Watchers In The Shadows

---

King Lucian's POV

Both he and his Beta stood in silence, watching the chaos unfold below. The ridge overlooked the clearing like a throne carved by nature itself—a vantage point meant for rulers, for strategists, for predators assessing territory not with fear, but with cold calculation and years of royal training had taught Lucian the art of detachment, of seeing violence as data, patterns, and consequences rather than personal calls to action. Do not interfere unless necessary. Judge only when the picture is complete. Act only when your move cannot be undone.

He lived by those rules. Thrived by them.

And yet—

He couldn’t deny the flicker of something foreign in his chest as he observed the older she-wolf fight below. A strange tug, as if fate had reached up and curled a claw beneath his ribs, pulling his attention harder, deeper.

Her movements were unlike anything he expected.

Precise. Controlled.

Graceful—like poetry forged in battle, sharpened by experience rather than youth. She wasn’t simply defending herself; she was choosing her targets, turning the landscape into a weapon. Every duck, twist, and strike held intention.

A curiosity Lucian hadn’t felt in years stirred beneath the surface. It was not desire—no, that emotion had long been tempered by discipline and loss. It was something older, rarer.

Recognition.

Where had she trained? Who taught her to move like that? No ordinary pack produced wolves with instincts like hers. Even from a distance, he sensed something in her aura—dense, layered, almost ancient. A strength beneath her skin that felt uncharacteristically potent for a female wolf. Only a handful of females he'd encountered possessed even a fraction of that raw force.

And those few belonged to bloodlines nearly extinct.

He had tried to brush lightly against her aura earlier, to sense more, perhaps even link—but the moment had slipped through his fingers like ash. The rogues descended too quickly. Her focus fractured. His window vanished.

If they survived this ambush, maybe he’d get another chance.

Below, her daughter, maybe sister—he assumed from the similarities—struggled to fend off a rogue twice her size. Too green. Too soft. Too unprepared. She fought like someone who had learned combat in theory, not in the dark, not in the dirt, not in blood. But she was fast and loyal, and those traits lasted longer in war than talent alone.

At his side, Casius, his Beta and lifelong friend, was unusually tense. The muscle in his jaw twitched with every blow the women took. “We’re going to help them… right?” he asked, voice low but carrying an edge that did not belong to a Beta speaking to his King.

Lucian turned, arching a brow. “And then what, Casius? Take in strays?”

Casius didn’t flinch. That itself was a challenge. Few wolves in existence held the right to question a monarch without consequence. Fewer survived it.

“Why are two women like that out here alone?” Casius pressed. His eyes never left the clearing.

Lucian said nothing. Observation first. Answers later.

Casius continued, voice tightening with something dangerously close to moral outrage. “Once those rogues get to them—”

He swallowed hard. The words nearly stuck in his throat.

“You, of all people, know what atrocities they’ll commit.”

Lucian’s expression darkened. A storm gathered behind his eyes. His jaw ticked once—just once—but in a king like him, such a subtle gesture was the equivalent of a roar.

The words hit too close. Too raw.

The past was a wound that obeyed no amount of discipline.

Slowly, Lucian turned his head to face Casius fully. The look he gave could have shattered a lesser wolf’s resolve into ash. But Casius held his ground, shoulders squared, chest set. This was not defiance. This was loyalty wearing the face of argument. This battle—this choice—Casius would not lose.

“I can’t explain it,” Casius murmured, gaze flicking to the older she-wolf again. “But we have to help them.”

Lucian stared at him for a long moment. Long enough for a scream to tear through the clearing. Long enough to watch the older woman pivot, grab a branch, and plunge it into a rogue’s throat. Long enough to feel again that strange pulse beneath his sternum—recognition, memory, fate, something.

Then Lucian exhaled through his nose, slow and controlled.

“Go,” he said at last.

Casius blinked, stunned. Lucian rarely yielded. But when the King gave permission, the Beta did not waste it. He nodded once, sharp, then signaled three warriors with a tilt of his chin. They broke from the ridge and descended the slope with practiced precision.

“But remember,” Lucian added, voice low, “our people’s safety comes before all else.”

“Always,” Casius answered.

Lucian stepped forward, cloak shifting behind him like a shadow aware of its king. The wind caught the edges, snapping fabric like a flag of war. His gaze followed his warriors as they sprinted into the clearing—each movement an extension of his authority, his command, his will.

“Bring one of the rogues back alive,” Lucian called after them. “I want answers.”

Rogues this deep near their borders meant surveillance, hunting, or plotting. Packs didn’t wander this far without purpose. And rogues—true rogues—never worked in organized groups unless someone with power manipulated them.

“Yes, My King,” Casius replied, voice fading as he shifted into wolf form and launched himself into the fray.

Lucian remained on the ridge, watching with a calm that was anything but calm. His eyes tracked the older she-wolf effortlessly now. She fought harder when she realized help had arrived—like a mother determined to survive if only to shield someone younger. She moved as though she had forgotten what surrender felt like.

Interesting.

No. Fascinating.

He folded his hands behind his back, posture regal and predatory.

Casius and the warriors could handle this. They always did.

If that she-wolf survived…

If she lived long enough for him to speak to her, to reread her aura, to demand her lineage, her training, her history—

Lucian intended to know her name.

And more.

Because something told him—

something older than instinct—

that this encounter was not an accident.

It was the first ripple of a storm long overdue.