The Alpha's Voice

CLAUDIA.

“Attention, calling all maids to the throne room.”

I freeze as the announcement blares through the speakers. I’m in the maid’s quarters, looking for something in my drawers, and I have to admit that this is an interruption.

My friend Maia, another maid, watches me with boredom as the announcement continues to echo in the room. “Give it up, Claudia. Stop trying to prove that you were friends with the Alpha King when you were kids. You’re a maid and what would Alpha Achilles want to do with you?”

I don’t answer her. I just flip over my bottom drawer until all my socks fall out. But along with the socks comes a small folded parchment, containing the words, “To Claudia, from Achilles.”

“Aha!” I shove the paper right into her hands. “Feast on that.”

Maia rolls her eyes, but she just reads it aloud. “Dear Claudia, I hope this note finds you well. I refused to open the door for you because I believe I made things clear. We are no longer friends.” She chucks the paper at me. “How old is this note?”

My face heats up. “Maybe eighteen years?”

“So he sent that to you when he was twelve and you were… six?”

“Yes,” I mutter, pocketing the note. “It’s important to me, okay?”

She laughs at me. “Why? Because you’re hoping you could be close again? He’s the Alpha King now, Claudia. And our duty is to keep this place and the people running. Get over yourself and let’s go before we get thrown out.”

Everything she said was right. It’s a stupid thing to hold onto, but I can’t let it go.

Even when Maia drags me to the throne room, I find myself bursting with hope. All the maids are now gathered for some sort of meeting, and instead of worrying about what it’s for, I’m craning my neck, trying to look at the golden thrones on the dais.

But the only person I find standing there is Beta Carlos, a tanned, dark-haired unit of a man who handles everything minor for Alpha Achilles.

He surveys the room with indifference, as a person of his standing usually does, clearing his throat before speaking. “I gathered you all here because we need one maid to come with us to the Moonlight Grove Pack for the annual winter solstice meeting tonight. Since we are short-staffed, we decided to see if anyone volunteers first.”

I wait for hands to shoot into the air, but there are only whispers rippling among the crowd. The maids are all avoiding Beta Carlos’s eyes as though they would evaporate if they made eye contact with him.

I understand why. Rogue attacks have been notorious lately. Our pack, Sangria Amori, is the biggest and the strongest, which is the reason why we haven’t experienced any breaches yet. But the smaller packs have, and it’s enough for some of our maids to quit to be with their families.

The only ones who are stuck here are the single maids or the ones who are desperate for money. Then you have people like me, loyal servants for generations.

Beta Carlos’s frustration is clear now. He opens his mouth to say something but he stops when the curtains behind him suddenly open.

And out comes the Alpha King himself, Achilles.

The world stops. My heart picks up its pace, beating so fast that I thought I was going to have a heart attack. I stare at him as he stands next to Beta Carlos, towering over him by half a foot. Everyone inside the room sinks into a bow, but I don’t. I can’t. The only thing I can do is stare at him.

It’s like he has his own gravitational pull on me. I’m unable to look away from the shiny waves of his black hair and the coolness of his blue eyes. Despite the raging snow outside, his skin has a touch of gold, complimenting the bloodred coat he’s wearing. His presence is almost divine. Even the chandelier lights from above seem to be drawn to him.

As though it can’t get any better, he meets my eyes.

And just like that, I raise my hand. “I volunteer to come to the solstice meeting.”

“What are you thinking?” Maia hisses at me, trying to tug at my uniform to get me to lower my hand.

But Beta Carlos already saw me. Alpha Achilles did too.

However, his face darkens with disapproval.

I clear my throat and speak louder. “I volunteer! I will serve—”

“Claudia, is it?” Beta Carlos interjects. “Have you forgotten that our Alpha King… can’t hear you?”

The silence that follows is almost loud. Loud enough to make my ears pop. Only then do I realize my mistake.

Alpha Achilles is deaf and mute. For some reason, this has also affected his ability to mind-link. These are details that I shouldn’t be forgetting, but then again, he and I have a history, and he didn’t use to be that way.

We played together a lot as kids. He would take me to the forests behind the palace so we could pretend to spar. We were inseparable, until one night. All I can remember was waking up in the infirmary dripping wet and cold. Achilles wasn’t with me, but I was told he was in his room.

I didn’t know what happened, and I still don’t. But the first day I tried to visit him in his room was when I received his note.

Fast forward six years. He was eighteen, I was twelve. He got crowned as the next Alpha King. He could no longer hear or speak.

Some say it was a curse from the Moon Goddess. Some say it was a developing disease in his body that reached its peak. It’s been twelve years since that reveal. He’s thirty now, and I’m twenty-four. No one knows the truth yet.

I want to tell him that I’m sorry through sign language, but I don’t know how. He just turns to Beta Carlos and shakes his head ever so subtly.

He doesn’t want me to come.

Beta Carlos swallows. “Claudia… would you come up here, please? The rest are dismissed.”

As I make my way to the dais, the maids start to file out of the throne room. Maia catches my eyes for a second and shakes her head, but I continue to walk until I’m standing in front of them.

“No one else wants to come,” I point out in a shaky voice. “I… I want to go. I want to help.”

Beta Carlos looks at Alpha Achilles pointedly. I don’t know what kind of communication is happening between them, but it seems that Beta Carlos is urging him to give it a chance, probably because they have no other choice. Alpha Achilles doesn’t seem to want to, but in the end, he relents and stands close to me.

So close that I can catch his scent. So close that I can see the flecks of green in his eyes.

So close that he can kiss me if he wants to.

My breath hitches in my throat. Longing fills my heart. How many times have I wished this to happen? I want to say so much to him. I feel like so much time has been stolen from us. Our friendship was so amazing….

“I will do well,” I whisper. “I won’t let you down.”

Alpha Achilles stares at me for a couple more seconds, then he just turns around and walks away.

Beta Carlos sighs and starts to follow him, turning to me at the last second as though I’m an afterthought. “Follow me.”

I run after him through the tunnel behind the throne room, but his long legs are carrying him so far and I have to jog to keep up. Finally, we arrive at the back lawn of the palace. The cold hits me like a punch in the gut, but Beta Carlos tosses me a fur coat. I wriggle into it as a carriage pulls up in front of us, with a sleek red and gold body, pulled by two palomino horses.

“Get in,” he says blandly, and I climb into the carriage with him behind me.

Alpha Achilles is already inside, staring through the window, completely ignoring my presence.

I try to communicate with him, but Beta Carlos gets in and pushes me into the corner as the carriage starts to move.

The seats are cushioned and the walls are upholstered with red velvet, but I still get hurt as the carriage basically leaps and crashes on the cold snowy ground. The horses are running at full speed, which I understand, because we are about two hours until dusk, and Moonlight Grove Pack is one hour away.

The coachman whips the horses, rallying them into a frenzied sprint faster than before. I gasp as I fly off my seat. I thought things would settle after a while, but something seemed to be off.

The horses are whinnying. The silent path is now riddled with a mix of thuds and heavy breaths. A strange smell permeates the air. A putrid stench, a mix of rot and blood and savagery.

The scent of Rogues.

CLAUDIA.

Fear grips my throat like a vice. I look over at Alpha Achilles and Beta Carlos, and it seems that they noticed the stench too.

“We’re being followed,” Beta Carlos tells me. “When I tell you to hide, you hide, alright? We will outrun them and kill them at the same time.”

I just nod, paralyzed in the corner as growls and howls start to fill the air.

This isn’t my first time to encounter Rogues. I ran into a small pack of them once when I was one of the maids assigned to do the shopping for the palace. This was two years ago, but I still remember it so vividly. Our carriage, much older and less stable than this one, passed by their hideout, and I managed to catch a glimpse of five Rogues tearing apart a dead guard in uniform.

The first thing that hit me was the smell. The distinct combination of decay and fresh death. It was in the air like a bad perfume. Strangely enough, it was so fitting with the scene laid out in front of me. As they broke into the meat of the guard, the smell seemed to get stronger.

I wasn’t able to eat meat for months. Even now, it still repulses me sometimes.

Since then, armed deliveries have been made to the palace.

But I will never forget.

In fact, the whole scene is flashing in my mind now as Alpha Achilles opens a chest at the side of the seats. He pulls out a silver crossbow with a quiver of arrows. Beta Carlos opens the windows, and Alpha Achilles sticks his entire upper body out, firing the bow with unimaginable strength as the carriage moves faster.

I didn’t want to look, but I turned around and stared through the back window.

There are about a dozen Rogues running after us, snarling and biting and wandering just too close to the carriage. But one by one, the big black Rogues start to falter. The closest ones are hit directly in the eye, the silver arrow piercing right through their skulls and instantly killing them.

Alpha Achilles continues to shoot them all down. As more of them topple, more Rogues start to back off. Eventually, the path behind us is clear.

But the smell lingers in the air.

“There’s more of them around,” I whisper, and Beta Carlos looks at me.

“You’re right.”

Alpha Achilles slides back into the carriage, slamming the window shut. He looks enraged. I can almost feel it emanating from him as he throws the bow and arrows back into the chest and kicks it back into place. He slides a map toward the coachman, who slows down for a few miles and then completely swerves in a different direction.

I want to ask what’s wrong, but when even Beta Carlos looks wary, it’s best to be quiet.

We sit in that awful silence for a couple more moments. The coachman is really pushing it, whipping the horses more and more frequently. But since we changed routes, we arrive at the meeting after three hours.

The big iron gates open for us, and I see the gigantic wall surrounding the pack. The pack mansion looms into view. Men in black uniforms are carrying silver weapons, staring at our carriage as it pulls up.

We jump out of the carriage and run into the mansion, and standing in the foyer are the other Alphas.

Alpha Tristan of the hosting pack, a brutish monster of a man with copper-colored hair and gray eyes, steps forward.

“You’re late,” he spits out at Alpha Achilles. “We were expecting you more than an hour ago. Do you simply not respect anyone else’s time?”

Alpha Achilles turns to Beta Carlos to sign his response and have him relay it. I’m about to step aside when I suddenly hear a voice in my mind, loud and clear: 'Tell him we had to find another route because of the Rogues around his pack.'

My heart drops. I turn back around, and I realize that the exact thing I heard is what Beta Carlos is relaying to the group now. “Alpha Achilles wishes to inform everyone that we had to find another route, seeing as there were Rogues around the property.”

I freeze. Did I just hear Alpha Achilles mind-link his words to me? I blink hard to shake off the possibility of hallucination, but nothing happens. I know I heard him. I know that was him.

Alpha Tristan scoffs. “There are no Rogues here. We drove them all back. We killed all of them. One can even say that my pack is now safer than yours, Alpha Achilles.”

Needless to say, Alpha Achilles does not take that well. He squares up against Alpha Tristan, his lips pulled back in a snarl. He motions something to Beta Carlos, who goes pale. He shakes his head, telling him that he can’t understand.

But I can. I hear the voice in my head again. ‘You’re a liar. You didn’t kill a single Rogue. Your pack is in danger, and you’re too high up in your ass to admit it.’

I can understand Alpha Achilles.

I can hear his voice when no one else can.

“Well?” Alpha Tristan prompts. “What is he saying?”

Beta Carlos still doesn’t understand, and Alpha Achilles is visibly frustrated now. The other Alphas are starting to whisper among themselves, obviously not pleased by this inconvenience.

“What is he saying?” they keep asking, while Beta Carlos is red-faced, trying desperately to communicate.

I know I should probably shut up. My job here in the first place is to assist in the meeting, a mere delivery girl for snacks and anything else that the Alphas might need. But I just can’t help seeing the helpless hint in Alpha Achilles’s eyes when no one can understand what he’s saying.

So I step forward, relaying the words I just heard. “Alpha Achilles said that you’re a liar. The Rogues are alive, and you’re too arrogant to admit it.”

The entire room goes silent. The Alphas are at a standstill, all looking at me with varying expressions of shock. The world seems to freeze for a moment as I slowly come to the realization that I messed up.

“I’m so sorry,” I quickly amend. “I… I just heard the Alpha King—”

“Heard?” Alpha Tristan echoes. “You heard him? He’s mute, you imbecile!”

The other Alphas laugh. I lower my head, but as I do so, I catch sight of Alpha Achilles looking at me.

His eyes are wide with shock, but I’m surprised to find just a tiny hint of fascination in there amid the rage. That minuscule drop of positive attention almost made me forget the heaviness of the words I just said for him, but the other Alphas didn’t. Especially Alpha Tristan.

“Get this little bitch out of my sight,” he splutters. “If she dares to speak a single word, I will shut her up myself.”

My heart stops. Beta Carlos approaches me as quick as lightning, ushering me back into the carriage. But then, Alpha Achilles steps in between us and grabs me by the arm.

Once again, his voice rings in my head. ‘Touch her, and I will chop your head off.’

“What is this?” Alpha Tristan demands. “What’s he saying this time?”

Beta Carlos swallows hard. “He wishes to say that if you touch the girl, he will chop your head off.”

I thought that the silence earlier was bad enough, but this time it ends up being inexplicably worse.

It’s the silence that makes it feel like the walls are closing in on me, suffocating me. I can almost hear the snow falling outside, gathering on the windows. The Alphas are now looking at me with expressions I can’t read, and I feel like it would be better if they just glared at me.

Alpha Achilles pushes me behind him, standing in front of me protectively. His scent immediately invades my senses, and I have to consciously make an effort to focus as I hear his voice.

'If you really can hear me, then you can be of use,' he says, and even though his tone is neutral, even cold, I find myself eager to help. 'Tell Tristan that his pride won’t erase the fact that Rogues are present around his pack, and they need to be dealt with. Tell him to stop being a pussy and do something about it.'

The bluntness of those words makes me gasp out loud. “I have to tell him that?”

“Tell me what?” Alpha Tristan demands. “Speak for him, if that is what he wishes to do!”

“Speak!” the other Alphas urge me, and I look at Alpha Achilles helplessly.

“He says that your pride, Alpha Tristan,” I begin nervously, “won’t erase the fact that Rogues are present around your pack and they need to be dealt with.” I pause, swallowing hard. “And you should stop being a pussy and do something about it.”

Saying that was like dropping a bomb. The Alphas suddenly rush forward, complaining about the words as though they came from me.

“Respectfully,” Alpha Tristan growls, “get out of my pack.”

Alpha Achilles smirks, but he starts to walk away, keeping me away from Alpha Tristan. Beta Carlos looks like he wants to protest, but it’s over.

The meeting didn’t happen not because we were late, but because no one wanted to listen.

However, before we can even make it through the door, loud sirens begin to ring inside the meeting room, echoing in the halls and in the whole pack. Alpha Tristan freezes. “We are under attack.”