Chapter2: The Lycan King

Veya’s POV

The journey to Nocturnis Palace lasted four punishing days. The carriage rattled over uneven stones, the horses’ hooves striking sparks against the road.

Above the horizon, smoke-colored fog choked the sky. The palace rose from the jagged ground—obsidian towers gleaming like scorched bone, black spires slicing through night with cruel precision.

The gates creaked open, a sound that groaned like the earth itself.

The carriage halted. A guard with a skull-shaped helm yanked open the door, his stare sharp and cold.

“Out.”

I stepped down. The wind carried iron and blood. Each breath stung my throat raw.

A servant approached, holding out a gauze veil. “Do not look upon the King. Do not speak unless spoken to. Do not touch anything.”

I nodded, slipping it over my head. “Understood.”

“Move, slave.” A soldier jerked the chain around my wrists. I stumbled forward, body sore, and stomach hollow.

Nocturnis’s grand hall reeked of power. Wolf skulls gilded in gold lined the walls, battle murals painted in red. And at the center, seated on a throne of jet-black stone, was the man every whispered tale feared.

Rael Arkhelen Vor’Serrax.

The Lycan King. Alpha above all Alphas in the land of Vargravia. A monarch whose name was carved into legend and nightmare alike.

A cloak of thick fur hung from his shoulders, cascading to the polished floor, drawing contrast to the bronze gleam of his skin. His golden eyes glowed like embers trapped in the eternal dark.

Stories said he’d torn skulls apart with his bare hands. Burned villages to ash for disobedience. Yet none of it captured the cold, magnetic beauty of the man before me.

He rose, each step deliberate, measured. Soldiers bowed as his boots echoed against stone.

I couldn’t look away. My instincts screamed to kneel, but my body refused.

Rael stood just inches from me, close enough that I could smell the haunting mixture of cinnamon and blood clinging to his skin. His sheer height swallowed my presence, made me feel like a fawn caught in the gaze of a starving lion.

A growl trembled in his chest. His nostrils flared. He was scenting me.

His hand reached for my veil, pulling it down. Fingers brushed my skin, a brief contact that sent a jolt through my nerves.

“I don’t smell a wolf on you,” he said, voice low. “Are you truly werewolf?”

My throat closed. The silence stretched too long.

“Deaf?” His tone cut sharp.

“I am… a werewolf, Your Majesty, but I cannot shift.”

His eyes flicked over me. “A broken wolf.”

Heat burned my cheeks. I bowed my head lower.

“Your father sold his crippled daughter to Lycans,” he murmured. “Amusing.”

The air thickened with my shame.

“What is your name?”

“Veya.”

His gaze narrowed. “Your blood stinks, Veya.”

The way he said it twisted something in my chest. Before I could ask what he meant, everything about him changed.

His spine straightened, muscles tightening like a bow drawn taut. A violent tremor seized him. His jaw clenched and his fists curled.

The sharp scent of blood sliced through the air. Rael’s roar shook the hall as he stumbled back. His body convulsed, struggling to contain a force too large for skin and bone.

His skin darkened, and his eyes bled into a molten red. Fangs erupted from his mouth. I heard the unmistakable snapping of bones reshaping and stretching.

A soldier made the mistake of stepping forward. Rael’s claws struck like thunder, slamming the man against the stone wall. He hung there, nothing more than a doll pinned by death.

“Your Majesty! Control yourself!” someone shouted, but the king was already lost.

His fur-lined mantle shredded as his transformation completed. He towered nearly three meters tall: half-man and half-wolf.

I screamed as he lunged at me. And yet beneath the weight of the beast hurtling toward me, something stirred in the pit of my soul.

His massive clawed hand struck the ground beside me with a thunderous crack, shattering stone and sending debris flying. He loomed over my trembling body. Amonstrous howl ripping through his throat.

My body convulsed, a violent tremor that seized every inch of me. Beneath the echo of my strangled scream, a soft and unfamiliar voice slithered into my mind.

“Touch him before everything shatters.”

My hand moved on its own. My fingertips brushed against the searing heat of his skin.

“Calm,” I whispered.

He froze. No more snarling, no more roars. Only the ragged cadence of our breaths.

The red haze in his eyes ebbed, fading slowly to gold. His body convulsed once more, then twisted violently, before collapsing into his human form. The gashes marring his skin sealed rapidly, leaving streaks of dried blood across bronzed flesh.

King Rael rose to his feet in silence. He looked down at me with a gaze I couldn’t decipher.

“Place her in the south pavilion,” he muttered.

A soldier hesitated. “But, Your Majesty, slaves are typically…”

“Do I appear to be asking for your counsel?” Rael turned his head just slightly, and the guard bowed, murmuring a quick apology. “Your scent, it tames the beast inside me. And maybe I can no longer hold him back.”

He stared at me a long while. And just when I thought he might say nothing more, he murmured words that froze the blood in my veins.

“They’ll think you’re just another slave. But if they ever find out what you truly are…” His voice dropped lower. “They’ll hunt you until the world burns.”