Chapter 1

ELEANOR

They always knocked twice—never once, and never three times. Just two crisp raps on the rusty old iron door that was corroding faster than I was.

I knew what the knock meant. It was breakfast time, and if I was lucky today, it wouldn’t be spat on. If I were unlucky, it’d come with a side of insults.

Today felt like both.

"Hey, freak!" a familiar she wolf's voice rang out through the open crack in the door. "Your king has eaten. It’s your turn to eat the leftovers."

I didn’t move at first. Not because I was stubborn—no, I’d lost whatever spark I had long ago. My muscles were too stiff, and the tingling in my bones was warm against the chill outside. Finally, I struggled and got up from the ragged mat that passed for my bed.

Trisha stood half-naked, the only thing covered, her crotch. She was Baron's latest entertainment for the night. Her mouth was bruised from his kisses, her hair a chaotic mess, and in her hand was a tray that smelled of eggs, burnt toast, and something vaguely like pee.

Also, she reeked heavily of sex.

She grinned when she saw me. "Not dead yet? Huh. Shame."

I gave her a cold glare. Sometimes, I wished I weren’t mute so that I could speak up, but I’d reached the stage where I’ve embraced my permanent silence.

"God, you're creepy when you do that," she said, shivering and shoving the tray against my chest. Half of the eggs slid onto the floor but she didn’t care. "Oops,” she said. “I guess that happened."

I ignored her and knelt to pick it up anyway. I always did. If I didn't, I wouldn’t have anything to eat. And I couldn't risk dying. Not yet.

"Tell me something," she burst out, tapping a finger against her chin. "Do you ever cry, you know, like normal people? Or does your quiet ass not even know how?"

She laughed at her own joke, and I grabbed at my throat, not because of what she'd said—I’d tired of letting their jokes get to me—but because I couldn't quite remember when I'd last cried. Or laughed. Or spoken. Or lived even.

She leaned forward, her voice deceptively gentle. "He tells me you were very beautiful when he first got you. But I don't see it anymore," she muttered, stroking a hand down my cheek.

I looked at her again, not with anger but exhaustion. I was just tired.

I’d forgotten who I was a long time ago. With platinum blonde locks that never seemed to shine again, bruised skin that went pallid, and grey, sunken eyes that at one time used to sparkle when I was a child, when I still dared to imagine that someone might love me someday, I couldn’t recognize myself.

I wasn’t ugly then. But I also wasn’t pretty enough to matter—not in the Moon Bliss Pack.

Not to Baron.

Least of all to Baron.

"Baron needs you," Trisha interrupted my thoughts suddenly, her lips twisting into a sly grin. "He's... entertaining tonight. Told me to fetch you."

My stomach twisted into a knot. I knew what he wanted, and I refused to move.

She caught my wrist, grasping too tightly. “Come on, mute. Don't make me have to pull you again. Last time, you made me lose a precious nail."

Her warning made me reluctantly follow. I had to. I always did.

The Beta’s house was a yard away from the outhouse I slept in, but it might as well have been miles away. Wolves looked at me as I passed by. Some sneered, and most did not. They were used to seeing the mute omega who wore shame like a second skin.

Trisha led me down the curving corridor, and the stench of sweat, alcohol, and lust was heavy in the air. The deeper we went, the louder the sounds increased—grunts, moans, a bed's groan of protest from the force of the activities carried out on it.

The guards didn’t stop us. They never did. I wasn't held prisoner here. I was property.

When Trisha pushed open the door, I knew what to expect. But still, I wasn’t ready.

Baron was behind a woman, bare and moving inside her. Some other random she-wolf was under him. Her blonde hair spilled across the sheets as he squeezed her breasts in his palm.

I turned my face away from the sight.

He rolled his head slowly when he saw me. "Ah. The mute has arrived."

The woman underneath him laughed. She glared at me like I was dirt, and at that moment, I felt worse than dirt.

Baron didn’t slow down. If anything, he picked up the pace and fucked them harder.

“This, Eleanor," he panted, thrusting between words, "this is what a true mate is. Responsive. Warm. Loud."

He groaned, his fingers digging into the other woman's legs. "Not you. Cold. Pathetic. Frigid like a little ghost."

I looked up at the wall above the bed.

"Don't look away!" he snarled, his voice cutting through the air. "You can feel it, can’t you?” he grunted. “Feel the pain as I fuck these whores? That bond between us, tearing at you. But you can’t scream, can you?" He turned to face me fully then. “Dumb little mute.”

He wasn't wrong.

The mate bond blazed up within me like venom, shattering every nerve. The pleasure he felt burned me. Her pleasured screams scraped down my spine, and I could feel the culmination of his orgasm like a countdown to my own demise.

The worst thing was that I couldn't scream.

I bit my lip so hard I could taste blood and I clenched my fists until my nails were digging into my palms as I tried to avoid looking at him.

"I should've let them kill you when you were a girl," he growled afterwards, gasping. "Useless little burden. Only reason I didn't was because I wanted to know how long it'd take you to break."

He pulled away from the woman on the ground and came over to me without a hint of remorse on his face.

"Look at you," he taunted, his eyes roving over my emaciated frame. "You don't even twitch anymore. Maybe you are already broken."

He ran his fingers over my chin, and when I didn't move, he slapped me with enough force to knock me over into the wall.

"Better," he muttered, standing over my battered frame.

I fell hard to the ground, and the room spun on its side.

Baron walked away from the other woman and turned his back on me as if I didn't exist. "Clean up your little pet, Trisha."

I didn't hear Trisha's reply. My head was pounding too hard to pay attention to anything.

The pain was slicing now, raw and paralyzing.

Something tore within me—not flesh, but something inside.

And just when Trisha was telling me to get up and move, everything went black.