The Delta's Daughter Chapter 136

TALA

Initiation week. The week I dreaded every year.

Once upon a time, when I was a little girl, I used to dream of finding my mate. He would whisk me away to his kingdom, because of course he would be a prince in my childhood fantasy. He would love and cherish me, give me gifts of jewels, I would wear a crown and we would live happily ever after.

Unfortunately, as I grew older that fairytale began to fade. Instead, nightmares of being mated began to override the sweet innocent dreams the older I got. The older I got the more I realized how much my mother hated my father, and the more I realized how fucked up their bond was.

They were true mates, but I always questioned if they actually loved each other at one point or not. And if they did, where did it all go wrong Oh, that’s right, my father’s unfaithful ways are where it went wrong. Why would the Moon Goddess pair my mother with a man as hateful and greedy as him What had my mother done so horribly to deserve him as a mate

Needless to say, I grew up watching my father screw woman after woman, and I don’t mean that as in he brought them home and then took them to bed. I wish. No, he actually brought these slave women to the dinner table, bent them over in front of my mother, sister, and me, and had his way. He would laugh when the pain would hit my mother and after he had finished with the woman he would take my mother upstairs, fuck her, and beat her.

It was a wonder she was still alive. Even at the tender age of 11, I remember him having a string of these slave women come to the palace. He would invite all the rich men, bankers, business owners, and anyone who had their pockets lined. His lords, he would call them, like he was some super important king.

I scoffed at the thought.

It wasn’t until a few years after that I realized, this was what he called initiation week. All the newly acquired female slaves would be served up as a dish to these men. Initiated into their new way of life, they became whores, whether they wanted to be or not. Used and abused however the men who owned them for the night wished to treat them. They would pay my father a great deal of money to possess a slave girl for the night.

The girls were usually shifter/human hybrids because they could take a beating and then some, plus they were able to recover, unlike humans. Every now and then one of the girls would be a full-blooded shifter. The girls came from all over the realm, kidnapped, and shipped to this living hell to serve as nothing but meat. Some were as young as 16, never any younger.

It still didn’t make it right.

Then there were the male slaves, thrown into the arena barracks, forced to fight as entertainment to this pack and a few others around. My father called them Gladiators, and huge wagers would be placed on either them or whoever and whatever they were made to fight against.

They were chipped with an invention my sister and Orion had concocted, an inhibitor that controlled your animal counterpart to some degree, making it impossible for the Gladiator slave to shift without killing himself. Slaves to technology and slaves to my father's sick games.

The worst thing was, that these Gladiator slaves were also stolen from their homes. They came in all ranks from Alphas to rogues. If they were no good for fighting, one of two things would happen to them, they would either be fed to my father’s pets, alive. Or they would become slave whores for those with that particular taste.

I truly hated my father, my wolf Mora even refused to acknowledge him as our father and often got us in trouble when she refused to submit to him resulting in a good beating.

Why hadn’t I left and escaped this god-forsaken place Because I knew I would feel guilty if I just left my mother and then there was Eloise and Jasper, I couldn’t leave, if I did I knew they would be the ones to suffer the Alpha’s wrath.

Jasper's mother, Alice, the Beta female had been preparing the palace for the past month, just for initiation week. She was a meek woman with light blond hair and beautiful honey-colored eyes. If her husband said jump, she wouldn’t even ask how high, she would just do it.

I had entered the grand foyer, coming from the kitchen to grab water when I found her holding a clipboard and looking around.

“Ahh, Tala!” She called out cheerily, always trying to find the bright side of life. “I have your mother's medication, I think it would be best if we just knocked her out for the week, what do you think”

I had to take a moment to still my tongue. It completely stunned me how she could act so casual about having to sedate my mother because my father would be having the orgy of his life this whole week. I rolled my eyes at her not even sure what to say. I should be used to this at 21 years old but I’m not sure I ever could, and nor did I want to.

“Don’t worry, I have some for myself, Baron said he would only participate on one night and would let me know what night that was.” Her smug grin was way too pleasing to herself. Like she had the best mate in the world because he would only betray her one night and he was letting her know ahead of time.

This was so wrong. Is this how every pack functioned I didn’t ever want to find my mate and I never wanted to be marked. To hell with that if this is how it goes.

“Yeah, just give the medication to me, I will be staying with her. I can take care of her.” I managed to give her a very small fake smile.

“Oh no, Tala! You have to be present, both you and Jasper. Alpha will be announcing your mating on the opening day of the games.” She clasped her hands together, a dreamy look on her face. “All the surrounding Alpha’s will be there for opening day and all the richest families will be attending. It's going to be the best opening day in a long time. Then in the evening, we have the ball and the slave girls will be presented. This will be Jasper's first year he gets to attend the slave girl auction.”