The Lycan King

(Gwen’s POV)

The whispering started somewhere near the front and rolled down the lines like a wave, and by the time it reached me I could hear every word.

"He's coming."

"Is that really him?"

"Goddess, I think I'm going to faint."

I rose onto my toes and peered over the mountains of curled hair and shoulders, but all I could see was the raised platform at the end of the courtyard and two guards hauling open a tall iron door.

A man stepped through it, and the whole place erupted.

Girls screamed, one clutched her chest like she'd been stabbed, and the girl in front of me grabbed her friend's arm so hard that the friend yelped. I stretched higher, nearly toppled, and finally saw him.

Xaden, the Lycan King, walked across the platform with no shirt on at all.

His dark trousers sat low on his hips and his chest was bare to the evening air, broad and hard, with a pale scar curving across his ribs that caught the light as he moved.

His black hair was pushed back like he'd dragged his hands through it on the way, and he moved with the slow, careless ease.

"Look at his stomach," the girl beside me breathed. "Just look at it."

"I'm looking," her friend moaned. "I'm trying not to die."

I rolled my eyes so hard it almost hurt. "Is this how he shows off?" I muttered.

The words went further than I meant it to. The girl in front of me shot a venomous look over her shoulder, and I found something very interesting to stare at in the sky.

On the platform, the king glanced at a guard, who hurried forward with a long black coat.

Xaden took it without a word and shrugged it over his shoulders, leaving it hanging open, which made things worse.

The courtyard let out a groan of disappointment, followed by a second, softer sigh when he dropped into the carved chair and stretched out his long legs.

A guard lit a cigarette for him, and he drew on it slowly, his pale gold eyes drifting over the two lines.

They moved across glossy braids and glittering necklaces and girls who pushed out their chests the moment his gaze came near, and the whole time his expression didn't change.

"He's looking at me," someone whispered. "Did you see?"

"He's looking at all of us, you fool."

I couldn't see anything but the backs in front of me, and panic crept up my throat.

I did the one thing I could think of. I hopped up on my toes, thrust my gloved hand into the air, and waved it like a child trying to be picked for a game.

His eyes skimmed right past me.

"Gods," I whispered, lowering my arm, my face on fire. "Of course."

The warrior woman stepped forward, and every whisper died on the spot. "Listen carefully, because I will not repeat myself. The Alpha will choose ten of you, and no more. If you are able to convince him, you will make it to the top three, and only then will he make his final selection. Those who are not chosen will leave the palace before nightfall."

"Yes, ma'am," the girls chorused.

The silence that followed was so death threatening. Xaden tapped ash onto the stone, leaned back, and began to point.

"You."

A tall redhead with a waist like an hourglass squealed and rushed forward.

"You. And you."

Two more followed, one with hips that swayed like she'd practiced it, one with a laugh like silver bells. Then two others, both curved in all the right places, all the way down to the hem of their gowns.

Five girls stood in a row on the platform before I'd finished counting, grinning and smoothing their hair.

"Three more," he said, and the girls with the lowest necklines stepped forward with their shoulders back, their cleavages exposed, and he chose them one by one without any hurry at all.

Eight. My stomach sank lower with each name.

"And you." He nodded at the girl with the gold in her hair, the one who'd shoved me, and she glided to the platform with a smirk she made sure I could see.

Nine.

I looked down at my plain green dress and the faint outline of the mark under my glove, and my throat ached. I had no chance.

What was I going to tell my parents? That I'd traveled a whole day just to be passed over in front of fifty girls?

I had cost my mother the wedding dress and my father his pride, and for what? It would be better to leave quietly before nightfall and not make a bigger fool of myself.

"You."

My head came up. Xaden was looking in my direction, his cigarette smoking between two fingers, and my heart gave a hard, hopeful jump.

And then it shattered, because the girl standing just ahead of me gasped and stepped out of the line with her hands pressed to her chest, her whole face glowing.

"Thank you, Your Majesty, I—"

"I wasn't talking to you," the king said flatly.

The girl's smile dropped away. All the color drained from her face, and she froze there, half out of the line, as a ripple of cruel, delighted whispers moved through the others.

"Oh my gods," someone breathed. "How embarrassing."

"Then who is he looking at?"

"The petite one," Xaden said, ignoring all of it. "Near the wall. In the green dress."

I honestly didn't understand. Then forty-odd heads turned in perfect unison, and I realized the whole courtyard was staring at me.

"Me?" I said stupidly.

The king replied tiredly. "Unless there's another girl in green hiding back there."

My feet moved before my brain caught up. I walked out of the last line with my gloved hand tucked tight against my skirt, feeling every eye on my back like a hot coal, and I kept my chin down so no one would see the color flooding my cheeks.

When I reached the platform steps, I did what the other girls had done and bowed my head.

"Thank you, Your Majesty."

The hostility in the air was so thick.

Behind me, the courtyard seethed with angry, hissing whispers, and the girl with gold in her hair gave me a look that promised I would pay for this later.

Xaden flicked the last of his cigarette onto the stone and crushed it under his boot.

For the first time, he looked at me properly, those strange gold eyes sweeping down my dress and back up, and I held still.

"How old are you?"

I bowed again. "Nineteen, Your Majesty."

I tried to smile, a small, polite one, and he made a low sound in his throat that might have been a hum.

Then he rose, pulling the coat closed over his chest, and for a heartbeat he stood close enough for me to smell smoke and cedar.

"Let's see how long you can last here," he said.

With that, he turned and walked back through the iron door, and the guards shut it behind him.