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The Cursed Alpha and His Human Bride

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Chapter 1 - The Bride in Chains

The hall was too quiet for a room so full of wolves.

Frost clung to the edges of the stone pillars like a warning. Torches crackled along the walls, their orange flames licking shadows onto the fur-lined banners of each noble bloodline. But no one dared move. Not when the Alpha had spoken.

Moonie knelt on the cold stone floor, her wrists locked in rusted chains that had rubbed her skin raw. Her head hung low, forehead nearly touching the ground. The thin cotton dress she wore was soaked from kneeling too long on melted snow. It clung to her ribs like a second skin. She was small, shivering, and silent.

A girl with no pack. No last name. A human.

A gift. A punishment.

"Let the cursed one take her," Alpha Eldric said, with no more feeling than if he were ordering the slaughter of a hog. "It's time he proves his worth—or stays forgotten."

A low murmur spread through the room like a ripple on black water. The other alphas, warriors, and clan heads exchanged glances. No one said it aloud, but the cruelty was clear.

To be married off to the cursed son was a fate worse than death.

He had been born of noble blood—son of the great Alpha Eldric—but no wolf song had ever answered his. No beast had ever risen beneath his skin. His eyes never glowed. His scent never shifted. The moon did not claim him.

The firstborn, and still a failure.

They had sent him away at sixteen—alone to the edge of the Blackwood, a place even wolves feared to tread. Rumors said he had gone feral. That he lived like a ghost, refusing even the wolves' call during the full moon.

And now, years later, they summoned him back.

Not for redemption. Not for reconciliation.

But to throw him a bride like tossing meat to a chained beast.

Moonie didn't know what to expect.

She only knew she had been sold.

A man stepped forward from the shadows. Heavy boots clicked on the stone floor. His scent reached her before he did—earth and ash and something colder underneath, like burned lavender.

The cursed one.

She wanted to raise her head to look—but didn't. She had been trained well: Never look a wolf in the eyes unless you want to be torn apart.

Still, when he stopped before her, when the warmth of his body replaced the icy air that wrapped her shoulders—something made her glance up.

Just once.

And her breath caught.

He was tall. Taller than the others. Dressed in all black, with a long coat lined in fur that trailed like night behind him. His silver hair fell just slightly over his brow, messy and untouched. His skin was pale, almost sickly in the firelight. But it was his eyes that froze her.

Dark. Deep. Empty.

Not dead. Not cruel.

Just… distant.

As if no light had ever reached him.

As if he had stopped expecting anything from this world a long time ago.

He looked down at her with the expression of someone who hadn't seen another soul in years.

Then, wordlessly, he reached into his pocket.

The hall tensed.

But he didn't strike her.

Instead, he took out a small iron key, bent at the end. Slowly, he knelt—not to meet her gaze, not to comfort her—but to unlock the chains binding her wrists.

The cuffs fell open with a soft metallic clink.

No one had ever unchained her with such gentleness.

Not her former owner. Not the wolves who kept her. Not even the handmaid who dressed her for this "marriage."

He said nothing.

And yet, in that moment, something passed between them. The warmth of his hand brushed against her bruised skin. Not tender, but not violent either. Like he was being careful—not because he cared, but because he didn't want to hurt what was already broken.

"This is your bride," Alpha Eldric said again, his voice cold with amusement. "Take her. She's yours now."

The cursed alpha didn't respond.

He simply stood and turned toward the door.

And somehow, Moonie understood: she was meant to follow.

They rode in silence.

The estate gates slammed shut behind them, and no one waved farewell.

She sat behind him on the old black horse, holding onto the edge of his coat so lightly it barely moved in the wind. She didn't dare touch him directly.

The forest thickened around them—bare branches like bones reaching out of the snow, nightbirds shrieking in the distance. It was not a road made for brides. It was a road made for the forgotten.

"What's your name?" she whispered once, barely loud enough to carry over the hooves.

He didn't answer.

She lowered her head.

It was fine. She hadn't expected one.

---

They reached the edge of the woods just before nightfall.

There was no village. No lanterns. No pack.

Just a wooden cabin tucked into a grove of frostbitten trees, with smoke curling gently from the chimney. A soft light glowed inside, golden and quiet—so unlike the cruel firelight of the great halls she'd known before.

He stopped the horse and dismounted.

"We arrived"

His voice was deep, quiet. As if unused to speech.

Moonie blinked, startled.

He was already walking toward the door.

She stared at his back, the long black coat drifting behind him like the trailing edge of a storm.