Chapter 3

Seraphina's POV:

His fingers tightened around my neck, and black spots danced in my vision. The fever had left me weak, my body limp in his powerful grasp as he dragged me from the bed. My bare feet scraped against the rough wooden floor.

"I... I don't know what you're talking about," I choked out, clawing uselessly at his wrist.

"Liar!" he roared, the sound shaking the small cottage. He half-carried, half-dragged me out into the storm and threw me into the passenger seat of his luxury car. The engine roared to life, and we sped away, the tires screeching on the wet asphalt.

We drove for what felt like an eternity, leaving the manicured pack lands behind and heading towards the border. My heart hammered against my ribs when I realized where he was going: the Blackwater Mire, a treacherous swamp notorious for being a hiding place for Rogues-packless, feral werewolves.

He slammed on the brakes, jerking me forward against the seatbelt. He hauled me out of the car and into the mud and pouring rain. And then I saw her.

My mother.

My small, frail Omega mother was tied to a post on a rickety little boat in the middle of the murky, swirling water. Her face was pale with terror, her thin clothes soaked through.

"No," I whispered, the sound swallowed by the wind. "No, Kaelen, please."

"She'll stay right there until you tell me where Lila is," he said, his voice devoid of any emotion. His curse was a low thrum of pain under his skin, making his eyes wild and his temper short. He was a beast looking for someone to blame, and Lila had given him a target. He shoved a small, glowing communication crystal into my face. "My men found this in Lila's room. It contains a threat, a demand for her to meet at the old hunting cabin. The message's spiritual frequency is a perfect match for yours."

He then gestured to his Beta, his second-in-command, who was holding a struggling, low-ranking pack member by the arm. The wolf was one of the few who had ever been kind to me.

"And this one," Kaelen sneered, "confessed everything. He said you paid him to help you kidnap my future Luna. He said you were insane with jealousy."

"He's lying! It's all a lie!" I screamed, desperation clawing at me. "I've been sick in bed for two days! I haven't seen anyone!"

Kaelen's face was a mask of stone. "You hate her because I chose her over you. You hate her because she is worthy of being a Luna, and you are not. Now, for the last time, where is she?"

"I don't know!" I sobbed.

He gave a sharp nod to his Beta. The man waded into the dark water, untied the boat, and with a brutal shove, plunged my mother's head into the freezing, filthy swamp water.

She came up sputtering, gasping for air.

"Stop! Please, stop!" I shrieked, fighting against Kaelen's iron grip. "Her lungs! She was injured years ago, she can't take this! You'll kill her!"

He ignored me. "Tell me," he commanded.

When I could only shake my head, weeping hysterically, he nodded to his Beta again. My mother was submerged once more, this time for longer.

"Last chance, Seraphina."

My world had narrowed to the sight of my mother's terrified face, the sound of her choking, and the relentless rain. I couldn't give him an answer I didn't have.

He looked at me with utter contempt. "Fine," he said, his voice deadly calm. "Cut the rope."

His Beta pulled out a knife.

"No!" I screamed, a primal sound of pure agony.

The rope was severed. The boat rocked, and my mother, bound and weak, slipped beneath the surface of the black water. The swamp swallowed her whole.

Something inside me shattered. The pain, the betrayal, the absolute despair-it ignited a fire I never knew I had. My wolf, the Omega part of me that had always been submissive and quiet, rose up with a feral snarl.

I launched myself at him, my teeth sinking deep into the flesh of his wrist. I tasted his blood, warm and metallic, the first drop of his I had ever drawn in anger.

Just then, a voice crackled through Kaelen's mind-link, loud enough for me to sense the urgency. It was his Gamma, his head warrior.

"Alpha! We found her! We found Lila in the old hunting cabin. She's safe!"

Kaelen froze, his eyes widening for a fraction of a second as he looked from my face down to my mother's last location in the water. He ripped his arm from my jaws, shoving me so hard I fell face-first into the mud.

Without a backward glance, he turned and barked orders to his men. "Let's go. Now!"

They left. They just left me there, covered in mud, with my mother drowning somewhere in the dark, unforgiving depths of the Rogue's Mire.

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