Kael's Point of View
I've been sitting in this chair for the past hour and I'm losing my mind.
Sage is asleep on the bed and I can't look away. My wolf is pacing inside my chest like a caged animal. She's here. My mate. The girl the prophecy spoke about. The girl I stopped believing in twelve years ago when I realized that fate was just another word for delusion.
But she's real.
I can smell her on the air. Pack territory and mountains and something uniquely her. Something that tastes like home in a way nothing has tasted like home since my father died.
My wolf is screaming at me to move. To claim her. To mark her skin so that every wolf in this realm knows she's mine. To erase the memory of Cohen's hands from her body. To replace the scent of rejection with the scent of possession.
I don't move.
She's been through enough without waking up to me tearing into her clothes and claiming her like some animal with no control. She's been rejected and broken and hunted. She deserves something different. She deserves to understand what's happening before her world shifts completely.
But God, it's hard to stay still.
Twelve years ago, my father told me something before he died. He told me that the Moon Goddess had shown him a prophecy. He said there was a girl coming. A girl born to weakness but destined for strength. A girl who would complete the Alpha King and teach him what it meant to be human.
I thought he was dying and confused.
I thought prophecies were the kind of thing weak Alphas believed in when they needed an excuse for their poor decisions.
I was wrong about a lot of things.
Three days ago, I walked into a dive bar in a human city and I felt it. A pull. A recognition so profound it knocked me sideways. My wolf knew her before I did. My wolf howled that she was ours before my brain could catch up.
She was small and broken and trying to disappear into the background while she poured drinks for humans who didn't deserve her attention. She was everything the prophecy said she'd be. Weak in body but brilliant in mind. Broken on the surface but unbreakable at her core.
She was mine.
I didn't think. I just acted. I sent Dante to find her. I prepared her rooms. I bought clothes in her size. I arranged everything because once I recognized my mate, there was no way I was letting her disappear again.
Sage shifts in her sleep.
Her face scrunches up like she's dreaming of something painful. Her hands clench into fists. She's reliving the rejection in her sleep. She's reliving Cohen throwing her to the ground while the entire pack watched.
I want to burn him alive for that.
But first I need to make sure she understands that no one will ever reject her again. That the broken pieces Cohen shattered are going to be put back together by someone who values every single fragment.
I stand up from the chair.
Moving toward the bed, I'm careful to be slow and deliberate. I can smell her fear underneath her sleep. Her wolf is aware of me even though her human mind is dreaming. I need her to understand that I'm not a threat to her. I need her to feel safe with me even though every instinct she has is probably screaming danger.
I sit on the edge of the bed and I just watch her.
Her hair is spread across the pillow like dark silk. There are shadows under her eyes from six months of not sleeping properly. Her body is too thin from forgetting to eat. Every physical sign screams that she's been barely surviving.
But her face is beautiful. Even broken, even exhausted, even damaged by rejection, she's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.
She wakes suddenly.
Her eyes snap open and she sees me sitting there in the darkness. Her whole body goes tense. For a second I think she's going to scream or run. For a second I see the animal fear rise in her.
Then her wolf recognizes me and everything changes.
Her body relaxes. Her breathing slows. Her pupils dilate as she processes what the bond is telling her. That I'm safe. That I'm hers. That I'm exactly who she needs.
"How long have you been here?" she whispers.
"Since you arrived," I tell her, and I don't apologize for watching her sleep. I don't apologize for invading her space. I don't apologize for anything because I'm past the point where apologies matter.
She challenges me. She tells me I planned all of this. She accuses me of not respecting her consent.
She's right.
And I don't care.
"I'm not yours," she says, trying to sound strong. Trying to convince herself that she has any choice in this.
"Yes, you are," I say, and I move. Not fast enough to scare her. Just fast enough to show her that I could move fast if I wanted to. I could do anything I want and there's nothing she could do to stop me.
That's not a threat. It's just reality.
She asks what I want from her and I tell her the truth. Everything. I want everything she is.
And then I close the distance between us and I kiss her.
The moment my mouth touches hers, something shifts in the universe. The bond completes itself. The prophecy fulfills itself. All the emptiness I've carried for twelve years gets filled with her.
She doesn't push me away.
She pulls me closer.
Her hands find my chest and her fingers grip my shirt like she's afraid I'll disappear. Like she's terrified that this is a dream and she'll wake up back in that basement apartment.
I deepen the kiss. I taste her like I'm trying to memorize the exact flavor of her. I pull her against me so there's no space left between our bodies. I claim her with twelve years of isolation and loneliness and the weight of ruling a kingdom that never appreciated what I sacrificed.
I claim her with everything I am.
When we finally break apart, she's crying.
"Why are you crying?" I ask, and I brush the tears away with my thumbs.
"Because I can't believe this is real," she whispers. "Because I thought I was broken forever."
I feel something inside me crack open. Something that's been locked down since my father died. Something that told me I could never be vulnerable. That I could never need anyone. That I was stronger alone.
This girl just proved me wrong.
"You were never broken," I tell her, and I mean every word. "You were just waiting. You were just surviving until someone strong enough came to claim you."
She looks at me like I'm the only thing in the world that matters. Like she can't believe that someone like me would want someone like her.
I need to show her.
I need to make her understand that she's not the broken one. That she's the piece that was always missing. That without her, I've been walking around incomplete and calling it power.
I pull her against me again and I kiss her deeper. Not asking permission. Not wondering if she wants this. Just taking what's mine because she gave herself to me the moment she got in that car.
Her body responds to me in ways that prove the bond is real. Her wolf is singing inside her. Her human heart is racing. Every part of her knows that she belongs to me.
I pull back just enough to look at her face. Her eyes are wide and filled with wonder and fear and hope all mixed together.
"I'm going to make you Queen," I tell her, and it's not a promise. It's a declaration. "Everyone who rejected you is going to bow to you. Everyone who said you were weak is going to see that you were always the strongest. I'm going to spend the rest of my life making sure you understand that you were worth waiting for."
"Kael," she says, and my name sounds different in her mouth. It sounds like salvation.
"Yes?" I ask.
"I'm scared," she whispers.
"Good," I say. "You should be scared. You just became the most important person in the entire werewolf realm. You just became the mate of the Alpha King. You just became the target of everyone who wants to take me down."
Her body goes rigid.
"What do you mean target?" she asks.
I should have kept that to myself. I should have let her have one more night of peace before the reality of what I've just done crashes down on both of us.
But I don't lie to my mate.
"The moment I claimed you, I declared war on everyone who opposes me," I say quietly. "The Council of Alphas doesn't want an Omega as Queen. Other packs will see you as leverage they can use against me. There are people in this realm who've been waiting for the Alpha King to show weakness."
"And I'm your weakness?" she asks.
"You're my everything," I correct. "And yes, that makes you dangerous. That makes you a target. That means from this moment forward, people are going to want to hurt you to hurt me."
She processes this. She's smart enough to understand what I'm saying. I just claimed her publicly by bringing her here. I introduced her to Dante. I let the entire Fortress know that she's my mate. By tomorrow, everyone in the realm will know.
And they'll start planning how to use her against me.
"So what happens now?" she asks.
There's a sound outside the chamber. Heavy footsteps. Someone running toward us.
The door bursts open and Dante is there, breathing hard like he just sprinted through the entire Fortress.
"King," he says, and his voice is tight with urgency. "We have a problem. The Council of Alphas just sent an official message. They're demanding a hearing about your mate choice. They're claiming she's illegitimate and unfit to be Luna."
I feel Sage's entire body go rigid against me.
"How did they find out so fast?" I demand.
"Spies," Dante says grimly. "Someone in this Fortress reported to them the moment she arrived."
Sage pulls away from me. Her face is pale. She's already calculating the worst outcome. She's already thinking about running.
"You brought a war with you," Dante continues, looking at Sage with something that might be pity. "The Council sees her as exactly what they needed to challenge your authority. They're going to tear her apart in that hearing if you don't prepare her."
I pull Sage back against me before she can spiral into panic.
"Then we prepare her," I say.
But I can feel the shift happening. The moment where everything changes from simple to complicated. The moment where my claiming of her becomes an act of war.
And somehow, looking at her terrified face pressed against my chest, I realize I don't care about the consequences.
I would burn the entire realm down before I let her go.
Even if it means destroying everything I've built to keep her safe.