Chapter 124: Marry Me Travis

Aina

"Where is she? Where is she?"

Aina paced back and forth across the stone patio of the Moonside courtyard, tapping her phone against her palm. The night air was freezing, biting through her clothes, and the entire moonlit courtyard felt eerie and suffocating.

She had received a cryptic text from Molly earlier, demanding she meet her here by eight o’clock. It was now half past nine. Molly was a solid hour and a half late.

Honestly, I should have just gone back inside thirty minutes ago, Aina thought, shivering as a cold gust of wind swept across the grass. I am actually freezing. I should have brought a jacket.

She paused, crossing her arms tightly. Wait. I don’t even own a boy jacket.

She cursed under her breath. She really should have bought her blazer. Instead, she was wearing nothing but a thin, long-sleeve school shirt. In fact, all she had worn lately were long sleeves, purely because she needed to keep Roiner’s name inked into her forearm hidden from prying eyes.

A sharp snap echoed from the dark line of trees behind her.

Aina whipped her head back, her muscles tensing. When she saw the figure stepping out from the shadows of the garden, the tension broke, replaced by sheer irritation.

"Oh, thank goodness," Aina breathed out, exhaling a cloud of cold air. "What took you so long?"

Molly stepped forward into the pale moonlight, wearing a dark cap pulled low over her forehead. "Wait, you can tell it’s me?" Molly whispered defensively.

Aina narrowed her eyes. "Yeah, the cap is doing absolutely nothing for you, girl."

Molly dropped her head, wringing her hands together. "I need your help."

"Oh, I owe you," Aina said, waving a hand. "After what you did for me back at the camp. I’ll do anything for you. What do you want? And why are you being so intensely secretive about it out here in the dead of night?"

Molly swallowed hard, her eyes shining with panic in the dark. "I know that we sort of have this... fake relationship thing going on in public, but... how about a fake marriage?"

Aina froze. She stared at the princess, blinking slowly. "What? I’m sorry, what?"

"Please, I need you to marry me," Molly blurted out, her knees buckling as she dropped straight down onto the cold stone, grabbing the hem of Aina’s shirt. She was begging. "I know it’s a massive thing to ask, but we need to get married today. We need to elope."

Aina stepped back, her hands flying up in defense. "Molly, I... why? I’m sorry, what?! I am completely failing to understand what you want from me here!"

"We need to get married," Molly repeated frantically, her voice trembling. "My parents want me to marry the Rogue King."

Aina blinked again, her brain stalling. "The what? Who? Who?!"

"The Rogue King! The guy who took Jax’s body!"

"Oh," Aina muttered, remembering the horrifying events that involved Jax. "Right. That guy."

"They are forcing me to marry him," Molly sobbed, tears spilling over her lashes. "But I can’t. I don’t want to marry him! So I need to marry you instead, so I don’t have to marry him. You understand this, right?"

Aina crossed her arms, frowning deeply. "Molly, I don’t understand why your parents are making you marry him in the first place."

Molly looked up, her face pale. "You may not know this yet, but my fathers, King Theron and King Alaric, marched a couple of days ago to wipe out the rogue pack."

Aina’s stomach dropped. "Oh, no... I know that. We talked about it in class."

"Do you know that they’re dead?" Molly whispered, her voice breaking entirely. "They lost. We lost miserably."

Aina felt the blood drain from her face. Oh, no. "Oh, no..."

"Yes," Molly cried. "And now the Rogue King is saying he wants to marry me so he won’t take the northern packs. He’s already taking the southern packs, and if I marry him, he stops there."

"So..." Aina pointed a finger at herself, trying to trace the logic. "You want to get married to me so you don’t have to get married to him?"

"Yes!"

"Molly," Aina said slowly, rubbing her temples. "Wouldn’t he still just marry you anyway? It’s not uncommon for omega girls like you to marry more than one alpha."

"Yeah, but he’s... he’s not the sharing type!" Molly pleaded. "So I want to try this!"

Aina shook her head. "Molly, there is something I haven’t told you yet."

"It can’t be important!" Molly shouted, scrambling back onto her feet and grabbing Aina’s wrist. "We need to go right now! I have Robin waiting for us in the car down the road!"

"Molly, seriously, you don’t want to marry me!" Aina insisted, pulling her arm back.

"Who I don’t want to marry is the Rogue King!" Molly fired back.

Aina sighed heavily, knowing she couldn’t keep up the act any longer. "Molly... I have sort of been lying to you."

Molly stared at her, confused. "What are you talking about?"

"I’m a girl," Aina admitted quietly, bracing herself for the fallout. "I’m not Travis Whitelock. I lied about that. I’m Aina Whitelock. I’m sorry... I shouldn’t have kept it from you, but I had to. You have to understand, when I arrived, you were a complete stranger."

Molly stood completely frozen. Her mouth opened, but no words came out.

"You’re a girl?" Molly finally whispered.

"Yes."

Molly stared at her in dead silence for a long moment. Then, she let out a dry, hysterical breath. "You know what? I don’t care. So what if you’re a girl? You’re still going to marry me."

Aina threw her hands up in exasperation. "I am not an alpha girl! I am an omega, just like you! If you marry me, it’s completely stupid, it won’t even count legally!"

Molly blinked, her jaw dropping. "Seriously? An omega too?!"

"Yes!" Aina muttered, pulling back the sleeve of her shirt to reveal the faded, pale ink on her forearm. She held it out under the moonlight. "And look... I’m bonded."

Molly grabbed Aina’s wrist, leaning close to read the name stamped into the skin. "Roiner." She looked up, her eyes wide. "It says Roiner."

"Yeah," Aina mumbled, her cheeks warming up. "I’m bonded to the headmaster."

Molly let out a sudden, breathless laugh of disbelief. "Girl, you’re bonded to the headmaster and you never told me?! That is some top-tier gossip! I would love to sit here and obsess over this if we were anywhere other than a collapsing kingdom!" She gripped Aina’s shoulders again. "But now that you’re bonded to Roiner, if I marry you, I could technically gain pack protection because you are bonded to Roiner!"

Aina grabbed Molly’s shoulders, shaking her gently. "Molly, stop. You’re reaching. You know there is no legal way out of this, and this definitely isn’t it."

Molly’s strength completely vanished. Her legs gave out, and she slumped down onto the cold stone bench in the courtyard, burying her face in her hands as silent, defeated tears streamed down her cheeks. "Then what am I supposed to do? Am I supposed to just walk into a fortress and marry that cruel monster?"

Watching Molly break down, Aina suddenly saw a sharp, painful reflection of her own past. She saw herself in Molly, when she ran away from home, terrified of being forced to become a breeder, stealing someone else’s identity just to survive.

"Actually... no," Aina said softly, sitting down beside her on the bench.

Molly sniffled, looking up through her tears. "What?"

"If you are willing to drop your entire luxury life and possibly live in a forest, scavenge for food, and wait until everything blows over... then you don’t have to marry him," Aina said, her voice steady. "You can run, Molly."

Molly’s eyes widened in sheer terror. "Run away?"

"It’s too risky for you to go to any known relatives," Aina advised, leaning in. "You have to stay away from civilization. Move through the forests, don’t stay anywhere too long, cut your hair off, and take someone else’s identity. Exactly like I did."

Molly stared at her, horrified yet strangely captivated. "My hair’s already short. If I cut it really short and dye it dark, and cover my scent..."

"Yeah," Aina nodded. "That could actually work."

Molly slumped back against the stone, a bitter, hollow laugh escaping her lips. "You know... after I run away, millions of people will probably die. Whole packs will burn because I wasn’t there to marry him."

"That is none of your concern," Aina said firmly, holding Molly’s gaze. "You have to focus on saving yourself."

"Isn’t that... isn’t that horribly selfish?" Molly whispered, her voice cracking.

"We are all selfish in one way or another," Aina replied quietly. "But if you don’t want to marry him, don’t force yourself into a nightmare."

Molly looked down at her hands, trembling violently. "Alone in the forest... no one to protect me. I feel like I’m being so stupid. I don’t want to ruin everything for everyone else."

Aina shifted closer, wrapping a comforting arm around Molly’s shoulders. "Whatever you decide... I’m with you."

Fresh tears fell from Molly’s eyes, wetting the fabric of Aina’s shirt. She let out a long, shuddering breath, her fists clenching tight against her knees.

"I want to kill that king so badly," Molly whispered into the dark, her voice dripping with a sudden, deadly venom. "I want him dead... but I don’t want to die in the process."

She swallowed hard, her chest heaving as she tried to steady her breathing. "Why can’t I be as brave as my brothers? I mean... if it was Vance, he would have charged in there in a heartbeat just to avenge Malric. But I... I’m just trying to run away. I’m no real princess."

"Your circumstances are completely different," Aina comforted her, squeezing her hand. "If it was Vance, fine—so what? He’d survive a fight. But you wouldn’t."

Molly rested her heavy head against Aina’s shoulder, letting the silence settle over them for a moment.

"You’re the girl in the purple dress, aren’t you?" Molly murmured softly, her voice barely audible over the wind. "The one my brothers have been looking for like madmen?"

Aina stiffened slightly, then let out a quiet breath. "Yes. How did you know?"

"When you told me you were an omega and a girl... I sort of connected the dots," Molly answered quietly. "My brothers checked every single omega student in this entire academy. There are not a lot of them. But the only person they never checked was you. And... I’ve never once smelled a wolf’s scent on you, so my guess is you smell like jasmine."

"True," Aina admitted.

"Are you ever going to tell them?"

Aina stared out into the dark shadows of the trees. "I don’t know. But Malric knows."

Molly lifted her head slightly. "Oh... so that’s why he saved you at the lake."

Aina let out a tiny, fragile "Yeah" a sound so small the night wind almost carried it away.

They sat together in total silence under the freezing night sky for what felt like an eternity, Molly’s head resting on Aina’s shoulder. Both of them were silently weighing the heavy, dangerous choices of their lives, wondering where the future was going to drag them next. Neither of them knew at the time that this would be the last peaceful moment they shared together would be the last time they met each other in a very long time.

Molly slowly straightened up, wiping the remaining moisture from her cheeks. A cold, hardened resolve settled into her eyes.

"I’ll do it," Molly whispered, her voice dropping into a dangerous, chilling calm. "I’ll marry him... and then I will kill him."