Chapter 1 - The Gamer Girl and The Crown

In the Library,

Moon Shadow Pack,

Rhea

I smirked as the screen flashed a brilliant blinding gold.

[VICTORY: TEAM REQUIEM]

[MVP: RYX]

I slumped back in the rusted metal chair, the boiler room’s heat sticking my camisole to my skin. My heart was a frantic bird hitting the cage of my ribs. Forty-five minutes. Forty-five minutes of pixelated war, and I’d actually done it.

"Ryx! Ryx, talk to me, you beautiful genius!" Jax’s voice was a jagged saw in my headset. "Five. Million. Credits. We’re in, Rhea! The S-League is officially our b*tch!"

"Keep your voice down, Jax," I hissed, my eyes darting to the heavy iron door. The boiler hissed back, a jet of steam mimicking my anxiety. "I’m in the basement. If a guard hears a 'demon' shouting in the pipes, I’m dead before I see a single credit."

"Right, right. Stealth mode," Jax whispered loudly. "But seriously, that flank? The way you baited their tank into the dead zone? I think I'm in love with your brain."

"Save it for the after-party," I said, my fingers flying across the mechanical keyboard to wipe the cache. "I have to go. The Mating Ceremony starts in an hour, and if I’m not there to be the family disappointment, my father will have my head."

"Wait! Don't you want to see the global rankings? You've jumped to..."

Click.

I severed the connection. The silence of the library’s basement rushed back in, heavy and smelling of wet coal and forgotten paper. I minimized the game client with a practiced twitch. Artherball vanished, replaced by a wall of dry, soul-crushing calculus.

I shoved my thick, blue-light-blocking glasses up the bridge of my nose and pulled the hood of my oversized, grease-stained sweatshirt over my long white hair. I didn't look like a pro-gamer. I looked like a basement-dwelling ghost.

The iron door groaned on its hinges.

"Rhea? Are you still down here in the dark? It’s practically bio-hazardous."

It was my sister Lyra, of course.

She stepped into the room, looking like she’d been dipped in liquid moonlight. Her dress was a gossamer silk that probably cost more than my entire rig, her blonde-white hair pinned back with diamond-encrusted moon charms. She smelled like lilies and expensive entitlement.

"I’m studying, Lyra," I said, not looking up from a particularly nasty derivative. "Some of us actually have to use our brains since we don't have... other assets."

Lyra let out a soft, tittering laugh that made me want to grind my teeth into powder. She walked over, her heels clicking sharply on the concrete, and leaned over my shoulder.

"Oh, you’re so diligent! It’s truly inspiring," she cooed, her hand resting ‘comfortably’ on my shoulder. Her grip was tight with a silent warning. "I’ve been telling Kael all morning how brilliant you are. I told him, 'Kael, don't be too hard on her just because she’s shiftless. She’s very good at... math.'"

"How generous of you," I muttered.

"I really, truly want this to work for you two," she said, her eyes wide and shimmering with fake sincerity. The classic 'sweet sister' move - sweet enough to rot your teeth while she pours the poison. "But Father is reaching his limit, Rhea. He’s already calling for the Alpha's Guard. If you aren't upstairs in ten minutes, he might just drag you to the altar by your hair."

"I'm going," I snapped, shoving my laptop into my bag.

"Good!" She clapped her hands, a jagged diamond ring catching the dim light. "Because I’ve already sent the maids to your room. They have instructions to make you look... well, presentable. For a human."

---

Moments later,

"Hold your breath, Princess. Unless you want to lose a lung."

Yank.

The corset strings screamed. My ribs groaned. I felt like a Victorian doll being prepped for an execution. The head maid, a woman with a face like a hatchet, didn't even look at me. She just kept pulling.

"You're hurting her," a younger maid whispered, hovering nervously with a bowl of scented water.

"She’s a Graymont," the lead maid snapped, her eyes cold as she looked at my short, messy white hair. "Even if she’s a dud, she has to stand straight. Now, scrub the grease off her neck. I won't have the Alpha smelling the boiler room on her."

The loofah hit my skin like a brick wrapped in sandpaper. They scrubbed until my collarbones were raw and angry red. Then came the hair - they brushed it with such clinical violence I felt tears prick the corners of my eyes. They pulled it back into a bun so tight it felt like they were trying to lift my entire face.

"Now the perfume," the lead maid ordered.

Pssh. Pssh.

The cloud of suffocating lavender descended. It was thick, oily, and smelled like a funeral home.

"And the dress," she finished, her voice dripping with disdain.

They lowered the slate-grey velvet over my head. It was heavy. It was hot. The high collar felt like a velvet noose, specifically designed to make me look small and dull next to Lyra’s golden radiance.

"There," the lead maid said, stepping back with a sneer. "As good as it gets for a girl without a wolf. Get moving. Your father’s patience is a thin thread, and you've already frayed it."

The second they filed out, I bolted for the bedside table. I didn't care about the dress or the stinging on my skin. I grabbed my phone, my thumb hovered over the biometric scanner.

Scan. Verify. Welcome, Ryx.

The screen bloomed into a deep, velvety dark as I entered my AI chat app. Then, a man appeared.

He was leaning back in a high-backed chair, a glass of dark red wine held between two long, elegant fingers. His obsidian hair fell over his brow, framing eyes the color of a hurricane at midnight as I set it to video call.

"You're late, Ryx," Adrian Veyran murmured. His voice was a low, vibrating hum that seemed to travel through the phone and settle directly in my marrow. "I was beginning to think you’d been kidnapped by your own equations."

"The match ran long, Adrian," I said, my voice finally losing its hard edge. I leaned my forehead against the cool glass of the screen. "But we did it. I've gotten five million. It's almost enough to buy the company back. I can leave."

Adrian’s eyes darkened, a flash of something possessive and sharp flickering in the depths. He leaned forward, his face filling the screen.

"I watched you too, you know," he whispered. "When you made me move at the thirty-minute mark... it was a masterpiece of slaughter. You were beautiful, my little gamer girl."

"I was lucky," I said, a blush creeping up my neck that had nothing to do with the maids' scrubbing.

"You were perfect," he corrected, his voice dropping an octave. "But you look... different. What is that hideous grey rag you're wearing?"

"The ceremony," I sighed, picking at the velvet. "The Mating Ceremony. They’re going to make me stand there while Kael picks Lyra. It’s just a formality... more like public shaming."

CRACK!!!

The wine glass in Adrian’s hand shattered. Red liquid sprayed across the digital floor, but he didn't even blink. His eyes suddenly glowed lethal crimson that made the air in my room feel heavy.

"Adrian?" I whispered.

"Let the wolf howl into the wind," he growled, a guttural vibration coming through the speakers. "He is a fool who stares at a candle while the sun is right in front of him. If he touches you - if he so much as makes you shed a single tear tonight - remember what I told you, Ryx."

"Adrian, it’s just a ceremony..."

"I will end him," he said, his voice flat and terrifyingly calm. "I don't care about your 'fated mates' or your pack laws. You are mine. Do you understand? Every fiber of my being is dedicated to you. You belong to me."

My heart did a full drum solo. "I... I have to go. They're calling for me."

"Don't be long," Adrian murmured, his image beginning to flicker as he leaned back into the shadows. "I find I have very little patience when my world is out of my sight. Go, Princess. Play your part. But remember who is waiting for you in the dark."

I closed the app, my hand trembling. I stood up, the grey velvet dragging on the floor like chains. I didn't want Kael. I didn't want the Moon Shadow Pack. I wanted the man in the screen who looked at me like I was the only thing that mattered in the world.

I walked down the long, gilded hallway toward the Great Hall. The heavy double doors were guarded by two massive wolves in human form, their eyes tracking me with pity.

"Alpha is waiting, Princess Rhea," the guard on the left said, his voice a low rumble.

"I know," I said, squaring my shoulders.