All Chapters of The Alpha Who Married His Enemy: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

Varek Keep was awake when Maevra arrived.Torches burned across the fortress walls. Wolves crowded the lower courtyard despite the hour, held back by rows of armed guards.News had travelled faster than she had.Prince Caelen Varek was dead.And Thornmere’s commander had been found beside him.“Murderer!”The first shout came before Maevra passed through the gates.“Kill her!”“She murdered the prince!”Maevra kept walking.Iron chains bound her wrists. Four guards surrounded her, with more following close behind.A woman near the front spat at the ground.“My son died at Greywater because of you!”That struck harder than the insults.Maevra remembered Greywater.She remembered every battlefield where Thornmere and Ravaryn had traded bodies for land neither side kept long.The guard behind her shoved her shoulder.“Move.”Maevra turned her head.“Touch me again and I’ll make you regret it.”He glanced at her chains.“So frightening.”“They come off eventually.”His expression changed.

Maevra had faced charging wolves with less hostility than the room waiting for her.Ravaryn’s great hall had been transformed before moonrise.Silver candles lined the long aisle. Black banners bearing the mountain wolf hung from the rafters, joined reluctantly by the white-and-thorn crest of House Sorn. Armed guards stood along every wall.Nobody smiled.Good.Maevra had no intention of smiling either.Lyssara Vane, the healer assigned to prepare her for the ceremony, adjusted the fastening at the shoulder of Maevra’s dark green gown.“You look like you’re attending an execution.”“I nearly was.”Lyssara’s hands paused.“Fair.”Maevra glanced toward the closed doors.“Has Rhydan recalled the troops?”“The order went out twenty minutes ago.”“Thornmere?”“A messenger carried notice of the Concord to the eastern ridge.”Relief came reluctantly.Nobody had crossed the border.Not yet.Maevra looked down at herself.The gown belonged to Ravaryn, but she had refused their silver ceremonial

The handle turned again.Maevra moved before the door opened.She snatched the bronze candleholder from the bedside table and pressed herself against the wall beside the entrance.Sariel surged beneath her skin.Blood still scented the room.Fresh enough that whoever had left the handprint could not have been gone long.The door opened slowly.A man stepped inside.Maevra swung.He ducked.The candleholder smashed against the wooden frame instead of his skull.“Luna!”Maevra stopped her second strike.One of the guards from outside stared at her, eyes wide.“What are you doing?”“I could ask you the same thing.”He looked from the weapon in her hand to the room.“Alpha Rhydan ordered us to remain outside.”“Then why are you inside?”“You called.”“I did no such thing.”The guard went still.A heartbeat later, Maevra saw his expression change.Confusion.Then fear.“Someone knocked from inside,” he said.Maevra’s grip tightened.“I heard a woman tell us to enter.”“There is no woman her

The message from Caelen’s room stayed in Maevra’s thoughts long after Rhydan ordered the corridor searched.Caelen found the money. He missed the buyer.Someone inside Varek Keep knew what they had uncovered.Worse, that person had been close enough to slide a message beneath a locked door and disappear before the guards arrived.Maevra stood beside the window in Rhydan’s private council room, watching morning light creep over the Ravaryn mountains.She had slept for perhaps an hour.Her cheek still carried the thin cut from the assassin’s knife. A fresh Thornmere weapon had been found in a dead guard. Caelen’s ledger contained payments surrounding her father’s death.She should have been thinking about all of it.Instead, she kept staring at the sealed letter on the table.Thornmere’s crest marked the wax.Rhydan stood across from her.“You don’t have to read it here.”Maevra looked at him.“Are you suddenly concerned about my privacy?”“I’m concerned you’ve been staring at that envel

The first horn sounded before sunrise.Maevra was already awake.Sleep had never really come after Sereth’s warning. She had spent most of the night staring at Caelen’s coded message and wondering how many people inside Varek Keep had known he was walking into a trap.The second horn came sharper.Closer.Sariel rose beneath her skin.Danger.Maevra was out of bed before the third.Someone pounded on the door.“Luna!”She opened it.A Ravaryn guard stood outside, breathing hard.“Border report. Eastern ridge.”Maevra’s stomach tightened.“What happened?”“Patrol clash.”“How bad?”His hesitation answered first.“Dead on both sides.”She pushed past him.“Where is Rhydan?”“War room.”Of course.Maevra ran.The war room was already full.Maps covered the central table. Taven stood over one with both hands planted against the wood. Three commanders argued near the windows. Lord Malrec occupied the far end, looking irritatingly composed.Rhydan stood in the middle of it.He looked up the