She Let Her Blood Save the Dying Alpha King, Then Black Veins Began Climbing Her Own Arm

Shrapnel of splintered oak and iron rivets rained across the polished stone floor.

The loud screams of dying guards echoed from the outer hallway as a dense, choking cloud of grey smoke rolled into the high-ceilinged council chamber.

“Raid!” Colin shouted, drawing his broadsword in a single, fluid motion. “Protect the Alpha!”

The eight territory lords drew their weapons instantly, forming a defensive circle around the high table.

Through the grey smoke stepped twenty heavily armed warriors dressed in unmarked dark leather armor. They carried tactical crossbows loaded with silver-tipped bolts and short, thick breaching axes designed for close-quarters slaughter.

Leading them was a man Mara had never seen before—a tall, skeletal figure with pale white skin, a bald head, and cold, milky-white eyes.

“Marcus Vance,” Caleb spat, his voice laced with pure hatred as he stepped in front of Mara, drawing a long steel broadsword from his belt.

Marcus Vance was the exiled Alpha of the northern frost packs—a ruthless warlord who had been banished five years ago for using prohibited dark magic and chemical weapons against his own people.

“Hello, Caleb,” Vance sneered, his raspy voice cutting through the ringing sound of clashing steel. “Nolan promised me the gates would be open at midnight, but I see he failed his part of the bargain. No matter. A front door is easily broken.”

Vance lifted a small brass whistle to his pale lips and blew a sharp, high note.

From the hallway behind him, ten more armored raiders surged into the room, leveling their silver crossbows directly at the high table.

“Kill the lords!” Vance ordered coldly. “Bring me the Alpha King’s head! And find the Ellison girl!”

Mara’s heart stopped.

He knows, she realized with sheer horror. Vance didn't come just to help Nolan take the territory. He came for me.

“Colin!” Caleb bellowed over the roar of battle, parrying a silver bolt with the flat of his broadsword. “Get Mara to the sanctuary! Now!”

“No!” Mara yelled, clinging to the back of Caleb’s leather tunic. “I’m not leaving you!”

“You have to!” Caleb roared, turning his head for a fraction of a second, his gray eyes blazing with desperate fury. “Vance knows what your blood is! If he takes you, he will use you to create an immortal army of northern raiders! Go!”

Before Mara could argue further, two northern raiders leaped over the mahogany council table, their short axes swinging down toward Caleb’s head.

Caleb turned, his broadsword slicing through the air with terrifying speed, cutting the first raider down in a single, violent stroke.

Colin grabbed Mara by the upper arm, dragging her forcibly toward the small secret door hidden behind the tapestry near the eastern wall.

“Move, Miss Ellison!” Colin barked, shoving her through the narrow stone opening as crossbow bolts thudded into the wooden frame beside her head.

Mara scrambled into the dark, narrow service tunnel, her heart hammering wildly against her ribs.

Behind her, through the closing stone door, she heard the brutal, terrifying roar of Caleb’s wolf taking full control, followed by the metallic clash of thirty men fighting for their lives in the smoke-filled hall.

She didn't run down the tunnel toward the sanctuary.

She stopped in the pitch darkness, her breath coming in ragged, desperate gasps.

Through the blood bond that tied her heart to Caleb’s, she felt a sudden, sharp spike of white-hot agony shoot through her chest.

It wasn't her pain.

It was his.

One of Vance’s silver-tipped bolts had just found its mark in Caleb’s side.

Mara looked down at her small, pale hands in the dark.

She was an inventory clerk. She was a human who had spent her entire life running, hiding, and pretending to be a nobody so the world wouldn't bleed her dry.

She looked at her reflection in a small wall mirror tucked in the service sconce.

Her eyes were glowing with brilliant, golden fire.