All Chapters of The Alpha King's Unclaimed Queen: Chapter 41 - Chapter 50

Vivienne POV"You're safe," I said, crossing the room to embrace Priya before either of us could say anything else. "You kept your promise. You came back.""I told you I would."She returned the embrace briefly, fiercely, before pulling back. The tiredness in her eyes suggested she'd slept no better than I had. Her expression was more serious than I'd seen from her since the night of the poisoning."I need to talk to you. About the locket. I should have told you everything the first time you showed it to me, but I let fear keep me quiet instead."I gestured toward the small seating area by the window. My pulse quickened at the thought of finally getting an answer to the questions I'd been circling for weeks."I'm listening."She sat, twisting her hands together in her lap. After a moment, she took a breath and finally spoke."My mother sent you that locket," she said. "Before she died. She'd been planning to send it for years, waiting for the right moment, though I don't think even she

KillianI sat alone in my study long after Vivienne had gone to rest. The fire had burned down to embers, and the reports Owen had left for me hours ago were still untouched on the desk.I kept thinking about the one thought I had not said aloud to Vivienne. It had come to me the moment she finished telling me the truth, and I had pushed it away because I was ashamed of how quickly it had appeared.Her claim could stand above every Alpha's authority. Her bloodline could, in theory, end every political challenge I faced simply by being made public and formally recognised.If I were a different man, colder and more calculating, I could have built an entire campaign around that discovery. I could have joined my crown to a claim no one could challenge. I could have used her exactly as she had feared I might when she finally told me the truth.I let myself think through that path instead of pushing it away. It would solve almost every threat around us. Voss's ambitions could collapse und

Killian POV“Draven's been there three times this week,” Owen said, handing me a folded page as he fell into step beside me.I unfolded it as we walked. Lise had written the report. She ran the Hollow Crown, an inn on the border road where Voss officers had held their quieter meetings in the back room for years. She had been passing Owen what she overheard there for almost as long, and she had never given us information that turned out to be wrong.“Not to drink,” Owen continued. “He goes straight to the back room, and the men waiting for him are senior Voss people. Lise recognised two of them from their own council.”I read the page twice. Dates. Times. A description of Draven that left little doubt. Lise had even noted the car he arrived in, the same dark, expensive one Vivienne had seen outside our gates the day he first showed up.“He's selling her secret,” I said.“That’s how I read it too.” Owen kept his eyes on the path. “It would explain how fast the rumor spread. If Draven go

Vivienne POV"You understand the process?" Fenwick asked as they led me into the council chamber."Owen explained it," I said, my voice steadier than the trembling in my hands. "The flame responds to blood. Gold if the claim is genuine."The chamber had been transformed by the time they led me in. Torches lined the walls in a pattern I didn't recognize, and the ordinary long table had been replaced by a wide, open circle of stone at the centre of the room. Ancient carvings covered its surface, worn smooth in places by years I couldn't begin to guess.Every elder was in attendance, more than I'd seen gathered at once even during the tensest council sessions. Beyond them, a smaller group of observers occupied seats near the back, representatives from allied packs and, unmistakably, two cold-eyed emissaries I recognized from Owen's earlier descriptions as belonging to Voss.They had come to witness whatever happened here personally, unwilling to trust secondhand reports for something thi

Killian POV"Six allied packs have already sent formal congratulations," Owen said, reading from the growing stack of correspondence spread across my desk. "Two of them are requesting an immediate audience. They apparently want to formally align themselves with what they're already calling the Sable restoration.""That's good news.""It's complicated news," Owen corrected. "Formal alliance requests this quickly, especially from packs we've only had distant relationships with, aren't purely goodwill."They're positioning themselves before the political landscape settles. If Vivienne's claim eventually gives her real authority, every pack rushing to support us now wants to be remembered as an early supporter rather than a latecomer."I understood the calculation, even if I didn't like it. "And the packs not sending congratulations?""Mixed. Some are genuinely neutral and waiting to see how this develops before taking a side. Others..." Owen picked another report from the pile."This on