Alpha King’s Lost Luna

KALEB

After my meeting with Cassandra, | escorted the healer back to her chamber, and once she was back there, safe and sound, | made the decision to pay Raven a visit. As | rushed straight to her laboratory in the prison tower, my hands balled into a fist at my sides. | was angry, more angry than I'd been in quite some time.

| couldn't let Ronald take my throne from me.

| couldn't let anyone take my power from me. Not after everything I'd been through to become the king of this country. I'd made too many sacrifices, shed too much blood, and cried too many tears in the quiet of my bedroom, to allow someone as terrible as Ronald to take my crown from me.

No.

This ended now.

When | reached Raven's laboratory, | wasn’t the least bit surprised to see her goofing around. She was playing with a pair of blood samples, combining them with some unknown chemicals and potions, and seeing how they reacted. | wanted to swipe them off of the table and throw them on the floor. She was behaving like a child, which only made me want to do the same. Why was no one content with following orders lately?

Had they forgotten who | was?

It wasn’t until | walked up behind her that Raven even noticed me. She looked up from her scientific materials and raised an eyebrow at me.

“Kaleb,” she said unenthusiastically. “What are you doing here?”

| angrily confronted her about everything Cassandra had told me. It took all of my restraint to keep from strangling her as | repeated everything about Lady Helene, and once | was finished, | was surprised to see how calm her expression was.

“It's true,” she said with a small shrug. “I did it all.”

My eyebrows shot up and a low growl escaped me. “Why would you do that, Raven?”

She shrugged again. “I just wanted to have some fun. Besides, | was doing it not just as a favor to Ronald, but to Yurene as well. Lady Helene didn’t want to get married to Lord Ronald. They quarreled all of the time. If she continued to protest, the wedding would have been postponed. Wouldn't something like that bring shame to Yurene, since Ronald had invited so many guests? Besides, it was nothing more than a little manipulation. | wasn’t going to leak any information about our research to Ronald.”

| rubbed my temple as she blabbered on rapidly. | knew there was no use in arguing with Raven.

She was so unbelievably stubborn and didn’t listen well. The only one who might have been able to get her under control was her sister, Roxy.

Astrange feeling surged within me.

Roxy.

Where was she now?

“You should be more concerned about the whereabouts of your twin,” | speaking. “Aren’t you worried at all about Roxy?”

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Raven grimaced. “Why would | be worried? | know my sister better than you do, Kaleb. Who could defeat a warrior like her? Moreover, Anubis is handling things, isn’t he? There’s nothing | can do about it all, so who cares?”

| opened my mouth to speak, but Raven wasn't finished.

“| don’t understand why you care about small things like this when there are more important things for you to consider,” the dark- haired sorceress rambled on. “You’re wasting time. Once we succeed with our great sorceries, the rest of it won’t be an issue. Ronald, the lords who conspire against you, Wegalla... none of it will be a problem anymore. The world will be at your hand, Kaleb. What are you so afraid of?”

| frowned as her words set in. She’d said plenty in such a short amount of time, and truth be told, | needed a moment to absorb it all.

| began to wonder... what was | afraid of?

What was | scared of?

| couldn't explain it, not in words that would make sense to anyone else.

Yesterday, when | dreamt of my sister, Eleanor, she asked me the same question. She was in support of Raven’s opinions and urged me to do whatever it took to keep my power.

In the dream, my older sister had been covered in thick, ruby blood. Her eyes glared at me sharply, and she laughed at me cruelly. The sound was grating and filled my mind with a terrified feeling. | hated every second of her laughter and wanted nothing more than for it to cease completely.

“| knew you were a ba star d with no guts,” she accused me. “What are you waiting for? Isn’t this what you wanted? You betrayed everyone to get power. And now, you want love and mercy? You're pathetic, Kaleb. You'd be a complete idiot to consider even for a second that that healer would ever love you. Why would someone love a scu mbag like you? Even if you became the king of the world, no one would ever truly respect/or love you. Ba star ds are ba st ards. You were born with low blood, and you'll die that way too. Lowly and pathetic.”

As she broke into another fit of cruel, evil laughter, | reached out, grabbed Eleanor’s slender throat, and squeezed tightly, killing her again to make her stop her cursing.

Unfortunately, her death lasted only a matter of seconds, and she resumed her laughter soon after. She wasn’t able to be killed in this dream. No matter what | did, how hard | squeezed, how much | anguished, she wouldn't perish.

“You have never changed,” she chided me sternly. “You want to have a soft heart. You want to use glorious excuses to disguise your bad intentions. But nothing can change the fact that at your core, you're truly evil, Kaleb. You’re not worth

of love. Who could ever love a monster like you?”

As | stared at Raven, Eleanor’s words repeated in my mind, and my hands balled into fists at my

side.

“| told you before that if you keep being like this, anyone could easily defeat you,” Raven reminded me. “Including Ronald.”

For a moment, reality began to blur and Raven sounded exactly like my dead sister. Unfortunately, they were both right. Like it or not, | had already done far too many cruelties. | couldn’t be redeemed. | was a king and | needed to play the role. Too much had happened for me to ever live a normal life again. | had to keep my power no matter the cost.

So, | needed to stop being weak and behave like a king.

Asilence lingered between us for a while until | heard a noise out in the corridor. | walked to the door of the laboratory.

“Who is there?” | demanded with irritation.

When | opened the door, | was surprised to see two guards attempting to stop a man in black from getting close to the lab. | recognized the man from his costume. He worked for Anubis.

“What's going on?” | demanded.

The man knelt on the ground. “Your Majesty, | need to speak with you in private.”

| glanced at the guards. “Leave us at once.”

The guards stopped at once, nodded their heads, and then turned on their heels and left. Once they were gone, | turned back to the man.

“What's going on?” | repeated myself.

Raven suddenly walked out into the hallway. The man opened his mouth to speak, but before he could say a word, his gaze lingered on her.

“You can speak freely,” | urged him. “She is of no concern.”

The man nodded. “Your Majesty, Anubis is dead. And the Southerners have captured Roxy.”