Chapter 5

Lucian

I had been restless all morning with my wig tugging against the restraints.

Twenty of the most powerful Alpha's allies sat around the obsidian table, waiting for my decision.

Most of them were here to renew their contract with the Lycan territory while the others desperately needed help.

One, border dispute and then the other, had a problem with pestering rogue packs… the last alpha wanted to discuss a trade agreement.

Ordinarily, I would have already reached a verdict a while ago as they weren’t just proposing to me but to everyone else on the table.

I, however, found myself staring at the same map without seeing it.

Something was wrong… 

My wolf had been restless since dawn, refusing every command I gave him.

“Lycan Lucian?” My Beta, Cassius, hissed underneath his breath warning… bringing my attention back to the table.

“We are awaiting your decision.”

I opened my mouth and the strange pressure settled deep inside my chest.

Not pain but rather just a pull.

It made no sense.

I had ruled the Lycan territories for decades and yet nothing had ever been powerful enough to distract me from matters.

Until today.

My wolf slammed against my control again but this time he whispered harshly, ‘Find her.’

I clenched my jaw.

“There is no ‘her’!” I muttered internally but yet he growled in disagreement.

I was still bantering with him when I felt pain tore through my left palm.

My entire body went rigid in shock… the force of it made me stand up.

Each Alpha expressed their concern.

I barely heard them as I was hit with a rollercoaster of emotions.

‘MATE! FIND MATE!’

Impossible.

I had searched for her for way too long and now, I was feeling that bond slip away.

 “End the meeting.”

The room fell silent.

One of the council elders frowned as he immediately said, “Your Majesty, this discussion concerns the security of our allies and the entire kingdom.”

“It can wait.” And with that I walked out of the room with my beta hot on my knees.

“Where are we going?”

I looked toward the distant mountains beyond the palace windows.

“I don’t know yet.” That was all I said.

I didn’t know who she was or why fate had waited centuries to bring her to me but I knew one thing was certain, she was in danger.

I found myself on the road to Ebonvale long after nightfall.

The closer I got to the city, the stronger the feeling became. And by the time the estate came into view, my jaw had tightened so hard that my teeth ached. 

The moment I stepped onto the estate grounds, I caught her scent… it was unlike anything I had ever encountered before and beneath that, I caught the unmistakable trace of pain.

It seemed as though they were starting to erase the scent.

She had been hurt here.

A guard moved toward me from the front steps, trying to look braver than he felt.

“Sir, this estate is private property,” he said, though the hesitation in his voice told me he already knew he had made a mistake the moment he approached me.

I looked at him once, and the rest of his sentence died in his throat when my aura rolled over him. I did not bother restraining it. 

Let them feel what I was bringing into their house. Let them understand, before I said a word, that I had not come there to ask politely.

By the time I stepped into the main sitting room, three people were waiting when I entered.

The man was the first I noticed. He looked like the sort of male who had spent his life hiding weakness behind position. There was no authority in him. 

Beside him stood a woman with cold eyes and a hard mouth, the kind of female who had likely mistaken cruelty for strength long ago. 

Between them stood a younger blonde woman with a bandage wrapped around her shoulder and false fragility written all over her face.

None of them looked pleased to see me.

The blonde was the first to speak. “Who are you?”

I did not waste time answering her.

“Where is she?” I asked.

The older man frowned, clearly offended by my tone. “I’m afraid you have entered the wrong house.”

I looked at him without expression. “I am looking for the silver-haired female who bled in this house. Where is she?”

That changed everything.

I saw it at once in the way their faces shifted. 

The blonde glanced nervously at the older woman before speaking again, her voice softer this time. “If you mean Selene, she is unwell.”

Selene.

Something deep inside me reacted to it at once. My wolf surged sharply, and I had to lock every expression out of my face to hide the effect it had on me. 

I fixed my gaze on the blonde. “Unwell?”

She nodded and lowered her lashes, trying for innocence. “She attacked me.”

I knew immediately that she was lying.

The room was filled with the scent of grief that still clung to the house and it did not belong to someone who had attacked out of cruelty. 

It belonged to someone who had been cornered, silenced, and broken.

It belonged to mate.

The older woman stepped forward. “Selene has not been herself for some time. She became unstable and violent. We did what we had to do to protect this family.”

There was no remorse in her voice. That was what struck me most. She did not sound like a mother speaking about someone she loved. She sounded like someone defending the removal of an inconvenience.

“What exactly did you do?” I asked.

The man answered quickly. “She became dangerous. We handled the matter.”

I looked past them, following the fading trace of Selene’s scent deeper into the house until it vanished entirely. She was no longer there. 

They had sent her away.

I was about to let all hell lose when two men entered.

At first glance, they looked almost identical. Both were dark-haired, broad-shouldered, and powerful in a way that made lesser wolves instinctively step aside. 

But the longer I looked, the more obvious their differences became. 

The angrier one saw me first, then swept his gaze over the room.

“Who the hell are you?” he demanded.

I held his gaze without moving. “That depends. Who are you to Selene?”

The effect of her name on them was immediate. Both men went still, and the colder one narrowed his eyes first.

“You know her name,” he said.

The other took a step forward. “Answer the question.”

My wolf did not like the way he said her name and the way he was speaking to me and they must have read the look on my face because they replied.

“We are looking for our sister,” The angrier twin turned his attention back to the family in front of us. “Where is she?”

The older woman tried to regain control of the moment, though I could already see her fear taking over. “Selene is unstable. We already dealt with the situation.”

The colder twin looked at her for a long moment. “You dealt with it,” he repeated. His voice was calm enough to send a chill through the room.

The blonde pressed a hand against her bandaged shoulder and lowered her eyes. “She stabbed me.”

The colder twin inhaled once and went still. When he spoke again, his voice was quieter.

“No,” he said. “This house reeks of fear and grief, and none of it belongs to you.”

That was when the angrier twin moved.

He crossed the room in seconds and slammed the older man against the wall so hard that the impact rattled the framed pictures behind him. The older woman screamed while the blonde stumbled backward.

“Where is Selene?” he snarled.

The man choked against the grip on his throat and clawed helplessly at the hand holding him there.

I did not stop it. Neither did the other twin.

He was watching the room too closely now, studying every face, every twitch, and every attempt at silence. Then his gaze shifted toward a servant standing half-hidden by the doorway. She was trembling so badly that it was only a matter of time before she broke.

“You,” he said. “Tell me where they sent her.”

The older woman spun toward the girl. “Do not say a word.”

That was the wrong thing to say.

The servant burst into tears. “They took her,” she said shakily. “The officers came and took her away tonight.”

The male pinned to the wall made a strangled sound.

I stepped forward. “Which officers?”

The servant looked at me, terrified. “Raven’s Edge Enforcement Unit.”

For a second, no one in the room moved.

I knew enough about Raven’s Edge to understand exactly what that meant.

It was called a facility, but men like me knew better. 

It was a place where wolves were broken in the name of discipline and hidden from the world afterward. The thought of Selene in that place, already wounded and alone, sent something dark and violent through me so fast that I nearly lost control of my wolf.

The angrier twin roared and slammed the older man harder against the wall.

“You sent her there?” he thundered.

“She was dangerous!” the older woman shouted back. “She attacked Amelia. Tyler had no choice.”

“No,” the colder twin said. “You had a choice. You chose the easiest person to sacrifice.”

I looked at the man gasping against the wall. “How long ago?”

“Hours,” he forced out.

Hours. Not days. Not weeks. Meaning there was still time.

The angrier twin released him with a final shove that sent him crumpling to the floor. The older woman rushed to him, trembling. The blonde backed away farther, looking less fragile now and more calculating than before.

The colder twin turned to me then and held my gaze for a long moment. We still did not know each other. We still did not trust each other. But none of that mattered as much as the truth we had just learned.

“You know what Raven’s Edge is?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said.

That was all I needed to give him.

He looked toward the door. “Then we leave now.”

I did not hesitate.

Before I turned away, I looked once more at the family who had sent Selene into hell and called it necessity.

“If any harm has been done to her,” I said quietly, “this house will be the first thing I bury.”