The manor of the late Alpha Garrick was a testament to the High Council's hypocrisy. While the Betas and Omegas of Oakhaven starved in the freezing streets, Garrick's residence was lined with imported Solarian silk, gilded mirrors, and massive hearths burning expensive, scented cedar.
I stood by the grand window of the Alpha's study, looking out over the city square. Below, the Lycan army was distributing the manor's hoarded grain and winter supplies to the citizens. There was no looting, no chaos. Gamma Silas had organized the logistics with his usual terrifying efficiency.
"You are thinking too loudly, my Queen."
Kaelen's deep, rumbling voice broke my focus. He was lounging in Garrick's massive, velvet-upholstered chair, his long, armor-clad legs stretched out casually. He looked entirely out of place in the opulent, delicate room—a dark, ancient warlord resting in a gilded birdcage.
"I am thinking about the ease of this victory," I replied, turning away from the window to face him. The mate-mark on my neck pulsed with a steady rhythm, mirroring his relaxed heartbeat. "Oakhaven fell without a single drop of Lycan blood spilled. But Solaria will not be so fragile. Lucius is a cornered animal, and cornered animals bite."
Kaelen stood up, his massive frame instantly dwarfing the room. He closed the distance between us in three long strides, his heavy boots silent on the plush rug. He wrapped his arms around my waist, pulling me against his chest.
"Let him bite," Kaelen murmured, his nose buried in my hair, inhaling deeply. "His teeth will shatter on our armor. You have given the North a cause, Elena. The packs in the Neutral Zone will hear of Oakhaven. They will hear that the White Wolf feeds the starving and slaughters the tyrants. By the time we reach the Golden Citadel, half of Lucius's empire will be fighting for us."
I rested my head against his chest, listening to the slow, powerful thud of his heart. The absolute security I felt in his arms was intoxicating. He was my shield, the immovable mountain that anchored my chaotic, blinding light.
"I want to tear down the Citadel, Kaelen," I confessed, my voice a quiet, ruthless whisper in the opulent room. "I want to take the magic they stole from my ancestors and watch their holy empire crumble into dust."
Kaelen tilted my chin up, his crimson eyes burning with dark, obsessive devotion. "And I will build you a new throne from the rubble, my little wolf. I promise you—"
He stopped.
The warm, cedar-scented air in the study suddenly vanished. It wasn't replaced by the crisp, biting cold of my ice magic. It was a suffocating, necrotic chill that sucked the oxygen directly from the room.
The roaring fire in the massive hearth didn't blow out; it simply ceased to exist, the flames swallowed by an unnatural, creeping darkness that began to bleed out of the corners of the room.
Kaelen's aura exploded. He shoved me behind him instinctively, his massive black broadsword drawn in a fraction of a second. A primal, earth-shattering growl tore from his throat as his Lycan instincts registered a predator.
"Silas!" Kaelen roared, but the sound seemed to die halfway across the room, muffled by the thickening shadows.
Through the window, I saw the city of Oakhaven plunging into absolute blackness. The torches in the streets were snapping out one by one. The cheering of the citizens turned into screams of pure, unadulterated terror.
"It's not an army," I whispered, stepping up beside my King, my hands already glowing with a brilliant, blinding white light to push back the encroaching dark. "Kaelen... the shadows are moving."