The Imperial Pack

ZACHARY

The serenity of the room I was in was just what my befuddled mind needed as I stared into nothing but open space. 

Technically I wasn't staring at nothing. 

I was staring at my reflection in the big standing mirror while the maids surrounding me wordlessly dressed me in the traditional royal attire for the Alpha prince. 

I watched how they clipped on my red cloak that has the large seal of a crown surrounded by wolves on it–the symbol of our pack. 

I watched how they pushed my feet into the golden shoes and buckled them tightly around me.

My eyes followed the combing of my black mass of hair with so much gentleness and care to make it fit perfectly on top of my head.

My eyes didn't miss the specks of fine powder dusted on my face to bring out the glow of my silver eyes.

Everything. I watched it all.

Yet I still felt like I was staring at nothing.

Of course, I was nothing. 

"Smile Zach. You shouldn't have that gloomy look on your face when today is going to be the day for you to prove yourself." 

Serge–my wolf, broke the placidity of the room in my head.

I barely held back a scoff because I didn't want to scare the maids. It's a miracle they are even able to dress me without peeing their pants. 

A single sound from me and they might go running out of the room, thinking I was having one of my mental episodes again. 

"Go away Serge...I don't want therapy today." 

I mind linked a reply to my wolf.

I really enjoyed the peace and quiet from moments ago before he broke it. The silence gets maddening at some point but it's nothing I haven't overcame before. 

"It's not therapy if I'm only trying to put a smile on that brooding face of yours. You look great These ladies aren't trying this hard for you to wear a scowl at them in return."

Serge's words only made a bigger scowl spread on my face. 

"This same face will be roughed up by Tybalt in a few minutes from now. What's the point?"

"You see, that's your problem, you do--" 

"You're all done Prince Zachary" 

A quiet voice shut Serge up before I did and I couldn't be more grateful. I looked up quietly at the maid whose voice from earlier was barely steady. 

They bowed immediately–all five of them although I didn't miss the glint of fear in their eyes before they did. 

I was feared but not for the good reason but since when was the feeling of fear ever good anyway?

Or the one that makes me feel some sense of power.

If anything, their fear for me makes me feel vulnerable. 

But I couldn't blame any of them either. My previous mental episode sent one of them to the hospital and she hasn't even recovered yet. 

"Leave."

The sound that left my lips was barely a whisper but they heard it anyway. All five of them scurried out of the room before I could say anything else. 

"You don't have to be me--"

"I wasn't being mean Serge. We both share the same feelings, how come you don't know that. Nothing I do changes the fact that I'm a mad man born of an unmarked affair." 

Silence. 

In the room and in my head. 

Because I said the forbidden words. I might have hurt Serge's feelings but at least the peace and quiet returned.  

I had meant to say the words to shut him up but I also said it so I can keep my sanity. 

Either way, the words hit the both of us with the same force. Serge remained quiet after that but I could still feel him around, brooding in the shadows. 

I stood up from the low stool I sat on while the maids were dressing up and went to stand by the window side. 

Since I lived alone in upper part of the Palace tower, I had the privilege to see the whole place from my window. The whole place starting from the quarters of the Palace and stretching further to the rest of the pack that stood just outside the gates of the Alpha's Palace. 

The entire palace was filled up with people. 

So much that one could mistake them for tiny ants. 

Canopies and stools lined the compound of the Alpha's Palace round. Decorations adorned the big and cleared space  where the duel will take place.

The people chattered freely like birds let loose in the forest. Their voices reached my ears in strings of incoherent and muddled words.

All those people came from far and wide. From the packs that were situated in the woodlands and even beyond. 

And they came here for just one purpose. 

To watch the two grown sons of an Alpha, fight for their right to be the new Alpha of the pack. 

The gaze I casted at them was that of both distress and disdain. Distress at the fact that to me, it was my humiliation this people have come to watch. Disdain from the fact that they found joy in something that leaves a hole in my heart. 

I didn't want anything but to get out of the deep sorrow that plunges my heart and from the nightmares that wake me every night.

Those nightmares were not subtle but intense reminders of my reality;

I was an unmarked child. 

A child born of two people who weren't mates. 

Of all the things that could go wrong as a werewolf, It has to be the most horrific one. If not for anyone, it is for me. 

Each day, I'm reminded of the fact that my father, the Previous Alpha of the Imperial pack had me with a woman, my mother, who wasn't his mate only for him to leave us to meet his true mate years after.

And then the death of my mother...

My past haunts me daily with nightmares and sometimes even daydreams. 

It's this terror that usually wakes me up most of the time with sweats of perspiration breaking on my forehead and making me trash wherever I find myself. 

I throw anything I lay my hands upon and punch my fist into walls with bloodcurdling cries of horror living my lips. 

Little surprise, the maids all fear me. 

One thing my father did to further make my life a living hell was bringing me into his palace after my mother's death.

I would have loved to die alone in the cold woods where he found me, rather than be the subject of the hatred of his Luna and her son, Tybalt–my half brother whom I will be fighting today for our father's throne. 

If left to me, I'd rather not fight for anything. 

I have lost to Tybalt all my life. This doesn't feel any different. 

But the rules of the pack emphasise on being fair. I had to fight whether I liked it or not.

Tybalt and I were born on the same day, which allows the both of us to fight for the Alpha throne. Even as an unmarked child, I had the full right to fight for my father's throne. 

I didn't want it.

But no one cares about what I want. 

The door of my room creaking open didn't take my eyes off the crowd just below me. 

"Alpha prince." 

A voice said just as its footsteps stopped a feet from me. 

"Speak." I commanded icily.

"The Ceremony is about to begin. We need to leave now." 

I turned to look at Alan, my beta. 

The only person asides Serge who helps in keeping my sanity in check. 

Alan has served by my side since my father brought me here when I was just Ten. 

Alan's loyalty to an unmarked child like me is unrivalled despite the few times I've been anything but good to him. 

He has come to remind me of my misery which was outside of this tower, waiting for me. 

I took one last look at the people below me before turning on my heels and approaching Alan. 

"Lead the way." 

Alan bowed and walked in front of me while I trudged along with him into the large hallway which we walked through to get to the stairs and down the tower.

A few maids and guards we met on the way bowed in reverence to me. 

We were about to step outside of the palace when Alan stopped abruptly automatically making me stop on my tracks too.

The reason for our abrupt stop was a long entourage of men in Khakis and girls dressed in hideous pieces of black and white clothing. 

"Who are those?" 

I asked Alan. 

"Alpha Jarvold's entourage from the Moonstone pack." 

I only grunted a reply as I watched the long entourage pass by. More people added to the already large number to witness my humiliation, I thought begrudgingly. 

The Entourage finally dispersed and freed the road for us to walk through. 

The noise of the crowd got rowdier when I stepped outside.  Loud drums announced my arrival and everyone left whatever it is that were doing to bow to me. 

I perambulated toward the large clearing in the middle of the equally large crowd. Silence fell all over the space, except for the sound of the drums beating hard to announce my presence. 

When a counter drum started from the far end–the direction of Tybalt, my Half brother's tower, I felt the rate of my heart beat, pick up. 

Just as I thought, he appeared from the other end as we both walked up to the clearing for the Duel. 

Tybalt stopped inches from me. 

His mischievous brown eyes gleamed at me. The hatred swirling inside of them was as clear as day. A smirk found its way to the sides of his lips when he said;

"Hello brother."