Chapter 009. The Bargain’s Edge

“I can sense your disdain.”

Saeris didn’t answer. Not right away.

She was standing with her back to the window. The view behind her had lost its luster hours ago … When she first saw it, she hadn’t breathed. Not really. The mountains were the first to steal it from her. Towering, jagged, snow-dusted peaks, more vast and savage than anything she’d ever seen. Not the tame hills near Greenvale. Not the soft-bellied woods or gentle river bends of the South. This… this was a city carved by war and ice and time. A terrain that dared her to survive it.

…the vastness of this place, its city, its power, its endless sprawl across the river … it was beautiful. But she was long past awe.

Right now, all of her attention was drilling into the man before her.

Six hours had crawled by since the sun-kissed woman left her alone. Six hours of silence, of pacing, of lying in that ridiculously soft bed. And then—he’d shown up.

“I want answers. Real ones.”

Vaelen crooked a dark eyebrow at her. “Answers about what, precisely?"

“Everything. Why am I really here? What aren't you telling me?”

“Our bargain was clear,” he said, not unkindly. “You’re to be my mate.”

“Pretend to be your mate,” she corrected.

Vaelen shrugged, because it made no difference to him. “Call it whatever you like. So long as they believe it.”

Gods, he was smug.

He didn’t have to make her feel stupid—he just enjoyed it. Fine.

“You failed to mention that Lycans aren’t exactly lining up to kiss wolf feet,” she said, holding his gaze. “You didn’t say a thing about how your people might hate me just for existing. That doesn’t strike you as slightly important? If I’m supposed to walk into this, and I am beginning to reconsider, I need to know exactly what kind of nightmare I’m stepping into, and why, truly, you of all people need someone to pretend to be your mate."

He tilted his head, watching her. “The person is you, not just someone.”

“You tricked me.”

“I didn't. I omitted. There's a difference.”

She waited, eyed him.

Vaelen sighed. “Lycans don’t… bond the way wolves do,” he said. “For us, mating is exceedingly rare. Most kings never find their true mate. When that happens, a tradition is enforced, a Luna Selection. Ladies from each of the King’s Hands. They compete for the role of Queen. It's political, brutal, and very public.”

Her stomach turned. “Did you…? Am I?”

“Yes and no.”

His gaze was unreadable. Not ashamed. Not proud, either.

The silence between them stretched. Tightened. And then—

“If you must know, the Luna Selection was stopped,” he added. “Because I declared I had found my mate.”

The room tilted slightly.

A crown that could slit her throat if she slipped. She was a wolf paraded into a den full of purebloods who’d kill for the chance to wear the title she was borrowing.

“You never planned on telling me, did you?” she said, voice quieter now.

“No.”

“Because you didn’t think I deserved to know?”

“Because I didn’t think it would change your decision,” he replied. “You already knew this wouldn’t be easy. And you came anyway.”

Because she’d had no other choice. Because she’d needed him. Her heart was pounding. A steady, punishing rhythm, like it wanted out of her ribs.

Pretending to be mates—

She’d made peace with that. Tried not to think much into it…the cost … for her wolf. For a chance to get her back. So she said, but not without bite, “Even if we pretend, that doesn't mean I am out of risks, the others might—”

“I will kill anyone who harms you,” Vaelen snarled. “They all know well enough.”

Even so, the temptation to ask was too strong to resist. “What’s stopping you from picking someone from the selection? Surely one of them is tolerable” she goaded. “Better yet, why not search for your actual mate—unless even that is too much trouble for someone so eager to dodge the ones they’ve thrown at them?”

Something shifted in his expression. She had felt it before, in Silver Clove… irritation.

Vaelen prowled toward her. His golden irises shifted, then began to burn, just enough to catch her eye, to make her pulse stutter. She tried not to pull back as he drew closer, but he was huge. He towered over her, taking up so much room, invading her space, blotting out the damn light. He was all she could see. All she could smell. A wall of heat and scent and skin… Curse her, it made her teeth itch—

Canines bared, he leaned in so close that barely an inch separated the tips of their noses.

And he snarled, “I did.”

Her breath strangled in her throat.

So he was giving up? Just to parade another as his mate? A lie. What the hell kind of king makes that choice?

Out of nowhere, his composure snapped back into place, his canines disappearing in a flash.

“We had a deal, wolfling,” he said, voice like carved onyx. “You’ll honor it. As will I. Stop your whining, it doesn't suit you. Now—hold out your hand.”

“Hold out my...?”

“Yes, hold out your hand.”

Still glaring, she did.

From a hidden pocket, he produced a vial. Blue liquid shimmered inside, catching the light. The same kind she’d seen before—before chaos and blood and that dead-eyed frenzy. Only that had been purple.

He placed it gently in my hand.

“Drink.”

She didn’t move, just stared at the liquid. It wasn’t going to turn her into one of them… right?

“What is it?”

"Something to mask your… current condition.” His eyes had returned to their normal shade. "Your wolf's silence is loud enough to attract unwanted attention. This will give you a scent strong enough to deceive them, but only temporarily. Thorold did make it for you.”

Somehow, hearing the name — Thorold — made it easier.

She didn’t know the scholar. Had never met him, never even seen his shadow. And yet, she trusted the idea of him more than she trusted the Lycan King standing across from her. Which said everything.

“You’ll meet him tonight,” Vaelen divulged. “Consider it the first step in restoring your wolf.”

That did it.

The vial looked harmless, and smelled sweet too. So she tipped it back and drank.

The heat was immediate, but it was Vaelen's intense gaze that truly set her ablaze. He watched her throat, tracking every swallow with a focus that made her acutely aware of their proximity.

Vaelen extended his palm, wordless. She dropped the empty vial into his waiting hand. And only then did he let her breathe.

“No need to be impatient…” That smirk—lazy, lethal—was designed to get under skin. “Our deal begins tonight. I’ll be yours soon enough.”

She barely resisted the urge to fling something at him.

“First,” he said, stepping back.

Then his gaze dipped lower. To the fabric of her dress. The corner of his mouth twitched—in distaste. That same look she remembered from the packhouse, when he'd first seen the lot of them. Like the sight of her in wolf-worn cotton offended his very existence.

“A bath. Sleep. And something that doesn’t look like it was dragged from a grave.”

✦✦✦

Hours later, Saeris stood before the largest doors she’d ever seen.

They loomed like stone gods. Twenty feet high, carved from something black and oiled, veined with dark ink. Armed sentries flanked each side.

She felt ridiculous in the dress they’d given her—silk, soft as sin, dyed in deep bone-white like the court walls. It hugged her hips like it had something to prove. Bared too much of her shoulders. On the other hand, the potion had done its job. Her scent was wolf again. Real enough. A lie painted over broken truth. Still… she couldn't tamp the mantra … would they know? Would the Lycans—ancient, blood-bound, sharp-sensed—feel her hollowness?

Her hands were cold. Her fingers flexed against her sides.

One of the guards’ brows twitched, as if hearing a voice she couldn’t. A mental link, likely. Then, without a word, both reached for the handles and pulled.

The doors swung open and the pit in her stomach bottomed out.

Whispers.

Her name? Maybe. Or just… “wolf.”

The hall was vast. Cathedral-vast. Vaulted ceilings that disappeared into shadow, marble floors that reflected candlelight in long streaks of gold and crimson. If she’d thought Greenvale’s great hall was grand, this place made it look like a broom closet. An abyssal space that must have taken decades to construct, filled with presumably pure-blooded Lycans who looked at her like she was prey as she took her first four steps, and stopped.

Mother above! She might not make it out.