Sold as the Alpha King's Breeder

Chapter 1420 - 19 : Processing Turmoil

*Saoirse*

My hand hesitated over the knob for the front door of the pack house. I had been standing like that for at least ten minutes, but I hadn’t made any progress one way or another.

Thoughts were at war with themselves in my mind, and it was all my mother’s fault. Well, it was hers and those elders.

I couldn’t help but curse in my mind.

My favorite curse was on repeat in my head, but it didn’t help in getting rid of my anger or helping me make a decision. It didn’t even make me feel better as it usually did because I had messed up this time.

Whatever happened now was my fault, one way or the other. That was why I was standing there trapped in limbo.

I had raced from the elders’ house, convinced that we needed to get back as soon as possible to alert the search party about the information I discovered. If they did something to the nest or the babies, it could have irreversible effects. They would be dooming us all.

As I got closer, I thought of what else the elders had told me. My people had known the truth once and still chose to do wrong. If I betrayed this secret, my mom’s secret, apparently, I wondered if the men would follow through with their attack anyway.

I knew Rhys wouldn’t. I didn’t know why, but I was sure of that. He was very logical and would see the sense in my words. At least he would listen to my words. The real struggle would be getting anyone else to listen.

So I stood frozen at the door, torn between telling the truth, which I resented being hidden from me, or keeping the secret from the masses. Many questions fluttered in my head. What was the right choice? What was I supposed to do?

Even though I knew it was wrong, I found myself blaming my mother for putting me in this situation in the first place. My image of my meek, shy, humble mother was gone. In its place was a giant question mark. Who was this woman who raised me?

Since I was standing so close to the door, it was easy to notice when a throng of noise increased exponentially, and voices grew in number. Something was going on. They were back. They had to be back.

Now there was no hesitation. I ripped the door open and ran outside. The guards did nothing to stop me as the man behind my confinement was right there in the middle of the road.

It was Rhys. He was in his wolf form, but it was Rhys. I recognized him. The wave of relief to see him all right hit me harder than I expected, making my heart skip. I knew I was worried, but I hadn’t realized that it had been causing such a heavy weight on my chest.

Now that the weight was gone, I felt free.

I ran toward him, forgetting about how he was the one who had me locked up all day and all the people around. All that mattered was that he was back, and he was okay.

As I drew closer, I came to a halt. When I was only a few feet away, I noticed that Rhys was in his wolf form for a reason. Along the long black fur of his back was an unconscious silver-haired woman.

When Rhys saw me, the crimson sparked in his eyes. He stepped closer, closing the small distance between us. My eyes glanced back up to the woman in wonder and confusion. Then my eyes flicked to the side where another body was being carried by a few men.

It was Conall.

"Move aside!" the man in front yelled. "Conall has been seriously injured! We need healers now!"

"Saoirse," my mother whispered, suddenly beside me, "help bring the woman inside our house. I’ll treat her."

I looked at her in confusion, but she gestured for Rhys to follow and turned toward the house. My father’s booming voice came through the crowd.

"Where’s Conall?" he demanded. "What happened?"

He stepped through the surge of people. I watched as his face went white when he took in Conall himself.

"How could this happen?" he yelled in fury to the men. "Hurry, get the healers! We can’t have the Alpha of Blackstone dying in our care! Do you know what that would do? Hurry! Go, go, go!"

I hurried to follow Rhys and my mother, not wanting to deal with my father and his mood. Of the two, my mother was still the lesser evil.

"Saoirse, give me a hand," my mother said as she began lifting the woman off Rhys’ back by the front door to the house. Rhys was much too big to fit through the door in wolf form.

I hurried forward to support the other side and help carry the woman into the house. We walked slowly. Instead of taking her to the couch, my mother led us into the kitchen.

"Just put her on the table here, and I’ll start fetching some ingredients," my mother directed.

I gently set the woman down on the table. Her head bobbled unrestrained, proving her level of unconsciousness. Her long hair flowed over the wooden table, looking like melted silver. I had never seen anything like it.

"Who is this woman?" I asked.

"Keelana," Rhys answered, making my head snap up.

He was walking into the kitchen, finishing up on the buttons of the shirt that Daxton must have given him. I felt a desire to walk up and hug him, but I fought it back. It was easier to do than normal since his eyes were focused on the woman in front of me.

"Keelana?" I questioned further.

"She’s the dragon," Rhys replied. "She’s a shifter."

I stared at him, then back at my mom, who hadn’t even stopped moving. "You’re joking."

He shook his head, still staring at the unusual woman. I turned my attention back to her as well, trying to picture what he was telling me. It seemed unimaginable to think of the beautiful woman as a large, scaly, winged beast.

"Explain," I insisted.

He obliged. Rhys began to describe everything that happened on their excursion, from finding the original nest, to finding the new one, to the fight that had started, and how everything ended. By the end of the story, I was staring at only him again.

I surprised us both by stepping forward and wrapping my arms around him in a hug. "Thank you."

It took him only a second to respond and hug me back. "For what?"

"For not destroying the eggs and being so compassionate. You may have saved us all," I admitted. "It almost makes up for the fact that you made me miss out on all that. If I had been there, you wouldn’t have had any issues."

"I know," Rhys said with a chuckle, pulling back from our hug. I noticed the guilty look in his eyes. "But seeing you in danger once was enough for one day."

My face warmed. I was suddenly aware that my mother was still in the room. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see her watching us. That sobered me up. I stepped away from Rhys, straightening my dress as I did. Rhys looked much less affected by the hug than I was, but I shouldn’t have expected anything else.

"So what’s wrong with her?" I asked, trying to distract from my hurt feelings. "Why did she faint if she wasn’t injured?"

I expected Rhys to answer me, but it was my mother who answered instead.

"Reverting to her human shape seems to have dangerously drained Keelana," my mother interjected, stepping forward with a bowl of concoctions. "Dragon mothers typically spend their entire birthing process in the dragon form until their eggs are hatched. All their energy is devoted to their babies."

Rhys and I stared at my mother.

"Excuse me, Luna Nora, what did you say?" Rhys asked, flabbergasted by my mother’s sudden knowledge.

Her knowledge shocked me as well. After a full day of learning that my mother was not who I thought, it was easier to process. It still didn’t change the pricks of rage I felt at even more secrets coming out.

"Forgive me, Your Highness. I can answer your questions later. Right now, my focus is on Keelana." My mother’s hands reached into the bowl of mush she had made and began to spread it along the strange woman’s forehead, throat, and heart.

I realized then she was placing her odd concoction on all of the chakra points, the energy points in the body. Rhys and I stayed silent as my mother began to chant under her breath over Keelana’s head, moving her hands in the air above her body.

I watched her familiarity with the practice and thought of how she had just said the woman’s name.

"Mom, you know Keelana, don’t you?" I accused her more than I asked.

Rhys glanced at me in surprise and then at my mother. He was lost in this entire exchange. He had told me of his day, but I had not told him of mine.

She stopped chanting and managed to look me in the eyes for a moment before quickly dropping them back to the other woman.

"I previously encountered Keelana. She knew of my people and asked for protection. I swore to uphold my oath and protect the ancestral dragon bloodline in human form until she birthed her eggs," she admitted.

At least she could be honest when she wanted.

"Wait, what?" Rhys asked, now completely confused, all sense of royal manners gone. "You have known this entire time?"

"I was not at liberty to say," my mother said softly and then began her incantations again.

Rhys stepped forward. "But–"

As much as I also wanted answers at the moment, I knew it wasn’t the right time.

"Let’s leave her be for now," I told him.

"But–" he began again.

"I know." He didn’t have a clue how much I felt the same way. "But right now I want her to be able to focus on Keelana’s recovery. We are a distraction that is not helping either of them. We can ask our questions later."

Rhys looked like he might argue again, so I took the excuse to reach out and put my hand on his arm. He reacted to the touch and focused back on me, which was exactly what I was hoping for.

"We need to get the eggs to a safe place. Let’s focus on that," I said. "Where are they?"

Rhys sent one more look back toward my mother with just as many questions in his eyes as I’m sure I had in mine. He then resigned to my idea, boxing the questions up like I had.

At least he didn’t have rage bottled up like me.

"I carried them down as well," Rhys said. "I could not risk it. Daxton has them now."

"Show me," I said, breathless. They were eggs, not babies yet. I was still rejoicing in the fact that my theory was correct.

It was a theory my mother could have confirmed herself if she hadn’t insisted on hiding stuff from me. After the day we had, I thought she was starting to open up, but I had just been fooling myself.

She was still keeping secrets. She was more worried about protecting the woman on the table than she was about protecting her daughter.

Rhys must have mind-linked Daxton because he didn’t move. It was only half a minute before Daxton walked in through the side door leading into the kitchen. He carried a large rag in his arms.

He stepped forward, and Rhys reached for the edge of the cloth. Without meaning to, I sucked in a breath and held it. With two little flicks, the fabric fell to the side, and three eggs revealed themselves.

Instead of wonder and amazement at the sight of these magical eggs, I felt an unsettling aura pass over me as I stared at them. As if sensing my mood, the faint glow surrounding the eggs seemed to pulse.

At the same time, the lifeless body of Keelana writhed around in a soundless scream.