Sold as the Alpha King’s Breeder

Chapter 274

 

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

did these belong to?” I asked, pulling the jeans on and tucking in the sweater I had pulled over my head. Dad was lacing up a pair of boots, grimacing as he

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

to deep craters and sharp, uneven peaks. Nothing grew here, and fields and fields of boulders marked our journey

Waving in the

a narrow cave opening

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

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54: What

nothing by 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’ve been here for

looked down at the bones at my feet, my stomach tightening as

she watched her mother lead the group. Seraphine had looked back at her, smiling,

They never came back.

what Seraphine might have been wearing, but they had dressed in a similar fashion for the journey. It was damn near

of the cave opening. He turned back, walking deeper into the cave where it was dark

“Dad!”

flashlights or matches. They had a

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 a lighter that was dry, useless. I also found a compass

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

miles of mountains and valleys between

 

river?” | asked. I remembered Seraphine, and she was always a strange woman. Not in a bad way, but in a way that made me wonder if she knew and saw things most people couldn’t.

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

for the expedition. I wanted to go with

a sober

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

I asked, moving

now, we need to find

had been eating rabbits and ground squirrels for

“Should we bury them,”

best to identify them so I can give their families closure when we return to Winter Forest, but that’s all. I don’t

agreed with that; the 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 where

went inside first, 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. We can’t have a fire inside, but we can have one burning

out to find kindling, careful of the uneven ground as I moved through the boulders.

would explain the strange landscape

towards the caves, seeing the top of Dad’s head disappear as he made his way back to the final resting place of the expedition. I felt a pang of regret as I watched

to save his daughter, who lost his hold on the castle

tucking them under my arm. Then I heard a whooshing sound and turned to it, right

I tried to maintain my balance. I could

“What,”

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