Chapter 3 A name he cannot speak
789 Words
The Alpha can’t stop thinking about the mysterious she-wolf he mated with during her heat.
His mother (the former Luna or queen) is pressuring him to choose a "pure" mate — someone from a known, noble bloodline to keep the royal family strong.
But the Alpha already knows he mated with someone… someone he can’t forget, but doesn't know her name or her pack.
He feels the bond, but he doesn’t know who she is… yet.
The snow fell slowly outside the stone halls of the old fortress, blanketing the mountains like a burial shroud. Inside, the fire crackled but offered little warmth to the man seated before it.
Alpha Vaelen sat alone, elbows on his knees, eyes locked on the flames — but his mind was far away.
It had been weeks since the Gathering.
Weeks since her.
And he still couldn’t shake her from his thoughts.
He didn’t know her name.
Didn’t know her pack.
Didn’t even remember her voice.
But he remembered her scent.
Gods, he remembered her scent.
Sweet and wild, laced with the raw heat of instinct. She had entered his room like a ghost — and left like a memory he couldn't erase.
He’d tried to forget. Tried to push it aside.
But every night since, his wolf stirred restlessly.
> Find her.
The doors swung open with the usual force of a mother who never asked permission.
“Still brooding?” said Lady Seraphina, former Luna of the forgotten kingdom.
She swept into the room like a storm, her silver crown tucked into her braided hair. Regal. Fearsome. Unrelenting.
Vaelen didn’t even look up.
> “You should rest, Mother.”
> “I should see you married,” she snapped. “The bloodline must live on, Vaelen. You’re not getting any younger.”
He smiled bitterly. “I look twenty.”
> “You’re nearly forty,” she replied dryly. “Royal blood or not, time comes for us all. Your sons are strong, yes, but if the kingdom is ever to rise again — we need the line secured. A proper Luna. A mate. A girl who is pure. From a noble pack.”
He stood now, slowly, letting the firelight catch the sharp lines of his jaw.
> “I already have,” he said quietly.
Lady Seraphina narrowed her eyes. “You’ve what?”
He turned toward the window. “I mated. During the Gathering.”
She blinked. “You— Vaelen— You what? Who?”
> “I don’t know.”
Her lips parted in disbelief.
> “You don’t know?! What do you mean you don’t know?!”
His fists clenched. “She came to my room. In heat. I didn’t force her. She came on her own. Drunk, maybe. But her wolf chose me. And mine… responded.”
Silence hung in the room.
> “You mated a stranger,” Seraphina said coldly. “You don’t know her name, her rank, her pack—”
> “No,” he said. “But I remember her. Every second of it.”
He closed his eyes. “She’s strong, whoever she is. Her heat wasn’t weak. Her body didn’t submit like a coward. She looked at me… and didn’t flinch.”
Lady Seraphina folded her arms. “And now you think she’s carrying your child?”
Vaelen opened his eyes, sharp and glowing green. “I don’t think. I feel it.”
> “The bond?”
He nodded once.
> “You don’t form a full bond during heat,” his mother snapped.
> “It wasn’t a full bond. But it was real. I feel her heartbeat in mine. Faint. Distant. But it’s there.”
Seraphina stared at her son — the fallen king, the Alpha who had once ruled more than half the wildlands — now pacing like a cursed prince in a ruined palace.
> “If she’s carrying your child,” she said carefully, “then that child carries the royal blood. The line of Eldros. The fire of the old kingdom.”
Vaelen said nothing.
> “You must find her.”
“I will.”
> “And what if she’s from a broken pack? Or a traitor pack? What if she’s mated to another?”
He turned, eyes flashing. “Then I take her back anyway. She carries my child.”
Lady Seraphina nodded once. “Then we better find her before the others do.”
Far away in the cold northern forest, a girl clutched her cloak tighter around her.
Her hand rested on her stomach.
A heartbeat answered her own.
She didn’t know his name.
But she had seen his eyes in every dream since.
- Writer
