Chapter 3: Done With the Pack

Amanda's POV 

“What did you just say?” Duncan demanded, finally standing from the bed, hastily dressing as if the words I had just spoken had jolted him out of the spell Kattie had wrapped him in. 

Even Kattie froze, eyes wide in shock. Before, I had always clung to Duncan, never wanting to let him go, excusing his coldness and punishments, even when she was the one clearly in the wrong. 

I had hoped, year after year, that he would change, that he would see me for who I was and accept me fully. But now, seeing him shift so violently at my defiance, I realized just how much control he had always held over me and how little of it had been mine.

“You’re an omega, Amanda. A servant as well, and an orphan with no one to fall back on. Without me, you’re nothing. How dare you speak to me in that manner?” he snapped, his words slicing through the air, laced with authority and venom.

“You rejected me three years ago, Duncan,” I said, my voice steady despite the storm raging in my chest. “I am only finally accepting that rejection. Why does that seem to rile you up?”

“Stop trying to act tough, Amanda. You and I both know that Duncan is speaking the truth. Just stay as he wants you to. Stop trying to provoke him. He wants you to remain his mate so don’t push your luck with emotional blackmail,” Kattie spat, rising from the bed, the mark on her neck blazing like a defiant challenge.

She had shifted her clothing just enough to reveal it fully to mock me.

“Shouldn’t you be happy with what I want to do?” I asked, voice cutting through the tension. “After all, you’d be the first person to benefit when your Duncan and I are free of the mate bond binding us together.”

Her face faltered, and for a brief moment, she had nothing to say. My words had hit home. She would indeed benefit, first and foremost, from my absence.

“Duncan, she’s right. Look at it this way,” Kattie spoke, voice trembling slightly as she attempted to reason with him. “She’s finally accepting the rejection, which is something we’ve always wanted. She…” But Duncan didn’t seem to want to hear any of it.

“You’re mine, Amanda, and you’ll only be free when I want you to be. If it’s because I marked Kattie that you’re acting this way, you need to understand why I did it. You’re wolfless, and I didn’t want the people to bully you. That’s why I took Kattie as my Luna. You still have all your rights as my mate, you…”

“Just stop it, Duncan!” I shouted, cutting him off. If it had been any other time, I might have been too happy to hear this from him, mistaking it for care or consideration. I would have believed that he truly saw me, that he had considered me.

Earlier today, I had even felt a flicker of hope, a stirring of my wolf, and I had wanted to tell him about the strength I felt coursing through me. I had imagined that he would mark me publicly, claim me at last, and that I would finally wolf out in response to the bond we shared. A tear streaked down my cheek, but I wiped it quickly, refusing to let him see it.

“You’re nothing without me, Amanda. And unless I give you permission to accept my rejection, a wolfless reject like you has no right to!” His voice had shifted now, dark and possessive.

He didn’t want me to accept his rejection. He didn’t want to lose his strength. He didn’t want to become weak. Three long years I had endured the agony of being rejected by him, clinging to the hope that he would accept me again. And now, the cruel irony of him not wanting that same pain settled in.

“I, Amanda Patrick, accept your rejection, Duncan. Our bond shall be annulled, and we are nothing together anymore!” I shouted, my voice steady despite the storm inside me.

“How dare you, Amanda?” Duncan roared, collapsing to the floor as the weight of my words hit him. Pain twisted his features, his body trembling in a way I had never seen him before.

“I am an alpha, and I have alpha blood in my veins! Do you think you can survive this rejection? Go down on your knees and apologize to me! If not…” His voice broke into a threat, though he could barely rise, clutching the floor, as Kattie scrambled beside him to help.

I winced at the sight, feeling a pang of sympathy but not nearly as deep as the years of pain I had carried in silence. I had suffered silently, enduring his rejection and disregard.

He had never acknowledged it. I had lived with the weight of every dismissal and nothing had come from my endurance.

And now he writhed on the floor, acting as if my words had struck him to his very core. I thought bitterly to myself. Why was Duncan acting as though the pain of rejection would kill him, when I had carried it for years without complaint? I had behaved better than this, despite being an omega, despite being “weak.” Did he realize, finally, that perhaps I was stronger than he was?

“Take back those words, Amanda!” he snapped again, blood flecking his lips as he coughed violently. “This is your last chance! I’ll mark you too. I’ll make you the Luna! Whatever you want!” His voice was raw with desperation now, crawling toward me, trying to reclaim what he had lost.

“What are you saying, Duncan? What do you mean by that?” Kattie questioned, pulling his face to her, but he shoved her away, pushing forward, his eyes focused entirely on me.

I had never expected it to be like this. Not that simply accepting his rejection would send him into such a state, making promises I no longer had any interest in. I felt a strange satisfaction, but also a weariness knowing that this was not truly him. 

Footsteps approached behind me, and I turned to see the guards entering the room. And then, to my surprise, Duncan’s father appeared, his face twisted with disgust as he looked at his son.

“Why did you reject him, Amanda?” he snapped at me. 

I stared at him, confused. His son had rejected me years ago. He knew it. He had only forced him to take me because of that rejection.  He had known all along that his son would weaken if I accepted the rejection, and that was precisely why they had tried to make me stay, why they had tried to chain me to this life.

“I’ll be leaving the pack,” I said firmly, my voice echoing in the room, “since nothing ties me here anymore…”

“I’ll pronounce you a rogue, Amanda! I’ll term you an outcast and make everyone treat you like an outlaw if you dare leave! You know how they are treated like nothing!” Duncan spat, rage and fear mingling in his voice.

I was already used to being treated like nothing, so his threats barely registered. I glared at him, my silence a defiance he did not want to accept. 

“Don’t let her leave the pack!” he suddenly ordered his guards, noticing how adamant I was. “If she dares leave this pack, I’ll have every member of your families beheaded!”

I froze, shocked at the cruelty of the threat but I did not bend. Years of being treated as nothing had steeled me. I had nothing left to fear from them, nothing left to lose, and everything to reclaim.