Grant
The den of the former Alpha smells of dust and decay. Not of filth, but of stagnation. Of a wolf who had grown too old, too comfortable in his power, and let his pack rot from the inside out.
“This is worse than we thought.”
Roric, my Second, runs a hand over a dusty wooden table. His face, usually a mask of calm discipline, is tight with disapproval. He is a wolf of logic and order. This place is an offense to him.
“They are soft,” Finn, my Third, says from the doorway. He is all muscle and coiled aggression. “I watched their warriors in the clearing. No discipline. Their eyes shifted with fear, not respect.”
I say nothing. I walk the perimeter of the room. The furs on the wall are moth eaten. The ceremonial spears are dull. Everything speaks of neglect. Of an Alpha who had lost his fire.
Taking this pack was a political necessity. The Silvermoon territory acts as a buffer to the feral lands in the south. An unstable pack here is a threat to my own. A weakness on my flank. I had expected weakness. I had not expected this level of decay.
“We can forge them into something stronger,” Roric says, his voice a low reassurance. “Stoneclaw wolves are not made, they are forged. We will do the same here.”
“They need to bleed first,” Finn growls. “They need to remember that fear has a purpose.”
I turn from the wall, my gaze silencing them both. “They will learn. But not through fear alone. They will learn through strength. My strength.”
My words sound sure. Solid. But inside, a storm rages. A storm with a single, quiet eye. A girl with defiance in her eyes.
Even now, her scent lingers in my mind. It’s not a perfume. It’s not the scent of a she wolf in heat. It is something cleaner. Wilder. Like crushed clover after a spring rain, and cold, clean stone. It cuts through the dust and stagnation of this den. It cuts through the iron wall of my control.
When my eyes met hers, it was not a choice. It was a collision. The world fractured, and in the space between the shards, a single truth burned itself into my soul.
*Mine.*
The word was not my own. It was the voice of the beast that lives within me. The ancient, primal wolf who has been silent for all my thirty years. It roared to life in that instant, a possessive, undeniable claim that shook me to my core.
I have felt the pull of attraction. I have sated the urges of my wolf during the Haze. But this… this was different. This was not an urge. It was a rewriting of my entire being. Every instinct, every cell, every breath I take now has a new purpose. Her.
“Alpha?” Roric’s voice pulls me back.
I realize I am staring at the wall, my hands clenched into fists at my sides.
“The pack is unsettled,” he continues, his eyes sharp with concern. “Your focus seemed… divided in the clearing.”
Divided. A mild word for it. My focus was captured. Stolen.
“That girl,” Finn says, his tone carefully neutral. “The one you looked at. The pack noticed. There are already whispers.”
My head snaps toward him. “Whispers?”
Finn holds my gaze, unflinching. “They call her the Ice Maiden. Brielle. An outcast. She is the only she wolf in the pack who has never participated in the Haze. They say she’s broken.”
Broken. The word is a shard of glass in my gut. An insult so profound it feels like a physical blow against me.
“She didn’t look broken,” I say, my voice dangerously quiet. “She looked like she was the only one in that entire clearing who wasn’t afraid.”
I remember her eyes. Not wide with terror like the others. They were narrowed with something else. Defiance. Control. A will of iron that stared back at an Alpha and did not shatter.
Ice Maiden. The name intrigues me more than it should. The fools in this pack see a cold, useless rock. I see a fortress. I see a strength of will that fascinates my wolf as much as her scent does. He doesn’t just want to claim her. He wants to see what it takes to make her surrender. And I… I want to know the woman who built such walls around herself.
“Broken or not,” Roric interjects, stepping between me and Finn, a subtle move of de-escalation. “She is a complication. You are the new Alpha. You must be impartial. You must be seen as a leader for the entire pack, not just for one female. Especially not an outcast.”
“I am aware of my duty, Roric,” I bite out, the words sharper than intended.
He is right, of course. My duty is to this pack. To its security. To its strength. I must project an aura of absolute, unbiased authority. I cannot show favoritism. I cannot be seen pursuing a single she wolf days before the Haze is set to begin. It would look like weakness. It would look like I am ruled by my instincts, just like the undisciplined animals I am here to command.
But my instincts are screaming. A primal, protective urge wars with a lifetime of discipline. The thought of her, alone, scorned by her own people… it ignites a fury in me that is terrifying in its intensity.
I want to find her. I want to drag her from whatever hole she hides in and stand her before the pack. I want to mark her, to fill the air with my scent and declare her mine so that no one ever dares to look at her with anything but respect again.
*Claim her,* the wolf howls in my mind. *She is our mate. Protect what is ours.*
“I will handle it,” I say, my voice a low command. I walk to the heavy oak desk, the Alpha’s seat of power. I run a hand over the scarred wood. “Finn, find the pack records. I want a full accounting of our warriors, our stores, our territory patrols. I want to know everything.”
Finn nods, a flicker of relief in his eyes that he is being given a task, and leaves the den.
Roric remains. “Grant. The Haze begins in three days. The bond… it will not make it easy for you.”
“I am the Alpha of the Stoneclaw pack,” I say, meeting his gaze. My control is legendary. It is the foundation of my power. “I am not ruled by instinct.”
It is a lie. Or perhaps, a prayer.
The bond is a fire in my blood. A constant, burning pull in her direction. My wolf paces the cage of my mind, rattling the bars, demanding release. And I know, with a certainty that chills me, that she feels it too. The shock in her eyes was not just recognition. It was fear.
She ran from me.
No one has ever run from me. They bow. They submit. They challenge and they break.
But she ran.
And I, the Alpha who is meant to be a rock of impartiality, wanted nothing more than to chase her. To hunt her down. To corner her and… what?
That is the question that haunts me.
My duty demands I ignore her. My wolf demands I claim her. My mind, the man caught between the two, is fascinated by her.
I look at Roric. “Summon the pack. A formal assembly. At sundown. It is time they understand who is in command.”
He nods, his expression clearing. An assembly is a good strategy. A show of force and order. He thinks it is about the pack.
He is only half right.
It is a move of an Alpha, yes. But it is also the move of a male. A way to see her again. To test the air. To look into those defiant eyes one more time.
This is a war on two fronts. One for the soul of this pack, and one for the woman who has, in a single glance, become the center of my world. And I do not know which one I am more terrified of losing.
