The Alpha’s Enchantress

The Deal

“Nyx, I know you are pretty confused about everything that has happened so far—”

“Confused is not the right word to describe how lost I feel.”

“Fine.” He exhaled. “The thing is… your Mom and I… are not exactly human.”

There it was, the thing I feared the most to be true. Not human. Then what exactly were they?

“Faes.” He answered. “We’re faeries. And this of course is not our land. Your mother brought you here to hide from them. I’m pretty sure you do not remember but this is not your first encounter with them.”

My eyes narrowed at him, wondering what that meant. If this wasn’t my first encounter with them, how come I do not remember it?

I took in a long drag of air. “Why do we need to hide from the werewolves?”

“Because they want to take you.”

“Why would they want to take me?”

Uncle Tom was quiet, as if he wasn’t sure how to answer that.

“Long ago, before you were born, the werewolf King suddenly barged into our land. He had gone straight to your mother, Elaris. At the time, she still had you in her belly. No one knew what they talked about, but she indeed had a long talk with him and the next day, Elaris left. She sought help from me to leave Thalorien, the land she loved most, the land she has ruled over for decades--

“Ruled over?” I c****d up a brow.

“Your mother was queen. That makes you a princess.”

A princess. I couldn’t believe it. Whatever this story was, it sounded absurd. Faeries, werewolves. I’d only heard about them in books. And now a princess? Perhaps this was a dream. This whole day just has to be one big f*****g dream.

“I had no choice but to leave with her,” Uncle Tom continued. "Your mother was scared. Even after giving birth to you, she was always scared, always running. It wasn’t until a few days ago she told me why, almost as if she smelled trouble.”

“Why? What was the reason?”

“The werewolf King.” He answered and gave me a glance. “He claimed you even before you were born, while you were still in your mother’s belly…”

“I don’t understand that. How can anyone claim me? And why does he have to do that?” It all sounded foreign to me.

“Because you are his mate.” Uncle Tom swallowed hard. “Your mother confirmed it when she called in the priestess. The werewolf king wanted to mark you as his at that moment and your mother could only protect you by deceiving him, buying enough time for herself to escape from Thalorien. He has been going crazy looking for her ever since, and now he has found your mother. He has found you.”

Silence was what passed between us for the next few seconds. I was processing the information he had just infused into my brain. I don’t know what a mate was, but I didn’t care about that right now. All I cared about and all I wanted to do was to find my mother. Perhaps everything’d be back to normal by then, and I could forget this whole thing ever happened.

Uncle Tom stopped the car before I could ask any more questions. We were in the middle of a deserted road and stepped into open space. He brought out an item from the big bag he had packed earlier. And very soon, almost immediately, a space opened up.

My eyes widened ever so slowly along with my jaws dropping from my face as I watched the description of magic unfold right before my eyes.

A way opened before us. Call it a portal or something. It was like a gate, a path to somewhere else. A water-like opening with its edges shimmering with magic.

“What is this?”

“This is Orith. A magical passageway.” He answered, grabbing my hand once again, telling me not to be afraid of it and slowly guiding me inside, through it.

Stepping inside it felt like stepping on air. My vision was filled with blinding light for a brief second before it all stopped. My feet touched solid again. And I saw we were in the living room of a mansion. Somehow, the surroundings felt familiar. As if I had been here before. But I couldn’t recall anything.

Uncle Tom ran his fingers through his hair, collapsing on a nearby couch and breathing heavily.

I watched him for a few seconds and once I opened my mouth to say something, he stood and threw me a look.

“Come with me.”

I followed him without a word, hurrying to match his pace as I asked. “What is a mate?”

“For faes, a mate is your other half. The one you’re destined to love. For werewolves, it is a bit more complicated. You’re each other’s possession. You might not love each other, but the bond would still be forced upon you, leaving you helpless and unable to control your lust. It’s even harder for the male and since you’re fae—”

I’d just been about to process the information he was bombarding upon me when he stopped in his track and froze. Uncle Tom backed away, slowly reaching for my hand, and before we could fully turn around to run, I saw him.

The guy with the creepy smile back home. He descended the stairs slowly, eyes watching us, a creepy smirk covering his lips.

How did he get here so fast? We practically used a portal.

“Well, aren’t you going to run?” he grinned at us, showing his teeth.

I could smell the danger in the air, the bloodlust. Uncle Tom didn’t say a word, but he was slowly reaching into his pocket. And with lightning speed, he threw powder into the air and we ran.

Two heavily built men blocked us immediately, and if my guess was correct, they were also werewolves. Just like that man in the boutique, they bared their fangs at us and lunged in the air.

Uncle Tom pushed me to the side and also dodged the attack. He grabbed my hand the next moment and hurried us towards the exit of the house. We ran out of the mansion, and into the woods, with three of them on our trails.

I was practically being dragged along. I couldn’t match Uncle Tom’s inhuman pace. He had to slow down for me, causing the werewolves to catch up with us quickly.

“I’m going to take care of them. So, when I tell you to run, you better do so. And fast. Don’t look back.”

I’d been about to protest, but then I saw his eyes, the glow slowly forming. It caused me to panic.

“Don’t you dare compel me!” I barked, “If you want me to run, then I f*****g will--”

He nodded, and let go of my hand just as the others caught up on us. “Go. Now.”

I hesitated for a brief second, but at the end I sprinted forward without looking back. My heart was pounding furiously in my chest, something like guilt gnawing at me. I shouldn’t leave him like that.

What if he couldn't handle them like he claimed?

I made the mistake of glancing back. Uncle Tom was handling them well. One of the werewolves pounced on him and the other was focused on chasing after me, but a burst of magic would appear out of nowhere, knocking him away from my path.

Run. Please, Nyxara. Run.

I could almost hear his thought when I met his gaze. He could handle this, right? They weren’t going to kill him.

I increased my pace, but I didn’t stop glancing back. And the last time I turned around, it was just in time for me to see one of those werewolves s***h through his chest with its thick claws.

I tried to stop on my track and ended up tripping over something. I fell face flat on the dirt and when I raised my head, shiny leather boots were what greeted my sight.

Another one of those werewolves.

Panic rushed through me immediately, but nothing would’ve prepared me for the sight I saw when I raised my head higher to his face.

No pointed ears, no fangs, no claws.

Instead, I was met with a face that sent shivers down my spine. And no, he wasn’t scary. At least, not entirely. He was just— lethally good-looking in a way that didn’t seem real. He looked bored, staring down at me like I was a nuisance in his path.

The air he carried around him screamed of power—raw, undisguised power. I knew I should get up and run then. I knew I should fight my way out of this. I should go back for Uncle Tom. But then, the stranger was looking at me so curiously, so innocently, and I didn’t know when I said the words.

Help me.

His head tilted to the side, his lips curled up sinisterly, and his curiosity was piqued even more. The air was thicker with a foreboding sense of doom, and I knew, I knew that it was coming from this man. Somehow, he could affect everything around him.

Even me.

“Help me.” I pleaded again, this time around, hearing my own cracked voice. I didn’t know why I was begging him. If he wasn’t a werewolf, then he was human. What could he possibly do?

I couldn’t think straight anyway. I choked out the words again.

“Please. Save my uncle…” I can’t let him die because of me. Mom was already—I forced myself not to think about it.

The stranger moved around me and I thought he was going to walk past, but then I heard his voice. Low, rich and edged with something rough, like gravel rolling over silk. “And what do I get in return?”

Anything. I’d give him everything I had if he could save him.

“Let’s make a deal then,” his voice sounded like death. Goosebumps traveled down my skin when he whispered against my ear. “I’ll save your uncle from them, and in return, you’ll promise me something.”

“What?” the word came out as a breathy whisper. I was too exhausted to speak.

He seemed to think about it for a moment and seemed to have finally made a decision.

“I’ll tell you what I want when I want it.”

So he wanted me to make a blind deal with him. I’d be stupid to do that with a strange man I’d just met. Besides, he could be human. He might not be able to handle those three.

“You have to tell me, so I’d know if I’d be capable of doing it.”

He smirked and tipped his head behind me once again. “That man only has a few seconds away from death. Are you going to just watch him die because you’re afraid?”

“Shouldn’t I be afraid? You could be working with them.”

“It doesn’t matter,” He said and stood. "I was not interested in helping anyway. You just happened to catch my eye.”

He turned around and was ready to leave at the same time that I heard Uncle Tom’s scream. He was in pain.

Panic surged up to my throat immediately, and I was already reaching out my hands to the stranger.

“Please save him. Please.”

He turned around slowly, and he took my hand. A devilish smirk was playing across his face when he did that. A white light shone in between our palms as he helped me up from the ground and when he released my hand again, I saw what had formed there.

A tiny dark ink of a wolf's head was tattooed on my palm. Confused, I looked up in time to see him disappear from his spot. With a speed that didn’t belong to a human, he appeared in the midst of the people I’d been running from.

They all coward at his arrival. Even the bastard with the creepy smirk. I saw him almost piss in his pants, staring at the figure that’d just appeared in front of him.

I didn’t see the stranger move, I only saw their heads rolling on the ground and their bodies dropping as blood spilled everywhere.

I stood there with frozen blood, stunned to my bones, realizing I had just made a deal with something worse than a monster. Something more dangerous than a beast.

My legs shook, causing me to collapse, especially when I saw him cast his gaze upon Uncle Tom.

What have I done?

The orith—the shimmering water gate opened right behind me, and I knew it was Uncle Tom urging me to enter it. His eyes were filled with a kind of look I’d never seen on him before.

Dread.

And terror. As he faced that man. The stranger who had just killed all those powerful werewolves in the span of five seconds. His claws were still dripping with their blood.

He wasn’t human.

As I walked into the portal, I found myself wondering about what he was.

I should be scared after the sight I’d just witnessed. I should feel terrified but I wasn’t. Instead,

I was curious.