BLESSING LUNA RISING

THE EX- ALPHA BEGS

CHAPTER 6:

The horn blew again. Three long blasts that shook snow off the black ice walls.

Darius's arms were still around me on the balcony, his bare chest pressed to my back, his hands possessive on my stomach. But the moment he heard that horn, his entire body changed.

The reverent King who had just watched my wings unfurl was gone. The monster was back.

He didn't let me go. He turned us both, still holding me against him, so I was facing the horizon with him behind me — caging me.

Through the snowstorm, four wolves were struggling up the mountain path to the gates of Nocturne Keep. Even from this high, I knew them.

Kael. His Beta, Jax. And Seraphine, wrapped in furs that were too thin for the Wastes, being half-dragged, half-carried. And behind them, a white flag tied to a spear — a flag of truce. The universal law that even Lycans could not break. If you carried white, you could not be killed at the gate.

"How dare he," Darius whispered against my ear, and his voice was so low, so lethal, that the fires in his chamber that had just turned white, turned black. "How dare he bring HER into my Kingdom after what she did. After what she took from you."

His hand slid up from my stomach to my throat, not squeezing, just claiming. His thumb brushed my pulse, which was hammering.

"Do you want me to kill him, little Luna? Say the word and his blood will paint the snow before he even reaches the gate."

For five years, I had bled for Kael Blackthorn. I had stitched his wounds. I had stayed up with his fevered pups. I had thought his silences meant he trusted me.

And he had thrown me away like I was nothing. For a girl who was already carrying another man's child.

I looked down at the tiny figures fighting the storm. Kael's head was up. He was looking for me. Even from here