Alpha’s Black Furred Slave Mate
Chapter 39

It's been almost a week since Mateo was taken from me; my body felt numb, and I no longer felt like my own person. I still had to study though and maintain my grades at school; I was lucky enough that I haven't been discovered yet. I told everyone that I wasn't allowed to remove my hair wrapping due to personal religious reasons. Religion has always been a touchy subject for almost everybody, so nobody really questioned me any further on it.

I've been reading a lot in the academy's library about politics and about how the noblemen's spot isn't as stable as everyone thinks. They are always in jeopardy of being overthrown and if the king finds you disagreeable with his rules, he can either have you killed or replaced.

I thought about how Marlon signed away the rights of slaves and couldn't help but wonder if it was because he wanted to due to being a racist pig, or because the king made him. Lately, I've been seeing Marlon a bit differently; he's shown me his more vulnerable side and opened himself up to me.

"Why do I feel like you're avoiding us?" Moira's voice cut through my train of thought as I continued to study in the library.

I jumped, startled, as Moira and Odette made their way over to me.

"Yeah, what are you hiding?" Odette asked; both looked anything but happy.

I was starting to run out of excuses as to why I couldn't hang out with them, so I began avoiding them. Now that was starting to catch up to me as well.

"Nothing," I told them a little too quickly as I shut my textbook. "I've just had a lot going on lately."

"There's always an excuse with you. I thought we were friends," Moira said, sitting down at my table.

"We are," I told them. "I just don't have a social life outside of school. Religious reasons."

I could tell from their faces that they weren't buying my lie. That's when I saw Odette's eyes staring at my hair wrapping; curiosity was in her eyes. I felt my heart racing against my chest and my nerves began to get the best of me. Standing to my feet, I scrambled backward.

"I'm sorry, ladies. I can't talk right now. But we can catch up later, okay?" I said.

I didn't wait for them to answer before I was already leaving the library. I went about the rest of my day and then returned to the manor where Marlon was waiting for me as usual. I wasn't about to tell him how I was almost discovered by two girls I had never mentioned to him before. I'm not supposed to make friends at this school; I'm not supposed to speak to anybody while at school.

Marlon expects me to keep my head down, do my work, and then return to the manor to complete my duties for the rest of the day. If he knew I was speaking to people and making friends, he would have my head.

I did my normal chores for the afternoon; cleaned Marlon's bedroom/make his bed, tidied up his study without being too nosey and looking through his documents, and brought him his evening meal and whatever else he wanted.

I couldn't stop thinking about what I had read about the king disapproving of his rules being disagreed upon. I wondered if Marlon ever once disagreed with the king's new treaty, or if he willingly signed the documents because of his hate for dark-furred slaves. If that was the case, where did that leave me? It still made no sense as to why he would keep me alive and start acting as though he cared for me.

"I read something while at school earlier," I found myself saying to him as he signed some documents in his study.

He glanced up at me, his lips thinning as he disapproved of me interrupting him. I ignored his gaze though and continued speaking.

"That a nobleman's ranking can be overthrown quite easily at any wrong move. That includes a disagreement with the king's orders," I said.

He frowned, staring around my features, and wondering where I was getting at.

"I guess I was just wondering if you ever felt like your ranking was in jeopardy," I finished, softening my tone.

"All the time," he answered without missing a beat.

I wasn't expecting an actual answer from him, and I appreciated his honesty.

"There are men that would kill to be where I'm at. I'm not safe anywhere. That's why I keep so many guards on hand and hardly leave the manor unless it's business-related. The Roessler's are anything but safe," he explained.

I frowned; I had no idea he was constantly in danger. But that didn't compare to what I've been through while on the slave farm. That didn't compare to what any dark-furred wolf goes through once they are ripped from their homes and placed on these farms to become slaves. I felt sick just thinking about it.

"When you signed away my rights as a dark-furred wolf and got me sent to the slave farm, was it because you felt like you needed to, or because you wanted to?" I heard myself asking; I could feel my tone growing weak with each word I spoke.

He looked up at me, surprised at my question.

"Excuse me?" He asked; he creased his eyebrows in a questioning manner.

"Did you want to send dark-furred wolves to the slave farm?" I asked him again; I wasn't sure this was an answer I wanted to know, but it was something I needed to know.

He was silent for a moment, weighing my question on his mind as he stared at me with shock plain in his eyes.

I could feel my wolf growing uneasy because she too was nervous about his answer. I kept my stance as we stared at one another.

After, what felt like a lifetime, he broke eye contact and turned back toward his papers.

"What kind of question is that?" He muttered.

He was avoiding the answer, which made my heart sink deep into my stomach. There was only one reason as to why he would avoid answering my question and it was because he knew I wouldn't like the answer.

"I had a family," I told him; tears building up in my eyes.

His knuckles grew white as he gripped the pen he was holding.

"A mother and a father," I continued. "They were commoners. Adopted me when I was 3 years old. I don't remember my birth parents. But my adopted parents were the only ones I knew of. They showed me love and trust. They showed me what it felt like to have an actual family. They made me feel safe. I was able to gain an education. They taught me good and bad. They were my safe haven, and I would be nothing without them."

"Why are you telling me this?" He asked, without looking at me.

"Because the day the king passed his new treaty, was the day everything changed for me. I was ripped from the only home I knew..." My voice cracked as I spoke. He looked over at me and met my eyes; I saw almost sadness flashing through them. "My mother tried to fight for me to stay, but they were too strong for her and took me anyways. They shackled my limps and my neck. I couldn't breathe and I was terrified of where we were going to go. They rounded me up amongst others and boarded us on a cart. We traveled for hours without food, water, or rest. They threw us on these farms like we were nothing but a bag of shit and treated us even worse."

Tears were now flooding down my cheeks. My lips were quivering as I spoke, and I had to stop to collect my thoughts once again.

"It's because of men like you that made that happen for wolves like me..." I said in a broken whisper. "I don't even know what happened to my family... I don't know if they are alive or dead..."

He sighed and put his pen down.

"Deonna," he said my name with such ease now that it gave me chills down my spine. "You need to understand how I grew up. The same way you grew up thinking the worst about the higher hierarchy, I grew up thinking the worst about the lower hierarchy and the bottom of the barrel. All I knew was that dark-furred wolves were gutter trash dirtballs. Dirty, uninteresting, uneducated, and disgusting creatures. I grew up thinking they shouldn't be allowed to repopulate, and that the world would be better if it was only lighter- furred wolves. That's what I was taught and that was all I knew. I made a lot of mistakes in my life, but I always thought they were for the greater good. So, when the king presented his new treaty for us to sign, it was a no-brainer."

He paused so that I could gather the information he threw at me. He was being so honest with me, and I didn't know how to respond. I was expecting more of a fight, but maybe he didn't have any fight left in him.

I wanted to be angry with him, but he was right. I grew up thinking the worst about the higher hierarchy. Thought they were racist pigs that had no heart and only wanted to see us suffer. That might be true for most light-furred wolves, that didn't mean they were all like that and that didn't mean the ones that were like that understood what it meant and why they hated us.

It appears Marlon was one of them that didn't understand his ranking and why it mattered. He also didn't seem to understand why dark-furred wolves were hated. He thought he did, but something seemed to be changing his mind. Or someone.

"It wasn't until you showed up that I realized, maybe we were wrong," Marlon added, looking back at his papers.