Claimed By A Midnight King

Chapter 10

The vial in Sofias hand pulsed with soft, artificial blue light, reminding one of a shallow grave.

Six hours.

“Rip it from her fingers”, my wolf snarled, his voice a jagged roar in the back of my mind. “Snap the brittle bond of her neck. Bath the snow in her gold blooded arrogance”.

The Midnight king didn’t understand diplomacy. He didn’t understand that if the glass shattered, the girl in the vault dies. To him, Sofia Thorne was a predator encroaching on our territory, a thief who had put a leash on our mate. He wanted to feel her pulse stop beneath his claws.

I forced my hands to stay flat at my sides, though the skin of my knuckles stung as my bones fought to shift. “You expect me to believe that you brought the cure all this way out of the goodness of your heart, Sofia?”

“I don’t have a heart, Alpha Vane. I have an investment”, she purred, her voice smooth and unbothered by the dozens of snarking wolves surrounding her carriage.

She stepped forward, the crunch of her expensive boots in the virgin snow. “Vivian is a delicate instrument . You let her go four days without stabilisation. Her internal temperature is spiking, her nervous system is fraying, and that power you’re so curious about? It’s eating her alive from the inside out”.

“She’s not an instrument”, I snarled, stepping into her path. My scent markers were flaring a warning to every wolf in the courtyard to stand ready. “She’s a woman you’ve been poisoning since she was a child”.

Sofia let out a cold laugh that felt like ice shards dragging down my spine. “Poison? I’m the only reason she’s alive. Without that tonic, she would have turned her own nursery into a Ash when she was six years old. I gave her a reason to exist”.

“You gave her a cage”, I bit out .

“And now you’ve opened the door”, Sofia's eyes sharpened, the green bleeding into something cold and clinical. “In five hours, she’ll start seizing until her bones snap. In five and a half, her lungs will turn to ash. In six, you will be holding a pile of grey dust and wondering why you didn’t just give her back to me”.

The ticking clock was a hammer in my skull. I looked at Silas. My spymaster who was standing five paces back, his silver eyes never leaving Sofia’s guards. He gave me a ghost of a head shake—a warning that resonated in the cold air. Don’t trust her.

“The trade”, I said, my voice like grinding stones. “The medicine for the girl. But you aren’t taking her today”.

Sofia paused, her head tilting. “Explain”.

“I don’t trust your medicine any more than I trust the Prince”, I said. “You hand over the vial. I give to to my apothecary to test. If it’s real, and if she stabilizes, then we talk about terms of her release”.

“Terms?” Sofia's lips curled. “There are no terms, Alpha. She belongs to the Sun Clan”.

“She’s on Shadow soil”, I roared, the sound echoing off the citadel walls, making the horses of her carriage rear in terror. “And in the North, the law is ME. You have five minutes to hand over that vial, or I kill every guard you brought with you and take it from your corpse”.

Sofia's smile didn’t falter. Which should have been my first warning. She held the vial up, her fingers poised to drop it over the stone floor.

“One drop, Dominic. That’s all it takes to shatter”. Sofia's green eyes flicked up to his amber ones, a cruel, knowing smile spreading across her lips. “The butcher of the North, brought to his knees but the moon's little joke. Do you really want to gamble her life on how fast your wolf can jump?”

I went still. Inside, my wolf whined a pathetic, high pitched sound of desperation. She saw it .

She knew the bond was holding me by the throat.

“Fine”, Sofia whispered. “A gesture of good will.but the medicine is a two part process. This vial stops the seizure. The second vial will stop her heart from failing, is still in the carriage. Under a timed lock”.

She tossed the blue vial.

My wolf moved before my human mind could. I caught the glass an inch from the snow, my fingers trembling with the force of the save.

“You have one hour to test it”, Sofia said, retreating toward her carriage. I’ll be waiting in the Great hall. I expect a contract of transfer ready by the time the sun hits the horizon”.

“Silas!” I shouted, not looking back as I sprinted toward the vault. “Take a sample to the apothecary!! If there’s a single grain of hemlock in there, I’ll have her head!”

I plunged back into the dark of the citadel, my heart racing. I reached the vault door in seconds, the guards falling back as I slammed my palm against the iron.

The door shrieked open.

The room was freezing, but the air was thick with the scent of ozone. Vivian was on the floor, but she wasn’t curled up anymore. She was arched, her back straining against the stone, her eyes wide and glowing a brilliant, terrifying violet.

“Vivian!” I cried out, dropping to my knees. I lunged to pull her into my arms, but the moment my hand grazed her shoulder, a shock of violet light threw me backward.

I hit the stone hard, my skin hissing and raw where her power had scorched me. Around her, the very air began to warp and shimmer, turning the dust motes into tiny sparks of grey ash. She wasn’t breathing. She was vibrating .

“Dominic…” she gasped, her voice sounding like stones running together. “It’s …coming out. I can’t… I can’t hold it “.

“Hold on”, I pleaded, the connection screaming in agony at the sight of her pain. “The medicine is here”.

“No”, she whispered, her gaze locking onto mine. In the violet depths of her eyes, I didn’t see a maid. I saw an ancient, starving power.

She reached out, her fingers brushing the mark on my neck.

A vision slammed into mind— a field of white ash,a black moon, and a woman with silver hair standing over the corpses of thousand kings.

“The Astrea does not need medicine”, a voice whispered in my head—not Vivian’s , but something deeper. “She needs to be let go”.

Vivian’s hand tightened on my neck. Her nails now sharp and tipped with violet light—dug into my skin.

“Dominic”, she whispered, her face contorting. “Run. Please.. run”.

I didn’t run. I pulled her against me, ignoring the way my skin began to blister where her power touched me”.

“Silas!!” I screamed .

But the door didn’t open. Instead, a low, rhythmic thudding started to echo through the stones of the Citadel.

Vivian turned her head, her violet eyes fixed on the carriage in the courtyard through the narrow, iron-slotted window .

“Sofia”, she whispered.

And It wasn’t a plea . It was a sentence.