Back and Stronger: Alpha's Daughter
Chapter 72

Remember, shoulders straight and chin up, baby…

That was the last thing Neil told her when the guards came to take her to her own court trial. She held onto those words as she entered the room, and she did as he’d told her to. The courtroom was full of council members and other citizens of the Lucian pack she didn’t recognize – not that she looked closely in any case – but she squared her shoulders and lifted her face and kept her chin parallel to the floor.

As she walked in between pack members, she could feel that all were watching her closely with stiff eyes. Sophia dug deep within herself and mustered up all the dignity she did not feel. Summoned every last shred of self-possession left in her. Marshaled every single particle of fortitude her heart would lend her.

Alone, none of these attempts would have been enough to keep her legs moving her forward, let alone keep her spine straight as she was being scrutinized by every set of eyes within the courtroom. No, she used all of it to hone every bit of resolve she could still find within the deepest recesses of her being, as she felt heavier and heavier the longer their stares dragged out.

Or maybe time had just slowed for her again, making everything move in slow motion. She refused to meet any of those stares she was certain would be filled with contempt and loathing. She’d gotten used to those sorts of looks for years now, but she didn’t want to risk losing the tiny bit of courage and pride she’d been able to dredge up somehow to one hate-filled look, much less all of them.

Sophia wondered if she’d even still be able to deflect them and not let them affect her. She was just too bone–bone–tired, she realized.

Well, what did she expect after sitting on the floor all night, unable to sleep, and then stressing the whole freaking morning about Neil’s case?

She could feel that her nerves were fraught and raw from all the wringing. In fact, they were all dilapidated and unwilling to go to work for her now, which made her feel what she could only describe as numb and stagnant inside.

At the same time, there was a barren acceptance deep within her as well. A part of her that didn’t care about what fate lay before her. Whether she was found guilty or not, to be executed or not, she just knew that she was incapable of nursing that meaningless concern anymore.

But even though she was something closer to the ‘walking dead’ than anything else at that moment, she still found the will within herself to walk through that damned courtroom not showing any of what she was truly feeling.

To the shifters around her, Sophia seemed to be a calm and poised young female, ready to face her destiny, but little did they know of the utter lack of a storm raging inside her.

At the back of Sophia’s mind, she wondered if Neil had been granted the same privilege she’d been given this morning to watch his trial live, and if he would have been able to see past her charade.

He was innocent and wasn’t going to be executed. That was all that mattered. Even though Judge Omen had wanted to have a private meeting with the council in his chambers, she knew that after all those testimonies, there was just no way they could still find him guilty of those ‘crimes’ he’d been accused of. It was clear that it had been orders from the pack Alpha, and Neil was a soldier, and he did what any good soldier would do – he had followed them to the best of his abilities, thinking he was serving his pack and was ensuring its safety.

There was just no way they could still find Neil guilty. Sophia on the other hand though, there would be no one to stand up for her as those soldiers still loyal to Neil had. No one but herself had been a witness to her alleged crime. She was the only one that could ascertain that she never killed her own mother, and she alone wasn’t enough to make people believe her because they already had their prejudiced minds made up about the events of that day, and about her specific involvement in it.

Oh, how ironic it all was… Again… Still…

Neil would go free to live his life, while the chances of Sophia doing that, and finally having a chance to be with him, was next to none, just like before when they had kept each other at arm’s length, and the worst was that Neil had even done that to her again just now before she had been taken from her cell.

She had wanted to confess her feelings for him as well, since she might never have the chance to do so again once she entered this room, but she just couldn’t. Not with the way he had his walls up again. She had the words on the tip of her tongue, but they never came out. It just didn’t feel right…

Why couldn’t she tell him what she felt for him? Why couldn’t she have just said it when it had most likely been her only chance to?

The irony was, that they had had all the chances in the world to be together. Even within those prison cells, they had their chance to be truly connected at last, but still, they just couldn’t. Even this morning Sophia had thought that at least they would reunite and be able to be together in death, when the chances of them both being executed had been prominent. But now they were even denied that small mercy.

No one really knew what happened to one’s soul after death, but the general belief was that the Goddess would pull a deceased person’s soul from their bodies and lead them to the Council of the Wise Elders. There each soul’s life and choices got discussed and reviewed in full, and depending on if the soul had fully learned its lesson yet or not would be the determining factor of what would happen to the soul then. Which for all intents and purposes, were very similar to what Sophia was about to face now in court. sᴇaʀᴄh thᴇ Find_Nøvel.ɴet website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

If the Elders have reached the conclusion that the specific lesson had not been learned and understood the way the soul was meant to, then they would be reincarnated into a new body to try and learn that lesson again in their next life. But if the soul had had many chances already but seemed to have learned nothing at all, and kept doing bad things life after life, they were sent to a prison of souls, which Sophia had no doubt was where her father was going to. It was a sort of Hell, if you will, where souls were captured within a void in the space-time continuum. Trapped and never allowed to reincarnate ever again.

On the other hand, if the soul had successfully learned what they were supposed to, that soul would Ascend and be allowed to become a member and citizen of the Moon Goddess’s Silver City, which was a rare and pretty much an unattainable honor.

But none of that was what concerned Sophia. She didn’t care wherever her soul ended up after death. For all she cared, all of this afterlife bullshit was just made-up stories for the purpose of simply solacing people with the conviction that there was a continuation of one’s individual consciousness after one died. For all she cared, absolute and never-ending oblivion would follow death instead.

All she cared about was to have a chance to ask the Goddess the following: “What the fuck, Goddess? What kind of sick lesson did you want me to learn from all this shit you made me go through? Other than the beatings and raping I had to suffer, what possible lesson was there to learn by keeping two people apart like this? Ever reaching, pulling, but never truly touching?”

This reminded her of the story about the moon and the sun. The star crossed lovers. Sophia couldn’t help but see the analogy here. Always yearning but never uniting. Loving from afar. The resemblance to her own life was uncanny and sent a flash of fury through her.

Benevolent Goddess my fucking ass! For someone that knew what it felt like. She sure had been very willing to make Sophia suffer the same fate!

She could imagine it already, how the Goddess would look all shocked and angry at her lack of respect once Sophia had said to her everything she was so freaking burning to say. She smiled secretly at the thought, not particularly caring if that also sent her straight to Hell. At least she would have gotten the chance to let her sentiments be known, and maybe–just maybe–Sophia would finally have an answer to why she had to endure such a sweet, then awful, then sweet for a little while, then awful again sort of existence. What the hell had it all been for?

Suddenly, Sophia felt her chin go up and her shoulders straightened without her having to force it anymore. She felt herself being filled with heated energy again. Purpose even, if you will.

She was going to face this final trial of her life with everything she got. There was no way she was going to be remembered as the murderous girl that just quietly accepted all the lies being spewed about her.

It was strange, but despite that, she didn’t hope for a different outcome. She would still accept death, and still very much wanted to talk with the Goddess, but she refused to have Neil, Leo, and Scott live on thinking that the fight they’d tried to teach her and hoped to see in her had been in vain.

Sophia raised her eyes to those around her that sought her doom. Incensed but composed, she met those stares she had thought would break her before. Instead, she found that they empowered her as she looked back at them unflinchingly. Other than the eyes she’d expected to see, those filled with nothing but scorn and contempt, she was surprised to find an equal amount of eyes shining differently at her.

Some of the shifters and council members were actually looking at her with commiseration and something like understanding now, as though they had finally realized what kind of a man her father was, and what she had to deal with since she was only just a child – still they had no idea. They never could, but at least they seemed compassionate about it.

She even found herself being filled with more determination when she spotted Ailis Carrick and Mr. Silvino, who both smiled at her in encouragement.

Sophia had to push down the urge to let them know that she had still gone and finished school, and had graduated with a better score than she’d ever expected, which she knew would surprise them too. She gave them a small smile of appreciation, and let their heartening presence reinforce and embolden her resolve as well.

Then her astonished gaze settled on Benson, who was casually leaning with her back against the wall. Strange, she thought. The sphinxlike female hadn’t even been present for Neil’s trial earlier. Was she more interested in what decision was reached with Sophia than she’d been with Neil?

It certainly appeared to be the case. And that was when The Moon Walker Alpha gave Sophia a solicitous smile and an encouraging wink.

Despite the disorientation she felt because of it, she gave Benson the slightest of smiles in return as she decided to ignore the fluttering in her stomach and the circling shadow.

Besides, she could use any support she could find, and who better than the person who seemed to be running the show in the Lucian pack at the moment?

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