The Alpha's Secret Heir

Chapter Five: The First Attack

The Bloodmoon Pack came on a Tuesday.

I remember that detail with strange clarity—the mundane specificity of it. Not under cover of darkness or during a storm. Tuesday, mid-afternoon, while I was eating a sandwich in the kitchen.

Sasha burst through the door before I could finish my lunch. "They're at the eastern wall. Kael wants you in the bunker."

"No."

"Maya—"

"Take me to the wall."

She stared at me, calculating whether she had time to argue. She didn't.

"Stay behind me. Do exactly what I say. If you die, I will resurrect you just to kill you again."

"Fair enough."

The battle was chaos. Wolves clashed in a blur of teeth and fur, their snarls mixing with the clash of weapons. The smell hit me first—copper and sweat and something acrid I later learned was fear-sweat from wounded wolves.

I saw Kael in wolf form. Massive and black, his golden eyes blazing, cutting through the enemy like a scythe through wheat. He was magnificent. Terrifying.

A Bloodmoon wolf broke through the line, heading straight for me.

I didn't think. I moved.

My knife found his throat before he reached me. The bond had warned me a split second before I saw him—a cold spike of intent that registered as danger before my conscious mind caught up.

Sasha stared at me, blood spattered across her face. "How did you—"

"The bond."

She whistled low. "Useful."

Kael found me after the battle, still in wolf form, his muzzle streaked with crimson. He shifted, unconcerned by his nakedness, and pulled me into his arms without a word.

"You fought," he said against my hair.

"You trained me."

"I trained you to survive, not to charge into battle."

"Same thing."

He laughed, the sound rough and relieved. "I love you. You know that?"

"Tell me again when I'm not covered in someone else's blood."

"I'll tell you every day."

That night, the compound held a funeral for the fallen. Three wolves, their names carved into the memorial stone that stood at the compound's heart. I stood at the edge of the crowd, feeling their absence through the bond like missing teeth.

"Loss is part of war," Elara said, appearing beside me like a ghost. "But so is love. Remember that."

"Hard to remember on a night like this."

"Then remember tomorrow."

She left me alone with the memorial and the silence. I stayed until dawn, watching the stars fade one by one, the names of the fallen etched into stone and memory alike.

When the sun finally rose, I understood something I hadn't before. This was what we were fighting for. Not power or territory, but the right to see another sunrise together.