<h4>Chapter 148: Chapter 148: You Are Mine, Kael</h4>


    Meriya’s POV~


    <fne092> Read full story at F?nd-Novel</fne092>


    The entire day I could not think of anything else. It was buzzing in my mind like a swarm of bees, loud and restless, and all I could see before my eyes was Kael—and the way he might look at me if only I could shine brightly enough to catch his gaze.


    "For just once... just once," I whispered under my breath, my lips trembling as if I were praying. "For a single heartbeat... look at me. Only me."


    My alphas. The ones who should have been mine long ago.


    It has been a year, an entire year, since that bitch died, and still their eyes carry mourning for her, still their hearts are shackled to her memory, as if she had not already stolen enough when she was alive.


    "Rot in your grave, Selene," I hissed, quiet enough that no one else could hear. "Rot and choke on the worms until there’s nothing left. You’ve stolen enough. Enough!"


    Sometimes I swear I want to drag her out of her grave with my bare hands and kill her again and again, until she never dares to appear before me in this life or another.


    All my life I had worked for this. From childhood I shaped myself into perfection, I carried myself with the grace of a queen because I knew one day I would be their queen, the one who walked beside them.


    Yet no matter how hard I tried, no matter how much I polished myself, I was always overshadowed. Always. By her.


    "Selene, Selene, Selene..." I spat the name like poison. "Even dead, your shadow still ws at me. How much longer must I endure your ghost?"


    She was the dazzling one, the beautiful one, the clever one, the kind one. The one everyone praised as if she were some goddess fallen from the skies.


    "She had beauty, she had wit, she had a heart of gold..." I mimicked in a sing-song mockery, my face twisting. "And what did I have? Nothing? No. I had everything—everything except their eyes!"


    But it was still bearable once, because in those days she was promised to my cousin, her fate bound elsewhere, and she never stood in my path.


    Until she did. Until she stepped into the lives of my alphas. The men who had been mine since before I could even spell their names.


    The four of them, shining like stars, admired and envied by all, dazzling and powerful—everything a girl could ever dream of. And they were mine. They were supposed to be mine. Everyone said so.


    "I was promised," I reminded the empty air, my voice cracking into augh. "Promised to them. Everyone knew. Everyone said so!"


    I believed it with all my heart. I became the perfect model of what they would admire, respect, and love. And yet when I returned... she was already there.


    That bitch. That cursed thief. Living under their roof, serving them, breathing their air, stealing their attention with her false sweetness and her cursed beauty.


    And in no time... they forgot me.


    I can never forget the humiliation. The day of our mating ceremony—I stood waiting at the altar, waiting to be marked, and all of them turned away.


    "They left me," I whispered, clutching my own arms as though to keep from shattering. "They left me standing there like a fool while the whole packughed. They left me for her."


    Do they know how I burned that day? Do they know how my soul cracked as I stood there alone, every eye on me, pitying, mocking, whispering?


    "Not enough," I muttered bitterly. "That’s what they said with their eyes. Not enough. Never enough."


    I snapped back from the sea of my memories when I saw him—the man I had admired my entire life. He stepped into the hall with that same unshakable aura, tall andmanding, and my heart was already shining with love just because he had appeared.


    "Kael..." I breathed, his name escaping me like a prayer and a curse entwined.


    For a moment it felt like the world had stopped breathing, and everything else blurred, because he was here. My Kael. And all I wanted was to step close to him, to touch even the edge of his sleeve, but when I reached out—when I dared to take that single step—he turned.


    And said only one word that shattered me into dust.


    "Enough, Meriya. Don’t touch what is not yours."


    The words cut deeper than any de.


    My lips trembled, and a broken whisper fell out: "Not mine? Not mine? Then whose, Kael? Tell me—hers?"


    That dead bitch? That whore who could not even crawl out of the grave, who was buried six feet under without a mark left to remember her by? Was she still standing between me and him, even in death?


    "How pathetic," I sneered, though my eyes burned. "Loving a corpse. Chained to a ghost."


    My nails dug into my palms until I felt the sharp sting of blood. I stood humiliated once again, in front of the entire hall, by the man I had once believed to be my destiny.


    But no tears fell. I would not give them that.


    "One day," I whispered fiercely to myself. "One day you will be mine, Kael. And that day... you will regret every word you ever spat at me. Every wound. Every humiliation."


    But then I followed his gaze.


    And I saw her.


    A nobody. A pretty little servant with no name, no status, no worth. Yet his eyes were locked on her with an intensity that made my stomach twist with fury.


    He was looking at her as if she were something precious, as if he wanted to devour her whole.


    "And what about me?" I whispered hoarsely. "What about the woman who bled for you? Who polished herself into perfection for you?"


    My anger rose so high it was like a storm inside me, and all I wanted in that moment was to rip that girl apart. To crush her beneath my heel and throw her broken body at his feet so he would finally see—no one could stand between me and him.


    "How dare you steal his gaze from me?" I whispered to her across the hall, my lips curling into a smile that felt like venom. "How dare he give it to you when I am still here?"