You're only mine

Maya’s POV

The blaring sound of the mystical alarms began echoing throughout the fortress, a sharp hum that vibrated straight through my teeth. I didn’t have time to process the golden burn still radiating from my palm, or the shock in Lawrence’s gray eyes after the crystal exploded. The Lycan King reacted in a millisecond. His massive body tensed, and a growl so low and primal that it seemed to shake the palace foundations escaped his throat.

“Stay behind me, Maya,” he ordered with a military rigidity that allowed no argument.

Lawrence didn’t wait. He crossed the office in long, feline strides and unsheathed a heavy dark steel sword resting beside the fireplace. His inner wolf was beginning to surface; the veins in his neck darkened to an inky black, and his fangs lengthened slightly, thick saliva dripping from them with adrenaline.

The wounded warrior who had burst through the door barely managed to move aside before a group of five burly men, wearing the dark cloaks of the High Council’s executioners and escorted by two gray-furred Silver Moon trackers, stormed into the hallway outside the office with their swords drawn. Their faces were hidden behind iron masks, but the stench of rotten silver and mystical poison gave them away. They hadn’t come to negotiate; they had come to exterminate.

“Kill him if necessary! The Council demands the rogue’s head and the relic!” the leader of the executioners roared, pointing his weapon toward us.

Lawrence let out a dry, icy laugh, a sound that made the hairs on my arms stand on end.

“In my palace, the only heads rolling will be yours, you bastards,” the King hissed.

With a supernatural speed that defied his immense size, Lawrence lunged forward. The clash of steel echoed like thunder through the hallway. The Lycan King’s sword sliced through the air with butcher-like precision; in its first swing, it beheaded the nearest executioner, sending a spray of hot blood across the stone wall. The two Silver Moon wolves leaped at him at the same time, trying to sink their teeth into his neck, but Lawrence caught one of them in midair with his bare left hand, crushing its mystical throat until a dull crack announced that he had shattered its windpipe.

Taking advantage of the carnage at the entrance, two of the Council’s executioners managed to slip past the King’s massive frame, darting around the side of the office straight toward me. Their eyes, filled with fanatical greed, locked onto my curves, my sturdy figure, and the amulet glowing beneath my blouse.

“There she is, the mystical bitch! Secure her!” one of them shouted, hurling a blessed silver chain net toward my legs.

Fear froze me for a split second, but the mystical warmth in my abdomen roared once more, sending a surge of energy into my muscles. I was never going to be the helpless servant Chloe kicked buckets at ever again. I grabbed the heavy bronze candlestick from the desk with my trembling hands and slammed it with all the strength of my sturdy arms straight into the face of the first executioner who reached me. The metal crashed against his iron mask, sending him stumbling backward as blood poured from his nose.

The second man, however, was faster. He grabbed my shoulder with brutal force, digging his fingers into my flesh, and dragged me to the ground, throwing me onto the fur rug in the middle of the office. A cry of frustration and pain escaped me as my back slammed against the wooden floor, knocking the air from my lungs for a second. The executioner drew a gleaming dagger, aiming directly at my thigh to cripple me.

“Move and I’ll bleed you out right here, fat girl,” the man hissed, pressing his knee against my abdomen.

But he never got the chance.

A colossal roar, so charged with Absolute Alpha fury that the few intact windowpanes exploded, shook the palace walls. Lawrence had turned the instant he heard my scream. His eyes were no longer gray; they were two blazing pools of incandescent silver, completely consumed by the Blood Moon beast. The Lycan King abandoned the entrance, leaving behind the mutilated bodies of the other attackers, and leaped across the office like a black demon exiled from hell.

He seized the executioner on top of me by the back of his robe and lifted him into the air as though he weighed nothing. With one ruthless, brutal motion, Lawrence smashed the man’s body against the stone fireplace so violently that the traitor’s skull split open on impact, leaving the lifeless body to collapse onto the burning embers.

The last executioner still alive in the room, seeing the massacre and realizing he had underestimated the King’s protective instinct, threw his sword to the floor and backed away on his knees toward the window, begging for mercy in a voice broken by panic. Lawrence advanced toward him with slow, heavy steps, leaving a trail of bloody footprints across the carpet. His claws were fully extended, and his Herculean chest rose and fell with savage, animalistic breaths. Without blinking, the King grabbed him by the back of the neck and hurled him through the window, sending the body plunging into the frozen abyss below the fortress cliffs.

A deathly silence, thick with violent adrenaline, once again filled the shattered office. The smell of iron and death was unbearable.

Lawrence slowly turned toward me. His bare, scar-covered chest was splattered with the fresh blood of the traitors, and his silver eyes remained fixed on my body, searching every inch of me to make sure I hadn’t suffered a single injury. He walked toward where I still lay on the floor, trapping me against the base of the enormous dark wooden desk.

He leaned over me, planting his bloodstained hands on either side of my head, completely caging me beneath his massive body. His wolf was entirely out of control, claiming the air around us, driven by a savage, possessive instinct that made the mystical bond between our souls vibrate with unbearable force. He was so close I could feel the suffocating warmth of his breath brushing against my fever-cracked lips.

Lawrence cupped the back of my neck with his long fingers, gripping firmly enough to draw a soft moan from my lips, bringing his mouth within millimeters of mine in a gesture so intimate that my heart threatened to burst from my chest. His silver gaze dropped to my mouth before locking onto my eyes with a promise of absolute destruction.

“I’m warning you, Maya,” he whispered in a hoarse voice, broken by the beast’s possessiveness, making me tremble to the core. “You’re under my damned protection from this second on. And if I have to march with my army and burn the entire world to make sure no other man ever lays a hand on you again… I swear on my blood that I will. I don’t care who comes after you. You’re mine.”