Chapter 1

Phina’s POV

“What the heck are you looking at? Get back to work, you wretched mutt!” Thea, the head maid gnarled at me with fierce aggression. Her voice was a few points shy of being a replacement for a fire alarm.

“Yes ma’am…” I whispered under my breath as I returned my gaze to my own portion of the kitchen where I was trying to clean up the mess which Layla, the alpha’s daughter had made while trying to prepare a meal.

I had been staring at her walking away from the kitchen after having nearly salted the entire kitchen while trying to make meat loaf.

The sound of her light feathery voice still echoed in my head, “I heard Jason’s favorite was meat loaf…so I decided to give it a try…” she had been all smiles when she had made that culinary blunder and that made me

Having someone like her shout over you every morning was more than enough to keep anyone on their toes.

But the thing was that my actual toes were beginning to hurt, not because I had been on their tips since morning, but because my feet were hurting from having to stand since the break of dawn.

Being an omega was the worst thing to be especially when some Alpha with a notable reputation decides to visit for no reason

It all seemed like an intentional effort to make us miserable. But then, I could only hope the day fleeted quickly.

Moments like that made me wish my parents had put in a lot more effort in staying alive during the so-called rogue invasion, which I was told had claimed them. That way, I would have had some kind of support system to go back to after every grueling day. Or better still, I wouldn’t be there in the first place.

So much for imagination… it was the only thing that I could actually escape to.

“Quit squabbling with the water and get those dishes done, Seraphina!” Thea roared from behind me, almost leaving me to wonder if she had suddenly wolfed out.

The fear had knocked me into next week, and made me drop the scrub which fell on the floor. I quickly bent over to pick it up without looking back to know where exactly in the large, white-themed kitchen she stood.

“The princess made such a mess…” I stopped myself from speaking just in time as I didn’t want any more complications from then on. But the silence in the room was more than enough to let me know those words had gotten to her ears.

I couldn’t keep myself from shaking as the footsteps from behind spelled danger for me. Thea wasn’t going to spare me for that one and I didn’t have any words left in me to plead for mercy. That was a quality lacking in the royal family.

“Just what did you say?”

My heart was almost skipping out of my chest as I turned around to see Layla standing right there with her cheeks flushed red, her brows furrowed, and her eyes staring down at me like she was going to tear me to pieces that time around.

“I’m sorry, I…” I stammered, knowing that deep down, I just didn’t have any words to say to her. My immense resentment for her made me unable to fake a heart-felt apology, even to save my life at the moment. “It just slipped out of my lips and I—”

Layla cut my attempt at an apology short with a hard slap that nearly made my neck snap. That time around, I was really knocked into next week, with an almost paralyzed face. The right side of my face had gone numb from the pain.

At that point, I felt something die in me and at the same time, I felt something awaken. I just didn’t know what I could do with my weak, wolfless self against the princess who was already being trained along with the Alpha’s strongest men.

“Alpha Jason is here…!” A voice shrieked with palpable excitement outside the building, drawing everyone’s attention instantly. That looked a lot like my saving grace that time around.

“I’m not done with you, orphan…” Layla snapped me out of my thoughts in such a rude manner and that made me feel like she was going to skin me alive. “You just wait till after Jason leaves, and I will make you bleed so bad you’ll wish you’d died with your parents…”

Those words cut me really deep, but I couldn’t do anything as she was the princess. I could only burn as she walked away.

“Hilda..!” Layla yelled at one of the maids as she walked away. “Come make me beautiful…” The maid scurried behind her as she left.

“What are you still standing there for?” Thea picked up from where Layla had left off. That was way beyond annoying, as she interrupted the brief moment of quiet I had. “Go scrub those dishes…”

I spent the next couple of minutes scrubbing and scheming how I was going to face Layla after the day’s event was done. After she hit me, I really felt the urgent need to return the message she had sent me with that vicious slap and the name calling.

In no time, I was done with all of that clutter and was about joining the other maids who never said anything to me. I was all alone in my lonely world of misery which left me wondering if that was how I was meant to live forever.

That was a question for another time as I just wanted to get that session over with and get a quick breather before facing Layla.

I joined the line of maids with trays, going down the stairs, patiently keeping in step with all of them. A maid’s worst nightmare at that point was mistakenly dropping a tray for any reason. That would be instant execution.

We were soon at the banquet room which was still empty as they were probably exchanging greetings with Alpha Jason and his people outside.

Soon enough, footsteps and voices muttering sounded together to create a buzz on the other side of the door.

Just when I was about putting down the tray in my hand, I felt a throb in my chest as an irresistible cedar sent filled my nostrils. My heart flustered, my knees became wobbly, and my body began shaking terribly and I could barely hold onto the tray…

What the heck was going on? It felt a lot like what the mate pull was described as in those discussions I had overheard.

“No…” I muttered under my breath as a maid’s worst nightmare was threatening to become my reality. “Please no…”

I was still pleading with whatever was behind my shakiness when the door was pushed open to usher in a tall, blonde enchanting masculine figure with a green storm raging in his eyes.

His sharp jaw moved as he said the very word that had been on the tip of my tongue all that time. “Mate…”

And the whole room went still.