Chapter 4: The King’s Shadow

I woke to the smell of expensive sandalwood and the crackle of a fireplace. This wasn't the drafty attic of my pack house or the damp moss of the forest. The bed beneath me was covered in silk so soft it felt like water against my skin.

I bolted upright, my hand instinctively flying to my chest. The jagged ache of the broken mate bond was still there, but it was muffled, like a radio station losing its signal.

"Careful, Little Guardian. Your body is still catching up to your soul."

I gasped, pulling the velvet duvet to my chin. Malachi sat in a high-backed chair near the window, a book in his hand and a glass of dark liquid on the table beside him. In the daylight, he was even more terrifying. His silver eyes seemed to see through my skin, straight into the purple fire humming in my veins.

"Where am I?" My voice was raspy.

"The Obsidian Spire," he said, standing up. He moved with a predatory grace that made Killian look like a clumsy pup. "My home. And for now, your sanctuary."

"Why?" I demanded, my fear starting to spark into anger. "You're the King of the South. You're supposed to kill anyone who crosses your border. Why am I in a bed instead of a dungeon?"

Malachi walked toward me, stopping just inches from the edge of the bed. He leaned down, his face so close I could see the silver rings around his pupils.

"Because," he whispered, "I have been waiting three hundred years for a Primal to wake up. And I'll be damned if I let a mediocre Alpha like Killian Vance waste a weapon of the Goddess."

I flinched at the name. "He rejected me. I'm nothing to him."

"He is a fool," Malachi growled, and the shadows in the corners of the room seemed to stretch toward him. "He saw a girl with no wolf. I see a woman who commands the roots of the earth and the ice of the sky. Tell me, Elara... do you want to hide, or do you want to make him crawl?"

I looked at my hands. They were trembling, but not from fear. The purple glow flared briefly under my nails. Make him crawl. The thought sent a thrill of dark satisfaction through me.

"I don't know how to control it," I admitted.

"Then you will learn. But there is a price for my protection." Malachi reached out, his thumb brushing the pulse point on my neck, right over the spot where Killian’s mark should have been. The skin there burned with a sudden, searing heat.

"What price?" I breathed.

"The North is coming for you," Malachi said, his voice dropping to a dangerous silk. "Killian realizes now that the 'wolfless' girl was the source of his pack’s prosperity. He will try to claim you back. My price is simple: when he comes, you tell him you belong to the Shadows. You tell him you are mine."

My heart hammered. "And if I don't?"

Malachi leaned in until his lips were brushing my ear. "Then I hand you back to him. And we both know you'd rather die than go back to being his shadow."

He pulled away, leaving me shivering. Before he reached the door, he paused. "Dress yourself. There are clothes in the wardrobe. We begin your training at sunset. Don't be late, Little Guardian. I don't have patience for weak things."

The door slammed shut. I scrambled out of bed and threw open the wardrobe. It wasn't filled with simple dresses. It was filled with leathers, silks, and gowns fit for a queen—all in shades of violet and black.

But as I reached for a tunic, I caught sight of myself in the full-length mirror.

I screamed.

My eyes—once a dull, common brown—were now a swirling, electric violet. And on my shoulder, where a mate mark usually sat, a new symbol was etching itself into my skin. It wasn't a wolf. It was a tree, its roots wrapping around a silver moon.

The Goddess hadn't just given me a second chance. She had rebranded me.

Suddenly, the floor beneath me vibrated. A low, mournful howl echoed from outside the castle walls—a howl I recognized.

Killian.

He was at the border. He was calling for me. But as his voice drifted through the mountains, the symbol on my shoulder burned ice-cold, and for the first time, I didn't feel the urge to run to him.

I felt the urge to hunt him.