Chapter 5 A new beginning
Soraya
I stand frozen on the spot as the door pushes open almost in slow motion.
This is it. This is where my life ends. I’ll be executed by the Gamma or head Luna for killing my Alpha husband.
The door fully opens up and the person behind steps inside. Viktor and I stare at each other in a moment of utter silence. Then his gaze drops downwards and his eyes widen in alarm.
“ is that… is that the alpha?” his voice trembles with fear and shock. He looks up at me, and for a moment, all 1 can see is the disbelief in them. The shock and fear as he regards me.
I raise my hand up, tears trailing down my bruised face. “ Vik, I… I”
“ what did you do, soraya?”
I squeeze my eyes shut as I hear the judgement in his tone. He's going to report me. The one friend I have is going to have to arrest me because I just killed his alpha.
“What the fuck did you do! Tell me he's not dead, soraya. Tell me he just hit his head or something. Tell me!" Victor yells in my face, grabbing my shoulders and shaking me vigorously. I can see the terror in his eyes.
“I killed him, Vik! I killed him!” I scream back at him, my voice breaking into a ragged sob as tears blur my sight.
I’m shaking so hard I can barely stand, the weight of what I’ve done sinks in. “I didn’t mean to! I swear I didn’t mean to! My wolf… Kira came out of nowhere. She took control and did it!”
“Your wolf? You felt your wolf?”
“Yes!” I sob. “She woke up! She sliced his neck before I could even stop her!”
Victor stares at me, his chest heaving, the terror on his face slowly shifting into quick calculation. He looks at Damien’s body pooling blood on the floor, then back at me. “Okay… okay, listen to me. We have to figure this out right now. You need to get out of here before—”
BANG!
The bedroom door suddenly slams open. We both freeze like statues.
Gamma Wilfred steps into the room, his eyes instantly dropping to Damien’s lifeless body on the floor, filled with a pool of blood. His jaw drops in shock.
I immediately burst into loud, hysterical tears, dropping to my knees beside Damien. “Gamma! Oh Goddess, Gamma, help! I…I just walked in and found him like this! Please, someone killed the Alpha!”
“Shut up!” Wilfred roars, pointing a finger at me. “I heard you! I heard you loud and clear through the door, you lying bitch! You just admitted to killing him! You just confessed to murdering your Alpha!”
He reaches for the whistle on his belt to sound the pack alarm. “You’re going to suffer for this! You’re going to be executed at the block!”
Before he can lift the whistle to his lips, a dark shadow glides up behind him.
CRACK.
Something strikes the back of Wilfred’s head making his eyes roll back as he collapses and hits the floor with a thud.
Standing behind him is one of the perimeter guards, holding a heavy wooden post in his hands. I look at him in confusion.
“Beta Victor,” the guard pants, “I got your mind-link. A squad of guards are heading up the stairs right now. they heard the glass breaking earlier! You have to get the Luna out of here now!”
“Go stall them! Tell them you heard a noise in the courtyard to draw them away, and get the pack gates opened immediately! Go!” Victor yells at the guard.
“Yes, sir!” The guard nods frantically, turning and sprinting back down the hallway.
The second he’s gone, I turn in a panic, grabbing a small leather bag near the vanity, desperately trying to throw a few clothes and shoes inside. My hands are shaking so badly I drop half of what I pick up.
“Soraya, stop! There’s no time for that!” Victor grabs my wrists, dragging me away from the bag and pulling me close. “Listen to me carefully, Soraya. I’m only going to say this once.”
I blink through the tears. “Okay. Okay, I’m listening.”
Victor reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small card wrapped in silver thread. He shoves it into my hands.
I look down and see the words printed: OFFICIAL ENLISTMENT PASS — ALL-FEMALE SHE-WOLF DIVISION.
“Vik… what is this? What am I supposed to do with this?”
“That pass was issued to my sister months ago when she applied for the kingdom’s female army,” Victor explains. “She got unexpectedly pregnant last week and had to forfeit her spot. The pass is unassigned to a specific name until you register at the border camp. You’re taking her place.”
I stare at him like he’s insane. “The army?! Vik, no… the army is dangerous! The leader is the Malrek—he’s a monster! He’s cruel, he slaughters people without blinking! What if I fail? What if—”
“Soraya, listen to me!” Victor grabs my face with both hands, forcing me to look directly into his eyes. “It is the only place in this entire realm where you will be safe! Nobody looks for a runaway Luna in the King’s army. You get to start afresh. Change your name, dye your hair, change your clothes. They don’t ask questions about your past as long as you can fight. You can hide in plain sight.”
“But…What if I get caught?” I whisper shakingly. “What if someone recognizes me?”
“Then you keep your head down and you don’t get caught.” He says it like it’s simple, like it has to be simple, because there’s no other option left. Tears blur my eyes as I look at him, at everything he’s risking just standing here with me right now.
“Why?” I choke out. “Why are you doing all this for me?”
He goes still. Then, quietly, “Because I love you.”
Before I can even process his words, he leans in and presses his lips to mine. It’s a desperate, one-second kiss before he pulls back.
“I had to do that just once before you leave for good,” he whispers, voice thick with emotion. He grips my shoulders and turns me toward the narrow hidden door behind the heavy wall drapery. “Go! Take the servant passageway. Follow the dark hallways down to the lower level. Once you get past the main gate, run straight for the river. There’s a ferry waiting at the bank that will take you across the ocean to the eastern territory.”
My heart squeezes tight. “What about you? Aren’t you coming with me? You can’t stay here!”
He gives me a bitter smile. “I can’t leave, Sor. Someone has to be here to direct the search in the wrong direction. If I run with you, they’ll know I helped you.”
“Vik, no! What if they arrest you for Damien’s death? What if Sheba—”
“They won’t,” he cuts in. “It will be my word against an unconscious Gamma. I’m the Beta. My authority is higher than his, and I’ll handle the narrative. Now go!”
He presses a kiss to my forehead before pushing me toward the other door. “Go, Soraya! They’re coming!”
The second I cross into the dark passageway, I hear the bedroom door slam open.
A second later, I hear Luna Sheba’s blood-curdling scream.
“MY SON! NO! OH GODDESS, MY SON!” She sounds hysterical. “GUARDS! Get that evil, cursed whore! Find her and bring her to me alive so I can skin her myself!”
I turn and run.
I rush down the narrow stairs, keeping one hand flat against the wall to guide me through the dark. I can hear the shouts echoing through the pack house behind me. footsteps, horns blowing, guards shouting orders.
I reach the bottom of the stairs and slip out through a door that opens into the back stables and step outside.
Then I hear voices.
“She took the main road! Search the forest line!” a guard shouts.
I wait until their torchlights flicker away before darting out from the shadows. I run like I’ve never run before towards the perimeter. Just as Victor promised, the pack gates are slightly open, and there is no single guard standing by.
I squeeze through the gap and step out of Bridgestone pack.
I don't stop. I don't look back. I run through the thick bushes, branches whipping my face, thorns tearing at my skin, until the sound of distant pack alarms fades into silence.
After what feels like an eternity of running through the dark, the dock comes into view with a small ferry waiting exactly where he said it would be.
I climb aboard with shaking hands, and the moment my feet touch the deck, the ferryman pushes, carrying me away from the shore.
I pull my knees up to my chest, trembling in the cold, and turn my head to look back one last time.
In the distance, the lights of Bridgestone pack looks small and distant. The place where I was beaten, starved, humiliated, and broken is now fading.
Damien is dead. The life I knew is gone forever.
I clutch the enlistment card tightly to my chest as tears stream down my face.
This is it. I’m starting a new life.
Goddess help me, please…
