Do you know what it meant to be a runt among the shifters? It meant you would be the smallest and the weakest among all the other shifters around you.

It was not usual for a werewolf to get sick easily, as it was well known that they had incredible healing ability.

A shifter could be littered with severe wounds, but it would only need a few hours or at most a day for them to be able to get back to their original state.

Therefore, you couldn't take a shifter lightly, a werewolf even more so, because they were at the top of the food chain. They were the predators.

However, it didn't work that way for Iris. The only reason being she was a runt.

Ever since she was born, she had been concurrently sick. She was also smaller than a normal shifter baby. In the first few years of her life, it was so hard even to feed her, it was a challenge, especially since she would get a fever every now and then.

And when she reached the age of sixteen, she was not able to shift into her wolf due to her spirit being too weak for her to be able to do so.

And now, when she was at the age of seventeen, when all the she- wolves would think this was the time when they would meet their mates, she didn't think she would find one.

And above all of that, she was not able to hear.

Iris could read people's lips, but she wouldn't be able to know what they were saying if they were not facing her when they spoke to her.

If it was not for her father being the alpha of the Blue Moon pack, no one would even know about her, as she would spend most of her time inside her house and had a tutor come to help her with her education.

Unfortunately, her life didn't get better even after she turned twenty.

"Come out now!" Someone shouted behind Iris, as she sat on the cold floor of the dungeon with her head lowered. "Damn it! I forgot she couldn't hear!" The man cursed under his breath and opened the cell before he marched toward the skinny girl and yanked her arm to make her stand up.

Iris gritted her teeth, she looked at the man with fear in her eyes. Her pack had fallen, they were defeated in a war and now she was a prisoner of war. She was the only daughter of the Alpha after all.

"The Alpha wants to see you!" The man showed so much hostility in his eyes, as he grabbed her by the elbow and dragged her out of this filthy cell, where she had stayed for more than a week now.

Iris couldn't hear him, but she could read his lips and she knew meeting the Alpha was inevitable. She trembled in fear. She hated being hurt.

Iris stumbled on her feet a few times because she couldn't keep up with the guard's pace, yet he didn't slow down at all.

She remembered this room, this room used to be the alpha's room and she had only entered it twice, since her father didn't really like her near him.

She was born as a runt, thus it was a disgrace to him.

"Alpha, I have brought Iris Lane with me," he said in a solemn voice, as he lowered his head and kicked Iris at the back of her knee until she knelt down before the alpha.

Alpha Cane.

He was a slave for ten years in this Blue Moon pack, since his pack, Howling Wolf, was razed by Iris's father and all of the pack members turned into slaves, including him, Cane Nortern, the then alpha's son.

His world fell apart when he was twenty two, he went from the most respectable alpha's son to be a slave that held no value whatsoever.

But right now, he managed to get his revenge and wiped out the Blue Moon pack, restored the glory of the Howling Wolf pack, and now he would get his revenge on Iris for what her father had done to him and his family.

"You can leave, Will," Cane said in a cold tone, as he stood up from his seat and Iris trembled in fear at the sight of him. His body was even bigger than her brother's or her father's. He towered above her, looking down at her with so much malice in his dark eyes.

The guard named Will walked out of the room and closed the door, leaving Iris with her predator.

Iris tried to scamper away from him, but Cane had grabbed her shoulder and his grip was so painful. She felt like he would be able to crush her shoulder easily.

"Undress and get on the bed," Cane said coldly, but because Iris didn't look at his face. She couldn't read his lips, so she missed the order and started whimpering. "Don't you hear me?!"

Outraged, Cane dragged her to the bed himself and pinned her down. She was crying, but there was no sound that came out of her mouth, she just trembled at the sight of him.

Cane had a long scar on his left face, traversed from his right eye across the bridge of his nose, ending on his left cheek. The scar was unsightly and he got this from when he was being a slave in the Blue Moon pack.

Cane gathered her arms above her head and pinched her chin so she could look at him and the hatred in his eyes only made Iris feel scared even more.

"See what I will do to you. I will give you hell like what your father gave to me."

Iris could read that and she spoke in a soft voice, shaking all over. "Why me?"

"Why me, you said?"

Iris could feel her chin hurting further when he tightened his grip, but she needed to look at him, so she could understand what he said next.

"Why don't you take your revenge on my father instead?"