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Chapter 13: The King’s Weight
publish date:
2026-04-24 15:49:14
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GIVEN TO THE WRONG ALPHA Chapter 17: The Watchers
The scent gets stronger by morning. Not in the marsh. In the nursery. Draven wakes first, claws already out. “Something was here.” I check the cribs. Cael sleeps. Lyana sleeps. Geralt sleeps. Love, who refused to leave them, sleeps on the floor. All breathing. All safe. But there’s mud on the windowsill. Not marsh mud. Clay. Red clay. Rowan sniffs it, recoils. “Old, older, than, Father, older, than, witch.” Caiden kicks the door open, rifle up. “Perimeter’s clean, no tracks, no heat sigs, whatever it is doesn’t show up.” Mercy limps in, Thorn One, healed but scarred. “Thorns, feel, it, too, like, ice, in, bones, not, enemy, not, friend.” Cael opens his eyes. “Watchers.” One word. The temperature drops ten degrees. Ambassador Reed calls, voice tight. “We have a problem, satellites over Duskbane went blind at 0300, full blackout, six minutes, came back with new topography.” “New,” Draven repeats. “There's a structure in the dead marsh now,” Reed says. “Wasn’t there yesterda
GIVEN TO THE WRONG ALPHA Chapter 16: The First Tree
Three days. That’s what we have before six more Mercy-level experiments walk into Duskbane territory. Draven calls the pack. Every wolf, every feral who chose to stay, every human soldier who didn’t run after Ch12. Two hundred bodies in the courtyard. “Not an army,” Cael said. “A pack.” So we don’t build trenches. We build a circle. The First Tree isn’t a tree anymore. It’s a stump, wide as a house, black with old blood. The first witch died here. Gerald took her blood here. Now his children come home here. We ring it with wolves, ferals, humans, Rowan, Mercy, Caiden, Draven, me. Cael in my arms. Lyana and Geralt with the High Priestess in the Keep, warded, guarded. Ambassador Reed watches from the ridge with drones. “President says if this goes wrong, we glass the whole county.” “Then tell her not to miss,” Draven says. Day one, nothing. Day two, the sky turns red. Day three, they come. Not together. One by one, like challengers. **Thorn Two** drops from the sky. Wings.
GIVEN TO THE WRONG ALPHA Chapter 15: The Seven Thorns
“Seven,” Draven says. His voice doesn’t shake. “Where.” Cael blinks. “Don’t, know, yet, waking, slow.” Rowan sets Lyana and Geralt in their cribs, gentle. “I, feel, them, like, sisters, but, wrong, twisted.” The High Priestess spreads the scroll on the floor. Ink, old, Gerald’s handwriting. “Phase 2: The Seven Thorns, implanted in human wombs across continents, dormant until Hollow King blood hits atmosphere, your birth triggered them.” My birth. Caiden stumbles in, holding his side. “So we killed one war to start another, great.” “No,” I say. “We end it, before it starts.” Ambassador Reed’s radio crackles from downstairs. “Duskbane Keep, we have seven thermal spikes, global, matching Hollow DNA, orders?” Draven takes Cael from me. “Tell the President, the King handles his Thorns, not her.” “Can he,” Reed asks. “He’s hours old.” Cael looks at the radio. “Yes.” One word. The radio dies. Reed runs up the stairs, pale. “All comms, dead, he, did he just—” “He’s King,” I say.
GIVEN TO THE WRONG ALPHA Chapter 14: The King’s First Breath
He doesn’t cry. The Hollow King comes out silent, eyes open, black with silver rings. He looks at me, then at Draven, then at the clone. And the world stops. Not magic. Fear. Every soldier, every feral, every drone, all frozen. Because a newborn just looked at them and judged them. Draven catches him before I drop him. Blood on his hands, on the baby, on the ash. “Wren.” “I’m here,” I say, but my voice is gone. The birth took everything. The clone snarls, breaking the freeze. “Give him to me, he’s mine by blood.” Rowan stands, placing Lyana and Geralt on the ground behind her. “No, mine, by, choice.” The baby turns his head. Looks at the clone. And smiles. No teeth, no gums, just a curve of lips that isn’t a baby’s. The clone stumbles back. “What, what are you.” The baby raises one hand. The clone screams. His skin peels, not from claws, from inside. Black smoke pours from his mouth, eyes, chest. The same smoke that left Gerald Ch12. The magic. It’s leaving him. “No,”
GIVEN TO THE WRONG ALPHA Chapter 13: The King’s Weight
The baby kicks. Not like before. This is command, not movement. My whole body locks, spine arching off the bed. “Wren,” Draven grabs me. “Breathe.” I can’t. The heartbeat in my womb isn’t a baby’s anymore. It’s drums, war drums, and every beat pulls at the air. Rowan steps back, both infants cradled in her bone arms. “King, wakes,” she says. “Too, soon.” Caiden stumbles to the door. “Get the Priestess, get everyone.” “No,” I gasp. The pain stops as fast as it came. The heartbeat slows, normal again. Sweat soaks the sheets. “It’s, it’s quiet.” Draven doesn’t let go. “What did it do.” I touch my stomach. “It listened, then it chose, not to.” The two babies Rowan holds are silent, eyes open. Gold. Like Draven’s. Like mine. Not black, not silver. Normal. “Names,” I say. “They need names, before someone else names them.” Rowan tilts her head. “You, give.” Draven looks at Caiden. Caiden nods, once. “This one,” I touch the smaller bundle, a girl, “Lyana, for the mother I lost.”
GIVEN TO THE WRONG ALPHA Chapter 12: The Second Body
Black smoke coils into the shape of a man. Gerald Holloway steps out of the ridge, whole, clean, smiling. No bullet wound. No claw marks. Just a different suit. Draven’s growl shakes the marsh. “I killed you.” “You killed a clone,” Gerald says. “Expensive, but worth it. You always were predictable, Duskbane.” The lieutenant raises his rifle again. “Stand down, all of you, this is a federal—” Rowan moves. One second she’s beside me, the next her hand is through the lieutenant’s chest. He drops, dead before he hits mud. “Rowan,” I shout. She pulls back, black blood on her fingers, tilting her head. “Threat, to, sister, to, pups, dead.” The human soldiers scream, opening fire. “Stop,” I scream, but it’s too late. The ferals hit them like a wave. Not protecting me now. Hunting. Draven grabs me, dragging me back. “We have to go, now, she’s not stable.” “She saved Caiden,” I say. “She chose a name, she—” “She just killed a man for pointing a gun,” Draven says. “Gerald made her
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