All Chapters of BOUGHT BY CRUELEST ALPHA: Chapter 51 - Chapter 60

Brown liquid splashes. Hot ceramic skitters across wet concrete. The woman in the red coat gasps. Again. Her hand flies to her mouth. Again. The cyclist swerves, curses loud enough to cut through the drizzle. Again. The traffic light flicks from amber to red. Again.Ten minutes. It’s always ten minutes. We’re stuck inside a broken pocket watch, ticking the same agonizing seconds. Havenhill Square. 3:47 PM. Relentless.The Child stands beside me, their face pale under the grey sky. Not scared. Not really. Distant. Their eyes scan the repeating scene, not seeing the people, the panic, the sheer wrongness of it. They see threads. Patterns. The Weaver’s tapestry fraying right here, right now. Their fingers twitch at their sides, tracing invisible sigils in the damp air."The tear is close," they murmur, their voice flat. Resonant with something older. "Resonance point. Hierarch’s signature… decay vector unstable."Weaver-talk. Cold. Precise. Meaningless to the woman picking up the same sh

"Stabilize local reference point," the Child intones beside me. Their voice is flat, but their eyes are wide, darting. Scanning the impossible. A wall of what looks like melted glass surges up, reflecting not us, but fragments of the Hierarch’s final moments – her silver mask cracking, her eyes wide with ecstatic terror, the Mirror shard fusing into her flesh. Then it’s gone, replaced by a forest of crystalline spikes humming with discordant notes.The whispers inside me explode. Not just whispers. Shrieks. Kieran’s echo is frantic, a trapped bird battering its wings against my ribs. "OUT! Lily, GET OUT! Her taint— it’s everywhere—" The Alpha snarls, not in rage, but in recognition. A predator scenting another predator’s kill. The land’s sorrow curdles into nausea."The shard," the Child states, pointing. Not with a finger. With their whole focus. Ahead, through a tunnel of writhing, fleshy-looking light, a dark point pulses. The Mirror shard. It doesn’t reflect. It devours the chaoti

The air in Arthur’s forest hangs thick, heavy with the scent of rotting leaves and something else… something fading. It’s not just the trees weeping crimson sap slower now, sluggish. It’s the feel of the place. The ancient oaks stand listless, branches sagging like broken arms. Vines choke paths that were clear yesterday. Thorns, unnaturally large and sharp, glint with malicious intent from tangled thickets that weren't there an hour ago. The forest isn’t dying. It’s forgetting how to live.The ache starts low. A familiar hollow grinding beneath my ribs. Not hunger. Not the whispers. This is deeper. Older. The Arthur-ache. A phantom limb pain for a soul dissolving into the earth. Every step deeper into the heartwood makes it worse. A physical pull, a yearning towards a vanishing point.The Child walks beside me, the purified Mirror shard cradled in their hands. Its light, usually serene, flickers erratically here, casting long, dancing shadows that twist like grasping fingers. Their f

They stand in a circle around us. Twelve figures draped in rough-spun grey, hoods shadowing faces etched with lines deeper than time. Their eyes, when they catch the flickering torchlight, burn with a fervor that chills deeper than the mountain wind. Ancient. Unyielding. His blood. Kieran’s legacy.The whispers inside me aren’t whispers anymore. They’re a riot. Kieran’s echo thrashes against the bars of his internal cage, a storm of fear, shame, and a terrible, gnawing recognition."The Elders…" his voice is a broken rasp inside my skull. "The Binding Rites… Lily, they’ll tear me apart—""Quiet!" The Alpha’s growl vibrates my bones, low and hungry. "Kin-blood… smells like power…" It stirs, a sleeping beast scenting prey. The Hierarch’s mad giggle weaves through it. "Oh, the drama! Family reunion!"The land’s sorrow is a dull ache beneath it all, forgotten in the face of this more immediate violation.The eldest Kin steps forward. No hood. Face like weathered oak, eyes chips of obsidia

Every step sends jolts of its agony up my legs, vibrating through the hollow cage of my bones where the storm rages. Kieran’s ghost sobs, a constant static. The Alpha snarls, tasting the chaos. The land’s sorrow is a tidal wave threatening to pull me under, drown me in centuries of spilled blood and broken promises.And the Child… my Child…They stand at the epicenter. Not floating. Anchored. But to what? Their small frame is rigid, head thrown back, eyes wide open. Not human eyes. Not anymore. Pupils dilated into bottomless voids, filled with swirling galaxies, cold, ancient light. The Weaver’s power pours through them, a river of cosmic indifference carving away the banks of their soul. Their face… blank. Beautiful. Terrible. The face of Judgment, not the child who used to bury their face in my neck during thunderstorms."Mama?" The word echoes in my skull, faint, distant. Not spoken aloud. A psychic ripple from the vanishing sliver of them still clinging on. "It’s… cold…"The plea