DESTINED [SLOW UPDATES]

Chapter One 'FAMILY'

I gasped in pain, this was my family but they were forcing me to give up everything that I ever wanted just to make their lives better than they already were. I was apparently getting married in three months to a man old enough to be my father. A man who already had two other wives. What was wrong with this family-to push me to a man who didn't even know what loving someone meant, not that I was an expect in love but how do you claim to love someone when you hurt them by piling women up like it's in fashion. I knew that this nightmare was inevitable when I was twelve years old and overhead Heron and Shelah discussing it but a part of me had hoped that for once my father would stand up for me, defend me, acknowledge that yes-I was half human but I was still his daughter and regardless of the shame of having a daughter who was half human I was still worthy in his eyes. That had been something I wanted desperately when I was younger, naive and eager to please but Heron and Shelah quickly clipped those thoughts and buried them deep but sometimes I hoped to see love in their eyes instead of hate, annoyance and boredom when they looked at me. To see a smile sincerely directed to me instead of Shelah's cruel sneers and my father's indifference.

"I am not ready to get married father, I thought I was going to school to-"
I started to say but I didn't even get the chance to finish my sentence.

"Silence!" Shelah screamed at me but she was far from done telling me how things were going to be.

"How dare you question your father and me Alyssa you ungrateful child? You will marry Samuel Jacob Azariah. Do you hear me? We have all made sacrifices in this family and it is your turn to make yours. You should be thankful that we didn't kill you when the option was given. We have fed and clothed you-you are a princess of this kingdom and you have us to thank for that. You will show your appreciation or I will deal with you very harshly." My stepmother Shelah Korah, the queen of Atroth Kingdom snapped with a cruel sneer on her face that made her beautiful face ugly.

A part of me acknowledged that she was justified to hate me but another knew she was cruel beyond words to put me in this position. I was seventeen. Why wasn't her own daughter marrying a man old enough to be her father like me. Instead she was given options. Me...I was told to jump and I only had to ask how high and that was the only acceptable question in their vocabulary when dealing with little old me.

What sacrifice had she made? Did she mean the fact that she looked the other way when my father Heron Korah cheated but when a child was born in that union she was to be treated like dirt? Was that the sacrifice she was talking about?
I looked at her, she was ageless, tall and very slender. I guess that was one of the Fae traits. They aged really slowly and they could live very long lives. Her dark eyes were cruel and cold, the way they looked at me terrified me. Her dark hair was a short chin length bob-funny that she didn't allow me to cut my hair yet she kept hers short and manageable.
"I'm seventeen. He is thirty eight-", the resounding slap that I received shut me up pretty quickly but I knew that today wasn't the day to bury my head under the sand if I wanted a chance that would open doors for me to having a better life. I knew how easily things could escalate with this woman but I deserved to live my life too. My father had married her because duty demanded he marry from a strong fae bloodline but eighteen years ago, he visited the human world and while there-had an affair with a human; and I was conceived. My stepmother never let me forget where I came from. She hated me but both my father and her had to bring me to the family because I wasn't entirely human and they couldn't risk humans finding out that fae truly existed, at least that was the story that I was told.

My existence could have compromised their lives that they preferred being kept a secret from the humans. They would have killed me but I showed a few impressive traits that they were curious about and wanted to experiment on them when it suited them-I'm only guessing but I really don't know why they didn't kill me while they had the chance. The fact that they didn't kill me though didn't mean that they had to treat me like family, they definitely didn't do that. I was a servant by the way I dressed and ate-yet a princess if they were selling me off to the highest bidder. Hypocrites-all of them.