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

I had pulled over my head. Dad was lacing up a pair of boots, grimacing as he

were sore and dead tired,

terrain we were in now was 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.

familiar flag. Waving in the stiff, unrelenting breeze.

a narrow cave opening

inspected the bodies, still fully dressed under layers of rotting fabric. He counted them, one by one, and after we found their

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What Happened

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

for roughly fifteen

kid? Really? This is them?” I looked down at the bones at my feet, my stomach tightening as the memory of

in her eyes as she watched her mother lead

They never came back.

been wearing, but they had dressed in a similar fashion for the journey. It was damn near impossible to

briskly, tossing an empty backpack out of the cave opening. He

“Dad!”

anything like flashlights or matches. They had a fire in here,

did as I was told, rifling through each of the backpacks. I collected two matchbooks that were in decent shape and at least half full, and

came out of the darkness. He had his hands tucked into the pockets of the jacket he had found as

be faster if we found this river. It’s hundreds, if not a thousand miles of mountains and valleys between Winter Forest and Valoria on the east. This was shortly after the war when

was always a strange woman. Not in a bad

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

them leaving for the expedition.

Dad said with a sober smile, “You fought

in Winter Forest. We were the generation born after the war, confined

I asked, moving towards the entrance of the

sure. I’d need to inspect them closer, but for now, we need to find a

ground squirrels for a week and had stayed well fed,

“Should we bury them,”

exited the cave, “We shouldn’t disturb them. I’ll do my best to identify them so I can

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

crouched and sat, but we couldn’t stand. “We’ll sleep here,” Dad

kindling, careful of the uneven ground as I moved through the boulders. They were black rocks,

the strange landscape

disappear as he made his way back to the final resting place of the expedition. I felt a pang of

Ethan, who likely felt he had failed to save his daughter, who lost his hold on the castle of

rose, tucking them under my arm. Then I heard a whooshing sound and

staggered backward, my vision blurring as I tried to maintain my balance. I

“What,”