Winter’s POV

I gasped in stupefaction, falling back to the ground with heavy aches in my heart and tears blurring my vision. There was so much bitterness building in my stomach that I couldn’t help but laugh out loud and cry simultaneously.

“I’m not going to ask you why you thought to exchange your child for another. But why haven’t you thought of trying to get back your child and return Winter?” The alpha continued his inquiry.

Mother looked down at the floor, kneeling on all fours.

“She’s in a place far better than being with me. What would my daughter gain by living with a poor servant like me? I was satisfied with watching her soar high from afar….”

“Where’s this daughter you speak of?” He asked her.

I held my breath in suspense, shivering and whimpering.

Mother looked at me then her gaze slowly moved away and rested somewhere behind the Alpha. I looked in the direction and saw that Janna and Dorra were standing there.

“Do not waste my time, woman!” The alpha bellowed, jolting us again with the thick sound of his voice.

Before anything else could happen, Janna lunged forward, “My love, please don’t entertain this witch and her daughter. They’re only trying to deceive us!”

The Alpha turned slightly, frowning, “Are you trying to say I’m incapable of deciphering whether I’m being deceived or not?”

“No, my love…I…just…”

“Then step back and don’t interfere,” he warned.

Janna stepped back reluctantly, and I could sense the tension around her demeanor, but I was too bothered with my own predicament to think about her.

“Go on,” he urged again.

Mother started crying; she looked up again in the direction Janna and Dorra were and pointed her index finger at Dorra.

“That’s my daughter…”

A loud noise rented the air, and I was equally shocked and was beginning to think it was all some kind of joke. Dorra, with anger, lurched at mother, pushing her roughly to the ground.

“Are you out of your senses, you filthy hag? Who is your daughter? Are you mad?”

The alpha signaled for the men to lift Dorra off our mother, but the latter kept kicking at her angrily.

“I told you not to entertain these foul-tongued insects! What a sacrilege! How dare you say the alpha’s daughter is yours, have you no fear?” Janna seethed angrily.

“It seems like you desperately want to lose your head,” the alpha bent slowly and angrily grabbed my mother by the jaw.

Pained, I crawled over to where they were and tried to help out. More tears streamed down my mother’s face.

“I swear on my life and my daughter’s that she’s mine. That very woman over there came to me that night with Winter,” she cried, pointing at Janna.

Janna angrily picked out a pitchfork from the leftover embers from the earlier ritual and aimed it at my mother in a fleeting moment, stabbing her with it. I gasped in shock, and so did the onlookers as mother gagged out blood and fell to the ground with a pitchfork in her stomach.

“Mother!” I screamed at the top of my voice and held her up, crying, “Stay with me…mother please…mother!”

She continued gagging up more blood. She looked at the Alpha and managed to say, “Please….come clos…closer…my…l—lord…”

The alpha stooped near her and said, “Save your strength. A doctor will be here any moment.”

She shook her head, “No…I won’t make it. Trust—me…Winter is your—daugh—ter…daughter. Birthmark. She has…her mother’s…birthmark…Please take —good care of—my…my….”

Mother’s body went limp.

I screamed and shouted, cried out my lungs as I held my mother’s dead body to my chest. The Alpha stood up, staggering a little. I continued crying there in the dust and calling for her to wake up. Just then, the alpha’s booming voice startled everyone and shook everything back to silence. Still sobbing, I turned to look.

He grabbed Janna by the throat, “I thought I told you not to interfere,” he seethed as she struggled to breathe, “you had to do that in my presence!”

If the beta and the other chiefs hadn’t persuaded the alpha to calm down, he would probably have strangled her to death right there. He threw her off, and she fell to the ground, coughing violently and holding her throat while she managed to say with a burning stare.

“I did what you failed to do!” She seethed.

Janna sniffled, still sitting on the floor. From the way she looked, she was obviously boiling with anger. I continued to hold my mother close to myself and whimpered silently in grief.

“Mother,” Dorra called amidst tears as she tried to help Janna up.

But Janna pushed Dorra harshly away, and she fell to the ground. All eyes were now turned in their direction. “Don’t you dare call me your mother. I am not your mother, you filthy thing!” She fumed.

“Mother!” Dorra called in a shaky voice.

Janna shouted again like a mad woman, “I said I don’t want to hear that word! I’ve endured hearing that word for years now. I can’t take it anymore!” Janna screamed.

Dorra burst out crying again as she tried to calm Janna down, “You must be exhausted, mother. Let me take you inside.”

Janna jerked her hand away and got up on her own.

My brows furrowed as I was surprised that Janna was now denying Dorra. Did it mean everything my mother said was true? Or was she just acting up because she was Dorra’s stepmother?

“So everything that woman said was the truth?” The alpha asked. Janna didn’t respond and started to walk away from the scene. The alpha laughed out loud. I guessed the shock of everything was also taking a toll on him.

In my own fury, I got up from where I was seated and went to kneel in front of the Alpha, with tears streaming down my face.

“My mother was just killed in front of me! Why’s no one doing anything? Why aren’t you saying anything?!” I screamed in anguish and kicked around in the sand, “Are you just going to ignore everything because we’re servants?” I sobbed, looking at him with tear-filled eyes.

If not for how terrible I felt at that time, I would never have had the guts to speak to the Alpha in such a manner.

He looked at me with a frown and stooped down to my level. I shifted back a little. He then grabbed my arm, and I shook with fear.

Before I could process anything, he reached out and flipped my long red hair over my shoulder, then ripped the back of my dress a little enough to make my back bare. I shrieked as I felt the chilly air of approaching dawn touch my back. I let out muffled tears.

“She has the birthmark!” The Alpha muttered in a shaky voice.

I froze in his touch. He held his large hands to my face and I saw they were glistening with tears.

“My child…” He managed to say again, as his voice gave way to muffled sobs.

I shook my head, desperately wanting to disagree with everything. This had to be a bad dream. I’d probably wake up from it soon.

“Now that I look up close, you do look like your mother,” he cried again.

I let out shivering gasps because I didn’t know how to react. A lot had happened in just one night, and different emotions were brewing inside me.

The Alpha pulled me into his chest and wrapped his arms around me in a tight hug as his strong hands cradled my head. I just remained mute, watching how they carried my mother’s body away from my sight.

Tears poured down my eyes.