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40. Ivan
Last Updated:
2022-06-09 14:09:46
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The Beta's Prize 41. Cherish
Ivan left me three hours ago for the showcase draw and he seems almost excited about it. I don’t understand anything about the past few days. He has stopped cuddling me to sleep in bed for one thing. He still promises to find me freedom but for the past few days he hasn’t wrapped his lovely warm arms around me and nuzzled into the base of my neck. I miss it. Halo constantly repeats Martha’s kind words every time I am stung by his new manner. /Ivan is preparing to lose you. He cares. He does./So why would he be so giddy about being picked in a death match? Especially seeing as all the signs point to Denton being his opponent. It’s what the crowd, the bookmakers and the Axelon gang want. The money spent on the two twelve-times winners would be unreal. Finally he knocks on the door, an annoyingly chirpy knock. Rat-a-tat-tat like he’s bringing me flowers and presents. I let him in cagily, peering through the crack in the door. "What happened, did you not get picked?” “I got Denton
Last Updated : 2022-06-10The Beta's Prize 42. Cherish
After blowtorching my heart, Ivan put me down, his face flushed red with emotion as he slammed the bathroom door. I stood against the wall where he left me, the last traces of sparks swiftly dying away leaving me cold and lonely. It wasn’t meant to go this way. If he wants me to leave without giving him a second thought…well he is getting there now. All my frustration, anxiety and passion boiled over as I shouted at the bathroom door, “to hell with you then!” I took myself off to bed, hoping I would fall into a blissful sleep, maybe Halo take me somewhere more pleasant. Instead I tossed and turned relentlessly, Ivan did not even enter the bedroom. It was his turn to be the mouse within the towels. I would have tried to sneak a look had I not been furious with him. I could hardly imagine his huge frame sleeping in the miniscule bathroom. If his plan comes together we have maybe just over twenty-four hours together and he has declared I am a mere fling. I spent the night replay
Last Updated : 2022-06-10The Beta's Prize 43. Ivan
Cherish has inevitably returned to her pile of towels on the floor. It is the night before the Showcase. I should be resting and yet I cannot help constantly peering over the side of the bed. Like scratching an itch I keep checking she is still there, even though she is rolled over facing away from me. It physically hurts seeing that blonde hair of hers spilling out over the floor. She should be in bed with me, safe and warm. /If you don’t make this right, you might never see or touch her again/ was the thought Kohl spun round and round. Unhelpful to say the least. If I did manage to bring this whole system to its knees, to even execute Vincent, Kingsley and the rest of his cronies for their crimes what would it be for if I never saw her again? Without thinking I thought out loud, my words cutting through the silence of the dark room “did you mean it, that you would have nowhere to go if you got out?” She immediately rolled over, she'd pretending been to be asleep. I couldn't hel
Last Updated : 2022-06-11The Beta's Prize 44. Cherish
I must be a glutton for punishment asking to hear all about his mate, the woman who truly has his heart. It's not a topic he’s ever truly elaborated on but I know it’s why he is here. Right down to the way he is holding me, close and fast to his body, sitting on his lap feels like the most natural thing in the world. He wriggles backwards, so his back is against the wooden frame of the bed. With a tug he drags the blanket down from the bed, enclosing us both in a warm, snug little cocoon. “I can’t live in towels like you Mousey,” he smirked, kissing me on the top of my head. When he called me darling a few minutes ago my heart fluttered. Am I scared of admitting I have fallen irrevocably in love with someone I will never get a real chance to be with? Whichever one of us lives, the other's death is soon to follow. It hurts me to even think of Ivan fighting in the Cage again, his body has been through enough. “What do you want to know?” he whispered into the top of my head. “Why are
Last Updated : 2022-06-12The Beta's Prize 45. Ivan
It’s possibly the worst way to prepare for a fight in history but I couldn’t care less. Up all night talking to her, holding her and then wrapped up in pleasuring her for hours of the morning. I am shattered, my back and arms are covered in scratches from Cherish losing herself in ecstasy. Any energy I did have she had completely wrung out of me, as she toyed with me and made me erupt countless times. All I can smell, and taste are her delicious berry notes. Deep red summer berries dance on my tongue from having tasted her sweet center. I might die today and yet my heart is almost light. My only regret is not being able to be fully intimate, to go to that next level of intimacy but that would require both of us surviving until tomorrow night, and the odds are not even worth looking at for that situation. /You never mentioned needing your beauty sleep before/ Kohl offered and I swear if wolves could smirk... I came around in the late afternoon, still in a tangle of white towels
Last Updated : 2022-06-12The Beta's Prize 46. Cherish
I numbly stepped into the shower, reluctantly washing that enticingly fresh smell of apples from my skin. Perhaps if I stayed under the water and pretended I had heard nothing…no, there was no way to erase what I had just witnessed. Ivan to allow Denton to kill him in exchange for my freedom? The first deal was atrocious, this one was just sickeningly pointless. I heard the door creak as Ivan slowly stepped into the bathroom. He slid his shorts down and silently stepped into the large tiled shower space. He simply wrapped his arms around me, pulling my chest to his torso, his hands around my lower back. I followed, my arms naturally finding their place up on his huge shoulders, my hands tangling his coppery mane. The hot water rained down on both of our bodies as he softly stroked my spine up and down. “Cherish…I know you don’t want this but I would rather you had a chance at getting out of here. I’m dead anyway.” “Don’t say that,” I whispered, looking down as my tears mixed int
Last Updated : 2022-06-13The Beta's Prize 47. Ivan
For the very final time, I wait in the holding cell. There are only two of us left as I am the second to last fight. The room stinks of men as I sit under a flickering strobe light examining my hand strapping for the thousandth time. The fighter after my match, Jackson is meditating away in the corner. Whatever helps I guess. Vincent knows that by suggesting a target to get to freedom it will spur fighters on. I imagine every rookie thinks they can do this ten or fifteen times if they had to. However Vincent, being the sick bastard he is, knows realistically, a shifter's body can only heal so much. Denton and I were probably fifty percent less powerful when we first arrived. My battle with Xavier sapped a lot of my inner strength, the whipping took Dentons. Now we are more vulnerable, fuelled not by muscle but primal emotions. Mine is the desperation to get back to Cherish, whereas Denton, all flaring black eyes and wild back beard, is angry. Sheer hatred for killing his only fri
Last Updated : 2022-06-14The Beta's Prize 48. Ivan
My victory was all but assured as Denton lay on the floor, his hands trying to cover the gaping, bleeding wounds of his smashed ribcage I looked once more towards the box where Vincent and Kingsley sat. Kingsley had a victorious little smirk on his face, as though he was already planning his tortures for Cherish. Instead I ran to the ladder where hundreds of men were gathered waiting to congratulate me on my win. Instead of climbing I used every last bit of strength and wrenched it from the wall. Aware of the thousands of eyes on me, I was relieved when it came away with a large metal plate attached. The crowd gasped and muttered. Was I planning to decapitate Denton, put his head on a spike like a barbarian? Or maybe something even grislier? “He hated him, he’s going to make him suffer, go on Ivan!” they shouted, loving the idea of an even gorier death than they had seen before. They watched as I ripped the backing plate from the ladders struts, giving me a long piece of metal. More
Last Updated : 2022-06-14
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The Beta's Prize Epilogue 6: White Forest Ball (Cillian)
Without thinking I shouted “Stop!” causing the cloaked person to sprint. “GUARDS!” I screeched, unable to mind-link members outside of my pack. Why was the entire fucking castle asleep! Sprinting after the cloaked figure I saw nobody else, no guards, not even a servant to help me catch the stranger. Arriving at the huge foyer of the castle, surrounded by flickering torches, hanging tapestries and miserable grey stone walls I had nothing to follow. They had vanished into thin air. All I knew from the build around the cloak was that they were a man, a man wearing long black trousers. Giving up the chase, I headed back to my room, flights of stairs, leading me to nothing but duplicating corridors of arched doorways, presumably student accommodation. The door to my parents’ suite remained open. “Papa?” I knocked softly to no answer. /Cillian, I am so sorry/ Vez said, realising before I did that my world had been knocked from its axis, shattered like porcelain. On the double bed, wrappe
The Beta's Prize Epilogue 5: White Forest Ball (Cillian)
I understood immediately why Papa never took us to many of these charades. Standing there in a pompous white shirt, on display like a prize pig at a fair I was happy to escape with Genevieve into the masses. I wasn’t so happy about Nikolai. We had only met briefly during a few childhood meetings but as a man he oozed anger and resentment. What for, I have no idea, but my sister and her wide eyes clearly thought it was the hottest thing she had ever seen. Silently, from my chosen distance, I watched his charisma overwhelm her, my own heckles rising. /She asked you to let her be an adult, to make her own choices/ Vez urged. Ever since first shifting and Vez came into my world it has been like having two fathers, both eager for me to prosper as Alpha. Our wolf fur was as red and fiery as my hair. I cringed, remembering how Jackson had laughingly called me the Infant Inferno, leaving me furious. Vez however, despite our fiery colour was sage, calming and fair. My papa tried to downpl
The Beta's Prize Epilogue 4: White Forest Ball (Genevieve)
Having to walk in behind my parents I felt like a child amongst women. Despite the stunning dress, the styled hair and jewels I’d been given, the ballroom had a strange feel about it. I felt watched ,studied, but not in the usual way, like at home in Cragstone when crowds gathered. One person’s gaze had me flustered. The smell of burning spice made my eyes widen in fear, urgently seeking out the owner. As though we were in danger of attack, then I saw Nikolai Romanov. He headed up towards our little royal enclosure furtively, as though he was breaking in. He was just as entitled to be there as the rest of us and yet his fearsomely dark eyes were stuck on me. He offered no greetings to anyone else, not even his parents. My heart flipped, what do you do when someone looks so blatantly at you? He wasn’t undressing me with his eyes or anything crude like the silly Kharkov boys. Instead, he was seriously, steadily looking at me as a person. Almost the same age as me, already nineteen and
The Beta's Prize Epilogue 3: White Forest Ball (Ivan)
I know exactly why she is nervous. It’s not ideal and we’ve put it off for so long that it’s brought the formal gold bordered letter from Alexander to force our attendance. They are so young, the twins are barely even adults. If they find their mates tonight there it is more complicated than they realise. For Kharkov’s girls, or Lyon’s boys, when they make their match it will be a simple case of falling in love and finding a place to live and be happy together. Our children, should it be from a rival pack, will see alliances drawn up, decisions taken out of their hands as their parents become a tangle of wants and wishes. Should my beautiful, delicate little Genevieve be drawn in with that dark-haired lout Nikolai, what then? He is the future Alpha of White Forest, as Freya is to live in Rising Star. I would lose my darling girl. I know it is just the mindset of a scared father. I am a proud, happy man, terrified of nothing the world can throw at me. Except for damaging my family'
The Beta's Prize Epilogue 2: White Forest Ball (Cherish)
I gasped at the sight of our intruder. Cillian, my beautiful boy, had somehow transformed into a powerful, charismatic man, his white shirt open at the top showing the sculpted chest he inherited from his father. His coppery red hair had an even fierier tone than Ivan’s, almost sheer red, whilst his eyes had eventually turned blue like my own, despite starting green. He had a strong, masculine jaw and his figure had developed over the past year. He had trained like a beast with Kharkov and Jackson, as if preparing for his mate by getting into perfect shape. “Are we ready to do this parade then?” he grumbled, fiddling with his cufflink, the rasping depth of his manly voice still making me wistful even after years of it breaking. “How has a white shirt made you look this grown up,” I said softly, adjusting the collar of his shirt whilst he towered over me and his father. The squidgy faced little boy who hid behind my skirts clutching stacks of buns he had stolen from Martha was no m
The Beta's Prize Epilogue 1: White Forest Ball (Cherish)
** TWENTY YEARS LATER ** “I cannot believe it has truly been so long since we were last at White Forest,” I murmured, standing in the same suite we had used so many years ago. Back when I shouted at Helena and suggested she had failed Ivan. The four-poster bed and stained glass windows were unchanged. As if we had simply stepped back in time. The sight of the balcony, where I had once stood in only a black cloak for Ivan to devour under the pale blue moonlight made me smile and Halo purr in remembrance. “You are as amazing now as you were then,” Ivan murmured, approaching me with a grin. In his late forties he was getting somehow even more handsome with age. His hair remained the stunning copper beacon I looked for first in every room whilst his frame remained strong, tall and muscular. Although my heart had two other beacons to contend with in Genevieve and Cillian, Ivan’s strength was the tree which my roots had grown around. They had turned eighteen last winter, Ivan insiste
The Beta's Prize 106. Cherish
Although Ivan’s silly trick with the balcony made me laugh, we were soon back in the same glum mood we had left the dinner party with last night. The stone walls around us swirled with confusion, the footsteps of unknown servants constantly pattering by made me feel watched, edgy. At home, in Cragstone we knew exactly who roamed our smaller world. “We should just ask Helena outright,” I snapped in frustration, “they’re discussing us and our babies so why shouldn’t we know.” Ultimately we had the matter taken out of our hands. A small, elderly male servant summoned us for breakfast with Alpha Brandon and Luna Hollie down in the dining hall. Kissing the babies and leaving them with Kharkov and Penelope we made our way for attempt Day Two of the so-called Conference. As expected the four of them were already there. Brandon raised his hand as soon as he saw us enter and saw Ivan assessing the situation. Alpha Alexander for once looked distressed. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes wer
The Beta's Prize 105. Ivan
My worst fears were confirmed. This wasn’t a proper conference, there was no respect for our attendance as the leaders of the Shadowlands pack, it was some ridiculous notion by Helena to try and fix her own ego. Kissing Cherish softly as she tended to the babies with Penelope I informed Kharkov I was heading for a stroll, he could stay with the women and enjoy some breakfast. His face lit up at the prospect, whether it was breakfast or the company of the women I could not tell which thrilled him more. I loved the fact he had such a bond with Cherish. Having someone in your corner like that, it’s how I used to see myself and Helena. Different but the same. /If everything had stayed the same, we would have been dead in a ditch long ago. Some things have to change/ Kohl murmured sagely. I agreed with him, but I still regretted my lost friendship. Heading out of the huge double doored stone archway I found myself looking down upon a splendid view of the surrounding forest. It was so
The Beta's Prize 104. Cherish
When the servant brought us into the dining hall it was just as grand as I expected. Huge golden candelabras and chandeliers lit up a picture perfect room. The usual tapestries and war scenes I had grown used to seeing at White Forest were not present here. Rising Star was a gallery of landscapes. The valleys, lakes and forests depicted everywhere gave the castle a softer feeling than I had expected this pile of stones to provide. Even the soft rugs were welcomely eyed by Halo, my feet still not fully healed made me want to jump to the nearest chair. I preferred this castle to White Forest, though as Halo warned me, that may just be because I had lingering reservations about Luna Helena and her knowledge of Fate. Ivan, bless him, knew my feet were not fully healed yet and made sure to have me seated comfortably before anything else. Alpha Brandon and Luna Hollie were kind and gracious hosts. They clearly adored Helena and Alexander, a cosy coupling that we were on the outside of.
