The Tyrant Alpha's Forbidden Mate

Elara's POV

"Dad, isn't Lila back? Where is she?"

I jumped down from my horse and sprinted into the Pack house, calling out to my father as I ran.

"Elara — Lila is dead."

My father, Lorcan, answered in a voice thick with grief.

My foot caught on the threshold. There, laid out on the black bear-fur rug in the middle of the hall, was a body. The smile died on my face. My eyes blurred with tears.

"That's not possible… Father, you and Lila are playing a joke on me, aren't you?"

"This isn't funny. Not even a little."

I walked toward her, one slow step at a time, and with every step the dread in my chest grew heavier. When I finally reached her and pressed my fingers beneath her nose, felt the cold stillness of her neck — I dropped to my knees beside her with a thud.

I stared at her for a long moment, unable to move. Then it hit me all at once, and I collapsed over her body and sobbed.

My sister Lila was dead.

We were two years apart. From the time we were children, she had always been the one protecting me. A year ago, a strange illness had taken hold of me — my wolf Lorna vanished, leaving me paralyzed and bedridden. Even the Pack's healers had given up, telling my family to prepare for the worst. It was Lila who had refused to accept that. She never left my side, not once, and because of her I had lived.

That same year, Alpha King Rhett Voss had issued a decree: twenty unmarried Omega virgins of age, drawn from every Pack across the land, were to be sent to the Palace to serve him. Lila had been chosen.

I never imagined that the next time I saw her, she would be a corpse.

I looked at what had been done to her body. There was not a patch of unbroken skin left on her. I couldn't bring myself to picture what her last days had been.

I fell to my knees before Lorcan, begging.

"Father, please — go to the Palace and find out who killed Lila. We have to get justice for her. We have to make this right."

Lorcan was the Alpha of Redpine Pack. He chose to swallow his fury and do nothing.

"Elara, you need to understand — the Alpha who rules that Palace is feared by every Pack on this earth. He is not someone you or I can afford to cross."

"But Dad… Lila was your daughter. She's dead." My voice broke around the words. I needed him to remember that.

"When the officers of the Royal Palace returned her to me, they made it clear that she had committed an offense and received what she deserved. The fact that they sent her home in one piece was already a show of the Alpha's mercy."

He was building excuses for his own cowardice. I had held my tongue for as long as I could, and then I couldn't anymore.

"Lorcan," I said, my voice raw, "my mom died because of your weakness too. And now you've lost another daughter. Are you waiting until I'm gone as well — until there's no one left around you — before you'll finally feel something?"

"Shut your mouth!"

His hand cracked across my face hard enough to blacken my vision. I crumpled beside Lila's cold body and knew nothing else.

When I came to, Lorcan had already arranged for Lila to be quietly disposed of. He hadn't even let me say goodbye.

That was when the hatred settled in me — deep and clean and certain. I hated his weakness. I hated that he could watch his own daughter's corpse be carried home and still refuse to demand answers. And so I began to plan. I would get inside the Palace. I would find whoever had taken Lila from me.

It was around that time that a middle-aged man named Brute found me.

He told me what I had already suspected in my bones.

"Your sister Lila was killed by Alpha Rhett Voss himself. He is a ruthless and bloodthirsty man who keeps people caged for his own amusement — tortures them, kills them, and calls it entertainment. Your sister is not the first Omega girl who has suffered at his hands. She won't be the last."

Then he laid out his terms.

"I can help you get your revenge, Elara. But in exchange, you must join our organization and carry out the assassination of Rhett."

I didn't hesitate for a single breath.

"I'll join. If it means justice for Lila, I'll do whatever it takes — including laying down my life."

A year of brutal, unrelenting training followed. By the end of it, I was a capable assassin. And then the opportunity I had been waiting for finally came.

Alpha Rhett issued a second decree: unmarried Omega virgins of age were once again to be gathered and brought to the Palace — this time, any woman who bore him an heir would be made his Luna.

I laughed bitterly to myself. A second round of selecting consorts, and now with the promise of producing an heir?

Was this truly about finding a Luna, or was it just a prettier lure — a way to draw in a fresh crop of innocent girls for him to break apart at his leisure?

This man Rhett. This brutal, blood-soaked tyrant. He really did have a gift for cruelty dressed up as ceremony.

I didn't waste a moment. I returned to Redpine Pack and, behind Lorcan's back, used his identity to register my name.

On the day of departure, the Palace guards arrived to collect me — and that was how Lorcan found out.

He exploded. He jabbed a finger in my face and let the words fly.

"Elara, do you have any idea what you're doing? Do you know that it was because of you that Lila — "

He caught himself. Cut the sentence off. I felt it clearly: he was hiding something from me. But today was not the day to unravel it. Nothing and no one was going to stop me from walking through those Palace gates.

"If you leave Redpine Pack today, I will have your name struck from our records. You will be no daughter of this family. You will have thrown away every bond of loyalty you owe us — "

"Then consider me already gone," I said. "I won't let Lila's death mean nothing."

I turned my back on him and climbed into the carriage waiting outside without looking back once.

The wheels began to roll. And through the walls of the carriage, I heard it — Lorcan's voice, calling my name as he ran after us.

He was still an Alpha, but he was old now. My mother was long gone. Lila was gone. And now I was leaving too.

I had promised myself I wouldn't cry. Only the weak shed tears — that was what I had always told myself. But the promise lasted about thirty seconds before I pulled my knees to my chest and wept anyway.

I'm sorry, Lorcan. I'm sorry I can't stay and look after you.

But I cannot let this go. I cannot.

The carriage rolled to a stop before a sprawling, imposing structure — the Palace, rising against the sky with the kind of grandeur that was meant to make you feel small. A guard called for me to step out. When I climbed down with my bag, I saw that dozens of other carriages had stopped alongside mine.

The Omega girls stepping out of them had dressed for the occasion. Elaborate makeup, fine clothing, every one of them presenting their best face. And I understood it. If one of them caught Rhett's eye and became his royal Consort, it would be a point of pride for their Pack — a guarantee of power and protection under the crown.

What none of them knew, and what I had no intention of telling them, was that Rhett was not the kind of man who took Consorts out of tenderness or desire. He was a tyrant. A cold one. And these girls, so eager to win his favor, were walking willingly toward their own destruction.

Attendants led us inside. We were eventually assembled in a grand hall — I counted the crowd and estimated over a hundred people, between the Omega girls themselves and the maids accompanying them, all young, all bright-faced.

I had not come here to compete for anyone's attention. The moment the crowd grew thick enough, I slipped my bag into a corner of the hall and ducked into the corridor alongside it.

I pulled out the Palace map I'd memorized and was scanning it, trying to work out the most likely location of Rhett's chambers, when a voice came from behind me — a middle-aged man, measured and authoritative.

"Weren't you sent to wake the Alpha? What are you doing standing around out here? Move. Don't keep the Alpha waiting on account of one maid."

I almost laughed.

Of all the luck. I'd been puzzling over how to find this man, and the answer had just walked up and offered to take me there by the hand.

I ducked my head quickly, turned, and answered in a light, compliant tone.

"Yes, sir. Right away."

Even with him leading me, the Palace was enormous. We walked for a solid half hour before a particular building came into view — large, severe, unmistakably important.

That must be his private quarters.

He led me inside and through several inner doors, down a long corridor, until we reached the innermost room of the wing.

"The Alpha is waiting inside. Go in quickly, be thorough, and for the love of the Moon Goddess, don't do anything to anger him."

When he finished those words, he raised a hand and wiped the sweat from his brow. I noticed his expression — that wasn't the flush of exertion. That was the pallor of a man who was afraid.

For one unguarded moment, I genuinely wanted to turn around and run. The creature waiting on the other side of that door had put my sister in the ground.

But then I thought of Lila — what had been done to her, what she had looked like when they brought her home — and even though my legs were shaking, I pushed the door open and walked in.

The moment it closed behind me, I drew the veil across my face and slid the poisoned dagger from my sleeve into my hand.

One clean strike. That was all this needed to be.

Except — there was no one in the room.

I turned a slow circle. The chamber was empty. Not a single shadow out of place, let alone a murderous Alpha.

It seemed he had grown tired of waiting and left before I arrived.

I've missed my chance. For now.

I was still coiled tight with nerves, and that tension must have undone me, because my grip slipped — the dagger slid from my sleeve and hit the floor with a sharp metallic clang against the red carpet.

My stomach dropped.

No one inside the Palace — no one except the guards and Rhett himself — was permitted to carry a weapon. If someone saw this, I would be dragged out and executed before I could open my mouth to explain.

I lunged to snatch the dagger off the floor.

A black leather boot came down on it first.

My fingers had already closed around the edge of his boot. For a split second I weighed my options — wrench it free and run, or play dumb and pray.

Then a man's voice came from above me. Low. Cold. Utterly calm.

"I've already seen it."