My Mate Killed Our Cub for Power—Then Learned I Was the Alpha Heiress

I was staking the tomatoes in the garden when I felt the second heartbeat. It was still faint, tucked under my own pulse, like a small animal that had only just learned to knock. Deep in my mind my wolf rose, circled it once, careful, and let out a soft whine. I sat in the dirt a long time. It wasn't until the dusk had climbed the fence that I remembered Kael was coming home tonight. I washed the soil off my hands, baked the honey bread he loved, and took the cider I'd been saving down from the cabinet. On the wooden table sat a little bell I'd just finished sanding smooth. After dinner, I'd give it to him. The first gift our pup would ever get. When I heard hooves outside, I couldn't help going out to meet him. Kael swung down off his horse in the dark—and there was another woman's scent on his black cloak, iris, not mine. What came in behind him wasn't game from a hunt. It was six warriors, each of them wearing a black-thorn crest. My steps slowed. "Lyra." He saw me, and there was none of the old coming-home smile on his face. "There's something I have to tell you." He walked into the cabin. He didn't take the bread I held out to him. "In three days, I'm holding a binding ceremony with Serena of the Ironclaw pack. She's going to be my Luna." I watched his mouth move. I caught every word, and I couldn't get them to line up into anything I understood. "Your what?" "Luna." Kael wouldn't meet my eyes. He looked past me, at the hunting bow on the wall. It was the first thing he ever made for me, after we said our mate vows. "My brother died on the border. My father's letting me come back for the succession trials. Ironclaw will hand me the elder votes and the warriors—on the condition that I marry Serena." Three years ago, Kael had stood under that same bow and told me he was nothing. Just a drifter his family had cast out. Back then I'd just gotten out of the Silvercrown stronghold. I was done with it—done studying judgment and marriage-alliances and war, done with the way every single person looked at me and saw only the Alpha I was promised to. I'd changed my name, kept my family's scent buried under herbs for months, and wanted nothing but a patch of land and a life that was only mine. We both knew it, clear as anything. We weren't fated mates. But the moon was good that night. We traded mate pendants down by the creek, each one carved with the other's name. He told me a fated bond was nothing special. What he wanted was someone who saw him with nothing to his name and chose him anyway. I chose him. And I believed he'd chosen me. "And me?" I heard my own voice shake. "What were these three years, then?" Kael came closer, his fingers reaching for my face out of old habit. I caught that iris scent that wasn't mine, turned my head away, and his hand stopped in the air. "I'll give you the north-slope property. Land, fruit trees—you can grow whatever you want." He softened his voice, the way you'd gentle a hurt wolf. "As long as you stay out of Serena's sight, you're still my mate." "A mate with no name. One who isn't allowed in the light." "I'm protecting you. Ironclaw's people won't stand for another woman anywhere near their future Alpha." I laid my palm flat over my stomach. The heartbeat was still there, small and stubborn. I almost told him the truth. I almost still believed a father couldn't bring himself to walk away from his own pup. "And if I could give you more than Ironclaw can?" Something tired came into Kael's eyes. "Lyra. You've got no pack, no name, not even the standing to set foot in the stronghold. Don't throw out desperate lines to make me give it all up." Outside, the sound of lamp oil hitting wood. I turned my head. The six warriors already had their torches to the fence. Kael locked a hand over my shoulder from behind. My wolf felt the threat and slammed toward my skin—and then his familiar scent gave her a half-second of doubt, and she hesitated. That hesitation was all it took. The first flames crawled up onto the roof. "I can't leave evidence I bound myself to a packless woman. Not before the trials." Kael held me tighter as I fought him. "Don't be afraid. When I'm Alpha, I'll build you a better house than this." A roof beam cracked in the fire and came down on the little bed we'd made together. The bell rolled off the table into the ash and gave one last small sound. I looked into that fire, and the secret in my throat couldn't come out anymore. It wasn't just a cabin he burned down. It was the home I'd been about to hand him.