The Lycan King's Defiant Surrogate

0

-

Nina the woman my pack previously sacrificed to the Lycan King?

"You're alive. I am seeing her with my own two eyes and still can't believe it.

No one was ever truly sure what happens the tributes once they were sent off as devotion to the King. Some women, we knew, were selected to be members of the harem. But what of the rest? None ever returned from their trek to the Capital.

While a great honor to be chose as tribute for the Lycan King, we all reasoned it was a potential death sentence. The King is known to be ruthless, and as we never heard word hack, we could only assume....

For the sake of the families, members of my pack treated those sent away as if they had died. Funerals were held. Memorials

were built.

To see Nina here in the flesh, when only last year, I had attended her funeral is shocking to say the least.

"I'm not dead." Nina says, scoffing. "You think I wouldn't be chosen? I'm in the harem."

Glancing at her state of dress, a fine silk gown wraps around her body. Heavy golden jewelry drapes around her throat and wrists. It's shackles, same as the blunt collar around my throat, but Nina's are gilded. She remains a prisoner, but her cage is made of gold and fine silk

I bet she even has a room with a window,

Truthfully, I've been given occasion to reach out," Nina continues. "But knowing our pack's traditions, I figured I might well not bother. I'm already dead to them. Why correct it?"

"Your mother might want to know..." I remember how she cried at the funeral.

Nina shrugs with indifference. "I don't have any intention of looking backwards. My future is what's ahead of me. Everything I need is here."

I relax somewhat now, knowing she likely doesn't mean me any harm.

"What kind of future is here?" I ask her. From what I've seen, this place contains only madness, torture, and death.

"It's freeing here," she says, which seems like some kind of paradox to me. She barrels onward, not noticing my reaction or not caring about it. "Here, everything you've ever done in the past is washed away. All that matters is earning the King's favor."

"And that's how you want to spend the rest of your life?" I ask. "Competing against other women for the passing fancy of

some man?

"The King is not some man," Nina says with distaste. "You of all prople should know that. For a slave, he's been giving you plenty of attention. We all saw what happened in the courtyard yesterday."

I shudder, remembering. "Veronica was someone who also valued favor above all else."

"Veronica was a fool who became overconfident and too comfortable with her place at the top," Nina says. "It was past time for her to fall from grace." Nina's eyes go distant. "King Caleb is worth every effort. He's the peak Alpha, all strength and wide shoulders and "Ruthlessness," I say, cutting in

"He's not a weak man," Nina says. "That's another quality in his favor."

Nina seems set in her opinions. They are all alien to me, but I doubt I will

able to change her ideals when they seem so

deeply rooted within her. This makes me wonder something else.

"What are you doing here, Nina?" I ask. "Surely you aren't here to convince me to care about the King's favor?"

"No." Nina sighs. "I hope you know how lucky you are that they sent me to persuade you to reveal the whereabouts of the

child. They could have sent a torturer. They have one, I've seen high all kinds of knives in a rolled ups

I shiver at the thought, but press my words forward. "He woulddet pull anything from me, even under torture. Nina, there's never been any child. I've never been pregnant. If he does have a child, it's not with me."

Nina flicks her gaze over my face. I keep my expression open, hoping she can see my sincerity.

"You could be lying," she says. "Your distain for the King is clear just from what you've said today. The pack could be trying to protect you both."

"I'm not valued in the pack, you know that. Not after my disgrace."

"Even so, to keep the King's child... They need not care about you to want to hold onto that leverage."

"You can't think so poorly of your own pack!"

Nina looks away. "My allegiance is fully to my King now, above all else."

That she refuses to meet my gaze as she says the words fills me with hope. She can say what she needs to say to survive here, but no one can turn their back on their true family so easily.

As a fellow pack member, surely she can understand our plight.

"Nina, I overheard the King talking strategy with one of his advisors," I say. "They know that the bear clan plan to attack during the next Alpha ceremony, but they don't plan on doing anything to stop it. They are going to let our pack be destroyed" Nina doesn't say a word, but her jaw clenches.

"We have to find a way to send a message to them," I say. "Samuel and the rest... They have no idea what's coming. If can warn them, they'll at least have a fighting chance."

"You don't know what you're asking." Nina says. "If the King discovers what you plan to do..."

I plead with my eyes. "Please, Nina. Remember where you came from."

She frowns. "I'll see what I can do," she says, and leaves.

Every morning for the next few days, Nina comes to see me. Officially, she's to interrogate me about the child, but after that is done, we talk more about the pack and share some memories of our youth. Nina is two years older than me, but we shared some of the same teachers in school, or went to the same events.

We were never friends, but we were in similar circles. She even has a slight accent on the way she says words with a long "a" sound. It makes me homesick.

During the day, I stay in the King's shadow, standing off to the side as he works. At his command, I give him scalp massages. We've started to fall into a routine.

With each passing day, however, my anxiety grows for the survival of my pack. Every day that goes by is one where they could have been working to prepare for the encroaching attack.

Unless I act swiftly, even if I can get work to them, it will be too late for them to actually do anything about it.

That night, I stress so much, I can't sleep. Tossing and turning in my bed, I keep envisioning the bear clan striking my 12:59 Sat, Nov 16

unsuspecting family and friends, ripping through the ceremony imagine Samuel in a pool of his own blood

When Nina comes in the morning. I'm already dressed and wasting She doesn't seem surprised to see me aske After our typical back and forth...

"Where's the child?" she aske

"There isn't a child," I reply.

Nina leans close to me and whispers, her voice barely audible, but with our closeness, I can hear

"I believe you about the bear clan attack. You have to go warn them," she say, "I know a way you can flee the Capital"