1. Messing with her

"I don't feel good, Suzy." A beautiful lady in her late twenties looked at her best friend Suzanne with a worried look on her beautiful and flawless face.

"What's wrong, Athy?" Suzanne asked in a worried tone while stopping what she was doing. 

"My left eye has been twitching since morning. I don't have a good feeling about it." The beautiful lady said as she clutched the pendant which was around her neck. 

The pendant has always been with her as far as she remembers. It gives her a weird sense of assurance that she doesn't understand. 

"Calm down, Athy. It happens sometimes. It doesn't necessarily mean that something bad is going to happen." Suzanne tried to console her. 

“I don't see myself going out of the pack today and nothing good ever happens in this pack. So, that left us with only one option.” She said as she fisted her hands by her side thinking of how helpless she was over the situation.

They both were the slaves of the Shadow Eclipse pack, a pack full of lies and deceit. It presents itself as something outside while it is completely opposite of that inside. In the eyes of the world it is a great pack that takes in rogues like her, even members from other packs' like Suzanne. Two and half years ago, they were attacked, kidnapped, and kept held here as slaves of the pack. 

That has been their fate since then…

"You can still hope for the best, right?" Suzy asked with a sigh as she wiped the dust off of the vase in her hands. 

"I have only one hope, Suzy and never in my dream I will let that get involved with the dark sickness of this place at any cost." The woman said in a strong tone with determination in her eyes. 

Suzanne let out a sigh when the word hope reminded her of her hope. Her only hope is to be out of this hell hole.

Her mate. 

They are stuck in this pack with no way out. They can't go out. They can't attend balls or parties. They can't meet people. Then how are they supposed to find their mates? Even though the topic of mates anger Athena beyond limit for some reason. But it's not the same for Suzanne. 

She wants a mate and prays to find him all the time. She is never going to lose hope on that. 

"Don't worry, you are not going to lose your hope." Athena spoke up with a small chuckle which brought Suzanne out of her thoughts. She looked at Athena with widened eyes. 

"Did you just read my mind?" She asked in shock. 

"No, silly. You should have seen the look on your face. You always have that face whenever you are thinking about your mate." Athena said with a small smile, making Suzanne blush. 

"Yeah, I wonder when I am going to find him. I am going to leave this goddamn pack the moment I find him. I am not going to stay here another second." She said with gritted teeth, making Athena go blank. She noticed that. "What are you going to do when you find your mate? Leave as well?" She asked slowly, not trying to upset her.

"I don't need my mate to escape this, Suzy. If I want to leave, I can do it myself." Athena said in a blank tone, completely dismissing the thought of a mate.

"You are so strong, Athy. I admire you so much for that. I don't understand why you don't want to run away from here!" Suzanne exclaimed in frustration at the weird stubbornness of her best friend which angers her so much sometimes. 

Athena, her best friend. Athy is the nickname she had given her. Athena is a very beautiful woman with golden blonde hair. She has the most beautiful deep sea blue eyes. But what's more beautiful in her is her strong personality. Suzanne looks up at her a lot. 

There were a lot of times in this two and half years old period when Suzanne had a mental breakdown because of how messed up their situation was. But never even for once Athena break down and bent down in front of the situation. She not only handled Suzanne but also faced all the insults, inhumanity and workloads all alone bravely with a blank smile. 

How strong she was!

"Leave all this. Where is your duty today?" Athena asked, changing the subject as always. Suzanne let out a sigh and looked at the clock. 

"I got the duty to clean up the office area." She answered. 

"Oh, the office area. I have heard that someone from the leader pack of the North region came here to have a meeting with the alpha. Be careful while you are there. Don't do anything to grab attention." She warned in a caring tone as she wondered why those important people might have come here. 

'Maybe to give some more donation to the 'generous' alpha.' Athena heard her wolf speak up in a sarcastic tone. She rolled her eyes at her sass before ignoring her. 

"Don't worry, I will be careful. Do you know why they are here?" Suzanne asked in a secretive tone while looking around cautiously. She didn't want them to fall in trouble for talking about this here. 

"I don't know. You know how I always stay away from all this gossip. I was personally asked by the beta on alpha's order to stay away from the office area today. That's why I know about the meeting." Athena said with a frown as she was confused about why the alpha wanted her to stay away from those important people. 

"Yeah, apparently someone ran away from the pack a few days ago and there's a possibility that he reached the alpha of Crescent Mystery pack, leader of the North region. He complained to the alpha about it." Suzanne said in a hushed tone as the walls here have ears. Athena looked at her without many reactions. 

"And you think that's going to change anything? The most that's going to happen is, the alpha of the Crescent Mystery pack is going to hand over that person to this pack and he is going to get a merciless death. That's it." Athena said in a blank tone as she stopped cleaning the table and looked at Suzanne who was going to say something more. 

"Throw these thoughts out of your mind and go do your work. It's time and don't forget to be careful." Athena warned once again but this time in a soft and worried tone. She really had a bad feeling at the back of her heart and it was intimidating her a lot. 

"Oh my, Athy! Look at your face. You are so worried. Don't worry. I will be okay. I promise." Suzanne said with a big assuring smile which managed to put a small smile on Athena's face as well. "Okay, now I have to go. Bye!" She said hurriedly when she noticed that she was getting late.

After that, she ran away from there even before Athena could say something. Athena let out a small chuckle at her childish act before walking out of the room they both were cleaning. 

Usually, she gets the duty of cleaning rooms. But today she got the duty of cleaning the hallways of the second floor. She hates this duty because it's an open space. She doesn't like to bump into different kinds of creatures who don't have any other work other than feeling superior to anyone else in the world.

"Oh, look who is here?" 

Speak of the bitch and the bitch appears. In this case bitches. 

Athena let out a sigh after hearing the voice of the most irritating person in the world but didn't turn around and continued to mop the floor. But she was forced to stop when they stood just in front of her, dirtying the place she just cleaned. But she didn't show any reaction yet.

"Please move out of the way. I have work to do." She said in a polite tone while biting the skin of her inner cheeks to not sound rude. 

"How dare you order us, bitch! Stand up!" The same voice shouted down at her, making her ears almost bleed. 

"Get up, whore!" 

"Don't make the future Luna angry!" 

Two other voices snapped down at her, making her sigh. She realised that she didn't have any way out at that moment. So she stood up while putting a good two hands distance between her and them. 

She looked up with an expressionless look as she faced the people in front of her. There was a woman with dirty blond hair. Anyone can say that it wasn't her natural hair colour. Her face had the meanest look in the world. She stood a little shorter than Athena. While beside the fake blonde beauty, there was a pair of identical twins with brunette hair. They were shorter than her as well. 

All of their faces were filled with cruelty and tonnes of make-up. They were wearing such short dresses that they were hardly able to hold in their assets. But then again, that could be their goal as well in the first place.

"Can I help you guys with something?" Athena spoke up in a professional tone while looking away from them and looked down to show 'respect'. She wasn't looking for trouble at that moment. So if looking down while talking to these brats can do the work, she doesn't have any problems at all. 

"Look at the whore, girls. She is giving us an attitude." The blonde girl said with a smirk, she was the leader of the group. 

"We need to teach her a lesson, Amanda." 

"She is flying too much." The twins, Selena and Helena, said one after another while looking at Athena with disgust. 

"You guys are right. We should teach her a lesson by cutting her wings. I just can't stand this whore and her bastard son! Wish there was a way to get rid of them." Amanda said in utter frustration and disgust as she glared at Athena too who glared back. 

"Don't say a word about my son. You can say whatever you want about me but don't drag my son into this dirty environment of yours." Athena said in a cold tone while looking deep into Amanda's eyes to let her know the depth of her words. 

"Ohhh, girls! Did you hear her? The little whore didn't like us dragging her bastard son into this. She is even threatening us. Did you hear her?" Amanda asked in fake amusement as she let out a fake laugh immediately after. But she stopped immediately and gave a hard slap to Athena who wasn't prepared for this. Amanda glared at Athena while fuming. 

"What are you going to do, huh? You pathetic little whore!" She cursed but Athena didn't move a single muscle of her body or face at all. Athena was still maintaining a blank expression as she looked at Amanda. 

"I am telling you again, do not drag my son into this. Don't call him by that name." She said while sounding as clear as before and it seemed to anger Amanda more. 

"You don't want me to call the bastard a bast-...” Amanda couldn’t complete her sentence when she felt a hard slap on the cheek which threw her off of her feet and she landed on the ground with a thud. Everything around them suddenly turned silent as they all were in shock excluding Athena who knew what she was doing.

“Don’t you dare to make this mistake again, Amanda. I am warning you. Stay the fuck away from my son.” Athena growled at them which made each of them flinch. Her wolf was trying to get control. 

They were shocked by her intimidating outburst for the first time in years. But Amanda came out of the shock soon and stood up fiercely. She glared at Athena venomously which didn’t faze her at all. 

“How dare you, bi-...?” Amanda couldn’t complete her sentence when an old maid named Mary interrupted them.

“Athena, you need to come fast. Suzanne needs you.” Mary’s tone was filled with fear and worry as she looked at Athena. Athena looked at her in panic as she felt her heart drop to her stomach. 

“What happened to her?” She exclaimed in worry before not waiting to hear anything as she ran off toward the office's direction. She didn’t pay heed to Amanda’s threat about making her regret.

She quickly ran toward the office and soon was able to hear Suzanne’s loud and fearful cry. She sped up and soon reached there and found Suzanne sitting on the floor and crying while a man was trying his very best to touch her. 

“Don’t you dare to touch her!” Athena let out a loud and threatening growl, almost intimidating everyone present there, as she ran toward the duo and pushed the man aside with full force. 

"Athy, no! He is my mate!"