Page 4 of The Alpha's Fated Destiny

From the age of ten, my identity has been that of an Alpha. I've struggled through everything and finally dragged my people out of the darkest of times. And now, I'm no longer the Alpha. Or am I?

I still don't know where I stand. Where my people stand.

I could always discuss it with Sophia but right now, but I don't want to add to her worries, and knowing her, she will worry about something like this.

Forcing my unpleasant thoughts back to the present, I ask the man, “May I have your name?”

He shakes his head. “It will do you no good. What I came to tell you is that Grace, your mate's mother, will not survive here.”

My body stiffens at the mention of Sophia’s mother, who is in a critical condition right now. She risked her life to save Sophia. Her life hangs in the balance, and my mate is already very upset over this fact. Sophia was ripped from her mother's arms as a child, and her mother was imprisoned while Sophia was raised in the pack orphanage. She was told that her mother died during childbirth. It took her more than twenty years to finally find her mother, who had become a shell of herself due to years of torture and abuse at the hands of Robert Black, the now-deceased Alpha of the Red Rock Wolf Pack.

I stare at the man before me. "My mate's mother is from the Central Alliance, isn't she?"

An uncomfortable expression crosses his face. "Well, yes."

"So why haven't you offered her any assistance? Why have you only shown up now?"

The man looks tense. "I'm already crossing a line by talking to you about this situation."

I want to say more, but I turn my focus back to the critical point. "You said she won’t survive here. Then what are we supposed to do?"

"The Central Alliance knows how to treat the Silver Wolves if they push themselves beyond their breaking point,” he tells me. "That’s all I can say. Bringing Grace will be pointless because she will not survive the journey. But your mate should petition our leader for the medicine needed to save her life."

He turns around but I stop him. "Why can’t you give us the medicine now?"

The man hesitates. "I’m not in a position to do anything. Only the leader of the Central Alliance has the ability to distribute that medicine."

My questions are not over yet. "You called her Grace. How do you know her name?”

The man covers his head with the hood of the cloak, his hands clenching around the fabric. I can’t see his expression anymore, but I can sense the pain in his voice. "I used to know her. A long time ago. Before…she was a good person. All this time, I thought she was…"

He begins walking away mid-sentence, as if unable to finish what he was saying.

“Petition the leader of the Central Alliance?" Dorian sounds pensive. “He’s never even attended a banquet. I heard he retreated to somewhere deep within his territory a long time ago. Nobody has been able to request an audience with him.”

My lips purse into a thin line. "I have a feeling my mate might be the first person to do just that."

Dorian doesn’t look very convinced, but he turns his attention toward me. "There's something else you should know. I had a meeting with the other pack leaders. We’ve also been conducting some investigation into our own territories. Some things have come to light. I believe that you should be aware of them."

I meet his gaze. "Covens of witches are disappearing? Human populated cities are experiencing an increase in human abductions?"

Dorian’s expression contorts. "You were aware of this all along?”

“The first witch coven that disappeared was from the Black Alder territory," I inform him. "Overnight, the entire coven vanished. There was no trace of a single witch from that coven. This was about four years ago. Since then, different witch covens from different territories have begun vanishing. At first, we assumed they were simply packing up and leaving, but when we conducted a discreet investigation, it seemed more like a case of abduction. Their homes had been left as if they were in the middle of their meals, their daily tasks. Tables still have food on them. Some covens still had clothing hung on the line to dry. Their schools had books open on the tables. It’s most likely that they were ambushed. But the one thing that stood out to me was that there was never any sign of a struggle."

Dorian’s face is pale.

“You have a theory in mind, I take it.”

“Karina has a habit of going after the vulnerable. She might have targeted the children first and the adults were forced to go along. The other option is that she had witches working for her already. It would be easy if the entire coven was put under a sleeping spell before being transported. I have made some inquiries, and this is definitely possible. However, the witches I reached out, to found it hard to believe that their own kind would do something like this to other witches. However, something definitely has them spooked."

"You mentioned Karina," Dorian asks, grimly. "You think it's her, then?"

I smile cooly. "You don't think it's strange that a majority of the witches have sworn fealty to Karina? Witches are meant to be on the side of humans. Although our kind buys their services for our clothes, to have them swear loyalty to any particular person from our kind is unheard of.”

“The only reason they might do that, is if they fear their lives were being threatened or they are under duress,” Dorian finishes, his voice tense. "Our investigation has not gone that far yet. We only discovered the missing covens around six months ago. But we haven’t paid much attention to the humans who are disappearing. The news had reached our ears, but we assumed it was a human problem.”

He studies me intently. "Isn't it?"

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