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CHAPTER 40
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2025-09-12 15:35:36
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THE SUBSTITUTE MATE FOR THE ALPHA KING CHAPTER 73
The days that followed were a strange, suspended reality. The Citadel was a world of regimented order and echoing stone, a stark contrast to the chaotic wilderness we had escaped. Elisse, slowly emerging from her shell of shock, found a fragile sense of wonder in the towering, torch-lit halls and the kind, if reserved, attentions of the Citadel’s women. They brought her warm clothes and simple toys carved from mountain wood. They were careful, respectful, but their eyes held a knowing pity that made my skin crawl. They knew our story. They knew the role we were to play.I was given a new, dark grey dress of simple but sturdy wool, the color of the Citadel’s walls. It felt like a uniform. My recovery was supervised with detached efficiency by the Citadel’s healers, who tended to my scrapes and the deep, invisible bruises on my spirit with the same clinical precision. I ate, I slept, I walked the prescribed routes through the inner courtyards, all under the watchful eyes of Valerius’s g
THE SUBSTITUTE MATE FOR THE ALPHA KING CHAPTER 72
The gate commander’s jaw went slack. “Commander Valerius? You… you were expecting them, sir?”Commander Valerius did not take his eyes off me. They were ancient eyes, eyes that had seen centuries of mountain winters and the fleeting lives of those who tried to conquer them. They held no warmth, but a deep, unsettling knowledge.“The stones have been restless for days,” he said, his voice low, as if sharing a secret the wind might steal. “The mountain dreams, and in its dreams, it sees what approaches. A shattered Alpha. A mother’s grief. A child of two worlds.” His gaze flickered over my worn clothes, the bloodstain on my sleeve that was Kairi’s, the utter exhaustion in Kelra’s stance. “And the shadow of a great bear’s judgment. You have passed a test few survive.”He gestured, a sharp, fluid motion. “Open the gate. They are under the Citadel’s protection.”The massive, iron-banded gates, which looked as if they hadn’t moved in a generation, groaned inward on hinges that screamed in p
THE SUBSTITUTE MATE FOR THE ALPHA KING CHAPTER 71
The world had lost its color. The majestic, snow-capped peaks of the Ironpeak range were just grey shapes against a washed-out sky. The wind, which had once felt bracing, now held only a biting, cruel edge. Every step I took was a mechanical act, my body moving while my soul remained trapped in that dark fissure, listening to the fading echo of Kairi’s breath.Elisse’s small hand was a cold, limp weight in mine. She hadn’t spoken since we’d left the chimney, her silence a deeper wound than any cry. She just walked, her eyes vacant, staring at the ground. She had seen the terror on my face. She had heard the finality in Kelra’s silence. She knew.Kelra walked ahead, a solitary, grim sentinel. His shoulders were set in a rigid line, his usual confident stride replaced by a heavy, plodding gait. He had lost two of his best fighters, and now he had helped leave his Alpha to die in the dark. The weight of it was crushing him, too.We walked for hours, the silence between us a third, grievi
THE SUBSTITUTE MATE FOR THE ALPHA KING CHAPTER 70
The world stopped. The vast, blue sky, the clear path to the Citadel, the very air in my lungs—it all ceased to exist. There was only the dark, jagged mouth of the fissure and the echo of that single, pain-wracked word."Kairi!" My scream was raw, tearing from a place deeper than my soul. I scrambled to the edge, peering down into the impenetrable blackness. "Kairi, answer me!"Kelra was already moving, his face a mask of grim purpose. "Jax's rope! In my pack!" he barked, shrugging it off. We had kept the dead warrior's climbing rope, a final, morbid inheritance. Kelra fastened one end around a sturdy rock pinnacle, testing the knot with a brutal yank."I'm going down," he said, his voice leaving no room for argument. He looked at me, his eyes hard. "You stay with the child."He disappeared into the fissure, the rope going taut. Elisse was sobbing, clutching my legs, her small body wracked with tremors. I held her, my own body shaking, my eyes glued to that hole in the world. The minu
THE SUBSTITUTE MATE FOR THE ALPHA KING CHAPTER 69
The silence that followed Kairi’s words was heavier than the mountain itself. Trapped. The word echoed in the frigid air, sucking the last vestiges of warmth from our hope. Below us, the abyss was a black maw. Above, the Citadel’s lights twinkled, a cruel imitation of the stars, close enough to see, further away than the moon. We were stranded on a stone raft in a sea of sky.Elisse’s whimpers subsided into a shivering silence, her wide eyes fixed on her father, waiting for him to fix the unfixable. Cora’s breathing was a ragged, wet sound in the dark. Kelra had managed to staunch the bleeding from her side with a torn strip of cloak, but her face was the color of ash. Jax’s body lay where he fell, a stark reminder of the price of this journey.“We need to assess our supplies,” Kelra said, his voice a study in forced calm. He was the rock, even as the world crumbled around us. “And our wounds.”The inventory was devastating. One waterskin, half-full. A few handfuls of dried meat and b
THE SUBSTITUTE MATE FOR THE ALPHA KING CHAPTER 68
The silence of the high mountain passes was a different creature from the hushed peace of the Vaelen cavern. This was a cold, thin-aired silence, broken only by the moan of the wind through jagged granite teeth and the crunch of our boots on scree. We had been climbing for days, a small, weary caravan: Kairi, myself, Elisse, Kelra, and the two remaining loyalists, Jax and Cora. The lush, threatening forests of Gideon’s domain were far below us now, replaced by a stark, breathtaking landscape of grey rock and endless sky. The Ironpeak Citadel was our beacon, its distant peaks gleaming like knives under the relentless sun, but each step toward it felt like a mile.The confrontation with Renejay had left its mark, deeper than any physical wound. Kairi’s shoulder was bound and healing, but a new tension lived in his eyes. He was no longer just a warrior or an Alpha; he was a father who had looked into the abyss of losing his child, and the abyss had stared back with Renejay’s triumphant e
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