Claws

The moon is getting fuller by the night. I can feel it in my bones. It's like a quiet pounding in the distance, a rhythm only my wolf and I can hear. My wolf stirs now, more than she has in years. Pacing just beneath my skin. Nuzzling the edge of my mind like she wants to come home. She doesn't belong here. We don't belong here.

I'm scrubbing floors again that morning, the edges of my dress is soaked with soapy water and my knees ache from kneeling for long. 

Sounds of snarls and grunts drift through the window beside me. I take a pause from my chore to watch the warriors. I miss it; the feel of my feet in the soil, the shift of muscle and the bite of challenge. 

I look away from the window with a sigh.

That's not my life anymore. I get up and pick up the bucket to move to another section. My life now is scrubbing floors until my fingers prune and sweeping floors that are never truly clean.

“Staring out like you lost something,” Mira says behind me. I look at her but she isn't looking at me. She's busy running a rag over the banister. “or someone,” she adds.

I don't answer. She's one of the Omegas who doesn't treat me like I'm dirt under their claws. Sharp tongued, blunt truth but something's fractured in her too. That's the only kind of bond I can stomach right now.

She doesn't mind the fact that I don’t answer. She still says, “Careful, full moon is coming. It makes the Alpha twitchy and the others cruel. You don't want to be on their path that night.”

It makes me dangerous.

But I don't tell her that. I settle with, “I will. Thank you.”

That afternoon, I'm sent to the outer clearing to bring water skins for the hunt. It was supposed to be something quick but I make a wrong turn by the tree line and I hear a rustle before I smell him.

Ryken.

He's tall and broad. One of the alpha's elite. Not quite beta-born but something close to that. He's cruel in the way that wolves with too much power and too little hearts are. I've seen him spar on the training grounds many times and he's unnecessarily brutal with his own pack members. I've done whatever I can not to cross his oath but looks like today isn't my lucky day.

“Well, well,” he drawls stepping out from behind a tree. “Isn't it the mute Omega. Alone are we?” his lips stretches into a sardonic smile.

I grip the sack containing the water skins tighter and made to move past him. He blocks me easily.

“Your scent shifts when you're angry,” he murmurs, moving closer. “Almost like you're not what they think.”

My jaw tightens and my knuckles turn white from clutching the sack so hard. “Im exactly what they say,” I reply. “Low-born and wolf less. You shouldn't bother with someone like me. I'm beneath you.”

His lips twitch. “Is that so? Maybe I should peel you open and see what's inside.”

His hand brushes my arm and then, like a thread snapping, it's gone.

He was yanked backwards with a grunt. Alpha Caden puts himself between us, his back to me. His presence doesn't just silence the air, it strangles it. 

“Is there a reason you're cornering the Omega,” his voice was low and dangerous.

Ryken straightens, lips pressed into a white slash. “Just chatting with the omega.”

Alpha Caden must have been giving him a look because Ryken casted his gaze down.

 “You were told to prep for the southern line,” Alpha Caden finally says.

“I was-”

“Go.”

Ryken left eye twitches but he nods and walks off, not before tossing a final glance at me. I knew this was far from over.

I don't wait. I dip my head and turn to leave too.

 But Caden speaks again, “You always walk like you're braced for war.”

I freeze just for a second then right myself. “It's keeps me upright,” I say without turning.

I feel him behind me, unmoving. Watching. “Good,” he says finally. “You will need that here.”

I exhale slowly and walk but the weight of his gaze stays on my back until I'm out of sight.

My whole body trembles as I walk back alone. By the time I reach the edge of the trees, the fury I've been holding back surges to the surfaces. I don't even think, my hand reaches out, my claws rip free before i can stop them and I drag them down the bark of the tree closest to me. A deep gouge is left in the wake of my actions. 

My breathe hitches. 

I hear a gasp behind me. I whirl around to find Mira watching. Her expression is not disgust. Neither is it anger nor confusion. Maybe fear.

She doesn't speak, just turns and walks away.

That night, I retreat to my corner of the servant quarters. I refuse to meet Mira gaze on the other side of the room. I lay on my mat, digging my nails into my palm.

“You don't get to come out,” I whisper into the darkness. “You're not safe here.”

My wolf raises her head from her paws to look at me with those glowing gold eyes before going back to sleep.

I wake to a sharp snap outside the window closest to me. The room is almost shrouded in darkness if not for the moonlight. The other Omegas are fast asleep.

I move to the window. A tiny shape lies just beyond the ledge, it's a rabbit and it's neck has been broken. There's no bite and also no blood.

I know it's a message and it curls my lips in a snarl.

Someone is watching me.