The Feral Alpha's Captive-Chapter 31: Ploy

🔹️THORNE

Her lashes fluttered as she slept, brows wrinkled still even as her breathing found a steady rhythm.

Her mouth moved, though none of the words made any sense to me. They sounded like regurgitations from her past couple of days, all garbled jargon that did not make much sense.

It didn’t matter to me.

I pulled away, slowly, so that she would not stir.

The hours I had spent had drawn on longer than I would have preferred, constantly tugging on the mate bond to intercept the brand’s hold on her body.

It required my contact and my thinning patience. But the moment I had laid her down and pulled her flush against me, her lids began to droop from exhaustion.

Touching her made my skin crawl. I bit back a growl that could disturb her when Umbra countered with a low snarl.

My wolf had no loyalty to reason and nothing but his basal instinct—to feed, hunt, and mate.

We had been in sync since I awakened him until now.

And now, we would be at loggerheads until I rejected her and took a chosen mate instead of a fated one.

But for now, his want and insatiable craving for her would leach into my—

Her hand shot out, fingers wrapping around my wrist with surprising strength for someone half-dead moments ago. I froze, my entire body going rigid, prepared to pull away—

But she was still asleep. Still lost in whatever nightmare her mind had conjured. Her grip tightened, desperate, and her lips moved again.

"Draven," she whispered, and the name hit me like a physical blow. "Draven, please—"

Something dark and vicious coiled in my chest. My jaw clenched so tight I heard my teeth grind together. Draven. She was calling for another man, like I had not been the one to lull her to sleep. Even now, even after everything, she was—

"Please think of the baby," she murmured, her voice breaking on the words. "Please, I’ll do anything. Just... the baby..."

Then she went quiet.

I stared down at her, my mind racing despite my attempts to shut it down.

Baby.

She’d been pregnant?

The timeline didn’t make sense. She wasn’t married to the Alpha of Hollowhowl. The records had been clear—omega tribute, wolfless, sent to my Labyrinth as payment for whatever deal the Allied Packs had struck. No mention of a mate. No mention of children.

But the way she’d said it—the raw desperation in her voice even unconscious—that wasn’t something you fabricated in a dream. That was memory. Trauma.

Had she lost a child? Been forced to give one up? Or was she—

Stop.

I yanked my wrist from her grip, perhaps more roughly than necessary, and she whimpered in her sleep but didn’t wake. Good. I didn’t want to see those grey funereal eyes open. Didn’t want to face whatever questions might be swimming in them.

This wasn’t my concern. Her past, her losses, whatever tragedy had put that kind of pain in her voice—none of it mattered. She was a complication. A burden fate had thrust upon me. And the sooner I extracted what information I needed and severed this cursed bond, the better.

I found myself thinking too deeply about her anyway.

About what kind of life would drive someone to jump from a window rather than endure one more moment of pain. About what Draven had done to earn that desperate plea in her voice. About a baby that may or may not have existed, and what had happened to it.

Enough.

I pulled away completely, retrieving my mask from where I’d discarded it hours ago. The cold metal settled against my face like armor, a barrier between myself and the girl still trembling in her sleep on my bed.

My bed. Because I’d brought her here instead of the infirmary. Because the bond had demanded I keep her close, keep her safe, and some traitorous part of me had obeyed.

Nyx fluttered down from the rafters, settling on my shoulder with a disgruntled caw. "You look like you’ve been wrestling demons, Alpha."

"I will rid you of your beak," I said quietly, moving toward the door."

"You despise honesty, that is why are lie to yourself."

I didn’t raise to his dangling Bait. Didn’t have an answer that wouldn’t damn me further.

I stepped out of the room, closing the door behind me with deliberate care. Posted guards outside. "No one enters. No one except Grandmother if the brand activates again. Understood?"

"Yes, Alpha."

I turned to leave, to put distance between myself and the omega whose presence was unraveling everything I’d built—

And came face to face with Ivanna.

She stood in the corridor like she’d been waiting for me. Probably had been. Her expression was unreadable, but her eyes were cold, calculating, assessing—took in my disheveled state, the mask hastily donned, the tension radiating from every line of my body.

"Alpha," she said, her voice carrying that particular edge that suggested she knew far more than she should. "We need to speak."

Nyx tilted her head.

"What about?" I asked, my voice revealing nothing of the war raging in my mind.

Nyx’s talons tightened on my shoulder.

Ivanna didn’t blink.

"What about?" I repeated, my voice smooth enough to pass for calm.

She studied me for another heartbeat—long enough to catalogue every fracture in my composure—then turned and began walking without waiting for permission. A calculated insult. One she could afford.

"Walk," she said. "I’d rather not discuss Northern security breaches in a corridor with ears."

I followed. Because she was right. And because refusing would have been its own admission.

The stone beneath our boots dampened the sound of our steps as we moved deeper into the western wing, away from the sleeping quarters. Away from her. Ivanna stopped before one of the narrow observation balconies overlooking the inner ravine. Cold air rushed in through the open archway, sharp enough to bite.

She faced me then.

"It’s a ploy," she said without preamble. "An old one. Effective. And frankly—disappointing that it’s working."

My jaw tightened.

"You’re referring to the omega," I said.

"I’m referring to the asset," Ivanna corrected coolly. "The one who arrived conveniently broken, conveniently helpless, and somehow managed to bypass three layers of scrutiny without setting off a single alarm. The one whose tears have now bought her access to you, your bed, and—by extension—the North Clan itself."

Her gaze sharpened.

"Do you really believe that’s coincidence?"

Umbra stirred, bristling. I forced him down.

"She was branded," I said. "Against her will. I felt it activate. You think she orchestrated that too?" 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎

Ivanna’s mouth curved, not quite a smile. "Pain doesn’t preclude intent, Thorne. If anything, it makes the performance convincing."