The Alpha's Fated Outcast: Rise Of The Moonsinger. - Chapter 28

Chapter 28: A visit to Blue Ridge Pack 2
Ramsey

How could they not be aware that their daughter was attacked? The thought angered me more than I cared to admit.

“What do you mean you weren’t aware?” I demanded, my frustration deepening. “Is that how little you care about her? What kind of parents are you?”

Her parents shifted uncomfortably, both of them lowering their gazes, including their daughter.

“Alpha!” her father began. “Most of the time, we don’t understand Lyla. She’s always been closed off and rarely…”

“Rarely does what?” I cut him off, and my patience was wearing thin. “Your daughter, the one you’re supposed to protect and care for?”

Lenny placed a hand on my arm, a silent reminder to maintain my composure, but I shrugged it off. Lyla’s absence, her family’s indifference – everything was pissing me off.

“And where were you,” I continued, my voice rising with every word. “When she was taken to the White Mountains? You didn’t even show up to try to plead for her release. All the other parents do. Do you even care about her? Do you have any idea what she went through? What she’s still going through? And now you dare to stand here and tell me you didn’t know about the attack?”

The room fell into an uncomfortable silence, and Luna Vanessa looked close to tears. It was Alpha Logan who finally broke the silence.

“Alpha Ramsey,” he said, meeting my gaze. “Why are you so worked up about my daughter? She’s a deviant and wolfless. Why do you care so much? I thought the whole purpose of taking her to the White Mountains was to have her punished for what happened at the Gala?”

The words hit me like a slap. I could feel blood rushing to my head, suddenly aware of how my behaviour must seem to others. What was I doing? As the Lycan Leader, I was supposed to be above such emotional displays. And yet here I was, nearly losing control over a girl I had rejected, making a fool of myself in front of her family and the warriors that had come with me.

This wasn’t like me – I never lost control like this.

Taking a deep breath, I forced myself to calm down. My mind was racing as I tried to find an explanation. Something that would make me sound less of an idiot.

“Still, it is my duty as the Lycan Leader,” I said, my voice strained. “To ensure that packs treat their members – especially their children – respectfully and with care.”

The words left my mouth stiff, awkward and hollow, and even as I said them, I knew how ridiculous they sounded.

Lenny quickly came forward and continued smoothly from where I stopped. “Perhaps speaking with Lyla directly would be better?” he suggested, “You see, we want to hear her account of the Feral attack for research purposes course and also to check her condition so that our Pack Doctors and Healers would know what medicine works best for future situations.”

Alpha Logan and his wife exchanged another glance before Logan turned to look at me.

“I’m afraid that’s not possible, Alpha. Lyla left a week ago. She’s gone back to her home in the human world.”

My heart dropped, and Lax howled in anguish within me. “What! Where did she go?”

“Back to the human world,” Logan repeated. “She’s been living there for about three years with her Nanny. She’s more comfortable there.”

Lyla was gone? She had left a week ago, and I hadn’t known. Lax could have felt something, surely. I had come all this way, wrestled with the decision to see her again, and now she was just… gone. My mind reeled, struggling to process the information.

I had rejected her and distanced myself from her, but the thought of her slipping further away, of the possibility of never setting my eyes on her again, caused me to panic.

Lenny must have sensed how devasted I was by the news, so he continued the conversation, buying me enough time to compose myself.

“She left on her own?” Lenny asked.

“Yes!” Alpha Logan nodded. “She made the decision herself. We.. we didn’t ask her to leave.”

Why had she left? Was it because of the rejection? Or had something else pushed her away?

“I see,” Lenny continued. “Well, perhaps you could call her and ask her to return? As I mentioned earlier, we need her for research purposes, to understand the effects of the Ferals attack and the treatment methods used on her.”

I turned to Alpha Logan, hope flaring in my chest, but he was already shaking his head and had a grim expression on his face.

“We’ve already tried that,” he admitted, “But we can no longer reach her.”

My chest tightened with dread. “What do you mean you can’t reach her? Don’t tell me you don’t have your daughter’s phone number?”

“She masked her Pack mark,” Logan sighed resignedly. “Left the Pack Chat room and changed her phone number. I can’t find her anymore, not through our usual means.”

My heart began to race – frightened.

How could she sever every tie to this place? Wasn’t she a werewolf, for Moon’s sake?

“Her Nanny,” Alpha Logan continued, “the one she lives within the human world is an Omega, and we don’t always give Omega’s traceable Pack Marks. So even she doesn’t have a pack mark we could use to trace Lyla.”

“And you don’t know where she lives?” I asked, feeling like grabbing him by his neck.

“I never went there!” he said, his gaze darkening with shame. “Since she went to the human world, I have visited her once on the day of the Gala. I had used her mark to trace her to her school. I went there, but they told me she hadn’t shown up.”

“What…” I took a deep breath, sucking in the anger that teased at the edges of my sanity. It keeps getting absurd. “Has she done this before? What happened this time around? Why is she cutting ties? This is her home; she doesn’t belong with the humans.”

“Well!” Luna Vanessa spoke this time around. “When she returned from the White Mountains, she packed her things and left. She said…she said she was no longer part of this family.”

“And you just let her go?” I asked, struggling to keep my voice even. “Your daughter, who can’t shift, who you claim is a deviant – you let her sever whatever bind she has with her heritage and walk into the human world alone?”

“Well, she has her Nanny…”

“I heard what you fucking said!” I growled, “Do you know the potential risks of having one of our own out there? The secrets about our world that might come to light? Tell me, is she even your daughter?”

“Alpha!” Lenny walked over to me and tried calming me down, but I did not care.

“I came here, hoping I could learn something about her. About her inability to shift, it seems so strange that she’s Alpha blood—her parents are Alpha blood, but why? Only to discover that you care less about your daughter than everyone else. Wow!” I ran a hand through my hair. You and your mate…” I wanted to roar, to shake them until they understood the magnitude of their failure as parents, but I held back.

I was here as the Lycan Leader, not as the man desperately searching for my mate.

“You know what!” I exhaled sharply. “I’m done. Let’s go, Lenny!” I turned and started going towards the car.

As I reached for the car handle, Alpha Logan suddenly remembered something. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small vial. When he opened it, a pungent odour filled the room, causing me and the others present to recoil instinctively.

“Wolfsbane,” Alpha Logan explained, coming towards me. “We found this in Lyla’s room after she left. We believe she used it to mask her scent and her pack mark. We have made efforts to find her, Alpha. I swear.”

I stared at the vial, realizing that it might have caused my fever all week and the reason I hadn’t been feeling the mate bond. It all made sense now: Lyla had used it to sever my mark on her neck, and I was only suffering from the side effects of the wolfsbane.

While I considered the new information, Clarissa, Lyla’s sister, stepped forward. Her eyes darted nervously between her parents before she spoke.

“If… if the Lycan Leader is desperate to find Lyla,” she started hesitantly. “There might be someone who knows where she went.”

“Who?” I demanded, walking back to the girl.

“Nathan,” she said. “Lyla’s friend.”

“Nathan?” Alpha Logan and his wife exchanged confused glances. “But how would he know?”

Clarissa took a deep breath as if she was about to say an abomination. “On the night Lyla left,… I followed her,” she admitted. “I was worried about her and wanted to say my goodbyes. I followed her to the boundary of our world with the humans. That’s where I saw her with Nathan. They were talking for a while, hugged before she left.”

The name sent a jolt of anger and jealousy through me. Nathan, again?

“Why didn’t you mention this before?” Her father demanded.

“I… I didn’t think it was important,” she shrank back. “And I didn’t want Nathan to get in trouble.”

I stepped forward, growing annoyed by the images of Nathan hugging Lyla. “We need to speak with Nathan immediately,” I said. “Where can we find him?”

“He lives next compound, in the Beta quarters. I’ll have someone escort you…”

“That won’t be necessary,” I threw over my shoulders, already walking back to the Pack House gates.