ALPHA PARTHE.
I snarled and took a step forward, but he stepped back, pressing the sword even harder on her delicate throat.
“You fucking coward,” I growled, a scoff escaping my lips.
“We both know I am not a coward, Parthe. I am more of a man than you’d ever be. Everything I have had to endure only made me stronger and carved me into the man I am now,” he said.
The girl made a choked noise, but Rorden didn’t react.
He wasn’t really here.
His mind-his soul-was somewhere else.
“Do you even know what it’s like, Parthe? To survive on your own like a real man should?”
“To be the unwanted son?” His voice cracked. “To know that no matter what you do, no matter how hard you fight-your own father will never fucking look at you the way you want him to?”
I clenched my fists, my claws biting into my palms. “Our father was…” I was saying when he cut me off.
“No.” His smile was thin. “Your father. Not mine. Never mine.”
His grip on the girl tightened.
“You were the golden child, Parthe. The heir. The one with the power, the strength, the fucking favoritism.” His laugh was hollow, humorless. “And what was I? Hm? The mistake?”
I said nothing.
He bared his teeth. “You had everything I ever wanted.”
His voice was shaking now, fractured with something raw and violent that it almost got to me. But I didn’t let it.
“A father’s love. A mother who didn’t die a slow, painful death while he stood there and did nothing.” His voice cracked. “And when I finally-finally-found someone who made me feel something, someone I thought I could have-”
His breath stuttered. “You killed her.”
Fuck.
“You took that from me, too. And do you know the worst part?” He let out a slow, shuddering breath. “I forgave you for that… For killing her.”
The words made something shift in my chest.
“I tried to fucking forgive you! Because I thought it wasn’t your fault. I also knew how the cursr worked and how out of control it can get. But you never deserved that forgiveness.”
He shook his head, his eyes burning.
“And then-then I met her.”
I knew who he meant before he even said it.
“Luxuria. It was love at first sight.”
A sharp, violent pressure coiled inside me at the sound of her name on his tongue.
His fingers twitched, his grip on the sword faltering for a fraction of a second.
“Do you know what it felt like?” His voice was barely above a whisper. “To realize that the only other woman I ever loved belonged to you?”
His knuckles turned white around the hilt of his sword.
“Always you, Parthe. Always. Fucking. You.”
He looked up at me then, and for the first time, I saw it… Not just the rage… Not just the bitterness.
The pain.
The loneliness.
The hollow, aching pit inside him where love was supposed to be.
“Do you know what it’s like to never be wanted?” His voice was barely there. “To never be chosen?”
I did.
But I would never tell him that.
“You took everything away from me even before you were born. And yet, for some reason, your arrogant self couldn’t even love me like the cousin I was supposed to be to you.” He struck a chord there.
“You never saw me as blood. You saw and treated me like a stranger,” He sucked in a deep breath to steady himself, “Now, tell me, Parthe. How could a villain not have been born after enduring all these?”
“A villain who wants nothing but to get back every fucking thing that belongs to him?” He added, and that smile returned.
I exhaled through my nose, trying to calm the numerous emotions bubbling inside me. “Let the girl go, Rorden.”
His grip on the blade trembled, “Not in a thousand years!”
And before I’d take another step forward, he sliced the girl’s throat.
The moment the blade sliced through, my body moved with a rush of speed, with lightning in my veins.
I ripped the girl from his grip, my claws sinking into his wrist, forcing the weapon away. She collapsed into my arms. She was so small, so damn fragile, as blood gushed from the deep gash along her throat.
Her body spasmed. A wet, gurgling sound escaped her lips as she struggled to breathe, her fingers clutching weakly at my chest.
No. Fuck.
I dropped to my knees, pressing my palm over the wound, trying to stem the bleeding.
“Stay with me,” I growled and prayed, pushing against the wound harder, as if sheer force could keep the life inside her.
I couldn’t let her die. She was my one shot at life. As selfish as it sounds.
Her wide, terrified eyes flickered, her lips parting, trying to speak-but nothing came out except a shuddering gasp.
Suddenly, I felt a shift. I heard the whistle of a blade right behind me, but I was fast enough to catch the movement from the corner of my eyes.
It was Rorden charging towards me with a look of murderous wrath in his eyes.
I moved.
In a heartbeat, I was no longer kneeling beside the girl but on my feet, spinning to meet him.
His blade slashed down-
I caught his wrist mid-swing.
His eyes widened in shock, fury twisting his features as he tried to push forward. But I was stronger. I had always been stronger.
And this time, I wasn’t holding back.
My other hand plunged straight through his chest.
Flesh. Muscle. Bone.
The wet, sickening sound of my claws tearing through him filled the space between us.
His body jerked.
A strangled noise escaped his throat as his wide eyes locked onto mine. I saw the raw pain, agony, regret, sadness, and every other emotion he must have felt all those years he felt neglected. They all flashed in his eyes, almost touching a part of my heart that shouldn’t exist.
He choked, blood spilling over his lips as his fingers feebly wrapped around my wrist as if trying to push me away.
But it was too late.
I could feel his heart.
Warm. Beating. Breaking.
His breathing turned ragged, his lips trembling as a single tear slipped from the corner of his eye.
“Parthe…” He whispered.
I clenched my jaw, fingers tightening around the fragile organ, feeling the last desperate beats against my palm.
“It’s a pity,” I murmured, “You will never have the love you longed for all your life.”
His brows twitched.
“And Luxuria… she will never be yours. She has always been mine.”