I spent the night in the archives.
Not sleeping. Not resting. Preparing.
The holographic files glowed across my desk like ghosts of the past. I pulled up everything on Lord Darius Kane — the Shadow Alpha of the Northern Reaches, the man who would walk into my clinic in less than nine hours and try to bury the Supreme Alpha while he was still under my knife.
His backstory was a blade wrapped in silk.
Born the second son of a minor Northern lord, Darius had watched his older brother die in a border war Justin had ordered eight years ago. The official report called it “necessary sacrifice.” Darius called it murder. He had spent the last seven years building a shadow network — spies in every territory, alliances with the lesser Alphas who resented Justin’s iron rule. He never challenged op
