The Rejected Omega's Ruthless Comeback

Seraphina POV:

The first thing I felt was the burning in my lungs.

A brutal pressure crushed my windpipe, stealing the air. My vision pulsed with black spots, a frantic drumbeat pounding in my ears.

Through the watery blur, a face swam into focus. A face I knew better than my own, a face I had once loved with the foolish devotion of a destined mate.

Prince Valerius Kensington.

His handsome features were twisted into a mask of pure rage, his blue eyes blazing with a hatred that was chillingly familiar.

Then, the memories hit me. Not a trickle, but a tidal wave.

My last life. The birthing bed soaked in blood. The unbearable pain. His voice, cold and distant, telling the doctors to save the child, not me. And my stepsister, Isabelle, her face a mask of false sorrow as she held his hand.

They had murdered me.

And now, I was back. Reborn into the very moment of another betrayal.

"Monster!" Valerius snarled, his voice a low growl that vibrated through his hands into my throat. "You really thought you could tarnish Isabelle's pure name with your cursed body?"

Isabelle. Of course. She had played the victim again, and this Alpha fool had swallowed every lie.

My fingernails dug into his forearms, drawing blood. I thrashed, but it was useless. I was an Omega. Against his Alpha strength, I was nothing more than a doll to be broken.

The darkness was closing in again, the cold shadow of death I remembered all too well.

No. I couldn't die again.

My mother, Eleonora. In my last life, she died shortly after me, her death ruled a complication from "grief." I had to get back to her. I had to save her.

Begging him was pointless. So I stopped fighting. My body went limp, then began to twitch in a grotesque, unnatural way. A white foam gathered at the corner of my mouth.

Valerius flinched, his grip loosening fractionally at the sight. It was unexpected. It was wrong.

I used the sliver of air he allowed me, forcing two words from my raw throat.

"The... silver..."

As a Healer, one of the best, I knew things. I knew how a precise mixture of harmless herbs could perfectly mimic the initial symptoms of silver poisoning. I was betting my life that this pampered prince knew nothing of toxicology.

His face went pale. Silver. The ultimate poison to our kind, a substance so deadly its use was controlled by the Alpha King himself.

He ripped his hands away from my neck as if he'd been burned. He stared at his own palms, his breath coming in ragged gasps, his inner wolf panicking at the mere suggestion of contamination.

I collapsed onto the plush carpet, sucking in a ragged, life-giving breath, but I kept my body convulsing, playing my part.

"What did you do?" he roared, his voice laced with a new emotion. Not just disgust. Fear. "You lunatic!"

I pushed myself up weakly, letting the dim light catch the ugly, puckered scar on my cheek-a mark left by a silver dagger years ago. A constant reminder of my family's shame.

A cold smile touched my lips. "You've always hated this scar, haven't you? Now you get a taste of it yourself."

I deliberately dragged my fingernails, the ones that had drawn his blood, across the back of his hand.

He recoiled as if struck by a viper. I saw the panic in his eyes as his own mind began to betray him. He imagined a burning sensation on his skin, a racing heart-the psychosomatic effects of pure terror.

For the first time, he looked at me with fear, not just loathing.

Good, I thought. This is the first payment on the debt you owe me.

I curled into a ball on the floor, my voice a venomous whisper only he could hear. "Want the antidote? You'll have to trade it for something you value more than anything."

He gritted his teeth, his jaw tight with fury. "What do you want?"

I looked up, meeting his terrified gaze, and spoke each word with chilling clarity.

"A formal, public Rejection."

His pupils shrank to pinpoints. To publicly reject a destined mate was a stain on an Alpha's honor, an admission of failure. It was a fate worse than a thousand duels.

He never expected this. He thought I would cling to him, beg for him.

I watched the war in his eyes, the battle between his pride and his fear, and a vicious pleasure surged through me.

My voice dropped, turning to ice. "That, or you can wait for the 'silver poison' to slowly corrupt your inner wolf. Until you're nothing but a powerless cripple."

His fists clenched, the sound of his knuckles cracking loud in the silent room. Murder flashed in his eyes, but he didn't dare step closer.

I had him. For now.

I closed my eyes, hiding the inferno of hatred within me, leaving only the cold, hard surface of my plan.

Valerius. Isabelle. The entire House of Beaumont.

I'm back.

He stared at me for a long, silent moment, his chest heaving. Then, with a final, guttural snarl, he turned and stormed out of the room, slamming the door so hard the walls shook. He was running to the royal physicians, desperate to confirm the poison I knew they would never find.

The room was silent. I was alone.

I dragged my aching body up from the floor and stumbled to the mirror.

The girl who stared back was a wreck. Pale face, wild silver hair, and that hideous scar, a twisted mockery of my past life's stupidity.

I pressed my hand against the cold glass, my fingers tracing the outline of my own haunted face.

"From this day on," I whispered to the reflection. "Seraphina Beaumont lives only for herself."