All Chapters of Rejected by My Alpha, Claimed by the Lycan King: Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

Lyra’s POV"You're certain about this?" I asked, following Mira down a narrow, unmarked path that wound away from the city proper, deep into wooded hills I hadn't known existed so close to Silver Fang Capital."I'm certain," Mira said. "I sent word ahead three days ago. They've been waiting.""Waiting for what, exactly?""For you." She glanced back at me, something careful and hopeful tangled together in her expression. "I told you my family came from refugee stock, scattered after the Dominion fell. What I didn't tell you is that some of those refugees never fully scattered. They settled together, quietly, hidden well enough that even most of Mooncrest never knew they existed.""Cassian knows we're doing this?""Darius does. He's watching the path behind us, though he agreed to give us space once we arrived." Mira offered a small, reassuring smile. "I promise, this is as safe as anything else in your life right now. These people have kept this place hidden for over two decades. They

Cassian’s POVI hadn't planned to make the announcement that day. Standing before the full Council, watching Malachar's carefully veiled insinuations about Lyra's "uncertain origins" poison the room for the third session running, I found my patience finally, completely exhausted.Three separate sessions now, each one circling the same territory with slightly different words. Whispers about her bloodline. Careful questions about why a King so notoriously guarded had suddenly become so visibly protective of one particular exile. I'd answered every insinuation with careful diplomacy so far, exactly the way ten years of ruling had trained me to handle Council pressure.Watching Malachar smile pleasantly while dismantling her credibility piece by careful piece, I decided diplomacy had run its course entirely."Enough," I said, rising from my seat, my voice carrying easily across the Grand Assembly Hall's considerable width. "I've listened to this Council speculate, insinuate, and question

Lyra's POVI woke to Mira's sharp intake of breath and Cassian's hand gripping mine tightly enough to ache."Lyra." Her voice carried an edge I'd never heard from her before, somewhere between wonder and alarm. "Don't move yet. Just — look at your hair first."I sat up slowly in the unfamiliar bed, my body aching in ways that suggested I'd been unconscious far longer than the single night I remembered. Sunlight streamed through tall windows I didn't recognize, and it took a moment to place myself back in the royal wing, in Cassian's own chambers rather than my own."What happened?" My voice came out hoarse, throat dry. "The garden, the light — Cassian, what happened after?""You collapsed," he said, relief and lingering worry warring plainly across his face. "Almost immediately after the light faded. I carried you here myself. Mira's been monitoring you through the night.""How long was I unconscious?""Nearly a full day," Mira said, still studying me with that same careful, assessing

Lyra’s POVThe face in the mirror belonged to a stranger a little more each morning.I studied my reflection carefully, the way I'd started doing every day since waking in Cassian's chambers three weeks ago, cataloging the changes with a mixture of fascination and quiet dread. Silver now claimed nearly half my hair, spreading steadily outward from my temples like frost creeping across a window. My eyes held their faint golden luminescence constantly now, no longer requiring heightened emotion to catch the light.Even my posture felt different lately, some instinct I didn't fully understand straightening my spine, lifting my chin, as though my body remembered a bearing I'd never consciously learned."You're doing it again," Mira said from the doorway, arms crossed, though warmth softened the observation. "Staring like you don't recognize yourself.""I don't, some mornings," I admitted, turning away from the mirror. "It's strange, watching yourself disappear into someone else, one stran

Cassian’s POVI stood over the survivor's cot long after Mira had stabilized her, watching the shallow rise and fall of her breathing, guilt settling heavy and familiar into my chest.I'd seen wounds like hers before, during the worst years of the civil war — the particular hollow exhaustion of someone who'd survived by hiding among the dead. I'd hoped never to see that expression again on anyone under my protection."You couldn't have known," Rowan said quietly, appearing beside me in the healer's house's dim evening light. "The raids, the timing. There was no way to predict this.""I should have anticipated retaliation the moment I named Lyra before the Council," I said. "I knew there would be consequences. I simply didn't imagine they'd fall on people who had nothing to do with any of it.""You can't protect everyone from every possible consequence of every decision you make, Cassian. That's not leadership. That's an impossible standard nobody could survive trying to meet.""Tell t