chapter 004

Chapter four

The alpha price

Kael pov

I smelled the blood before I saw her.

Fresh. Mixed with wolf scent and fear and something else I couldn’t identify.

“There,” Marcus pointed to a figure collapsed just inside our border. “It is female. Badly injured.”

We approached cautiously. Rogues were always dangerous, especially when wounded.

But when we got closer, I froze.

She was tiny. Silver-white hair matted with blood and dirt. Skin pale as death. Her clothes were torn and soaked red. Bite marks covered her arms and legs…defensive wounds. She’d been running.

“Dead?” one of my warriors asked.

I knelt beside her and checked her pulse.

“Alive. Barely.”

“Who is she?”

That was the question, wasn’t it? Her scent was strange…familiar somehow but I couldn’t place it. Pack-raised, definitely. High-born from the quality of her remaining clothes. But running alone? Wounded like this?

“Should we finish her?” my warrior asked. “Rogue on our territory…”

“No.” The word came out harder than I intended. “Bring her to the pack house.”

“Alpha Kael, we don’t know who she is. What if she’s dangerous?”

I looked at the small, broken figure bleeding out on our territory. Dangerous. Right.

“She’s half-dead and unarmed. I think we can handle it.” I scooped her up carefully. She weighed nothing. Her head lolled against my chest. “Move.”

My warriors exchanged glances but followed.

As I carried her toward the pack house, her face turned slightly toward the moonlight.

And I saw it.

That face. Those features. That silver hair.

I knew exactly who this was.

Elara Moonshadow. Alpha Darius’s daughter. The wolfless one. The defective stain on the great Moon Chosen bloodline.

What the hell was she doing half-dead on my territory?

And more importantly…why did Darius let this happen to his own daughter?

She whimpered in pain, her body curling instinctively toward warmth. Toward me.

“Stay with me,” I heard myself say. “Don’t you dare die.”

I had so many questions.

And she was going to answer every single one of them.

After she survived.

If she survived.

-----

Our pack healer…Old Maria…was waiting when we arrived.

She took one look at the girl and her face went pale. “Get her to the medical room. Now.”

I carried Elara through the pack house. My wolves stopped to stare. Everyone wanted to know who the bloody stranger was.

But I said nothing. Not yet.

In the medical room, I laid her on the bed. Maria started cutting away the ruined clothes to see the wounds better.

“Wolf bites,” Maria said grimly. “She’s lucky to be alive.”

“Can you save her?”

“Maybe. If infection doesn’t set in. If she fights.” Maria looked at me sharply. “Who is she, Alpha?”

“Just do whatever it takes. Keep her alive.”

Maria nodded and got to work.

I stood by the door watching as Maria cleaned wounds and stitched torn skin. She didn’t wake up. Didn’t even flinch. She was too far gone.

But her heart kept beating. Stubborn thing.

Hours passed. The sun came up. Maria finally stepped back, wiping blood from her hands.

“She’ll live,” Maria said. “But she needs rest. Lots of it. The wounds were deep.”

“Good.” I moved toward the bed. “Tell me when she wakes up.”

“Alpha.” Maria hesitated. “Forgive me, but… why are we helping her? A rogue on our territory should be killed or driven off. Not healed.”

I looked at the small figure on the bed. Even unconscious and wounded, I could see the Moon Chosen's features. The silver hair that marked Darius’s bloodline. The delicate bone structure of high-born wolves.

This was Darius’s daughter.

The daughter of the man who killed my father.

And somehow, she’d ended up half-dead on my doorstep.

This was an opportunity. This was fate.

“She’s useful,” I said simply. “That’s all you need to know.”

Maria looked like she wanted to argue. But she was smart enough to stay quiet.

“Watch her,” I ordered. “Report to me the moment she wakes.”

-----

Three days passed before she opened her eyes.

I was in my office when Marcus came to get me.

“She’s awake, Alpha.”

Finally.

I found her sitting up in bed, looking around with confused violet eyes. Maria was trying to make herself drink water but she kept turning her head away.

“You need to drink,” Maria said firmly. “You lost a lot of blood…”

“Where am I?” Her voice was rough. Scared.

“Shadowfang territory,” I said from the doorway.

She jumped, turning to stare at me. Fear flashed across her face.

Good. She should be afraid.

I walked closer and Maria stepped back, giving us space. Elara pressed herself against the headboard like she wanted to disappear into it.

“Who are you?” she asked.

I raised an eyebrow. Did she really not know? Or was she playing stupid?

“I’m Alpha Kael Nightborne,” I said. “You’re in my pack house. In my territory.” I sat in the chair beside the bed. “Now. Tell me who you are.”

She bit her lip. Her eyes darted around like she was looking for escape.

“I’m… I’m just a traveller,” she said. “I got lost. Some wolves attacked me. I didn’t mean to cross into your territory…”

I almost smiled. Silly little wolf, I thought. Did she really think she could fool me?

“A traveller,” I repeated slowly. “With expensive clothes. High-born features. Silver hair.” I leaned forward. “Try again.”

She swallowed hard. “I… My name is Elena. I was travelling to visit family when…”

Still lying. Still trying to hide.

But why?

I reached out and tried to sense her wolf. Every werewolf had one…even weak wolves had some presence I could feel.

But from her?

Nothing.

Complete emptiness where a wolf should be.

The rumours were true. She really was wolfless.

How was that even possible? The Moon Chosen bloodline was one of the most powerful in existence. And yet here sat Darius’s daughter with no wolf at all.

“You don’t have a wolf,” I said. It wasn’t a question.

She looked away. “No.”

“Elara.” I made my voice softer. Not kind, but not cruel either. “You crossed into my territory covered in wolf bites and running for your life. I’m not stupid. Something happened. Either tell me the truth or I will throw you back across the border to whoever was hunting you.”

Her hands twisted in the blanket. When she finally spoke, her voice was barely a whisper.

“Please,” she said quietly. “Just let me go. I’ll leave your territory. You’ll never see me again. I just want to disappear.”

“No.”

Her eyes widened. “What?”

“You’re not going anywhere.” I walked to the door. “You’re staying here. In my pack. Under my protection.”