4. Nothing more than a prisoner

[Layla’s POV]

“Lock her up in the prison. She will be my personal slave and suffer endless torment and would even wish she had died today. That is my judgement,” he said, and those words kept echoing in my head.

Against my will, I had forcefully been grabbed by the guards and thrown into a dark prison with no windows, condemned to not see the light of day again and to be forever enslaved to the present Alpha King.

“No, I didn’t do anything wrong. Let me go,” I screamed repeatedly till I screamed out loud and opened my eyes.

I heaved a deep sigh, relieved that it had all been a dream. I sat up tiredly, but when I looked around, I realised it wasn’t necessarily a dream. What happened yesterday had kept visiting me in flashbacks, dreams, trances, name it. I wanted to deny it all I could, but it wasn’t possible. I was truly a prisoner.

The prison was small and very dark. I couldn’t see anything, and it only made my head swim with scary thoughts and messed up with my mind, and it had only been a day. If everything was like this in just one day, how then could I live through with it for the rest of my life? He should have just killed me there and then.

Heaving a sigh, I realised that was the whole point of my suffering. He was right. Death was an easy way out. In a moment, it would all be over, but a lifetime punishment for something I didn’t even know about was the worst torment anyone could possibly receive, and there was no room for escape.

I crawled to a corner of the prison and sat there, shuddering at my own thoughts. My toes felt numb, and on feeling them, I could instantly tell that they had been gnawed on by rats. No wonder they were all puffy, itchy and practically numb.

If there were other prisoners along with me, perhaps, I would have felt better. Why did I always have to be the outcast? Why had I always been set aside from other people? All my life, it had been that way. My stepmother hated me, as well as my stepbrothers and ensured she made my life a living hell, but nothing she had done compared to the hell I was going through right now, which in all honesty, was her fault. She had made me bait after all, without caring if I died or not.

“Food is here,” I heard a voice say.

I looked up and saw a guard, whose face I couldn’t see because it was covered with a mask said as he pushed a tray of food under the bar in the prison cell.

“Thank you,” I said hurriedly, as I found strength to move finally because food was involved, and also because I didn’t want the rats in the cell to get to the food before I did.

The guard began to leave, and that was when a thought crossed my mind. “Can I speak with the Alpha, please?” I inquired.

“Why?” he asked, stopping right in his tracks, but not turning back around to look at me.

“I believe that the Shadow Pack is fair and there are rules in doing certain things. My family sinned, but I also need to defend myself before being judged, isn’t that how it used to be when the late Alpha was alive?” I asked.

I heard him sigh. “Well, times have changed. Get used to the new government,” he said to me, then walked away.

I banged my head against the wall in exasperation, then picked up the stainless bowl which contained my meal. I leaned against the wall close to where the prison gate was, as that was my only accessibility to sunlight and I needed to see what I was eating.

There was an apple, a slice of cake and a small chunk of bread which was as hard as stone. Wait, this was all I got? I was basically starved all through the day, and this was the food I finally got? I wasn’t even served water. What did they expect me to do after eating this? Swallow my spit?

“Oh, no, this is a mess,” I muttered to myself.

Seeing as I had no choice, I just began to eat the bread that seemed capable of breaking my teeth, after which I devoured the first bitter cake I had ever tasted in my life, and I was slowly beginning to munch on the apple. I wasn’t pleased about the food, nor was I satisfied, but I knew it wasn’t his fault. I didn’t want to blame him, and despite all that had happened, I knew for a fact that he wasn’t a bad person.

That day, I had been mocked and taunted by rogues, but he had defended me and dealt with all four of the rogues mercilessly till they ran away in shame. He was the very first person to ask if I was okay, and he had been so sweet and nice to me with a beautiful smile on his lips.

Now, he didn’t care if I was okay or not, and he hadn’t smiled all through yesterday either. He was reddened with anger that I doubted if he was the same person that had stolen my innocence, and if he had a chance, he would feed me to the rogues... but it wasn’t his fault. I shouldn’t hate him. I couldn’t hate him.

I began to hear the gate unlocking, and looked up to see two guards. I hadn’t even realised that they were there because I had been deeply engrossed in my own thoughts.

“The Alpha King has agreed to speak to you,” one of them, who I was sure was the previous guard said to me.

“Really?” I asked in surprise as I stood up, with a smile playing around my lips.

He opened the gate wider. “Really,” he responded.

Immediately, I threw all that was of the apple into my mouth and I began to skip outside. I had known that he would definitely come around, and his anger yesterday was fuelled because of his father’s sudden death. Everything was going to be okay, I assured myself.

“Slow down,” the second guard said as they accompanied me to the throne room where he was.

“I’m sorry,” I said, unable to hide my excitement.

“Greetings, your highness,” I heard them say to a woman who was round and chubby, and had a lot of heavy makeup on. She was sitting just outside the throne room with two maids who fanned her, while she read a romance novel.

I bowed my head to her as well, and she barely acknowledged any of our greetings.

“Who is she?” I asked in a low tone as we approached the throne room.

“She’s the Alpha’s cousin’s mother, Lady Millicent,” the guard replied.

“I see,” I said, and before I could say another word, I had been thrown into the throne room and the door was shut firmly behind me.

I winced in pain, then looked around the room as I slowly managed to stand up. It was a large throne room, with golden decorations and some statue creations of the late Alphas surrounding the room. A red rug ran across the middle of the tiled floor, with a long golden centre table and red high chairs with golden handles meant for the elders surrounding it. The room was painted with red and gold, and with the golden chest and glass images with several paintings on the wall, it felt really majestic.

“Wow,” I said aloud.

Something however bothered me. It was the fact that it was practically empty. I walked in there alone, admiring and touching everything. I wondered when he was going to show up, and thought he was testing me because he had left me there all alone. Should I just take one of the swords in the shelf and strike him down? Or should I escape with a precious gold possession?

I chuckled to myself, knowing I wasn’t capable of neither of those things and was only just fooling myself.

“It’s funny how you are laughing when you are nothing but a common prisoner. Perhaps, I haven’t made you suffer enough,” I heard his familiar voice say, and I turned back only to see him appear from behind the curtains.

I hiccupped, taking in his appearance. He even looked better than he had the first time I had seen him, dressed like pure royalty with his long dark brown hair which touched his shoulders packed up in a bun.

“Y - - you’re here,” I stuttered, finding my tongue after completely being mesmerised by him.

“That is something you would have known if you weren’t such a weak Omega that is incapable of even catching the scent of someone who is in the same room with her,” he said.

I moved backwards as he approached me, forgetting that a chest was behind me, and so, I tripped.

“Ahh!” I screamed out in fear, but I didn’t feel any pain even as I fell backwards, and that was when I realised he had caught me.

His hand was placed firmly around my waist, and his eyes were fixated on me. He hadn’t let me fall, and I stayed like that, holding his enchanting hazel eyes in mine. I ran my eyes over his handsome face, hiccupping once again as the memory of him looking at me this way when he was completely naked, flashed through my brain.

Suddenly, all that was washed off as he let go of me, and like that, I tumbled over the chest and fell to the floor with a loud thud, as an excruciating pain hit me instantly.

“Why did you -"

My words hung in the air as the door of the throne room opened. I looked out, and there she was, standing in the doorway, looking so radiant and beautiful with her ebony wavy hair fluttering along with the evening breeze. She smiled at him broadly, showing off her perfect dentition and he approached her steadily.

My heart broke and tears clouded my eyes as he pulled her to him and drew her into a long embrace, stroking her hair, ignoring me who was on the floor with agonising pain and... jealousy?

Of course not. I had so much to be worried about now, and him being gentle with a different girl was the least of my concerns, but my heart ached and I couldn't understand why.