Todos los capítulos de My Second Chance with the Alpha King: Capítulo 11 - Capítulo 20

~Nyla~By the time I heard about Elara, half the omega quarters had already turned it into gossip worth repeating twice."Duskmoor." Janet said it like the word itself was scandalous, sitting cross-legged near the fire while she braided Sandra's hair. "Her father's practically begging for the alliance. You should see the dresses she brought with her. Silk, not homespun.""I heard she caught linens for a servant girl without even being asked." Lily added, settling in beside me with a bowl of stew she hadn't touched yet. "Can you imagine? Nobility, actually helping."I could imagine it, unfortunately. I could imagine it far too easily."She sounds perfect." Sandra said, though there was an edge beneath the words, something almost resentful. "Jenna's not going to like that."That was an understatement.I said nothing, letting the conversation wash over me while my stomach twisted itself into something cold and tight. In my first life, Oswald had chosen me at the coming of age ceremony, p

~Nyla~ Every eye in the council chamber turned toward me at once.I'd spent my entire life perfecting the art of not being seen. Standing there with the alpha's gaze pinned to me and a dozen council elders craning their necks to find out who he was talking to, I discovered exactly how useless that skill became once someone actually decided to look."Alpha." I dipped into a bow so low my hair fell forward across my face. "Forgive me. I'm only here to attend Jenna.""Stand up." Oswald said.I straightened slowly, keeping my eyes fixed somewhere near his boots."Look at me."That was harder. I made myself do it anyway, lifting my chin until our eyes met, and the moment they did, something twisted painfully behind my ribs. He was studying me the way a man studies a puzzle he's half convinced is a trick, brows drawn, head tilted slightly, searching my face for something he couldn't name.I knew that expres

~Oswald~ The storehouse door didn't stick.I stood in front of it for a long moment before I touched it, testing the theory the way Artemis had described it to a frightened omega three nights ago. He'd been right, of course. He usually was. The hinges took my weight without a sound, and the smell of oil was still faint on the metal when I ran a thumb along the pin.Two weeks, he'd said. Someone had oiled it two weeks past.I let the door swing shut and went looking for the quartermaster.His name was Dorne, a squat, grey-bearded wolf who'd kept the palace stores since before my father died, and who greeted me with the particular alarm of a man who has never once had an alpha visit his ledgers in person."Alpha." He wiped his hands on his apron twice. "Is something amiss with the shipments? The grain count was short last moon, but I've accounted for—""Nothing's amiss with the grain." I said. "I want to

~Nyla~ They rang the great bell at midday, the way they had the last time, and the sound went through me like a hand closing around my throat.I knew this day. I'd lived it once. I knew that the drummers would circle the age grade three times before the priestess spoke, that the clay bowl would be cold enough to sting, that Sandra would be disappointed by her wolf and Lily would pretend not to be. I knew the shape of the light on the altar stones in the late afternoon.I did not know a single thing about what would happen after, and that was the terror of it."Stop." Lily caught my wrist as we lined up at the edge of the clearing. "You've been grey all morning. Whatever it is, it's not worth this.""I'm fine.""You're not." She looked at me a moment. "Nyla. Whatever happens up there, you're still you afterward. Wolf or no wolf. That's all it is. It's a bowl of water and a lot of drumming."I loved her very much in that m

~Nyla~ "My father hasn't come home."Jenna was standing outside the omega quarters in yesterday's boots, hair pulled back so hard it dragged at her temples. No green silk. No paint. She'd been out in the cold a while, by the look of her hands."Walk with me." She said,"I've water to carry.""Sandra's carrying it. I told her you were sick."Sandra was already halfway to the well under two yokes, and the look she threw back at us would have stripped bark."She owes me a favour." Jenna said. "Now she doesn't."We went out past the drying sheds toward the old grain field, where there was nothing to do and so nobody to do it. Jenna walked fast. She didn't speak for a hundred paces, then two hundred, and I let her not speak."Two nights." She said at last. "His bed hasn't been slept in either night. His hunting coat's off the hook. I've asked eleven people where the beta is, and eleven people have found somethin