Chapter 3 An Alpha

The question takes Heaven by surprise. She remains calm, nevertheless. “Nothing,” she lies, “why?”

“It’s just… I heard when you said ‘as long as he’s not an Alpha’. You might have said it beneath your breath, but my wolf ears picked it up, you know. Does it have to do with you being a dormant wolf, and envying those with stronger abilities?”

Heaven’s eyes widen a bit at the last question. “You discovered that too?”

“I did. It’s the very first thing I noticed about you.”

“I’m not ashamed of that.” Heaven shrugs. “My rogue father with a dormant wolf married my rogue mother with a dormant wolf. Together, they had a dormant wolf, though my mom’s advantage is that her lineage has an amazing skill of healing people.”

“So you are a healer of some sort?”

“Not really. The ability never passed down to me.”

“So, basically, the only thing you know how to do is dance.”

Heaven looks away with a nod.

“How about fuck?” Ziason suddenly asks again, earning a sharp glare from the girl. He doesn’t mind her glower as he continues, “every woman should, at least, know the basics of pleasing a man.”

“I have no intention to please any man,” Heaven nearly snaps, “and please add it in the contract that on no account should both parties cross the boundaries of the other. My boundaries are not to talk to me about anything relating to sex, and do not try to sexualize me in any way.”

Ziason looks out the window. “No worries. I have no interest in women either.”

“Good.”

But…

If he isn’t interested in women, what else would he have an interest in when he’s looking so hot?

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______

Wolf Kingdom.

Moon’s Wrath Pack.

The car soon stops after a long journey.

Between Ziason and Heaven, it has been absolutely silent after that talk of sex. Both seem to enjoy the quietude too.

Someone opens the door from outside the car. Since it’s his side, Ziason steps out first without bothering to help Heaven.

She follows slowly behind him while dwelling more on checking out her surrounding—a large compound floored with old bricks, rounded by a great fence that looks like it could fall at any minute, and harboring a round tower of dark stone walls that rises in uneven layers, several narrow slits in the walls serving as windows.

A cool air of damp limestone and old iron whizzes past Heaven’s nose, and—due to the silence within the vicinity—she suspects there may be fewer or no souls living around the area.

Glancing up, there aren’t any electric wire crossings either, which means Ziason wasn’t kidding when he told her to forfeit her phone. He really was bringing her to an uncivilized area.

“Just out of curiosity, Mr. Father,” Heaven starts while jogging to catch up with Ziason’s long strides, “would I be allowed the liberty to use a TV, at least? I cant be dancing everyday all year long, and I’ll certainly grow bored.”

The man doesn’t respond. Instead, he pushes open the heavy, iron, double doors of the tower that usher them into a large abandoned-looking hall.

Heaven gasps as she takes in the view of the hall as musky air clouds her smell. Since it’s empty, she can’t help but envision the looks of it when there were still people living in the tower.

Gazing up, she notices that the dim lit building rises in tiers, the view as if staring at a coiled snake of balustrade.

With no ceiling in sight, the top looks unending, the whole structure winding up in a spiral pattern with open floors—as in inner balconies—protected by balustrades, each floor topping another like an atrium.

Across the double doors is the start of a stairway, where stands a nervous-looking man in brown suit.

Heaven catches him bowing to Ziason, who casually hands him the contract while halting in his front and mumbling, “Satisfactory?”

The way Ziason looks at the man seems to intimidate him. The latter dares not return the gaze, so he just mopes at the contract.

“Uh… Yes— yes, sir,” he stutters.

Heaven is confused, and doesn’t seem to figure out what’s going on as Ziason fakes a smile at the man before going up the stairs.

She she trails behind him, she has the urge to ask of the man’s identity, and why he looked so scared of Ziason. But she couldn’t find the courage to, so she simply drops the questions.

“This building looks really old from outside, yet how is it so refined on the inside?” she queries instead, trailing her fingers along the rough balustrade edges as they slowly climb up the unending flights of stairs.

“Maintenance,” Ziason simply utters.

“Isn’t it dangerous to stay in it? I mean, it could crumble at any time.”

“It has been standing for nearly a century, Heaven. It will not fall on your head, I promise.”

When they reach the uppermost floor of the tower, they walk through the dark and chilly inner balcony that has several closed doors, which probably belong to rooms.

Ziason uses his phone torchlight to lead the way, as one could barely tell daytime from nighttime from up here.

At a point, he opens one of the doors and stands aside for Heaven to enter the room. The girl hesitates before doing so.

“This will be your room,” he tells her.

“Not bad.” She shrugs.

The room would be exactly her type had she ever had a private one—big enough to her taste, aged walls that pull the faint scent of autumn, a four-post bed at the center that’s encircled by a black mosquito net draping from its canopy, and about four candle sconces on each wall with lighted candles casting warm glows across the room.

One small uncovered window lets in fresh air and some light that chases musk and darkness. And the fireplace doesn’t seem to have been used for ages, telling from how cold the room is. But it’s well-kept anyways.

“I love the dark aesthetics of the place,” Heaven begins after some moments of silent appreciation, “but what about the kid?”

Ziason gestures for her to come out of the room. When she does, he closes the door and continues walking through the floor.

Heaven counts the doors they walk pass until the seventeenth door after hers. That’s where Ziason stops, opening the door.

The room’s décor isn’t any different from Heaven’s. Except, there’s a little girl clad in a silk white robe sitting cross-legged on the bed, her wavy hair cascading down her shoulders to favor the bed sheet.

She jumps out of the bed with a smile the moment she sights Ziason, running to the duo and clasping her little body around Ziason’s left leg.

The man pats her head while crouching down.

“How have you been, my little lamb?” he coos, even though his deep voice betrays him.

The child nods in response.

“What’s her name?” Heaven asks.

“Kaicha.” Ziason rises to his full height. “Do not bother asking her anything, though. She would not respond.”

“Seriously, why?”

No response.

Kaicha looks up at Heaven, jamming gazes with the latter’s.

She’s a redhead like Heaven, though hers is a little darker—as in burgundy. And her eyes are so sharp that for some reason Heaven starts to feel like she’s staring directly into her mother’s orbs.

She quickly shakes the feeling off with a question, “Does she listen to instructions?”

Ziason nods. “Very well.”

“And her mother?”

“She left me with Kaicha and left.”

“She wasn’t prepared for motherhood, eh?”

Ziason shrugs. “I will have her maid bring food for you as well. The maid will also prepare your bath and every other thing you may need.”

“So, will you show me where the dance practice room is?” Heaven asks while moving out of the room.

“The ballroom, you mean?” Ziason follows suit. “It’s on the floor before the ground floor. Come.”

The two adults board the stairs again. When they reach the second floor, Ziason brings Heaven to a hall introduced through the very first door in the floor. It’s smaller than the bottom hall, yet Heaven can already feel her feet itching to slide on its appropriately slick floors.

“It’s my first time seeing a medieval ballroom,” she giggles.

Ziason huffs while leaning against the wall. “It is empty, Heaven, and the floors were modified recently to fit your practice. You do not think these floors existed back then, do you?”

“Well, what do I know?”

“Besides, most content of this tower have either been destroyed or given away. If this room still had its matters, you would have been absolutely astonished by its whole look.”

“Why did you give away the ones that weren’t destroyed, then?”

Ziason pushes himself from the wall and leaves the hall, heading for the stairs. “To forget past memories.”

Heaven jogs to catch up with him. “I won’t ask about the memories, so how about the kind of dance you want me to teach Kaicha? We haven’t clarified that.”

“Any type that speaks to the soul.”

“Oh…” Heaven stops at the stair landing and watches Ziason hurry down the remaining steps to the bottom hall.

“As this has been settled, sir, is it okay for you release my family now?” the man in brown suit, still standing close to the stairs, asks Ziason who has already rushed past him.

“Oh, right! How could I have forgotten that?” Ziason mutters as he suddenly turns back and approaches the man. “You were such a patient lawyer, David, and a good one. It will be so sad to lose you.”

“What?” Panic strikes across David’s expression that instant, confusing Heaven again as he raps breathlessly, “I swear, I don’t know this lady or why you need her! I don’t know a single thing and neither does my family! Please, let us go, I’m begging you!”

Ziason nonchalantly pauses in front of David, his hands resting in his pants pockets as he tilts his head down to stare intently at the lawyer. “I WILL… let your family go,” he whispers with a tight smile.

David doesn’t seem to buy it. “Alpha, pleas—”

Ziason waves his right hand closely across the man’s neck with a sharp movement. Heaven would swear she saw the long nail of Ziason’s index finger slice through the man’s throat right before blood gushes out. But, even at that moment, she’s gobsmacked at David’s last words.

“You— you’re an Alpha?” she whispers to Ziason, who merely glances up at her before making for the door again.