Lume

*

“Luna…Luna Zoe!!” I shouted, shaking the unconscious body of my pack’s Luna lying in front of me. “Help… somebody… help…” I whispered the last part when I saw multiple glowing eyes running in my direction.

Pack warriors.

They must have sensed it.

Alpha must have sensed that something happened to his mate.

Before I could open my mouth to ask them for help, the head warrior shifted and commanded that I be arrested.

“Capture the traitor who tried to kill our Luna.”

“What? No…” I didn’t get a chance to explain, and two of the warriors grabbed me by force as if I, someone without a wolf, could win the fight even against one. “I didn’t do anything. Luna called me here.” I shouted, watching the head warrior approach the Luna’s body. He checked his pulse and declared her dead.

What?

No! No! No!

“Throw her in the dungeon. Alpha will decide her punishment.”

“Luna…Luna…” I called for her. Not because I was being dragged toward the dungeon or I was framed, but because I couldn’t believe that she was dead.

How?

Who would kill a kind person like her who couldn’t even kill an insect?

“Ahh…” I groaned in pain when I was thrown in the dungeon like some object, but then it wasn’t something new or something that happened to me for the first time.

Since I was the only adult without a wolf in this pack. I was treated as everyone’s entertainment whenever they wanted to have fun or relieve anger.

That was why the pain that I was feeling from being dragged wasn’t hurting that much.

‘Yes. It doesn’t hurt.’ I told myself before, though I was bleeding and my skin had turned blue and black.

Tears rolled out of my eyes, realizing that, unlike before, there wouldn’t be anyone to call a healer for me.

‘Will I die like this?’ I asked myself when it had already been a day, and no one came to check on me, nor did I provide any food or water.

“....”

Except for my breath, I couldn’t hear a thing. In that silence, I jumped a little when I heard a loud banging sound of the iron bar. I didn’t need to be a genius to know that someone was finally here.

Hearing the multiple rushed steps, I could tell that Alpha was finally here.

The door of the dungeon was slammed open, and in the next moment, I was in the air, struggling for breath.

“Why did you kill her?”

The man who was unaware of my presence until now, the man whom I’d admired and had been secretly in love with, my Alpha, was looking at me with hatred as if he would kill me in the next moment.

So, I was going to die like this? By the person for whom I had spent years silently nursing unrequited feelings.

“Brother! Nolen!” The other people who came with the Alpha tried to stop him, while I didn’t show any sign of resistance.

I coughed once I landed on the ground after his grip loosened or he let it go.

“You can’t kill her until we find out who ordered her to kill our Luna.”

“Exactly. You just can’t give her an easy death.”

“I know you’re in pain, but you can’t deal with this situation by erasing the only evidence that we have.”

“Torture her enough so that she would die but beg for her death until she opens her mouth.” Alpha Nolen commanded, giving a death glare with his bloodshot red eyes.

Turning on his heels, he was about to leave when I spoke after inhaling as much air as I could to speak.

“I didn’t kill her, Alpha. I’m being framed. Please look into this matter for Luna’s sake.”

“Should I rip her tongue?” Beta Lance, Alpha Nolan’s brother, asked his older brother with a smile as if he was asking to cut the cake instead of my tongue.

Well, I wasn’t surprised, though; he was one of my bullies who made my life a living hell in the pack. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if I learned that he was the one who framed me.

“Not before she answers our questions.” Alpha Nolan responded coldly before looking at the guard. “Whip her until she falls unconscious. I want to hear her voice laced with pain and begging for mercy.”

With that, everyone slipped out of my cell.

“You’ll regret this, Alpha,” I shouted at the top of my lungs. “When the truth is out, you will regret this.” I was sure that I was going to be killed because of this false accusation, and no one was going to take a stand for me. So, instead of living in fear in the last couple of days, why not live like it was my last day?

*

Later, just like Alpha commanded, I was whipped by one of the guards until the floor turned red because of my blood, and I fell unconscious. By the time I woke up, it was already the next afternoon, and I was perfectly fine, as if I hadn’t been beaten to death. 

Beside me was a plate full of cold food.

‘I’m supposed to eat it and gain energy for the next torture.’ I thought about the purpose of these favors by the Alpha.

Later at night, I was beaten by the female guards with the intention of breaking all my bones. I kept crying and begging for them to stop, but it was all in vain.

The next day, I again woke up without any injury. Now I realized why Alpha had said that I would beg them to kill him, but I wouldn’t be able to die.

It was a mental torture.

After suffering from constant torture for a week, I started to get mentally weak. Throughout the torture and interrogation, what I felt was the fact that what they wanted was my confession that I killed our Luna instead of believing that I was innocent.

“Yes, I killed her. I hated how she acted as if she were kind to me. I never wanted her kindness. What I wanted was my wolf and her mate. She always looked down on me by giving me false hope that one day I’d have my wolf. I wanted to have everything that she had. Her title, her authority, and her mate. Yes. I killed her because I wanted Alpha Nolen for myself. Poor Luna, she never suspected me. To be honest, I wasn’t the one who killed her, but her fake kindness was.”

I finally confessed to what they wanted to hear, hoping they would kill me immediately, and I could get relief from this hell.

“Alpha will decide how he is going to kill her after he returns. Let’s go.” I heard the voice, but didn’t have the strength to lift my face and see whether each of them really left or not.

I coughed up oozing blood out of my mouth.

Tonight.

Or tomorrow would be the last day of my life.

I smiled at the thought of meeting my parents after my death. I was an orphan found in the forest, so I assumed my parents might have been killed or died instead of abandoning me because I was a girl.

I didn’t realize when I slipped into the darkness with that happy thought. By the time I woke up, I was perfectly fine again.

‘What? Nooooo!!!’ I held my head, looking at my uninjured body. It was then that I realized something.

My eyesight had improved.

My hearing ability had increased.

My smelling power was working like a dog.

And someone’s presence in my mind.

‘You’re here, aren’t you?’ I asked her in my mind.

‘Hello, human.’

I couldn’t believe my fate. Just when I was going to die, my wolf had woken up.

*

#TBC