MAID FOR THE RUTHLESS ALPHA

CHAPTER 1: SLAVES AND MONSTERS

Humans meant nothing in our world. Every single day was the horrible reminder that we were all merely pitiful spectators and slaves, subjected to watch those furry monsters burn everything we valued to ashes.

For years now, humanity has had to come face to face with the harsh truth that werewolves, creatures of claws and nightmares, were as real as the torment they wrecked our world with. They ruled high on the food chain and my kind has been forced to serve as slaves and even traded as merchandise. Those who dared to rebel against their sinister authority would face the burning wrath of the Alpha King, who’d show no mercy in sending them to their early graves in the most terrifying way possible.

The glory of that cruel beast has been sang for ages. Alpha King Arthur Blackwood, that is. He was afterall the monster responsible for bringing about the fall of mankind. Mum had told me the story over a million times, of how he slaughtered off all the world leaders by ripping out their hearts, how he heartlessly tortured those who refused to submit to him and how he hated humans with every wicked bone in his body. He hated our kind so much that he created a system where humans are considered as good as animals and branded by the names of their master. In summary, the man was the devil in the worst form of it.

However, since the day I was born, my mum had hidden me from the hate and chaos that the world offered. She had done her best to keep me safe and sheltered in a cave with her as that was the only place we could stay undetected by slave traders.

But that was until she died in my arms few days ago.

My heart twisted agonizingly in my chest, being a firm reminder that I had lost the only person I loved and I was all I had left now.

I didn't last a single second on my own.

I remembered that fateful day like it was yesterday, I had pulled my hood over my head in hopes that I wouldn't attract any attention to my person. Human bounty hunters had been littered across roads and multiple check-points were mounted for the cars that drove by. Warrior werewolves had been standing by the entrance of every mall and building as they thoroughly inspected everybody who walked in and out. There had been nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide.

I had pushed my fears off a cliff and turned myself around the corner, onto the street packed with monsters and slave traders.

That was the last day I walked free.

The moment they sniffed me out from under my hood, the werewolf slavers snatched me up and tossed me into this hellhole.

And here I was now, about to be sold off to the highest bidder.

Tepid sweat dribbled down my back and between my breasts even as a low chill rattled my bones and wicked shivers slithered up my spine.

I was dressed in nothing but cobwebs, silk and gossamer. I had been primed, picked, plucked and polished until my light skin shone and cast a golden hue, my n*****s had been rubbed until they stood up and puckered sensually, and then I was swaddled in flimsy clothing that exposed every rounded curve, every luscious swell of my body.

The dress I was wearing was a white see-through gown with a plunging neckline down to my navel and hip, high slits on both sides of my body. Gold brooches held it together at the shoulders and elaborate ribbons had been woven into my hair. The dress left little to the imagination. Nothing was hidden and I was no better than a prized meat on display. Something to be sold off, like some property.

I was not the only one in the slave ring...

I looked around in dismay, my heart pounding wildly in my ears, a sudden panic seizing my throat and stealing the air from my lungs.

I had not been the only one in the entire room as at this morning. The day started with over a hundred girls dressed just like me but now, we were down to five.

And with each passing tick of the clock, I felt my life draining before my eyes.

Girls that couldn't be auctioned off at the end of the day would be killed by nightfall.

I gasped suddenly when someone smacked my butt.

Hard.

I gritted my teeth and flashed him a glare without even thinking and he withdrew his hand and pursed his lips.

"I wouldn't put it past this one to murder me in my sleep," he declared, angling his head at me, as if he was studying me under a microscope. "It's your job to tame and bridle these creatures before selling them off.” He cast a furious glare at the matron that was standing at a corner, watching me with a disapproving glare.

Elowen, the woman charged with managing our affairs since I had been snatched up by the slavers, was a thick heavy set woman in her mid fifties.

She glared at me in a way that promised a good beating before I get transferred to the executioner if I don't get sold off by tonight.

I gulped, my throat tightening, and avoided her gaze.

"Some men like them a little feisty." Her voice sounded a little closer and I turned around to see her smiling solicitously at the buyer. "Some like the extra challenge," she continued, her voice patronizing. Enticing. "Imagine the satisfaction you'll get when you finally break her."

"And risk getting my throat slit in the process?" The man scoffed and mussed his hair. "That's too much trouble for something that isn't even worth the mud beneath my shoes."

He spat at me and I flinched, shocked at first, not expecting the action, then waves of anger bloomed in my veins. My hands fisted into angry balls, my nails digging into my palm as I tracked him move around the ring, sampling the rest of the girls.

His eyes brightened at tiny little Lizabetha who just turned eighteen, whimpering quietly in a corner, her blonde hair matting to her wet cheeks.

Her outfit was a skimpy short frilly excuse of a dress that barely covered her butt, her breasts had spilled out of the dress and she had given up trying to put herself back together. Her hair fell like a veil over her and she looked as broken as she felt.

My heart went out for her. We had bonded just last night over the fact that we just lost our mothers and how today was to be our last day at the auction.

I watched in blazing anger as the man's hand slipped into her dress and palmed the swells of her breast, eliciting a shocked gasp from her and more profuse tears.

"I'll take this one!" He decided, his eyes shining with lust and craving. "Now, this is one bird I'd love to break." He crooned to her.

A low growl escaped my lips, angry that I couldn't stop him from taking her. Angry at the sinister double meaning of his words.

If he was human, he wouldn't have heard my silent growl but because he was a werewolf, as soon as the sound left my lips, his head snapped up to meet my eyes. "Maybe another time, feisty." He tipped his head, mirth in his eyes.

I watched him walk away with Lizabetha, a sickening feeling in my gut, but relieved at least that she got to walk away with her life.

But as the relief came, a heavy sense of foreboding suddenly washed over me.

We were down to four girls who were better looking, more docile, fitter and more provocative than me and as another man claimed Esmeralda, the noose around my neck tightened, making it harder for me to breathe.

My lungs were constricting around my heart and I couldn't see past the treacherous tears burning my eyes. I couldn't hear past the violent thudding of my heartbeat in my ears.

Calloused hands suddenly wrapped around my arm, her sharp nails digging into my skin were enough to make me cry out in pain.

But I didn't give her the pleasure of seeing me cry, I clamped my teeth down on my tongue harder than ever, until I felt the metallic taste of blood in my mouth.

Elowen's eyes flashed yellow, her wolf lurking just beneath her skin, her lips pulled back into an enraged sneer. "Come with me!" She ordered, jerking me down, out of the ring and and leading me to an adjoining room away from the auction hall.

She flung me into a dressing room and delivered a blinding slap on my cheek. I gasped as pinpricks of pain erupted, my face snapping to the right, my head spinning round and round.

"What is WRONG with you!" She hissed. “Do you have any idea what would happen to you if you don't get bought?"

I inhaled a shaky breath, my hand slipping to my cheek, my skin burning from her assault.

I ground my teeth in murderous rage and looked at her. "I know exactly what would happen to me." I seethed, a violent ache pounding in my skull.

"Then, act like it!" She growled, turning around on her feet and exiting the room.

I swallowed a pain, gasped and looked at myself in the floor-to-ceiling mirror, sirens ringing in my head.

My heart was heavy with the weight of the death of my mother and the impending doom of what was to come to me.

My death. I couldn't escape it. Not when the day was almost over.

I fixed myself, applied some more cosmetics to my face to hide the blooming bruise of Elowen's four fingers on my cheek. I brushed my hair and adjusted the gaudy necklace of cheap glass around my neck.

Taking a deep breath, I wandered back into the auction hall, my heart canting a new beat when I realized that the slave ring was now empty and Gwyneth, the last girl, was doing a seductive dance number on the stage.

Only a handful of patrons remained and the slave master was announcing to the audience as the men watched her sensual dance, their eyes transfixed on hers.

My heart stopped beating for one painful moment as numbers started flying out from their lips in their bid to buy her.

"Two hundred!" A voice shouted.

"Five hundred!"

"Seven hundred!"

"A thousand gold coins!"

My voice stuttered to a stop at the very obscene amount of money the patron was about to spend to acquire her.

The entire room fell silent and as nobody opposed the bidder, he came to stake his claim on the raven haired beauty.

I was the only one left unbought.

The metaphoric noose around my neck wound even tighter to the point where the world tipped sideways and I couldn't tell what way was right and what way was left.

I was only vaguely aware of someone taking my hand and leading me to the stage.

"As always, we aim to please and we saved the best for last," the slave master's sycophantic voice announced to the few disinterested patrons who were looking at me, sizing me up with skeptical looks in their eyes.

"I'm setting the bid at a thousand gold coins," he announced to the men.

For a startling second, nobody said a single word and as the seconds passed, I realized that this was it. This was my end. I was about to join my mother in death.

A thousand was a lot. Too much. Not everyone had that type of money to waste on a disrespectful slave.

"Two thousand." A man drawled, his hand shooting in the air.

My head snapped up, my eyes flew open, surprise evident on my face.

"Three thousand!"

I couldn't breathe. All the air had left the room.

"Five thousand!"

My hand was sticky with sweat, my dress sticking to my torso as the hall exploded into a heated burst, each of the men rattling out numbers it would take to acquire me.

"A hundred thousand gold coins.” A low sensual male voice drawled, stopping the patrons from talking any further.

My heart stuttered to a stop as my face snapped up, catching the man's icy hard gaze.

His cold, harsh beauty stole the air from my lungs and I found my legs going weak at just the piercing look in his gaze, his eyes never leaving mine. Not even to sample my body, to check out what he was buying.

My heart exploded into furious beats, heat shooting up my face and spine as the auctioneer announced, "A hundred thousand gold coins. Going once! Going twice! Gone!"

He slammed his gavel twice on the stand, sealing the fact that I had been purchased.

This dark stranger just saved my life. Little did I know that I was about to descend into hell.