CHAPTER SIX
952 Words
DAMIAN'S POV
The wolf’s howl slices through the courtyard like a blade to the throat.
I’m already moving before the echo fades. My guards scramble to follow, boots pounding stone. I barely hear them. All I hear is the promise I left in her room: You are mine to protect.
And already I know I’ve lied.
Because I can’t protect Alessia from the one thing I can’t strangle with my bare hands: betrayal inside my own walls.
I push through the outer gate, past a pair of stunned sentries pointing dumbly at the treeline. Moonlight bathes the courtyard in a cold glow.
My wolf itches under my skin, pressing against my ribs. I smell them before I see them — the stink of fear and old blood. Rogues. More than one. And too close.
“Form the line!” I bark.
Steel flashes as my warriors obey. Young wolves fumble their blades, glancing at me for permission to be brave. Fools. The moon has no patience for children tonight.
A dark shape breaks from the brush — low to the ground, eyes blazing yellow, foam on its jaws. One of Rowen’s cast-offs, twisted by hunger and lies.
I don’t hesitate. I shift.
Pain rips through me — skin splitting, bones warping. Silver eyes become a predator’s. Fur bristles where flesh ruled before.
I hit the rogue mid-lunge, teeth burying in its throat. Warm copper fills my mouth. It kicks once, twice, then goes still.
I drop the carcass and turn.
Two more circle the clearing’s edge, hackles up, snapping at the line of wolves behind me.
“Hold!” I snarl, voice raw through a wolf’s throat.
One pup breaks ranks anyway — a stupid, shaking beta thinking courage means charging first.
The larger rogue spins, jaws wide.
Too slow.
I bolt, a silver blur, intercepting the snap meant for the boy’s neck. My claws rake across the rogue’s ribs. It screams — a sound more human than beast. I finish it fast, jaws locked until bone cracks.
Blood spatters the snow. My pack watches, wide-eyed, fear and loyalty fighting for space in their skulls.
Good.
Fear keeps them alive. Loyalty keeps them mine.
A shout tears through the dark: “Alpha! Another one — north side!”
I pivot, ears flicking at the crunch of fresh footsteps behind me.
But before I can lunge, I feel her.
Her scent threads through the iron tang of blood — moonlight and defiance, soft enough to break me if I let it.
I turn, shifting halfway back to speak.
She stands just inside the gate, barefoot, hair loose, a dagger clutched so tight her knuckles glow white in the moonlight.
“Alessia,” I snarl. “I told you to stay—”
She strides forward, eyes locked on the rogue circling to my right. “Then order your pack to stand back.”
I could kill her for this. I could kiss her for it too.
A low growl curls out of my chest. “Don’t test me now.”
She doesn’t flinch. “Then don’t test me.”
The rogue chooses that moment to charge. Smart beast. It knows it’ll die faster than we can argue.
I surge forward — but Alessia is already moving.
She pivots sideways, lets the beast barrel past her, then drives her dagger up beneath its jaw. A clean strike — one her father must have taught her long before he taught her courtly lies.
The rogue twitches once and goes limp.
Blood drips down her wrist. She breathes hard, eyes on me, chest heaving. Alive. Glorious. Infuriating.
The other wolves watch, their fear flickering to something else. Respect. Awe.
A tiny seed of rebellion dies in that moment, but a bigger storm takes root instead.
She drops the corpse at my feet like an offering.
“You said I belong beside you,” she pants. “Then stop treating me like a ghost chained to your walls.”
I shift back fully, skin crawling over fur and bone. My voice, when it comes, tastes like iron.
“Inside these gates, you obey me.”
She steps closer until the heat of her skin mocks the winter air.
“Then lead me, Damian Blackthorn. Or get out of my way.”
Moon above — my wolf howls at the challenge in her voice. He wants to mark her. To bind her teeth to mine, her blood to mine, right here among the corpses.
I cage him down with every scrap of control I have left.
Behind us, Lira appears, sword slick with rogue blood. She takes in the bodies, then Alessia’s dagger, then my naked fury.
“Well,” she drawls. “Looks like our Luna has teeth after all.”
I shoot her a look sharp enough to silence the whole pack.
I turn back to Alessia. She doesn’t look away. Never does.
“Inside. Now.”
She wipes her blade on the dead rogue’s fur and tosses it at my feet.
“I’m not hiding again.”
I step so close our noses nearly brush. “You will do as I command, or you’ll doom every wolf in these walls.”
She tilts her head, and the glint in her eyes is equal parts promise and threat.
“Then teach me to command them myself.”
A fresh howl shatters the moment — louder, closer. Lira’s eyes widen.
“Alpha,” she hisses, pointing to the distant hilltop where torches flicker like falling stars.
“They’re not just rogues. They’re organized.”
And all I can think, as Alessia’s defiant breath brushes my jaw, is—War is here. And she is my sharpest weapon.
- Writer
