I am Alana
ARIA
“Z-Zuleik…” I stepped back while holding my breath when my back was literally on the cliff already. One wrong move and I could be a cold shredded meat in an instant.
“Did you know what I went through just to penetrate the boundaries of this fucking palace just to find you?!” he said in gritted teeth. “Did you know that that fucking alpha prince whom you have been munching over with is holding Lola hostage?!”
He grabbed my arm burying his nails on my skin. “You are my mate, Aria! You should have been with me! But what are you doing? You are busy fucking with him behind my back while your people are suffering!”
He yanked me onto him while letting the shovel fall into my feet making me winced in pain but he just dismissed it coldly.
“Did you know that you are fucking selfish? I sent Lola to get you and look what you put her into! She was captured by the alpha prince!”
I grinned and tried to strip his hand off my neck. I don’t really like everything that he said to me now. I know it was my mistake to come here with a botched plan of revenge but he’s taking it too far to shove all the blame on me.
“Am I really the one who’s selfish, Zuleik? She was caught because you left her for sure. You always have a knack for leaving your people once something goes wrong out of your plans, right?”
His eyes widened in anger as he growled under his breath, his fur appearing on the back of his hand ready to shift into his beast.
“What did you say?! You are just my mate, Aria! I am your alpha! You should obey everything that I said and refrain from insulting me! You are only meant to carry my babies, not insult me this way!”
He threw me to the side and howled into the thick foliage. His whole face is red from anger that he’s keeping himself from murdering me.
I grimaced in pain when my leg hit something sharp on the ground and a gust of blood started coming out.
I am already having difficulty standing up so I just stayed still on my spot hoping that even if I told the alpha prince to not come for me, he would still look for me.
“If there is someone who’s selfish between us, it’s you!” he yelled, pointing his finger on my face. “I gave you all the time in the world to move on! Five years! Five fucking years, Aria! How could you not move on from him when you did not even have any memory of him!”
He grabbed my arm and squeezed it so hard that I immediately saw bruises on them. “You are the most selfish person I have ever known in my entire life!”
“Selfish?! Me?!” I laughed and forced my tears from not falling due to being physically in pain. “I am not the one who ditched his first mate just to be with me!”
His face slowly changed from anger to surprise.
“Yes, that’s right. I knew all along that Lola was your first mate but then you rejected her for unknown reasons and took me as your only mate. And to keep her in check, you put her as my attendant so you could sleep with her every night. Isn’t that the most selfish thing to do, Zuleik?”
I caught him off guard enough for his hand to let me go.
“What happened to Lola is not my fault, Zuleik. That was all on you! That was all on you!”
With his whole body burning in wrath, he dragged me back to the cliff and clutched my face with his big calloused hands.
“Your tongue has become so sharp that I have to give you some lessons. I think I have been too lenient on you, Aria. Once I take you to the new village that I just formed, I will make sure to tame you in everything from your words down to your continued refusal to sleep with me!”
My whole body got chills with his insinuation that I started struggling to break free from him.
Seeing my desperation, he smiled and leaned in to me.
“After I am done with you, I will give you to my new soldiers as a gift.”
My tears fell because of fury. “Fuck you, Zuleik!”
“I will certainly fuck you, Aria!”
He grabbed my neck to try to kiss me when a loud growl interrupted him.
“Fucking let her go, Zuleik!”
My heart swelled in relief upon seeing William a few meters from us. His whole face is too cold while staring at Zuleik.
“Alpha prince!” I said and started sobbing hard.
He came! He looked for me!
“Let her go, Zuleik!” The alpha prince ordered him again and took a step back to which the lycan prince answered through moving closer towards the cliff.
“Ah, so he is still the reason, Aria. After everything, he is still the one your heart beats to.”
He smirked at the alpha prince before saying his piece.
“If I can’t have her, then no one can will her, alpha prince. I will gladly do what I did to her before. Besides, I don’t need a mate who is still in love with another man.”
Without thinking twice, he pushed me to the cliff and ran as fast as he can away from the alpha prince.
“No! Alana!” I still heard the alpha prince say that while I was busy trying to shift but my broken leg made it all impossible.
So, I just opened my eyes and watched the alpha prince shift into his wolf and tried to catch me.
“Alana!” I heard a distant voice in my head from the past as a memory came back to me.
The alpha prince was able to snatch me away from the waiting boulders of rock and we landed heavily on the ground at the same time that I got all of the memories I lost the last five years.
“William…” I spoke his name as I returned back his warm desperate hug.
Our breathing is ragged, filled with a sigh of utmost relief as if he’s telling me through his breaths that he’s relieved that he was able to save me this time.
“William…” I gasped hard as beads of tears fell from my eyes.
“Ahhh… William!” I buried my face into his bare chest.
My body trembled against him as I burst into a more uncontrollable weeping.
He’s right. I am really Alana. I am really his mate.
I was his mate.