Chapter 1

"She's just a nine-year-old child, he wasn't going to find her yet," Papa's voice held the low authority of an Alpha. "Let's keep her our dearheart a while longer."

"I know, I just had a horrible nightmare about the Lycans." Mama whispered with red eyes.

I stood by the door, puzzled. I knew Papa was talking about me. After all, I was the only one in our family turning nine today. I wanted to keep eavesdropping, but I couldn't bear to see Mama cry. So, I rushed into the room and threw my arms around her.

The moment I ran into the room, they fell silent. Papa scooped me up and tossed me into the air, catching me with a laugh, while Mama covered my face in kisses. In a second, the strange words I'd overheard were forgotten.

Tiny paw. Princess. Little jewel. Brat. Dearheart. The Alpha’s little girl.

Everyone called me different things, but my name was Iris Graupelfyr. I loved my Mama, and my Papa. And my brothers, even though they were a pain. I was the youngest daughter in our Pack, and today was my birthday!

It meant I was another year closer to gaining on my brothers. No matter what, even the youngest of my three big brothers managed to stay ten years older. But if I grew secretly, I might’ve managed to sneak a year on them. Especially on the older two, who were usually gone far away for their studies.

Papa and Mama had always made sure I was looked after, and that I got everything I could ever ask for. Toys, dresses, fun trinkets. All my big brothers teased me about being spoiled, and then gifted me more things.

But I didn’t get everything, not really. Papa and Mama didn’t let me go out. They didn’t let me play with the other pups of the Pack.

And despite me being so old, Papa and Mama had never even let me train. I had heard of pups starting daily training by their fifth year!

But Papa said, “There are no pups close enough to your age for you to train with, dearheart, so it’s for your own safety–”

Pffft. If I could survive living with my third-eldest brother who whacked me too hard in pillow fights sometimes and even got scared when he caught me climbing the upper-level bannisters, I could handle other pups who were a bit older than me. And they always looked like they had so much fun training….

But Mama said, “Listen to Papa. Your brothers will be home to celebrate your day with us. You have fun with them, right?”

But this year will be different, I’d decided.

“Iris!” My eldest brother shouted as soon as he saw me enter the dining hall. I barely had a chance to turn around before I was scooped up and kissed on the cheek. “You know you’re supposed to stop being cute past a certain age?”

“Supposed to stop being so puny too.” My second-eldest brother sidled up beside us to kiss my other cheek.

They were always like that. Maybe that was why I felt bolstered, made brave by my brothers doting on me.

“I want to start training this year,” I announced as soon as I reached the table.

“Iris,” Mama sighed.

“I promise to be good,” I said trying not to whine. It was important that I sound grown-up about this. “And I promise not to cry. And the better I get at fighting, the less of a chance I’ll have at being hurt.”

“We’ve already spoken about this,” said Papa firmly.

“We can speak again!” I snapped.

Before anyone could answer, a scream tore through the open air from outside. Frantic and tortured. I had never heard anyone sound like that before. More followed it.

The doors to the supper hall burst open.

“My Alpha!” One of Papa’s men went straightaway to his side. “Lycans. King Zavan is–”

The room exploded into motion. Mama took my hands where I had frozen in place and ushered me from the table, towards the grandroom. If monsters from nightmares were made real—they would be Lycans.

The Lycans were larger, faster, stronger than any werewolf, impossibly fast, and a horror to look at. I’d heard stories. Awful ones my brothers told me just to be gross, scary ones Mama told me to warn me to be good, and ones I knew were true because those ones were told by Papa.

The Lycans were powerful rulers, fearsome overseers of all werewolf territories– so sadistic that Witches had gone as far as to curse them. When the werewolf packs attempted to overthrow the weakened Lycan rule once the old King died, those rebels were brutally and mercilessly slaughtered by the successor– the now-reigning Lycan King Zavan.

Most folk did not speak of him openly, as if saying his name would summon bloodshed to their doorstep. But there were always whispers. About how he crushed anyone who dared defy him, about how he brought death with a smile.

They were here? In our territory? Outside our home?

As Mama carried me past the windows, through the noise of our men rallying for battle and transforming into wolves. “Mama,” I said, but I could barely hear myself.

Mama was pushing aside a portrait. A secret place– one of many ones she had shown only me “in case of trouble”. I had only ever used them before to cheat my brothers in hide-and-seek. She gathered me into her arms, holding me tight, before pulling away slightly to fasten something– a necklace?-- around my neck.

She then guided my hand to the focal weight of the dainty chain. A locket.

“Never take this off, no matter what happens,” Mama told me, almost pleading. She kissed my forehead and closed me in behind the wall, behind the portrait.

After that, chaos. I heard only noise, all terrible. Screams. Howls. Snarls. Tearing, things being ripped apart– but not clothes, the noises were too wet to be clothes.

The air became quickly tinged a metallic scent, cloggy with it. I felt sick. I didn’t know how long the noise lasted.

Maybe hours. Maybe minutes. But once it became quiet, my hands were shaking all on their own as I peeked through a fracture in the wall to see what had happened.

And I saw red. So much red. All the people and wolves on the ground, unmoving, were of our Pack. But none of this felt real. Did my brothers invite the Lycans? Maybe as a prank to scare me. My head was spinning. My name is Iris Graupelfyr. My birthday is today…it’s my ninth year….

The Lycans were snarling, snapping at my parents. Accusing them.

Something about traitors. Something about a mate.

Why’s everyone talking about mates? Lycans can’t mate with werewolves.

Papa fell. Then, Mama.

Both of them made a horrible, wet sound. Both added to all the red.

Go away. Go away.

My eldest brother—the one who always hugged me too tight, kissed me too much, and sent me more gifts than Mama could find room for—was shoved forward, hackles raised even as he collapsed at their feet. He snarled, his face twisted into a look of fury that I barely recognized on him. But then, the Lycans turned their bloodied teeth and piercing eyes on him.

“No!” My legs moved before I could think. I burst from my hiding place, even as Mama’s warning rang bright in my mind, and threw my arms over my brother’s head.

“Iris,” my eldest brother nosed at me, huffing frantically.

A Lycan, dripping with blood, turned and bared teeth that looked too sharp to be real. He grinned and said, “Well, what do you know? A runt.”

The other Lycans all laughed with scorn. One grabbed me in his maw, yanking me from my brother. I cried out, but all I could do was flail.

I was thrown onto the floor, pinned. And then the maw dipped towards me again, teeth bared and shiny and tinged with my parents’ red.

“Stop–,” a snarl cut through the room like a blade. Low, sharp, gutting. “Stand down. Now.”

Somehow, I already knew who it was before I dared to look.

Zavan. The Lycan King himself. He stepped toward me, walking through the horror as though it were nothing. Like an uncaring god, unmoved by the carnage.

Past Papa. Past Mama. Past our Pack. Stepping over all the red, like a prophet upon water.

A walking tower of a wolf. A shadow with legs, its darkness growing toward me in the fading light of dusk. I shrank back, clutching the locket like a shield.

When he finally stopped in front of me, his face was dark and heady, like the sky before lightning rips into the land. He knelt, and even then he was so…big.

Tiny paw. Princess. Little jewel. Brat. Dearheart. The Alpha’s little girl.

Everyone calls me different things, but my name is Iris Graupelfyr.

And right then, on the birthday of my ninth year, the Lycan King Zavan called me, “Mate….”