The Alpha's Blind Fate
Chapter 32: I Will Not Lay With The King!

Chapter 32: I Will Not Lay With The King!

In a leering voice, Lykom continued. "Hope my present this morning didn’t startle you much."

The confirmation that indeed, Lykom was behind the incessant recent assassination attacks on Zina was still startling despite the fact she suspected that much. Recovering herself, Zina tilted her head upwards in a show of nonchalance. "Which of them do you mean? The first or the second?"

Lykom broke into a billowing laughter. "I didn’t mean for you to stumble on the second present. It was more to sate my blood rage knowing fully well that by some twist of fate, you would avoid death this morning. Hope the blood didn’t stain your shoes much?"

Zina merely fixed him with what she supposed was a freezing stare, hoping that Lykom would freeze and die under it.

The man took a step closer to her, in a leering albeit low voice he continued. "I know you met with the Matriarchy, incorruptible Theta."

The mock in his words didn’t escape her. To show him that she was far from being scared of a maniacal imp like him, she took a step closer. "What about it?" She said, her lips curving into a smile that Seraph had tagged devilish.

"I see you’ve no fear in you. Conspiring for the banished prince behind the Alpha King’s back." he tsked, "do you truly think you’re untouchable simply because you’re the great seer who foretold the Great Famine?"

"What a bold allegation you level against me. I suppose you must have evidence if you’re bold enough to accuse a servant of the Temple for doing such a horrible thing."

Zina could feel the anger that engulfed Lykom. He was probably tethering between strangling her and walking away when he gritted sarcastically, "Incorruptible Theta? A woman after the heart of the moon goddess herself? No matter how many vows of chastity you take to make yourself appear otherworldly, you will always remain the dirty woman who did terrible things just to secure her meagre life."

Zina refused the anger to take over her. For all of Lykom’s boldness, he knew nothing. Daemon NorthSteed didn’t need Zina’s help to acquire the cooperation of the GreenLands. Admittedly, Zina might have influenced the help he later acquired, but that was far from the reason why she secretly met with the Matriarchy.

Her meeting with the women-only pack was to discuss the very monsters that Eldric had refused to investigate. Monsters that would soon ravage and swallow them whole if nothing was done about them.

She would allow Lykom to think whatever he wanted. After all, he too was now in her list of men that must be eliminated.

Peeved by the stretching silence, Lykom declared. "I shall claim your life even if it is the last thing I do."

Before she could stop herself, Zina burst into delirious laughter that sent tears streaming down her cheeks. Wiping away the errant liquid, she asked. "How can you claim a life that I don’t own? You asked me if I’ve many lives, that is not the issue here, Lykom Lupus. My life is simply not for you or myself to take."

It is for him to take.

’I shall return alive to claim your life. No matter the ends of the earth you escape to, you shall never be able to escape me.’

For six years, Zina had waited for him— the man she had pulled down with a false vision. And now, it would seem as though the time of their reunion was close. Zina didn’t imagine she would be the one to go to him first. No matter, it was too sudden and dangerous for her to travel to the GreenLands. Resolving to ask the Temple for help on how to revert Eldric’s irrational decision.

Not wishing to continue the tiring game of a conversation she was having with Lykom, she turned to leave. Seraph and Ablanch quickly joined her as they walked away.

"We shall go to the temple." Zina said, impatient to escape the castle walls.

"Before that," Seraph said uncomfortably, "her majesty the Luna Queen has asked to see you."

Zina halted in annoyance. "Why?"

"Today is the full moon." Seraph answered uncomfortably.

Zina squeezed her eyes in exasperation, a throbbing headache coming over her. Even though it was just morning, tiredness hung over her like a blanket.

"Does the Luna Queen need help in fulfilling her duties?" she asked irritably.

"Her majesty was reported to have been irritable when the Temple delivered to her a request to fulfil her duties." Seraph continued uncomfortably.

Continuing her journey to the carriage house, Zina asked impatiently. "And...?"

Seeing that she would not be able to escape the uncomfortable explanation, Seraph mechanically continued. "Well, her majesty screamed in response and I quote ’that damned Eldric should mandate one of his toy boys to give him a son! I shall not subject myself through one more mating process with him.’"

"So she summons me for what reason? To have a son in her steed?" Zina bit back without care for whoever would hear.

Of all the ways she imagined her day would go, she had never put Bella NorthSteed in the mix. The woman was as much a Luna Queen as she was the Queen of parasitic demands. One would think that since she heavily coveted the position of the Luna Queen, she would swallow the bitter pill of her duties equally.

But no, Bella NorthSteed wanted to eat her cake, and have it back.

Zina paused in her stride, the urge to commit lèse-majesté overwhelming her. Really, could anyone fault her when her day was going so terribly?

Whirling around, her dislocated shoulder still dangling in pain, Zina started walking in the opposite direction. "To the Luna Queen’s chambers it is."

The moment Zina was ushered in, Bella’s first grating words to her was, "I need you to cancel the mating that is to happen tonight."

Zina summoned her most sweet smile, taking care to show none of her irritation. "But your majesty, tonight’s heat is the best time to conceive a son. The Temple observers observed that the red moon will flare brighter and...."

"Did you not hear what I said?! If the King wishes for a son, then by all means procure him an army of harem and let him have his way! I shall not be lying with that man tonight!"

Zina pursed her lips. The last time a concubine had been brought into the palace, the woman had mysteriously turned up dead. Zina was not going to subject some poor soul through such pain again. But to keep up with appearances, Zina had to appear as if she took the welfare of the NorthSteed pack as seriously as her own life. Unfortunately, that role included showing an unhealthy amount of attention to the dire straits of Eldric NorthSteed’s nonexistent line.

"Your highness..." Zina started in a more placating tone. "A son will also do the BloodMoon pack a lot of good."

Bella was originally a BloodMoon, and her father, the Alpha of the BloodMoon pack, had a greed for power that even Zina’s blind eyes could see. In his mission to ensure that his daughter became the mother of the future Alpha King, the man had gone to lengths beyond Zina’s imagination.

And yet, it would seem matters of Bella’s womb and whatever crept out of it was one sealed in a scaly fate.

"Have you ever laid with a man?" Bella asked her in a voice akin to frostbite. Zina stilled, guessing that would follow next was probably a barrage of a cold, carefully delivered verbal abuse. "Of course you haven’t. You do not know what it feels like for a man to take you until there’s nothing left. Unlike you, not everyone can easily take a vow of chastity."

Surprisingly, Bella’s voice did not hold any hostility. There was a forlornness to it, a longing even, and then there was fear.

Zina hadn’t been paying attention to Bella as matters of possible sightings of strange monsters had stolen her attention in the last few weeks. She wondered if anything happened doing the King and Queen’s last coupling. No matter, it wasn’t Zina’s place to pity her.

"I am the Theta, and you, the Luna Queen. We both have our duties to perform, and I ask that you perform yours."

"I will not lay with the king." Was Bella’s cold, stubborn reply. Her childish tantrum was gnawing at Zina. "You know it, that I haven’t stopped hating you for what you did to Daemon six years ago, right?"

The abrupt change in topics caused Zina to still. Before she could utter a response, the voice of a little girl interrupted them.

"Mother."

Zina whirred her attention to the direction of the voice she supposed belonged to the Alpha King and Luna Queen’s three-year old daughter.

"Where are her nannies?!" Bella screamed in an anger that would have caused Zina to shiver if not for the fact that she was already quite used to such display. "Have her out at this moment!"

Zina was horrified at the mother’s response to her daughter.

"Mo... mother." The voice, shaking and tearful, continued to call out. But Bella’s titillating rage was all the response the little girl got.

The doors fled open, and hurried footsteps scrambled in. "Apologies, your majesty." The crying girl was hauled out, and silence descended in the once momentarily chaotic room.

Zina offered a bow and turned to leave. On getting to the door, in the coldest voice she could muster, she said to Bella. "Your majesty, the maidservants shall prepare for your mating with the Alpha King tonight."

And with that, she left just as Bella hurled a vase that shattered against the door, narrowly missing Zina’s head. Ignoring her rage, Zina made her way to the temple for Sybril, the only woman who actually knew of Zina’s traitorous dreams and supported it.

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