Chapter 3

Alexandria POV:

The night wind blew my torn, mud-caked dress against my shins as I stood over Beatrice, leaning on the shovel handle.

After a brief moment of terror, the arrogance of being the Pack Alpha's wife returned to Beatrice. She scrambled up from the mud, breathing heavily.

"You blind little freak!" Beatrice shrieked, pointing a trembling finger right at my nose. "So what if you climbed out? In Silvermoon Kingdom, bloodline is law! You are still a wolfless piece of trash without an inner wolf!"

I tilted my head slightly, listening to the shrill pitch of her voice. My right index finger tapped a slow, steady rhythm against the wooden handle of the shovel, counting down her final seconds.

Enraged by my silence, Beatrice raised her hand and swung a vicious slap toward my left cheek, trying to reclaim her authority as Lady Cameron.

Right before her palm touched my skin, I caught the shift in the air current. I leaned my head back half an inch, dodging her slap completely.

Because she had used too much force, the missed swing threw Beatrice off balance. She let out a clumsy yelp as her upper body lurched forward.

Without hesitation, I lashed out with my right leg. My foot struck the back of her knee with a dull thud. Beatrice screamed as both of her knees slammed onto the sharp gravel. She curled forward in agony, gasping for breath as tears poured down her face.

Hearing their mistress cry out, three more guards hiding in the shadows of the courtyard drew their steel blades from their waists. Roaring, they charged at me from three different angles to cut off my escape.

I listened closely. Their footsteps varied in weight. The guard on the left breathed the heaviest, clearly an impatient brute looking for quick credit.

He reached me first, swinging his steel blade down toward my skull. I felt the cold air off the sharp edge. Grabbing the shovel handle with both hands, I thrust it upward.

Clang!

Sparks flew as the wooden shaft blocked the steel blade head-on. The heavy impact made the web of my thumb ache. This body's muscles were far too weak, so I couldn't fight them with raw strength. I tilted the shovel handle, letting his blade slide down the wood, and drove my left knee straight into his unguarded stomach. He groaned and flew backward into the dirt.

Seeing this, the guards on my right and behind me changed tactics, closing in at the same time to trap me between their blades.

The guard behind me growled and thrust his sword tip straight at the center of my back. I threw myself forward onto the ground, executing a clean tactical roll through the mud. The sword tip grazed my back, slicing open the fabric of my dress. Coming out of the roll in a half-crouch, I spun around and swept the iron shovel horizontally like a spear.

The heavy flat of the shovel smashed into the guard's shinbone. A loud crack echoed through the courtyard. He howled and collapsed to his knees, clutching his broken leg.

The last guard froze in his tracks. Looking at his groaning comrades on the ground and then at my shut eyes, his hand shook violently around his sword hilt.

"M-Monster!" he yelled, dropping his weapon onto the gravel and turning to run.

I sneered. Pulling my right arm back, I hurled the shovel like a javelin. The wooden shaft tore through the air with a sharp whistle and struck the fleeing guard squarely in the center of his back. The force slammed him face-first into the dirt, knocking the wind completely out of him.

I stood up slowly and brushed the dirt off my palms. Behind me, Beatrice knelt on the gravel, her breathing shallow and erratic. Her elite guards had been wiped out by a blind girl in less than three minutes.

I turned and walked toward the sound of her ragged breaths. My boots crunched against the gravel with every step. Beatrice dragged herself backward across the mud until her spine hit the trunk of a dead tree, leaving her nowhere left to run.

"Stay back!" she screamed, her voice cracking. "I am Lady Cameron, the Luna of this territory! If you touch a hair on my head, your father Reginald will tear you to pieces!"

I stopped right in front of her, leaned down, and clamped my freezing fingers around her well-maintained chin, forcing her head up toward my empty eyes.

"Lady Cameron? The moment you poured that poisoned tea down my throat, you were already dead to me."