Chapter 2: Captured 

Mima's POV 

The dungeon was suffocating, a dark lightless pit that reeked of decay, despair and rotting flesh. Bodies littered the cramped cells, slumped against the cold stone walls.

The other members of my pack were packed into one cell. I was alone in another. I looked across the hall and spotted my best friend. Her head was resting on the wall. Her once striking brown eyes were dull, rimmed with red from several hours of crying. 

She had lost her mate in the attack. I heard this from the muttering of the other pack members about the people we had lost…

 She must be really hurt.

She hadn't spoken since we were thrown into this hellhole. No one had. All we had witnessed was too great for words.

My stomach churned from starvation and and my wrist felt raw from the silver laced iron chains that chained me to the wall. I closed my eyes letting the silence of the cell fill my ears but all I saw were my family's dead bodies. The sound of my mother's screams, the look in my brother's eyes and the sound of the snap of his neck. 

I pressed my hands on my face trying to block the images and sounds out but the image persisted, seared into the back of my eyelids. 

The sound of heavy boots thundering down the stone floor jolted me from my thoughts. A guard appeared, tall, broad and armed. His face was covered with a helmet. His eyes scanned the cells before they landed on me. He turned back and called more guards before instructing them to open the cell of my packmates and match them out.

“What are you going to do to them? What did they ever do to you? Let them go!” I rasped out as I had not spoken since we got shoved into the truck.

“ Is the little princess trying to save her buddies?” He said in a baby voice, cooing at me and mocking me. He burst out into a large laughter and ignored me as he jingled his keys to open my cell. 

I flinched as he unlocked the cell door, the creak of rusty metal made my skin crawl. 

“Come on now, princess. Let me get that for you.” He approached me and unlocked my chains before speaking again.

“Get up!” 

I didn't move, I wanted to but my body refused to obey. 

The guard moved closer and yanked me up from the ground. Pain shot through my shoulders and knees and I stumbled to my feet. 

“I said, get up!” he struck me hard across the face, I felt my face turn to the other side from the force as I fell back against the wall, tasting blood. 

“Leave her alone!” Zahra’s voice, horse and trembling, rang out from the other cell as she was being marched out. 

The guard turned to her, his lips curling into a sneer “Shut up bitch, you'll get your turn.”

“No, don't—” I struggled to breathe as his hands wrapped tightly around my arm painfully.

He dragged me out of the cell ignoring the weak protests of my packmates that had yet to be matched out from the cell. My legs barely carried me and I stumbled at every chip or crack in the floor.

The hallway beyond the cell was full of assigned guards. Their faces were twisted with disgust and mockery. 

“Look at her, isn't she Alpha Asher’s daughter? Asher died, she will be punished in her father's place!” One said in between laughs. 

“She most certainly is. Red claws, more like blunted claws” another bellowed out laughing.

The taunts and jeers continued till we were out of the hallway. The guard dragged me into an open courtyard and the sheer brightness of the sun made me squint. It was a wide clearing with seats for an audience. The seats were filled with many werewolves. And in the middle of the clearing, there were some of my packmates lined up and back in chains. 

I had to look twice to confirm if what I saw was real. There was a wooden platform and on both sides were guards with swords dripping with blood.

I slowly looked at the ground in front of the platform to find heads separated from the bodies of my pack mates.

Bile rose up my throat and I couldn't hold myself back as I hunched over vomited all over the guard's boots making him flinch back.

“Fucking, damnit. Do you know how much those cost?” He flung me away from him and stared down at his ruined shoes. 

“These damned slaves.” He walked up to me and stomped on my midsection with the stained boot, over and over and over…

I thought I was going to die.

“Hey, you. Stop it.” Another guard called out and the one assaulting me settled back but not before spitting on me in disgust.

I looked at him with hatred in my eyes and he must not have liked the anger in my eyes.

“You'd better learn your new place, princess.” He said in a mocking tone and walked away from me.

I struggled to get to my feet and when I finally did, spitting out blood, I saw that the rest of my people were being marched out, including Zahra.

No, no, no.

A guard spotted me standing alone and stormed over, grabbing my arm roughly. Without a word, he yanked me away and shoved me to the back of the line like I was nothing. My knees scraped the ground, but I barely noticed. My eyes were fixed ahead, drawn to the woman being dragged to the platform.

Miss Eliana.

“No,” I breathed, my heart dropping.

“Let my daughter go, please!” A desperate voice rang out. I turned to see Mr. Raphael, our coach and Eliana’s father was being restrained by four guards, tears streaming down his face. He struggled against them with everything he had, but they held him back. More guards rushed toward him, trying to subdue his strength.

This man, the fierce, loyal warrior, had trained my brother and me every single day back home. He was a pillar in our lives. And Miss Eliana… she was light. She always smiled, always dreamed, always spoke of the mate bond like it was the most beautiful gift the Moon Goddess could give. She made me believe in it too. She made me hope.

“LET HER GO!” I screamed, my voice cracking with grief. They took my family. They couldn't take anyone else. I wouldn’t let them.

Mr. Raphael roared, throwing off two of the guards. He surged forward, but they kept coming, tackling him down again.

Fueled by rage and horror, I shoved the guard holding me with every ounce of strength I had left. My body screamed in pain, but I didn’t stop. I ran towards the platform.

I shouted for them to stop. Over and over. My voice was hoarse, but I didn't care.

Why weren't they listening to me? Why couldn't they hear me?

Miss Eliana turned her head. Her eyes met mine, dull, sorrowful, no longer bright with life. But then… she smiled. One of her sweet, infamous smiles. That same smile she wore every time she talked about the mate she hadn't met yet. The future she still dreamed of.

No. No, she hadn't given up… had she?

I was almost there, almost able to reach her, when a guard stepped forward, grabbed her chin, and turned her face away.

No…

The sword came down.

Her blood splattered across my face. Her head rolled across the wooden platform.

I didn’t scream. I couldn’t. My throat closed up, and all the air left my lungs. My body shook.

Mr. Raphael yelled so loudly, a sound so guttural, it rattled the earth beneath us. His roar was agony itself.

Then… silence.

The clearing went quiet, as if the world paused to grieve with us.

But it didn’t last.

The crowd erupted into cheers. Loud, heartless, celebratory cheers.

I turned slowly, to face the father who had just witnessed the loss of his child. Mr. Raphael stood frozen, his eyes wide and empty. He looked down, saw the sword one of the guards had dropped.

“No…” I whispered. “Don’t… don’t do it.”

But he didn’t even flinch at my voice. He lifted the sword with both hands, the blade trembling in the air.

“Please…” tears kept falling out of my eyes. 

In one swift motion, he drove it into his chest.

Blood poured from the wound. He collapsed forward, the sword still lodged deep in his chest. 

And I stood there, soaked in Eliana’s blood, staring at the crumpled body of a man who had lost everything.

I felt it again.

That numbness.

That aching, suffocating void that swallowed every feeling and left only silence in its place.

The scene spinning in front of my eyes, and my stomach was being gripped by a big hand. Not eating for a long time made my sights going white, until a cheer brought me back to the present.

The jeers of the crowd got louder and something snapped inside me.

“SHUT UP. ALL OF YOU, SHUT THE HELL UP.” I screamed at the top of my lungs.

The crowd went silent as they all stared at me before they began to boo and a guard dragged me away back to where I was previously standing. 

This went on and on with my pack members meeting a terrible end. I was getting infuriated with every life that was taken. I couldn't do anything.

I felt my wolf stirring with me in anger. She wanted to come out but with so many silver burns on me, she couldn't. 

I could do nothing but seethe, my rage threatening to consume me whole.

“Next,” a guard called coldly.

My head snapped up, Zahra.

No. No, not her.

She stood frozen, her shoulders slumped, her eyes hollow. She didn’t even resist as they dragged her forward. Our eyes met, and in that instant, my heart shattered. She tried to smile… tried… but it trembled and cracked as she shook her head slowly, mouthing words I wasn’t ready to hear.

I love you.

It felt like time slowed, like everything else faded into silence. They couldn’t take her. They would not take her.

I screamed, thrashing against the chains. The metal tore into my skin, slicing deep into my wrists and ankles.

I felt the burn, the blood, but I didn’t stop. I couldn’t. I pulled with everything I had.

Pain surged through my body. My joints screamed, my legs barely held me but I ran. 

My lungs burned, my vision blurred, but all I could see was Zahra, kneeling, the guard's sword lifting above her head.

“No!” I howled.

The sound tore from me, loud enough to silence the crowd. The guard hesitated, startled by the force of it.

That moment, that single second, was all I needed. I slammed into him with everything I had, driving my head into his chest and knocking him off balance. He stumbled, his grip on the sword faltering.

Zahra collapsed into my arms, sobbing, shaking.

But before I could even take a breath, a dozen guards surrounded us.

“Back off!” one of them barked. “You’ll die for that.”

They raised their weapons, and I stood in front of her, shielding her with my body, my arms outstretched even as blood dripped from my wounds.

“I won’t let you touch her,” I growled. “Not while I still breathe.”

The closest guard smirked. “Guess we'll have to take you out first then.” 

“STOP!” a voice yelled from somewhat fat away from where we stood. 

The voice… it stirred something inside me. I felt like a child that had just been given her favo

urite candy. I felt happy and alive. My wolf kept trying to tell me something, I tried to listen. 

The scent was earthy and comforting, I felt alive.

The words slipped past my lips

 “Mate!”