เข้าสู่ระบบSeraphina’s POVThe visiting Lycans arrived before sunset. By nightfall, the royal dining hall was crowded with nobles dressed in enough velvet, fur and jewels to feed every servant in the lower palace for a year. I carried wine between them while they discussed hunts, marriages and people whose names meant nothing to me.Lucian sat at the head of the table. He had barely spoken since dinner began, yet every conversation moved around him. No one interrupted him. No one reached for a dish before he did. Even the older Lycans watched his face before deciding whether something was amusing.The Blood King did not need to demand attention. It belonged to him before he entered a room. I was refilling a nobleman’s glass when he caught my wrist. His grip was not painful, but it stopped me.I looked down at his hand. The man was thick around the middle, with grey threaded through his beard and several rings cutting into his fingers. His eyes moved over my servant’s dress before lifting to my fa
Seraphina’s POVTwo mornings later, a guard came to my room and told me the King wanted me in the training yard. I assumed I was finally being punished.Perhaps Lucian had reconsidered my attempt to punch him. Perhaps the officer from the laundry had demanded justice. There were several reasons the King might want me dragged into a yard full of armed Lycans. None of them explained the practice knife waiting in his hand. Lucian stood in the centre of the yard wearing black training clothes, his sleeves pushed to his elbows. Soldiers trained around him, but their movements had slowed since I entered. Everyone was watching. Lucian tossed the knife towards me. I caught it by the handle.“Show me what you can do,” he ordered. I looked down at the blunt blade.“No.” Lucian said nothing. He simply waited. I hated when he did that. Silence gave me nothing to push against. No argument. No anger. Just those golden eyes watching me as though he had all day to discover whether I would obey.“I’m
Kael’s POVFive nights earlier in BlackridgeI woke falling. There was no bed beneath me. No room. Only open air and the sick rush of the ground coming too fast. Then pain tore through my side. I screamed and hit the floor beside my bed hard enough to bruise my shoulder. My body curled around a wound that was not there. I pressed my hand against my side and expected blood. There was none. Ragnar exploded inside me.‘MATE!’The word ripped through my skull. I could not breathe. My chest locked. My heart hammered once, twice, then seemed to stop entirely as something inside the damaged bond stretched so far I felt it begin to tear. Seraphina. I reached for her through what remained between us. There had always been something, even after the rejection. A faint warmth. A pulse that did not belong to me. Proof that somewhere beyond my sight, she was still breathing. Now there was almost nothing. A weak flicker. Then silence.“Seraphina.” I forced myself upright and stumbled towards the doo
Seraphina’s POVI woke with a scream trapped behind my teeth. Pain tore through my chest, so sudden and violent that I curled around it before I was fully awake. It was not the wound in my side. That still burned where I had reopened it, but this pain was deeper. The mate bond.I pressed both hands against my chest and tried to breathe. Something came through the damaged bond in broken waves. Panic. Rage. Grief so heavy it felt like someone had reached inside my chest and squeezed my heart in a fist. None of it belonged to me. Isolde paced wildly inside my head.‘It’s him.’“No.” My voice came out broken.‘You know it is.’“He rejected us.”‘Apparently nobody informed the bond.’“Stop.”Another wave hit me. This one carried a pain so raw that I nearly called his name. I bit down on it until my jaw hurt. Whatever Kael was feeling was not my concern. He had made sure of that in front of the entire pack.I dragged myself out of bed. The room was dark except for the dying fire and a thin
Seraphina’s POV Two days passed. Edmund sent me to the private armoury with a stack of clean training cloths and strict instructions not to leave them with anyone else. I should have known that meant Lucian would be inside. The doors stood open when I arrived. I walked in without knocking and stopped so suddenly that the cloths almost slipped from my hands. Lucian was shirtless. He stood beside a weapons rack with his back half-turned towards me, breathing slightly harder than usual. Sweat ran over his shoulders and followed the deep line of his spine before disappearing beneath the dark trousers sitting low on his hips. He had been training hard, judging by the split skin across his knuckles and the blood marking his lower lip. Lucian turned, and my eyes dropped before I could stop them. His chest was wide and hard, marked by old scars. One ran beneath his ribs. Another cut diagonally from his shoulder towards the centre of his chest. They should have made him less beautiful.
Seraphina’s POV I had expected the royal wing to mean better floors to scrub. That was the only difference between rich people and everyone else, as far as I could tell. Their dirt fell on polished stone instead of rough wood, and they had enough servants to remove it before they were forced to look at it. But since Edmund had moved me upstairs, I had barely touched a cleaning cloth. Instead, the King kept finding reasons to summon me. Not often enough for me to accuse him of anything. Just often enough for me to notice. That evening, a maid placed a tray in my hands and told me to take it to the King’s study. The silver covers were heavy, and the smell drifting from beneath them made my empty stomach twist painfully. I had not eaten since morning. There had been work to do, and by the time I reached the servants’ hall, the pots had already been emptied. I knocked once. “Enter,” King Lucian called from inside. I pushed the door open with my shoulder. The study was large, warm







