Blood on the Flowers

*Six Months Later*

The early morning sun filtered through the small window of the stone cottage, casting a warm, golden glow over the tangled sheets.

"I should be back by nightfall," Lycan murmured. His deep, gravelly voice vibrated against my skin as he pressed a lingering, fiercely possessive kiss to my bare shoulder.

I sat up, pulling the thick quilt over my chest. Lycan was already dressed in his rough canvas trousers and a thick leather tunic, packing a heavy canvas bag slung over his broad shoulder. He told me there were urgent issues at the border, a massive trade caravan that required a large batch of newly forged horseshoes.

I hated when he left, even for a day. Over the last six months, this tiny cottage and the beautiful garden behind it had become my entire world. The domestic peace we had built was worth every sacrifice, every rumor, and every mocking whisper from the pack.

"Do you really have to go?" I asked softly, reaching out to trace the heavy silver scars on his forearm.

Lycan sighed, leaning down to cup my cheek with his massive, calloused hand. His golden-amber eyes softened entirely. "The merchants pay well at the border, little beast. I want to buy you the winter furs you liked in the market. I will be back before the moon is high. Keep the door locked."

"Be safe," I smiled, leaning into his touch.

I walked him to the front porch, watching his towering figure disappear into the dense tree line. As soon as he was completely out of sight, a sudden, violent wave of nausea hit me like a physical blow.

I gasped, my hands instantly gripping the wooden porch rail as the forest around me violently spun. I stumbled back inside the cottage, grabbing a metal bucket near the hearth just in time to empty my stomach.

I collapsed against the cool stone wall, breathing heavily, wiping a bead of sweat from my forehead. My hands trembled as they moved down, resting instinctively against my lower stomach. Deep inside my chest, my inner feline beast—who was usually quiet and fiercely independent—let out a soft, rumbling, maternal purr.

I froze. I quickly did the math in my head, tracking the weeks.

A tear of pure, overwhelming joy slipped down my cheek, splashing onto the floorboards. *I was pregnant.* I was going to give Lycan a child. We were going to have a family—a real family, completely entirely ours, away from the cruelty of the royal estate.

I couldn't wait for the sun to set. I pictured the look on Lycan's face, the way his glowing eyes would widen when I told him the Blacksmith was going to be a father.

However, my joy didn't last even ten minutes.

The heavy, metallic sound of armored boots marching through the garden shattered the morning silence. It wasn't just one person; it sounded like a small army.

Before I could even stand up, the heavy oak door of the cottage was kicked with such explosive force that it flew off its iron hinges, splintering into jagged pieces across the floor.

"Well, well. Look at the little rat hiding in her filthy cage."

My blood ran completely ice-cold.

Standing in the ruined doorway, draped in lavish, ridiculously expensive velvet travel cloaks, were Regina, Victor, and my stepmother. Behind them stood half a dozen heavily armed elite pack troops, their hands resting on the hilts of their silver swords.

"What are you doing here?!" I demanded, backing away until my spine hit the stone wall. My hands instinctively clamped over my stomach to protect my unborn child.

"We are on our way to the Capital," Regina sneered, stepping into my home and looking around with absolute, venomous disgust. "The Lycan King’s Heir is finally receiving guests. Victor and I are going to secure a royal alliance with the Lycan Kingdom. We just decided to take a quick detour to see how the filthy peasant and her blacksmith were rotting away in the dirt."

"You shouldn't have come," I warned, my voice trembling but defiant. "Lycan will be back."

Victor let out a barking laugh. "The laborer? Let him come. I’ll have my guards flog him for failing to bow to his future Alpha."

My stepmother sneered, walking leisurely over to the fireplace. Her eyes scanned the mantle and landed on the only valuable thing I owned—a small, hand-painted portrait of my late mother. It was the only piece of my childhood I had managed to keep.

"Still clinging to the past, I see," she mocked, picking up the wooden frame.

"Put that down," I warned, my inner beast bearing her teeth.

With a cruel flick of her wrist, my stepmother tossed the portrait directly into the roaring fire.

"No!" I screamed, lunging forward to pull it out of the flames.

I never made it. Victor intercepted me, his heavy, ringed hand violently backhanding me across the face. The force of the Alpha’s strike sent me crashing hard to the wooden floorboards. The metallic taste of blood instantly flooded my mouth.

"You do not raise your voice at my family, Omega," Victor spat, drawing his boot back and kicking me sharply in the ribs.

I cried out, curling entirely into a tight ball. I didn't try to fight back; my only thought was wrapped around the tiny, fragile life growing inside me. I squeezed my eyes shut, shielding my stomach with my arms.

Regina walked over, her shadow falling over me. Her eyes flashed with psychotic jealousy as she looked down. Suddenly, she stopped. She noticed the ancient, priceless sapphire ring Lycan had given me, glowing brilliantly on my finger.

"You do not deserve nice things, Amy," Regina whispered, her voice dripping with pure, unadulterated hatred. "You are dirt. And you will die in the dirt."

She reached into her velvet cloak and pulled out a silver-forged hunting dagger.

Everything happened in a horrifying blur of agonizing pain. I screamed as Regina drove the silver blade deep into my side. Fire erupted in my veins, the silver burning my skin from the inside out. The troops laughed as my blood began to pool rapidly on the wooden floorboards, staining my clothes crimson.

"Let's go," Regina laughed brightly, wiping a drop of my blood off her pristine cloak. "We don't want to be late to meet the King's Heir."

They turned their backs on me, marching out of the cottage and leaving me to die on the floor.

My vision immediately began to blur. The edges of the room turned black. I couldn't breathe. The pain in my side was blinding, and my hands were slick, entirely coated in my own blood as I desperately pressed them against my stomach.

*Lycan,* I prayed to the Moon Goddess, my tears mixing with the blood on my face. *Please. Save our baby.* My eyes fluttered shut. My last, rattling breath echoed in my chest.

But before the darkness could take me entirely, the world exploded.

The heavy stone roof of the cottage physically groaned, cracking under an invisible, cataclysmic weight. The temperature plummeted to freezing in a microsecond. Outside, the pack troops didn't even have time to scream. The sickening sound of snapping bones echoed through the garden as an unseen, god-like force slammed the guards into the dirt, crushing them instantly.

Regina and Victor froze in the yard, the air violently ripped from their lungs as a suffocating, demonic aura flooded the entire forest.

Footsteps shook the earth. Slow. Heavy. Terrifying.

Standing in the shattered doorway was not a blacksmith.

He was flanked by an army of elite Royal Lycan Guards, completely blocking any chance of escape. He was draped in the midnight-black, impenetrable armor of the royal bloodline. A heavy crown of dark iron rested on his head.

His eyes were not warm amber. They were glowing, bloodthirsty crimson, burning with the wrath of a thousand suns.

Regina dropped her silver dagger, her face turning chalk-white.

The physical weight of his aura was crushing. The pack troops who hadn't been killed instantly were now pinned flat against the dirt, choking on their own spit as their lungs simply refused to expand in his presence. Even the wind howling through the trees seemed to die completely, terrified to make a sound while the true King was furious.

Lycan’s crimson eyes burned like hellfire as he stepped over the ruined threshold. He didn't look at the Alpha heir. He didn't look at Regina. His glowing gaze fell entirely on my bleeding body on the floor, and the air around us literally began to crackle with dark, lethal electricity.

Her knees gave out, sending her collapsing to the dirt in absolute terror as she looked at the man she had just mocked.

The Lycan King's Heir had returned. And he was looking directly at his bleeding mate.

**"Kill them all,"** Lycan roared, his demonic voice shaking the very heavens above them. **"Leave the sister for me."**