MARKED FOR PRETEND - Chapter 44: Chapter 44

Chelsea had stopped counting the days.She didn't know how many days had passed since she saw her parents in the realm or since she had been crowned "Lady Krippa" by a people who smiled too much and bowed too low.
Time moved differently here. Or maybe it didn't move at all.There were no sunrises, no sunsets. Just a skyless glow that pressed in from every corner of the Keepers' compound.
The windows in this realm showed no sky, just light, shifting , changing, always watching.
They called her chosen. They treated her like power wrapped in silk. But under it all... she was still a girl who had lost her home. Her wolf. Her mate.
And it was starting to eat her from the inside.They fed her like royalty. Dressed her like prophecy. Spoke to her like she was some long-awaited answer. But none of it mattered. Because every time she closed her eyes, all she saw was him.
His eyes, his mark and his silence before she vanished.
She hadn’t shifted since she arrived. Her wolf lay silent but not gone like it was waiting, watching. Pacing just beneath her skin. Her magic, though… it had grown sharper. Hungrier. Sometimes it sparked at her fingertips when she was dreaming. Once, she’d shattered a glass just by whispering Kaden’s name.
And last night, she had cried. Not loud. Not soft. Just… silent tears in the dark, curled on the cold stone floor, wishing someone would say her name and mean it.
And now, the silence stretched between them like a noose.
⸻
She was seated on a cushion, legs curled beneath her, The knock came at the usual hour. And when the door creaked open, it was her again the only servant who ever looked like she wasn’t born here. A girl stepped in slight, no older than sixteen, freckled skin, dark curls pinned beneath a scarf, and eyes too nervous to meet hers.
She moved with practiced quiet, placing a tray on the table and bowing.
“Wait,” Chelsea said softly.
The girl froze.
I’ve seen you before,” Chelsea said. “In the hall. You never bow as low as the others.”
The girl hesitated. Then gave a tiny shrug. “I was raised outside.”
“Outside where?”
“The warded lands. My mother was a healer. They took her for refusing to give her visions to the High Circle. I was… kept.”
“What’s your name?”
A pause.
“Bevy,” she whispered. “Lady.”
Chelsea winced at the title. “Don’t call me that.”
Bevy hesitated. Then slowly looked up really looked at her.
Just Bevy?”
Bevy nodded. “It’s enough.”
There was something in her voice — something cracked but not broken. Chelsea knew that sound. She had worn it herself once.
There was something in Bevy’s eyes. Fear, yes… but something else. Something like recognition.
Why are you still here, Bevy?”
Bevy met her eyes for the first time.
“Because you’re different.”
⸻
The words hit harder than expected. Chelsea sat down, her legs giving out beneath her.
“I don’t feel different,” she whispered. “I feel… caged. Like they dressed the trap in velvet just to make me forget it’s still a cage.”
Bevy stepped forward, voice barely audible. “They’re watching you.”
Chelsea tensed. “Now?”
Bevy shook her head. “Always.”
“Have you seen others like me?” Chelsea asked.
Bevy nodded once.
“Did they sit on that throne?”
Bevy swallowed. “Some tried. None stayed long.”
Chelsea leaned in. “Do you want to help me leave?”
The girl blinked, terrified.
Chelsea’s voice lowered. “Please.”
Then Chelsea said, “Do you think… do you think he’s looking for me?”
Bevy tilted her head. “The Alpha?”
Chelsea nodded, slowly. “Kaden. He marked me. Not in front of the packs. Not for the Selection. It was…” Her voice cracked. “Real. Even if he didn’t believe in fate. Even if he only did it to protect me.”
Her hand found the crescent-shaped mark on her chest.
“I don’t know if he loved me,” she whispered. “But I loved him. Gods, I think I still do.”
And just then — it hit.
Like a wildfire ripping through ice.
Her mark seared. Her body locked. Her lungs forgot how to breathe.
Bevy stepped back in alarm as Chelsea cried out — not in pain, but recognition.
Something had snapped through the bond. Not gently. Not sweetly. But like a beast pounding on a door that had been closed too long.
“Kaden…” she gasped, stumbling against the wall.
A growl — deep and dark and ancient — rolled through her bones.
Mine.
It wasn’t a whisper. It was a claim. A roar through realms and walls and lies.
Chelsea collapsed to her knees, heart racing, the scent of pine and musk hitting her like memory.
He had called for her.
And she had felt him. Bevy’s fingers twitched. And then, just as the air shifted — she looked up again. Eyes wide.
“What was that?”
Chelsea felt it too.
And somewhere, somehow, she felt him.
Kaden.
His voice. His rage. His wolf.
A growl through the bond. Not heard — felt.
Mine.
Chelsea stumbled back from the table, hand clutching her chest. Her pulse raced.
Bevy dropped to her knees. “Lady Krippa—”
“I said don’t call me that!”
Her power surged at her fingertips. The light in the room flickered.
Chelsea panted, gripping the edge of the wall, grounding herself. Bevy knelt beside her, wide-eyed.
“That was… that was him?”
Chelsea nodded, breathing hard. “It was the bond. And that wasn’t a call. That was a promise.”
Somewhere out there, Kaden had marked her not just in ceremony — but in truth. And now, that truth had found her.
Even across realms. Even through magic.
⸻
Bevy stood slowly. “You… you still belong to the wolves.”
Chelsea met her gaze, her voice steel.
“No. I belong to him.”
Bevy nodded once — and this time, it wasn’t fear behind her eyes. It was loyalty.
“Then we’ll get you back.”
Bevy lowered her head.
“Then we don’t have much time.”
Chelsea turned to her. “You’ll help me escape?”
Bevy met her eyes — no longer a servant, but something sharper.
“I wasn’t supposed to speak to you. But when I saw you, I knew. You don’t belong here. You belong with him.”
Chelsea’s hands curled into fists.
“Then let’s burn this cage from the inside.”