All Chapters of A Different Kind of Alpha: Blood Oath: Chapter 81 - Chapter 90

AlexeiI am still vibrating with the urge to kill when the door shuts behind us.The corridor outside the cells smelled like rot and old fear. Up here, outside Kieran’s chambers, it smells like smoke and clean linen and him. It should be enough to pull me out of it.It isn’t. Not quite.I can still feel Hrolf’s throat under my forearm. The give of gristle. The way the chain bit and creaked when I drove him into the wall. One more heartbeat, two at most, and it would have been done. Problem solved. Neck broken, lungs quiet, one less traitor breathing Silvercres

KieranThe great hall feels smaller these days.I take my place at the high table, spine straight, hands steady. Alexei stands with the guards along the far wall. Not at my back, not at my shoulder. A dark, solid presence half in shadow.If I look at him, Vorlag will see it. He’ll smell it like blood in the water. So I don’t look. I butter my bread. I ask Lyra a question about the southern patrols. I listen with half an ear to Marcus’s summary of Hrolf’s behaviour in the cells.“He’s eating,” Marcus says. “Sleeping. Smi

KieranI wake up sore and smug.The soreness I expected. My shoulders ache when I try to stretch them. My wrists protest when I flex my fingers. There’s a deep, satisfying heaviness in my muscles, the kind I usually only get from a day of drills or a week of anxiety.The smugness is new.I lie there for a moment, eyes still closed, taking inventory. Warmth at my back. A heavy arm slung over my waist. A broad chest pressed against my spine, rising and falling in slow, steady breaths.I’m wrapped in

AlexeiHis eyes flash. “You’re not nothing,” he says fiercely. “You’re not some… experiment I’ll move past when I’m bored.”“I know that,” I say.“Do you?” he presses.I shrug one shoulder. “Most days.”“Alexei-”“The logic is sound, Kieran,” I say, because if I don’t say

AlexeiThe hall has never been this quiet during my time here.Kieran stands in the center of it. No throne. No raised dais. Just him on the flagstones, a few paces from the foot of the high table. Behind him is one empty chair, and behind that chair is me.My hands are loose at my sides. My stance says, relaxed. My wolf says, let me kill something