Chapter Two: The Alpha's Claim
The forest consumed me.
Not as my village had always promised it would—teeth and blood and bone. No, this was quieter. Darker. Like being pulled into the lungs of something ancient that had waited for me all this time.
I followed the man down crooked paths and thick fog, stumbling more than I walked. My legs shook with every step, my arms brushed by branches, but I did not protest. I did not ask. He had not offered me a choice.
The only sounds were the crackle of the leaves beneath his boots and my struggled breaths behind him.
He never looked back.
But I knew he'd heard me. Knew he felt me, too. The air between us hummed—tension thick enough to suffocate. And whenever I fell behind, as if testing the edge of his patience, his voice would cut through the cold.
"Keep up."
I should have run. Or tried to. But something inside me—some weakness I hated—had already decided that safer was here with the beast than out there alone.
After what felt like hours, trees gave way to a clearing surrounded by high stone walls, worn by years and ivy. A massive iron gate groaned open as we approached, as if familiar with his smell. I caught glimpses of wood-and-stone structures—houses, barracks, towers.
A village. But not human.
Werewolves.
This was Moonfire territory.
He stood at the center, turned, and regarded me properly for the first time.
His eyes scanned me like a sentence—starting at rents in my sleeves, lingering on the bruise on my cheek, finally coming to rest on my wrists, which were crusted with blood. Something flickered across his face.
Regret?
No. Too human.
He took a step closer, and instinctively, I retreated.
"Don't," he commanded. "I dislike fear."
"I didn't know I was here for your entertainment," I snapped.
His eyes grew narrow. "You're here because you were tossed to wolves. Don't confuse my restraint with kindness."
I wanted to spit at him. To yell. To ask him what he'd meant when he'd declared I was his. But the coldness in his voice chilled me like steel.
A second man stepped out of the darkness—a wide, scarred man with eyes that were almost as cold as the first.
"Alpha," the man said.
Alpha.
So that's what he was.
Lucien.
The name rang in my head like an alarm.
"Is she the sacrifice?" the other man demanded, shocked. "A human girl?"
"Not usual human," Lucien answered practically.
"She reeks of blood and fear."
"She reeks of power." Lucien's gaze shifted back to me. "And destiny."
I didn’t know what scared me more—his certainty or the way his voice dropped when he said it. As if he hated the words even as they left his mouth.
“I want her in the East Wing,” he added. “Cellars. Lock her in.”
My stomach dropped. “What? No—”
“You’re safer there than among my wolves,” he said without flinching.
“I’m not your prisoner.”
He moved fast.
One second he was still, the next he was inches from me, looming, his scent—wild cedar and storm—choking my lungs like smoke. His eyes blazed into mine, silver blazing with something hot.
"You were thrown into my woods, bound and bleeding. You came to my land in moonlight. And your scent—" His voice dropped lower, more menacing. "— crawled under my skin the moment I discovered you."
He. reach out—his fingers tracing the line of my jaw. I flinched, but he. didn't stop.
"The bond acknowledges you. That doesn't mean I do."
Bond.
I did not. know the word. Not exactly. But when his skin connected with mine, something inside me flared. A pull. A warmth. Not of fear.
As hunger.
He blinked once, as if shocked by his own reaction, then. stepped back harshly.
"Take her," he snapped, voice raw.
The second man entered with two guards. I fought with them. Kicked. Bit. But they were more powerful.
Lucien did not notice me fight. He turned aside as if I were already pinned underneath him.
But I noticed his tense shoulders.
I noticed his clenched fists.
They placed me in a cell under the East Wing—stone walls, straw mat, rusty bars. A bucket of water. No light, but the faint glow of torches down the hall.
The door slammed shut behind me, and I fell onto the cold floor, aching body, pounding heart.
I was alone again.
But. I wasn't.
I could feel him above me.
Lucien.
I did not need to glance at him to know that he had not gone far. He was a presence in the air. I could feel each hair of my body rise up.
I rested against the wall and shut my eyes.
What did he say—\"Mine"?
He was a wolf. I was a girl cursed by a moon that I did not ask for.
There had to be a mistake.
I lay awake all night. Every time I started to sleep, the memory of his voice reminded me—low and rough, tightly coiled with self-control.
I did not dream. I would not.
My throat was dry and raw by the time morning came. My stomach growled with hunger.
I was waiting for another guard to appear.
A woman appeared instead.
She was young, maybe a little older than I am, with dark curls and bright eyes. She wore leather but not armor. A tray of food and cold water rode in her hands.
"I'm Rhea," she said straightforwardly, setting the tray against the bars.
"I brought this to you before the others could."
I looked at the food distrustfully. Bread. Dried meat. Cheese. A real apple.
“I’m not poisoned,” she added with a dry smile. “I wouldn’t waste my cooking on a corpse.”
I took the tray without speaking.
She crouched on the other side of the bars, chin resting on her knees. “You scared him.”
I blinked. “What?”
“Lucien,” she said. “You scared him.”
I let out a bitter laugh. “He’s a seven-foot wolf with glowing eyes. I’m the one in chains.”
"And still, he hasn't ripped your throat out. Or rejected you."
My heart rate accelerated. "Rejected?"
She tilted her head. "You really don't know, do you?"
"Know what?"
She smiled begrudgingly. "You smell of his mate."
I stood frozen.
Rhea stood, brushing off her knees. "He's battling. He thinks you're weak. Human. But his wolf knows."
Knows what?
"That I'm cursed?" I repeated frostily.
She reached the doorway. "No," she said. "That you're his."