Chapter 45 – The Weight I Hide

Chapter 45 – The Weight I Hide

I sat outside the cave long after the three of them had gone. Their words still clung to me like shadows that refused to leave. The air was quiet, but inside me there was noise, loud and sharp, like the echo of stones tumbling down a cliff.

“Go back to where you came from.”
“You don’t belong here.”
“The Alpha doesn’t see us anymore. He only sees you.”

Their voices played again and again in my head, until they felt sharper than blades.

I kept staring at the ground, at the dirt beneath my feet, as if it could give me an answer. But there was nothing. Just silence. My chest felt tight, my heart heavy, as though I had swallowed a weight too big to carry.

I wanted to cry. I wanted to let it out, let the hurt spill down my face. But no tears came. My eyes only burned, and I pressed my lips together until they hurt, refusing to let them tremble.

Crying would not help. Crying would not silence their voices.

I wrapped my arms around myself, pulling them close, as if that could hold me together. My mind drifted back, unwilling but unable to stop itself. I thought of my father—the way he had looked at me, always with expectation, always with pressure. His voice was never soft. It was hard, commanding, as though I was never enough. And yet, even now, even after all the things he had done, a part of me wished he was here. At least then I would not feel so… lost.

Then my thoughts slid to the Alpha. His face, his presence, the way his eyes followed me when he thought I wasn’t watching. He had been my captor once, the shadow in the night who dragged me from everything I knew. I had hated him then. Feared him. Sworn I would never forgive.

But now… now things were different. I didn’t know when the change began, or how it had taken root in me, but it was there. I felt it when he spoke to me without anger, when he listened, when his hand brushed mine by accident and left warmth behind. I told myself not to trust it, not to believe it, but my heart was stubborn. It beat faster when he was near, and it softened when I looked at him.

And yet, the words of those people still tore at me. They said he had forgotten his pack, forgotten his people—all because of me.

Was that true?

Had my presence caused him to neglect the ones who had followed him for years? Had I become the reason for their bitterness, their anger?

The thought twisted inside me, painful and deep. What if I was ruining everything without meaning to? What if I was nothing but a curse, just as my father’s enemies once whispered?

I pressed my hand against my chest, trying to still the storm inside me. My heart ached, but still I did not cry. I sat there in silence, the weight of all my thoughts pressing down harder with each passing moment.

The world around me felt so far away. The breeze brushed against my face. Birds sang faintly in the distance. But I could not feel any of it. All I felt was the heaviness inside me, the ache of not knowing where I truly belonged.

Was I the Alpha’s captive? His guest? His responsibility? Or something else entirely?

The questions circled in my mind until they tangled into knots I could not untie. I sat still, my back against the cold stone, my legs tucked beneath me. I looked like someone resting, but inside I was falling apart piece by piece.

Time slipped by slowly. I don’t know how long I sat there, staring at nothing, pretending to be strong when all I wanted was to disappear.

That was when I heard footsteps. Light, quick, familiar.

“Elara,” I whispered under my breath before I even saw her.

She appeared around the bend, her hair loose and her smile bright as always. She carried the kind of energy that filled a place, that warmed the cold air. When her eyes found me, sitting alone, her smile widened.

“There you are!” she said cheerfully, walking toward me. “I’ve been looking everywhere. You’re always hiding away when the sun feels so nice.”

I forced my lips into a small smile, though it felt heavy on my face. “I wasn’t hiding,” I said softly. “Just… sitting.”

She laughed lightly and sat beside me, close enough that her shoulder brushed mine. “You and your sitting. Always staring at the sky, or the trees, or the ground. What are you thinking about this time?”

Her question made my heart tighten. For a moment I thought of telling her the truth—that I had been told to leave, that people hated me here, that I felt like I was breaking from the inside. The words almost reached my lips.

But then I stopped.

What would it change? What good would it do to burden her with this? She had enough to worry about. She didn’t need to carry my pain too.

So I pushed it down, deep inside, locking it where she could not see.

“Nothing,” I said, forcing a small laugh. “Just daydreaming, I suppose.”

Elara turned her head to look at me, her eyes searching my face. For a heartbeat I thought she might see through me. But then she smiled again, bright and warm.

“Well, that makes sense,” she said. “You always have that faraway look, like you’re living in another world. Maybe that’s your gift.”

Her words were light, playful, meant as a joke. I smiled, but it was thin, and inside I felt bruised.

“I guess so,” I whispered.

She nudged my shoulder. “Don’t guess. Believe it. You’re stronger than you think, Ayla. One day, you’ll see it.”

I nodded, still pretending. Still smiling as if her words filled me with comfort instead of deepening the ache inside.

We sat together for a while, her voice filling the silence with small stories, little jokes, bits of gossip from the pack. I laughed when she laughed. I nodded when she looked at me. I played the part of someone who was fine.

But beneath it all, I kept my secret. The words of the three who came to me stayed buried in my chest, heavy and sharp. The hurt was mine alone, hidden behind my small smiles and careful answers.

Elara never knew. She couldn’t see that while my lips curved upward, my heart was sinking.

And so I kept it that way.

Because if I let even one crack show, I was afraid everything inside me would spill out—and I wasn’t sure I could gather it back again.

So I sat there with her, smiling like nothing was wrong, all the while feeling the weight of everything pressing harder inside me.

The weight I could not share.
The weight I had to hide.