Amelie
A loud crack echoes from the other side of the door, like a bone snapping. It is not the sound of a key. It is the sound of the thick iron lock giving way.
Then comes the splintering. A deafening explosion of wood and force. The heavy oak door doesn’t just open, it disintegrates, blown inward in a shower of splinters and dust. I throw my arms over my head, cowering as pieces of my prison rain down around me.
Light floods the cellar. It is blinding, a physical assault after the endless dark. I squint, my eyes watering, trying to make out the shape that fills the doorway.
He is a silhouette against the sudden brightness. A mountain of a man, so tall his head nearly brushes the top of the frame. The scent I noticed before, pine and ancient stone, hits me with the force of a physical blow. It is him. The King.
His gaze sweeps the tiny, foul space and lands on me. For a single, terrifying second, the world goes silent. The air crackles, and a jolt, white hot and electric, slams through my body. It feels like lightning striking the core of my being, awakening something I thought was long dead. My own pathetic, dormant wolf stirs, a flicker in the void, recognizing the inferno that stands before it.
The fated mate bond. It is not a gentle awakening. It is a violent, soul-shattering collision.
His eyes, the color of molten gold, lock onto mine. Then they drop, tracing the line of the crude iron cuff chained to the wall and shackled around my ankle. I see his hands clench into fists at his sides. The growl I heard before returns, a low, tectonic rumble that seems to shake the very foundations of the packhouse. It is a sound of pure, murderous rage.
He moves. It is not a walk but a blur of controlled power. In two strides he crosses the small cellar and kneels in front of me. I flinch back, pressing myself so hard against the stone wall that it scrapes my skin. All I have ever known from Alphas is pain. He is the most powerful Alpha in the world. The pain he could inflict would be unimaginable.
“Do not be afraid,” he says. His voice, so full of command before, is now a raw, strained whisper. It is rough, as if the words are fighting their way through the fury that consumes him.
He reaches for the chain. I squeeze my eyes shut, bracing for the strike.
Instead of a blow, I hear a sharp metallic snap. It is loud and effortless. I open my eyes. He is holding the two broken ends of the thick iron chain in one hand. He did not unlock it. He pulled it apart as if it were made of twine.
His golden eyes find mine again, and they are filled with an emotion I cannot comprehend. It is a storm of fury, of pain, of a possessiveness so absolute it terrifies me to my soul. He looks at me as if I am the most precious thing in the world, and as if he will burn that world to the ground for what has been done to me.
“Who did this to you?” he asks, his voice dangerously soft.
I cannot speak. My throat is a knot of terror. I just shake my head, tears I did not know were there beginning to stream down my face.
He doesn’t press. He shrugs off his heavy, fur lined cloak. It is the color of midnight and embroidered with the silver crest of the royal pack. He gently wraps it around my shoulders. It is impossibly warm, heavy with his scent, and for a foolish, insane moment, I feel safe.
Then, he slides one arm beneath my knees and the other behind my back. He lifts me as if I weigh nothing at all. My head falls against his chest, and I can hear the frantic, powerful beat of his heart. Or maybe it is my own.
He carries me out of the darkness.
The main hall is packed. The entire Blackwood pack seems to be there, their tour of the grounds forgotten, drawn by the sound of the King’s rage. They are a sea of shocked faces, their mouths agape. Alpha Valerius, Luna Serilda, and Lyra stand at the front, their expressions a mixture of confusion and dawning horror.
King Aric does not stop. He walks into the center of the silent crowd, holding me against his chest. My face is buried in the fur of his cloak, but I can feel hundreds of eyes on me. On the filthy, worthless omega slave from the scullery, being held in the arms of the Alpha King.
The silence stretches, thick and suffocating.
Alpha Valerius is the first to break it. “Your Majesty,” he sputters, his face turning a blotchy red. “What is the meaning of this? That… that is nothing. A disobedient servant being punished.”
Aric’s head turns slowly to face him. The look in his eyes is so cold, so lethal, that Valerius takes an involuntary step back. “She is not nothing,” Aric says, his voice deceptively calm, yet it rings with an authority that silences every breath in the hall. “She is my mate.”
A collective gasp ripples through the crowd. I feel a wave of dizziness so strong I cling to his tunic to keep from fainting.
“Your… your mate?” Lyra’s voice is a high pitched squeak of disbelief. “That is impossible! She’s a filthy omega! A worthless piece of…”
“You will not speak of her again,” Aric interrupts. The words are not a request. They are a law of nature. The air grows heavy, thick with his power, pressing down on everyone in the room. Some of the younger wolves drop to their knees, unable to withstand the pressure of his aura. “You will not look at her. You will not think her name. Or I will personally tear the tongue from your mouth.”
Lyra’s face goes white. She stares, her perfect features twisted into a mask of pure hatred and shock. Her eyes meet mine over the King’s shoulder, and I see a promise of future pain there, a promise that terrifies me.
Aric turns his attention back to Valerius. “You locked my fated mate in a cellar,” he says, each word a perfectly chosen stone, laid to build a tomb. “You put her in chains. You allowed your pack to harm her.”
“I… I did not know!” Valerius pleads, his bravado crumbling into dust. “How could I have known? She is an orphan, a stray…”
“She is a member of your pack,” Aric counters, his voice dropping to a low, deadly growl. “Under your protection. And you treated her like chattel. You starved her. You beat her. I can smell her pain on every stone of this house.”
He adjusts his hold on me slightly, shifting me so he can see my face. My cheek is throbbing where Lyra’s final blow with the riding crop must have caught me yesterday. I can feel the swelling, the ugly bruise that is surely forming there.
He looks down at me, and the fury in his eyes softens for a fraction of a second, replaced by that same aching tenderness that confuses and frightens me so much. “This will not do,” he murmurs, his voice for me alone.
He lifts his free hand, his fingers large and calloused, a warrior’s hand. I flinch violently as he reaches for my face. A lifetime of instinct screams at me to recoil from an Alpha’s touch.
“Shhh, little one,” he whispers. “I will not hurt you. I will never hurt you.”
His fingertips, warm and surprisingly gentle, brush against my bruised cheek. A jolt of energy, warm and golden like his eyes, flows from his touch into my skin. It is not painful. It is… soothing. The throbbing ache recedes, the swelling goes down, and the deep, ugly pain simply vanishes. The warmth spreads through me, chasing away the cellar’s chill that was lodged so deep in my bones.
I hear more gasps from the crowd. I must look different. The grime and soot of the scullery are still there, but the mark of violence is gone. He has healed me, with a simple touch, in front of everyone.
Aric’s gaze never leaves mine. He holds me, healed and whole, in his arms and turns back to face the stunned pack. He lifts his chin, and his voice rings out, imbued with the ancient power of his bloodline, a voice of Kings that every wolf, from the highest Alpha to the lowest omega, is biologically compelled to obey.
“I, Aric, Alpha King of all unified packs, invoke the sacred King’s Right of Claim,” he declares, his voice booming through the hall. “This omega, Amelie, is my fated mate. The other half of my soul. By my blood and by my power, I claim her as mine.”
He pauses, letting the weight of his words settle into the shocked silence.
“From this moment forward, she is to be shown all the respect and honor befitting her station. She is not a slave. She is not an orphan. She is your future Luna Queen.”
The final words fall like a death sentence on Alpha Valerius and his daughter. Valerius looks as though he has been turned to stone, his face a mask of utter ruin. Lyra stares at me, her beautiful face contorted with a rage so profound, so venomous, it is almost a physical force. She is utterly humiliated. Utterly powerless.
And I… I am terrified.
I am wrapped in the King’s cloak, held in his arms, the center of a world that has just been shattered and remade. He has claimed me. He has named me his Queen. But all I can see are the splintered remains of the cellar door, and all I can feel is the phantom weight of chains around my ankle. He is my savior and my captor, all in the same breath. And I have no idea if I have been saved or simply traded one cage for another.
