Chapter 2
789 Words
She woke three days later. Kael was sitting in the armchair beside her bed when her eyes fluttered open. He’d barely left the room, delegating pack duties to Rylan with a curtness that bordered on rudeness. He told himself he was just ensuring his territory’s security. He knew that was a lie.
Her eyes were the color of moonlight on water—pale silver, almost luminous. They widened when they focused on him, and for a moment, raw terror flickered in their depths. She scrambled backward against the pillows, hissing in pain as her injured leg protested.
“Easy,” Kael said, keeping his voice low. “You’re safe. I’m Kael Blackwood, Alpha of the Nightshade Pack. I found you on my border. You’ve been unconscious for three days.”
She stared at him, her breath coming in quick gasps. Then, slowly, she took in the room—the stone walls, the heavy velvet drapes, the Blackwood crest embroidered on the blanket covering her. Something like recognition dawned in her expression, and it wasn’t relief. It was horror.
“No,” she whispered. “Not here. Anywhere but here.”
Kael frowned. “You know this place?”
She turned her face away, a tremor running through her body. “Please. I need to leave. As soon as I can walk, I’ll go.”
“You can barely sit up. You’re not going anywhere.” He leaned forward, compelled by an urge he couldn’t name. “What’s your name?”
Silence. Then, so softly he almost missed it: “Elara.”
“Elara what?”
She didn’t answer. Her hands had fisted in the blanket, and her knuckles were white. She looked like a cornered animal, and something about that protective instinct twisted inside Kael again.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” he said.
She let out a bitter, broken laugh. “That’s what they all say.”
Before he could respond, the door opened, and Rylan stepped in. “Kael, your father wants to see you. He heard about the rogue and he’s... not happy.”
Elara made a strangled sound. All the blood drained from her face, and she looked at Kael with an expression of pure, undiluted dread.
“Your father,” she breathed. “Magnus Blackwood.”
Kael felt the first cold tendril of unease curl through his gut. “You know my father?”
Elara closed her eyes, and a single tear slipped down her cheek. “I was his mistress.”
---
The silence that followed was absolute.
Kael felt as if the floor had dropped out from under him. His father’s mistress. The words echoed in his skull, refusing to make sense. Magnus Blackwood had been Alpha for forty years before stepping down. He was respected, feared, a legend among the packs. And he had been mated to Seraphina, Kael’s mother, for nearly half a century. The idea of him taking a mistress was unthinkable.
And yet, looking at Elara’s face—the shame, the terror—Kael knew she wasn’t lying.
“Explain,” he said, his voice dangerously quiet.
Elara’s throat worked. “It was ten years ago. I was eighteen. My pack—the Silver Creek Pack—had been destroyed by hunters. I was the only survivor. Your father found me, brought me here. He...” She swallowed. “He was kind at first. He said he would protect me. And then he made it clear what that protection would cost.”
Kael’s wolf surged forward with a snarl. Kyr wanted blood—wanted to tear into something, anything. The thought of this fragile omega being used by his own father made him physically ill.
“You were his mistress for how long?”
“Two years.” Elara’s voice was barely audible. “Until your mother found out. Then I was banished. I’ve been a rogue ever since.”
Two years. Kael had been eighteen himself then, away at a training academy for young Alphas. He’d come home for holidays, but he’d never seen her. His father had kept her hidden away like a dirty secret.
“Why did you come back to this territory?” Kael demanded.
“I didn’t mean to. I was running from something else—rogues who’d been tracking me for weeks. I crossed the border by accident. I was too weak to keep going.”
Kael stood abruptly, his chair scraping against the stone floor. He needed air. He needed to think. His wolf was raging inside him, and the mate bond was still there, still pulling, despite everything he’d just learned.
This woman—this omega—was his father’s discarded mistress. And she was his fated mate.
- Writer
