Shattered - Completed

1- A Princess

This is just an extra. It helps if you have read TrueBorn's Queen. Enjoy!

Cece

The door to the Pack Hall is the heaviest in the entire village, I think. I mean, I've never weighed its door opening force, and don't have a pressure gauge to do that even if I wanted to, but if I did I'm sure that it would require a lot of force to open. I have to use all my strength to open it enough for my too-skinny, flat-chested body to squeeze through. As it is, my thin, pale arms are shaking with the effort to keep the solid wood panel from closing too abruptly and crushing me in the process. My bones would probably shatter like glass.

It slams shut behind me when I release it. You would think that the door would be easier to manage so that the elderly and small children (and me) can open it safely, but this is the DawnBloods, and no one is allowed to be weak here. Even the pups in the pack have to prove their strength, even if it's something as stupid as opening a door.

The pack is strong, but they are also heartless. It's a fact I know only too well, being the Omega, the lowest of the low, the reject.

I wince as my wolf bites at her own soft underbelly in despair. We are like a shattered toy, the two of us. An unwanted toy that a spoiled pup threw away in a fit of pique. I don't have to be crushed by the door, I feel like broken glass already.

I push away the pain of losing my mate to another she-wolf, one who is more worthy of DawnBloods alphason. I have work to do. The evening meal is only fifteen minutes away and I have to serve.

I stare at the empty kitchen. Not only is it empty of wolves, but most of the food is gone, too. A feeling of icy dread washes over me. Was dinner earlier? Did I miss an announcement? Ever since Tivo rejected me I have been losing track of time. I can't sleep at night and when I finally fall asleep at dawn I can't wake up on time.

I peek into the dining hall, glad to see several of my packmates inside. My stomach churns sickeningly. I like to hide away from the gazes of my pack members and the humiliation of messing up won't help me do that. Audrey, Tivo's new, improved mate, won't let the opportunity to torment me pass her by.

The entire pack is gathered. Oddly enough, no one is sitting down and eating. Did I entirely miss the meal? How early did they eat? Or am I hours and hours late? I peek behind me through the window, frowning at the sun still high in the sky. I just came in from outside. I know it's late afternoon. I can't be late. I just can't be.

I edge into the room behind the heavy brocade curtains along the western wall. I want to find out what is happening before I venture out.

A gap between the heavy damask curtains lets me know that I was wrong. Someone is sitting and eating.

The huge golden male radiates power. He is clearly blocking some of it, but it leaks through like light streaming through a sieve. Even if he did block his power completely, there is no missing the fact that he is sitting at Alpha Tilain's table, in his chair, eating the pack's thirty-pound rotisserie turkey, without a care in the world. Not too many wolves have the brass balls to do that. In fact, I would have assumed that no wolves had balls that big... until now.

Alpha Tilain and my mate, well, ex-mate, just stand there, eyeing him warily. I have the feeling that they don't know who he is, but like me, they recognize that this is a wolf you do not mess with.

"So," the giant beast says after swallowing a chunk of meat, "I hear that a Claiming is happening soon?" Dear Goddess, his voice sends shivers down my spine, and not the good kind. That deep, gravelly tone promises to test other wolves' mortality. Or, maybe, it is the mention of Tivo's Claiming to his 'mate' that has my fur ruffled. It's a wound that is still bleeding, freshly, slowly sapping my life and my wolf's life away.