chapter 18: the vision

The look on the seer's face told me everything before he spoke a single word.

Whatever he'd seen in that shattered crystal wasn't good ... I could read that much in the way the color had drained from him, in the way he wouldn't quite meet my eyes.

His hands trembled where they rested on his knees.

His mouth parted, then closed, then parted again, as though the words themselves were too heavy to lift.

He looked at me the way a man looks at death when he finally sees it coming for him ... that particular kind of stillness, that resignation.

Then he took a deep breath, steadying himself.

"Your highness. If their mate bond is broken, the curse will return. It will take full form in your nephew, and the prophecy will come to pass exactly as it was written. She's managed to subdue the curse so far ... but only because of her lycan blood…"

"Wait. What? She's a lycan?" The word left me sharper than I intended.

"Yes. The only lycan wolf left in this world, as far as I've been able to see. But if she doesn't break the bond, the strain of holding the curse back will eventually kill her. And if your nephew takes the full form of the beast ... we're all doomed. It will be a terror none of us can stop. Not you, not me, not the entire combined strength of every pack in this land."

"Is there nothing else to be done? No other way around it?"

"None that I've found. I can only subdue this dark force one way ... by binding her blood, yours, and his, together, the moment the mate bond breaks. It has to happen quickly, before the curse has time to root itself deeper."

"Then that's what we'll do."

"But your highness ... how do we get their blood? And how can you be certain she'll agree to any of this?"

"Leave that to me, Aeron." I said it with more confidence than I felt.

Deep down, I already knew this wouldn't be simple.

I turned the problem over in my mind, searching for every possible thread I could pull ... some way to force a rejection between them, quietly, cleanly.

Because the moment a rejection happens, they'll both cough blood, and Aeron can begin the ritual before either of them has time to think, to resist, to run.

And if that failed ... if she proved as stubborn as I suspected she might ... I would use my own power to end it myself.

There would be no wedding tomorrow.

Not while I still drew breath.

Not while the fate of every pack in this kingdom hung on a girl too foolish to see the danger circling her.

************†***********†****

"The general commander is back! Our warriors have returned!" The announcement rang through the palace halls, bouncing off marble and gold, and I felt something in my chest loosen at the sound of it.

Dickson entered first, chin high, warriors filing in behind him in tight formation, dragging a caged man between them.

Others followed carrying chests that overflowed with gold and diamonds, the wealth of a fallen kingdom now walking through my doors.

They set the cage down before my throne.

I leaned forward and looked inside ... and there he was.

Alsheba.

Curled up small as a mouse, all the arrogance stripped clean off him.

I gave the order, and the cage was opened.

He crawled out in chains, dragging himself forward, and knelt at the foot of my throne.

"Alsheba." I let his name sit in the air a moment before I continued. "When an antelope starts believing it can eat a lion, that's simply mean the antelope is calling for its own death." My hands rested easy on the arms of my chair, my legs crossed, utterly at peace in a way that I knew unsettled him more than any show of rage could have.

Alsheba had never been a match for me.

There was no version of this story where he succeeded in taking even an inch of my territory.

I glanced toward Dickson, and a proud smile touched my lips despite myself.

I have never once regretted naming him my commander.

Every other soul in this pack might turn on me someday, given the right price ... but never him.

That small frame of his houses one warrior no other kingdom has ever managed to defeat, and I intend to remind the world of that fact as often as necessary.

"I see you even tried to buy my warriors out from under me." I let my gaze drift slowly over the mountain of treasure now piled at my feet.

"Still. This will go toward rebuilding the pack you spent years destroying. I know exactly how your people have suffered under your rule. How many of them go to bed starving because of choices you made."

"Please, my lord. Have mercy on me. I don't know what came over me," he begged, forehead nearly pressed to the marble floor.

"Alsheba. Your father was a great king ... a man who cared for his people more than he ever cared for himself. You tore down everything he spent his life building. You spilled innocent blood to sit on a throne you never earned. And then you dared to send men against my pack on top of it. I won't spare you for this."

"Please ... I'll change. Let me serve you instead. Take me as your servant."

"I have enough servants."

"Then let me be your shoe-mat. I'll lie there for as many years as you ask of me, without complaint."

"I don't forgive, Alsheba."

"Dickson."

"Your grace."

"Take him to the square. Behead him. Hang his head at the entrance of his own palace, where his people can see exactly what became of him. Divide the treasure among them, and tell them plainly, the Lord of All Kings rules their pack, starting today." I gave the order the way I've given every order like it ... the way I rule every pack I conquer, directly, personally, until I find someone among them worthy enough to hold the throne in my place.

Everyone fears me. The stories their old rulers whisper about me in the dark see to that. And I'm glad of it. I show no mercy to evil ... not once, not ever, and I never will.