Chapter 3

ELARA’S POV

Behind me the silver wolf’s pupils shrank to thin slits.

The beast that had always stood in the center of every admiring gaze now stared as if it could not believe it had been passed over so completely. Its silver coat still shone under the morning light, yet for the first time no one reached for it.

Silence held the grounds for one heartbeat. Then the uproar broke.

“She’s crazy! She’s giving up a high-grade silver wolf for that dying thing?”

“Ridiculous. As expected of an adopted daughter. She really has no taste.”

“She just doesn’t dare compete with the real daughter, so she picked a worthless one to save face!”

I kept my back to the noise and my eyes on the grey wolf curled against the stone. Its dull fur barely rose with each shallow breath. It did not look at the crowd. It only watched me.

Selene’s voice rose above the others, trembling with perfect urgency. She grabbed Adrian’s sleeve and pressed close to him. “Big brother, sister must be angry with me. She’s giving up on herself because of what I said. Please persuade her. She can’t mean this.”

Adrian’s expression darkened as he stared at the grey wolf’s lifeless coat. His voice came out cold and final. “The pack’s resources will not be wasted on a useless wolf. Elara. Are you truly going to choose it?”

I raised my eyes and met his without flinching. The brother who had once protected me now looked at me as if I were already a disappointment. I felt nothing.

“Yes.”

An older man standing at the edge of the platform suddenly spoke. His voice carried the weight of years. “Doesn’t the color and bone structure of this wolf look a little similar to the wolf contracted with the Lycan King?”

The crowd erupted again, louder this time.

“Lycan King? The one whose brides all die on their wedding night?”

“The difference is huge. They can’t even be the same species.”

The elder narrowed his eyes and stepped closer to the barrier. He examined the grey wolf from head to tail, then let out a short laugh and waved his hand as if brushing away dust. “I must have seen it wrong. This wolf’s bloodline is mixed. It cannot compare to a single strand of fur from that legendary beast. It is nothing more than a mixed-blood that happens to resemble it slightly.”

Whatever thin thread of awe had appeared in the watching faces vanished at once. Disgust settled back over them like a familiar cloak.

I ignored every stare. I knelt on the cold stone, drew the small ceremonial blade across my palm, and pressed the welling blood to the grey wolf’s forehead. The moment my blood touched its fur a quiet burn traveled up my arm and settled behind my ribs. The contract was sealed.

I curled my lips just slightly and spoke only to the wolf. “In this life, I will raise you.”

No one cheered. No one offered congratulations. Handlers simply recorded the bond and stepped back as if the matter already bored them. I rose, and the grey wolf rose with me on unsteady legs. It followed when I turned and left the platform. It did not limp for show. The weakness was real, at least on the surface.

I brought it straight back to the small courtyard that had always been mine at the edge of the Vale compound. The moment the door closed behind us the wolf retreated to the farthest corner. Its dull fur stood on end. It bared its teeth at the empty air and let out a low warning growl whenever I took a step closer.

I felt no anger and I felt no impatience.

I simply knelt a short distance away, cut my palm open again, and let the dark red drops fall along the rim of a shallow bowl. The scent of my blood filled the quiet room. The wolf stared at the gathering liquid and growled deeper in its throat, body tense, ready to snap if I reached for it.

I did not reach, I just waited.

After a long while the tip of its tongue appeared. It stretched forward, licked a single drop from the edge of the bowl, then jerked back as if the taste had burned. Its ears flattened and its eyes never left my face.

I stayed where I was and let more blood fall.

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Half a day passed in that stillness. The light outside the window shifted from bright to gold to thin grey. My palm had closed and reopened more than once. The bowl held only a thin film now. At last the wolf moved. It crossed the floor on silent paws, hesitated once, then buried its nose directly into the blood still wet on my skin. A low, hoarse whine rolled from its throat as it licked.

I lifted my other hand slowly and rested it on the rough fur between its ears. The wolf flinched but did not pull away.

“Ash,” I said. The name felt right on my tongue. In my previous life this wolf had died in a forgotten corner without ever receiving one. “Your name is Ash.”

It was indeed extremely difficult to raise. Ordinary meat it ignored completely. Even the mid-grade spiritual medicine the kitchens sent up held no interest for it. Only high-level spiritual herbs and, more than anything, my special blood kept its attention. I cut my palm open whenever the dullness returned to its coat and let the dark red drops fall directly into its mouth. Each time I watched the grey fur slowly gain a faint, healthy sheen that had not been there before.

This blood was a secret I had hidden my entire first life. Not even Adrian or Marcus or Liam had ever known what ran in my veins. In this life I would keep the secret just as tightly. No one would learn what truly fed the wolf they all called useless.

When night settled over the courtyard Ash laid with its head across my knee, breathing deeper than it had that morning. I stroked the coarse fur and felt the quiet strength already beginning to gather beneath the thin frame.

My voice was low enough that only the wolf could hear. “The debts from my previous life, I will collect them one by one. Everything they owe me, I will not let anyone escape.”

Ash gave a soft whimper, as if it understood every word, and rubbed its wet nose against the healed line on my palm.