Sould As The Alpha King's Breeder

Chapter 54: What Happened to Seraphine?

Rowan-Valoria

Boy, did things unravel.

We hadn’t been able to sleep for long before Damian’s warriors found us again. Dad led us deeper into the forest, crossing the river and attempting to back track towards Mirage, but it was too late. The forest was full of wolves. We were two against an impossible force.

“What pack did that woman say she was from?’ Dad said, his voice cracking over the mind-link as we began to climb up the base of the mountains, our paws slipping on the uneven, fragile shale rock.

“Greenbriar, I think,’ I answered, my legs sore and hips aching from the exercise. I ran in my wolf from every single morning and had done so for years. But spending over twenty-four hours as a wolf was causing an indescribable exhaustion and something I had never experienced before.

Plus, I was watching my dad’s plans fall through, and he was pissed. Especially after we crested the top of a cliff face looking over the forest and our plane buzzed the top of our heads.

*Damnit!” he said, turning his head to watch it ascend into the clouds.

‘That was us, wasn’t it

‘Yes, obviously. Come on, we have no choice but to keep going. They’re pushing us into the mountains, and we’re outnumbered-‘

The mountains? What exactly are you planning,

‘I was wrong, Rowan. There’s too many of them. I hadn’t expected Damian to have made alliances with other packs in Valoria, especially without my knowledge. We have to get home

“By crossing the mountains? Are you insane? That’ll take us weeks!”

.

Howling drifted from the trees below as we continued to climb, and I winced, torn between two impossible paths.

How did I prefer to die? Being torn apart by wolves, or dying of exposure in the mountains between the North and Valoria?

‘We have no choice. They’re expecting us to travel through the forest until we reach the Northern Tier. Stop whining, let’s go.’

I followed him up and over another ridge, padding further and further into the clouds until I finally looked down, seeing a full view of what had once been Mirage. Fires burned in pockets across the city. I could see the destruction of the buildings from our perch. And there was the castle, standing like an untouchable fortress amongst fields of golden grass.

And ahead of us?

I looked up where Dad had stopped and stretched his legs.

Nothing but miles, and miles, and miles of stone.

***

One Week Later

asked, pulling the jeans on and tucking in the sweater I had pulled over my head.

teeth as he tied the other boot. We were sore and dead tired, having spent nearly a week trudging through overgrown

remarkably changed, the once perfectly sculpted mountains giving way to deep craters and sharp, uneven peaks. Nothing grew here, and fields and fields of boulders marked our journey between valleys. This hadn’t been what I was expecting. The mountains were far east, lined

Waving in the stiff, unrelenting breeze. The flag

to a narrow cave opening and

of rotting fabric. He counted them, one

0.00%

12:250

54: What

bone by now, and must have been here for a long, long time. But their clothes were surprisingly modern compared to how old I thought they

here for roughly fifteen

kid? Really? This is them?” I looked down at the bones at my feet, my stomach tightening as the memory of their departure from Winter Forest, all of us watching and cheering them on as they disappeared

Gemma, who had tears in her eyes as she watched her mother lead the

They never came back.

I tried to remember what Seraphine might have been wearing, but they had dressed in a

briskly, tossing an empty backpack out of the cave opening. He turned back, walking deeper

“Dad!”

for anything like flashlights or matches. They had a

told, rifling through each of the backpacks. I collected two matchbooks that were in decent shape and at least half full, and a lighter that was dry, useless. I also found a compass and popped it open, noting we were facing exactly due

the pockets of the jacket he had found as he scanned the ground once more, crouching down to examine the

if not a thousand miles of mountains and valleys between Winter Forest and Valoria on the east. This was shortly after the war when our planes and boats were in disrepair and supplies were

in a bad way, but in a way that made me wonder if she knew and saw things most people couldn’t. My

matter to me at the time. It sounded plausible. There were warriors that wanted to go,

expedition. I

that,” Dad said with a sober smile, “You

world for me and the other boys in Winter Forest. We were the generation born after the war, confined to one place while the adults cleaned up the mess. Suddenly, the small bubble we had been

asked, moving towards the

I’m not sure. I’d need to inspect them closer, but for now, we

rabbits and ground squirrels for a week and

“Should we bury them,”

do my best to identify them so I can give their families closure when

cave felt somewhat electric and overwhelming. I was thankful to leave, walking a quarter mile away over the boulders until we reached another short cliff

lighting matches as he examined the shallow cave. We could fit inside if we crouched and sat, but we couldn’t stand. “We’ll sleep here,” Dad said, “look for something, anything, we can burn.

of the uneven ground as I moved

explain the strange landscape

his way back to the final resting place of the expedition. I felt a pang of regret as I watched

the Alpha King. Ethan, the mate of the White Queen. Ethan, who likely felt he had failed to save his daughter, who lost his hold on the castle of Drogomor. Whose nephew, the Alpha of Drogomor, was

arm. Then I heard a whooshing sound and turned to it, right

as I tried to maintain my balance.

“What,”