Defying the Rogue Alpha
Chapter 195: Banished

Chapter 195: Banished

"And Sarah?" she asked after a pause.

"As soon as she’s well rested," Kade said, jaw tight, "she’ll be banished from every and all territory under Alpha Lucas’s control."

Ava’s lips pressed into a thin line. "Will you tell her where the child will be?"

Kade looked at her, his gaze cold and resolute. He shook his head slowly. "No. She doesn’t get to know."

"Good," Ava replied without missing a beat, nodding in approval. "She made her bed, now she can wander around without sheets."

"And have you decided what to name this lovely cutie?" Ava asked. She stroked a finger over the baby’s curled fist, smiling as the tiny hand instinctively closed around it.

"Adelita," Kade replied after a pause.

Ava’s lips curled in delight. "Adelita. That’s beautiful."

*****

Sarah stumbled as the two Gammas marched her toward the gates of the fortress. Her legs felt like wet noodles beneath her, barely functioning after childbirth. She was still wearing the blood-stained dress she’d given birth in, her hair plastered to her face with sweat and despair, and not a single soul had offered her water, food, or even a moment to catch her breath.

As the gates creaked open, she turned back for one last glance. Her throat tightened. That fortress had once been her world. Her kingdom. Her stage. She’d been the apple of Alpha Lucas’s eye, the whispered envy of many. Now she was nothing but a discarded name.

She looked at the thick stone walls rising behind her, the ones she had once sauntered through with sway and purpose. Where did I go wrong? she thought bitterly.

Did Lucas lose interest in me before Ava arrived... or only after?

The gate clanked shut behind her with a dull finality. A tiny part of her wanted to scream, just for someone to listen. But what would she scream? That she had hoped Alpha Lucas might forgive her, even after what she’d done?

The road ahead was long.

One of the Gammas cleared his throat behind her. "Keep moving."

They always spoke of Lucas like he was a legend carved out of stone. The Alpha who didn’t want a Luna, didn’t want a child, didn’t want the inconvenience of something as soft as emotional intimacy. He led like a shadow and he fucked like he was mad at the world. That part? That part Sarah had loved. In fact, it had made her feel chosen, like he’d picked her body as the battlefield where he fought the ghosts of his past. She’d worn the bruises he gave her like a twisted kind of honor.

But everything changed when Ava arrived.

Ava had crashed into Lucas’s world like a meteor and he hadn’t been the same since.

She, once the favored concubine, had become the forgotten one.

Not only forgotten, but erased. She gave birth to a child conceived on a drunken night tangled with Beta Dorian, may his soul rot quietly in hell, they didn’t even let her see the baby. Not a glimpse, not a breath. They had whisked the child away like it was a dirty secret.

And now, she was walking. Still bleeding, her legs jelly, her body protesting with every step. The Gammas didn’t slow down, didn’t offer a hand.

The terrain grew unfamiliar, the grass less tended, the scent of pack fading into the crisp scent of no-man’s land. When they finally reached the invisible but sacred boundary of Alpha Lucas’s territory, one of the Gammas nodded. Just a nod. That was it.

One more step, and she would officially be rogue. Not just cast out, but marked by the worst kind of stain; Alpha Lucas’s rejection. No other Alpha would dare take her in now.

The best thing for her to do, really, would be to head toward the human territories. But the thought of getting there on foot? She nearly laughed.

She stood there, one foot hovering over the threshold of her old life and the blank abyss of the future. The Gammas watched her, arms crossed like statues. They wouldn’t leave until she disappeared into the trees.

She sighed and took the final step, feeling it like a punch in the gut. She crossed into nothingness, the earth suddenly foreign beneath her feet. A cool wind bit at her blood-dried legs. Her dress—still sticky, still torn—hung off her frame like a flag of shame.

And then, she was alone.

The Gammas turned back without a word. Just like that, the fortress was gone. Nothing ahead but silence.

She trudged forward, biting down on her tongue to avoid screaming. She was tired. So very tired. Her stomach growled. Her lips were dry, cracked. Her thighs chafed.

She kept walking. Because what else could she do?

Her legs had long stopped feeling like hers. They were numb, stiff, each step a negotiation between willpower and gravity. So when she spotted a fallen log by the side of the road, worn and damp but vaguely seat-shaped, Sarah almost wept with gratitude. She dragged herself over and dropped onto it. Her whole body sighed. The bark scratched at her thighs through the thin fabric of her dress, but she didn’t care. At least she wasn’t moving.

The silence of the woods wrapped around her. She tilted her head back and looked up at the sky. Dusk was beginning to flirt with the treetops, casting long, melancholy shadows that made everything seem taller and sadder than it actually was.

She suddenly felt a quiet prickle down her spine. That whisper of wrongness that made every hair on the back of her neck rise. She slowly scanned the woods behind her. Nothing but trees, wind, and the occasional rustle of leaves. But still... she felt it.

She shook her head.

But the feeling didn’t leave.

In fact, it got worse.

Heavier.

The air thickened. Every breath felt like a struggle, a mouthful of pressure instead of oxygen. Her chest tightened. Her pulse quickened.

Then... footsteps.

Soft. Slow. Deliberate.