Kael's POV
The bride is forgettable.
I watch her walk down the aisle and feel exactly nothing. She moves like she is afraid of taking up space. Her eyes stay down. Her dress is white and expensive but it does not matter because nothing about her stands out. The Council could have sent a hundred girls like her and I would not have noticed the difference.
This is why I agreed to the marriage in the first place.
The ceremony hall is full of pack members and Council officials watching like vultures. They want to see if this political arrangement will actually work. They want to see if the Alpha of Shadowpeak can play house like a normal wolf instead of ruling like someone who has forgotten how to feel anything.
Joke is on them. I never learned how to feel.
The officiant speaks words that mean nothing. The bride whispers vows so quietly that I have to strain to hear them. I do not bother. Whatever she is promising does not matter. This marriage is a transaction. The Council threatened to cut off my trade routes and support if I did not accept a bride from a neutral pack to prove my stability.
So here I am. Standing at an altar. Pretending this means something.
When the officiant says the words that bind us, I nod once. I do not kiss her. I do not touch her hand. Kissing implies affection and affection is a liability. I turn and walk back down the aisle before anyone can expect more from me.
Owen is waiting at the side of the hall. My Beta and the only person in Shadowpeak who knows what it costs me to stand in this room right now. His face shows nothing but his eyes are asking questions I do not feel like answering.
"Pack meeting in an hour," I tell him before he can speak. "The northern borders need reinforcement. The rogues are getting bolder."
Owen nods but something in his expression shifts. He glances back at the bride and then at me. For a moment I think he is going to say something but he decides against it. Smart. There is nothing to say that would change anything.
I leave the ceremony without looking at her again.
The walk to my office takes me through the fortress corridors. Servants flatten themselves against the walls as I pass. A few of the younger wolves lower their eyes completely. Fear is respect in Shadowpeak. Fear keeps people from asking questions. Fear keeps them from wondering why their Alpha rarely sleeps and spends half his nights staring at files that make his chest tight.
My office is exactly as I left it. Dark wood desk. Maps of Shadowpeak territory on the walls. Weapons displayed like art. The view from my window shows the mountains that form the border of my territory. I built all of this. Every stone fortress. Every alliance. Every ruthless decision that kept this pack alive and powerful.
I built it alone.
And I will protect it alone.
A bride changes nothing.
I pour whiskey into a glass and drink it standing at the window. The sun is setting over the valley. Tomorrow the bride will wake up as my Luna and discover that I am not the kind of Alpha who pretends. I will not court her. I will not try to bond with her. I will simply ensure she has what she needs to exist quietly in my territory while I continue the real work of being Alpha.
She will understand eventually. Or she will not. Either way, it is not my concern.
I turn from the window and move to my desk to review reports before the pack meeting. That is when I see it.
A file sits on the corner of my desk. Unmarked. But I know exactly what is inside because I put it there myself three days ago.
The file is labeled Moonvale Investigation.
My entire body goes rigid.
Moonvale. The pack I destroyed five years ago. The one decision that still wakes me up in the middle of the night covered in sweat and rage and something I refuse to call guilt.
I grab the file and throw it across the room. It hits the wall and papers scatter everywhere. I do not care. I stand there breathing hard, my hands clenched so tight my nails draw blood from my palms.
Five years. It has been five years and I still cannot look at that name without feeling like something is breaking inside me.
The evidence had been solid. The reports came from trusted sources. Moonvale wolves had attacked our borders. They had killed our scouts. The threat was real and it was immediate. I made the only decision an Alpha could make.
Except somewhere in my gut, in the deepest part of me, I have always known something was wrong.
The timeline never quite fit. The witness statements had inconsistencies. Some of the reports showed signs of forgery if you looked close enough. And I had looked close enough. I have been looking for five years.
I have investigators searching every territory for any scrap of evidence that might explain what actually happened. But they have found nothing. The Alpha's family is dead. The pack is scattered or dead. There is only one person who could possibly tell me the truth.
The one survivor I never found.
The Alpha's daughter.
I have thought about her more than I should. A girl who would be around twenty-three now if she is alive at all. A girl who escaped somehow when everyone else burned. A girl who probably hates me with every breath she takes.
If she is alive, she is somewhere in hiding, using a false identity, living under a fake scent to avoid detection. Finding her is like looking for smoke in a storm.
I pick up the scattered papers and put them back in the file carefully. My hands are still shaking and I hate it. Alphas do not shake. Alphas do not doubt. Alphas do not spend five years searching for one girl to ask her forgiveness for a war they did not actually want to start.
A knock interrupts my spiraling thoughts.
"Enter," I say and my voice is stone.
Owen steps inside and closes the door behind him. His expression is careful which means he saw something in the ceremony that bothered him. My Beta is too observant for his own good.
"The bride seems well enough," he says carefully. "Quiet. Obedient. She will not cause problems."
"Good," I respond and turn back to the window.
"Kael." Owen uses my name instead of my title which means he thinks this is important. "Did you notice anything unusual about her?"
I did not. I was too busy thinking about Moonvale and guilt and the ghost of a girl I have never actually met but think about constantly.
"No," I lie.
Owen studies me for a moment like he is trying to decide if he believes me. Then he nods and leaves without another word. Whatever he saw, he is keeping it to himself. Good.
I return to looking out at my territory. The mountains are dark now. The fortress lights are starting to glow. Shadowpeak is powerful and strong and impenetrable.
But inside these walls, I am carrying a secret that gets heavier every single year.
Someone manipulated me into destroying Moonvale. Someone gave me fake evidence and real enough lies to make me believe a war was necessary. Someone benefited from that pack's death enough to orchestrate it.
And I have no idea who.
My eyes land on the Moonvale Investigation file sitting on my desk again. Inside are all the inconsistencies. All the suspicious reports. All the questions I cannot answer.
Somewhere out there, the one person who could answer them is living a life I cannot imagine. Probably hating me. Probably hoping I suffer.
If she is alive at all.
My new bride is somewhere in the fortress right now, probably being shown to her quarters. A girl I will never think about again. A girl who means nothing to me except as a tool to stabilize my territory.
A girl whose face I already forgot.
But as I sit at my desk with the Moonvale file in front of me, I cannot shake the feeling that something has shifted. Something has changed in a way I cannot name.
I just do not know what it is yet.