my pocket, rubbing my thumb over its smooth surface.

Not for the first time, I look up at the moon and try to project all my questions out towards it. 

All my pain, 

My regrets.

The wind blows past the stone ledge carrying no answer, leaving me alone in the dark.