Fated to the Alpha–And His Triplet Brothers

Chapter 21: The Dream and the Dress

~Hazel’s POV~

"Come here..."

A voice rasped after me, low and twisted like something crawling up from beneath the earth.

I ran. NovelFire

Faster than I ever had before, legs screaming, lungs burning, heart thudding loud in my ears. The air was thick and heavy I couldn’t tell if it was night or if darkness itself had swallowed me whole. I just knew I had to keep running.

I didn’t know where I was.

All I knew was that the voice guttural, broken, inhuman was behind me. Chasing.

My bare feet slapped against cold, damp earth. Tree branches scratched at my arms like fingers trying to pull me back. The scent of decay curled in my nose—wet leaves, moss, something else. Something rotting.

Then my ear caught a noise.

A cry.

A baby’s cry.

High-pitched, fragile... coming from the woods up ahead.

I faltered, breath hitching. My mind screamed at me to run the other way, but my feet turned toward the sound.

I was in a forest. But how? How did I leave Father’s house? I didn’t remember walking out the door. Didn’t remember anything at all.

Not that Father’s house wasn’t its own personal hell, but still... this place was different. Wilder. More dangerous.

I ran toward the baby’s cry, drawn by something I couldn’t explain. The shadow behind me was gaining. I could feel it. I didn’t look back.

"You’re an abomination," the voice hissed again, jagged and seething. "You are bringing more abomination. You’re destroying the balance of nature. You need to be taken down."

Abomination? What did that even mean? I was just... me. Ordinary. Forgotten. The rejected human girl in a cursed household.

How was I suddenly some kind of threat?

My thoughts were spinning, heart thundering as I pushed through thorned bushes and crooked trees. Then, suddenly I tripped.

I fell.

in front

dimness, I could see the small silhouette of a child swaddled inside. My hand reached out instinctively—but

turned my head

walking forward. Taller than any man I’d ever seen. Not walking gliding. There was no face, only blackness, swirling and alive. In its hand, A stake. Sharpened and glinting. Like it had been waiting just for

aching pulse right

cried louder, and

Pain.

Piercing. My entire world cracked in half as the stake

And I screamed.

flew to my chest, and for a terrifying second, I was

trembled as they

A small mark.

just a dream. A horrible, twisted dream. That’s

Wasn’t it?

when

of maids holding baskets of

back to the moment. The pain in my

Should I tell her?

call me insane?

Not even a shadow remained.

Maybe I was crazy.

her smile softening. "What’s going on?" she asked, her eyes narrowing slightly. "You look like you’ve seen a

just shook my head. No

didn’t push. "Good," she said instead, clapping her

one of the good ones, not the nightmare I’d just woken from. A large porcelain tub stood at the center, filled with steaming lavender-scented water and

I stared, stunned.

bath meant a cracked basin, cold water, and a quick scrub if I was

is courtesy of Beta Caspian," one of the maids said with a small smile, as though she could

it was Caspian. Who

couldn’t relax. I kept thinking about the dream. The baby. The mark. The voice

and I needed space. Alone with the lavender and the silence, I breathed in deeply and

and was wrapped in a towel. They helped me

then I