Mated to the Alpha: Sold to the King

Lorelei POV

"Do you believe in prophecies?"

I watched Kaelen’s face carefully as I asked, searching for any hint that he might dismiss the question, but instead, his expression slowly turned serious.

"Sometimes," he answered, his voice dropping into a quiet rumble as he shifted slightly and looked down into my eyes. "Why?"

I took a deep breath, trying to steady the tremor in my chest before telling him everything Princess Nala had said, from the vision of a relentless storm tearing us apart to the strange word Vekhara.

A word Prince Kalu had mentioned meant death is on its way.

By the time I finished explaining everything, Kaelen’s expression had hardened, his entire demeanor suddenly turning cold and serious. His arm tightened around my waist, pulling me closer against him as though he genuinely believed I might disappear from his arms at any moment.

"What do you think?" I asked softly, searching his amber eyes. "Will someone die?"

His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed, his dark gaze remaining fixed on mine.

"What if it was about your maid? Skye?" he asked, and my brows drew together at the suggestion because, until this moment, I hadn’t even considered it.

"What makes you think she’s the one who was meant to die?" I asked.

"Did she not almost die?" Kaelen asked quietly. "She was poisoned. She was literally on the brink of death. And from what you told me about Nala’s prophecy, the storm was supposed to pull us apart, wasn’t it?"

His hold around me tightened slightly.

"Isn’t that exactly what happened after the incident? I let my anger cloud my judgment, I pushed you away, and you almost left me forever."

As I listened to him, a cold realization slowly settled over me.

It made sense.

Everything we had just gone through over the past few days seemed to mirror Nala’s vision almost perfectly. The storm had come, tearing through everything between us and nearly taking Skye’s life in the process.

Seeing this, Kaelen’s expression softened as the tension slowly left his jaw. He pulled back just enough to press a long, tender kiss against my forehead.

"But now that it’s all resolved and we’re together again, stronger than ever..." He rested his chin against the top of my head, his fingers absently tracing little patterns along my arm. "I want to know more about you. About Lorelei."

I raised an eyebrow, unable to resist the slight tease in my voice. "Not the rogue?"

A soft chuckle vibrated through his chest. "Not the rogue."

A small smile tugged at my lips, but inside, my thoughts were already beginning to spiral. Where would I even start? Should I tell him about the curse? About how I had been marked as cursed since birth?

My fingers twitched against the sheets as memories of everything I had endured over the years came rushing back, and I quickly pushed them down again. We had only just found our footing with each other. Was it really too soon to burden him with something this heavy?

Right now, I just wanted to hold on to this rare moment of peace a little longer.

"Raven said you were being abused."

Kaelen’s cold, stern voice cut straight through my thoughts, making me flinch slightly.

He paused, watching me with an intensity that made it impossible to look away for long. The anger burning beneath his amber eyes was barely contained.

"She refused to give me the details, and honestly..." His jaw tightened as he looked away for a moment. "I’m still too much of a coward to ask anyone else about it. So..."

His voice trailed off, leaving the question hanging between us.

"I was," I whispered.

The words barely left my lips, so quiet and fragile that they almost disappeared into the room.

I lowered my gaze, desperately trying to force the memories back into the dark corners of my mind where I had kept them for so long. My hands curled into tight fists against the duvet, my knuckles slowly turning white as I fought to keep myself together.

Kaelen noticed immediately.

Without saying anything, he reached down and covered one of my clenched hands with his broad, warm palm, his touch gentle enough to ground me without making me feel trapped.

"You don’t have to talk about it right now if you’re not ready," he murmured softly.

With agonizing care, he gently pried my fingers open one by one before interlocking his hand with mine, and the simple, protective gesture somehow made the rest of my rigid body finally relax.

It was funny how you could convince yourself that you had completely moved on from your trauma, only for everything to come rushing back the moment it was placed directly in front of you again.

Now I couldn’t help wondering if I would ever truly be ready to face Jaxen when the time came.

Kaelen squeezed my hand, pulling me closer until my face was tucked against the warm skin of his neck.

"You’ll be my wife soon anyway," he whispered into my hair, his voice carrying such unwavering certainty that a quiet shiver moved through my chest. "So I’ve got all the time in the world to wait."

The casual way he brought it up again made me lift my head to look at him, deciding to test the waters.

"Were you actually serious when you asked me to marry you?"

Kaelen paused, staring down at me with genuine confusion. "Yes. Why wouldn’t I be?"

His brow furrowed, and the confusion in his expression quickly shifted into something much more intense as he searched my eyes.

"Do you really not want to marry me?"

"It’s not that I don’t..." I hesitated, struggling to untangle the mess of thoughts twisting inside my chest. "It’s just, like I said before... don’t you think everything is happening too fast?"

Deep down, I knew it was probably my trauma speaking.

With Jaxen, I had been forced to wait for years, constantly strung along by a fragile thread of empty promises that eventually snapped and left me with nothing.

Now a part of me was terrified to trust a promise this big, especially when everything between Kaelen and me had changed so quickly.

Kaelen shifted, leaning closer until his deep voice rumbled softly against my ear. "But I want you to carry my child. How can you do that if you aren’t my wife?"

A soft chuckle escaped me despite the heaviness that had settled between us, and I shook my head slightly. "You really do want a child, don’t you? That’s pretty much all I ever hear you talk about."

The second he heard the teasing note in my voice, Kaelen’s fierce expression completely softened. For a brief moment, he looked almost like a young boy who had just been caught red-handed with his hand in the cookie jar.

But instead of pulling away, his broad hand slowly slid down my waist before coming to rest gently against my stomach. The warmth of his palm seeped through my skin as he looked at me with an honesty that made my chest tighten.

"I really do," he whispered, all traces of the proud Alpha King disappearing from his voice and leaving behind nothing but raw, unfiltered honesty. "Aside from seeing you with a baby bump... having a child who carries my blood, someone I can give all the love and warmth I never got growing up..."

His voice softened even further.

"That’s been my biggest dream, even when I was just a child myself."

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