Alpha Soier clenched his hands in barely contained rage, though the smile on his face never wavered as he watched the royal entourage vanish beyond the borders of his land. A week. That was all the time those princes had stayed—just seven days—and yet in that short span, they had turned his entire pack upside down.
His son, once bold and brash, had been reduced to a stuttering wreck, a shadow of himself, while his daughter... his daughter was now being taken away under the polite but unmistakable label of "guest."
Everyone knew better. There was no courtesy in this invitation. It was nothing short of a hostage situation wrapped in the fine silk of royal diplomacy.
His jaw tightened until it ached. At least his Lyra was clever. She had always been quick to read people, quicker still to use her charm when needed. He had no doubt she would find a way to seduce one of the princes. And if not them, then perhaps that stiff-faced teacher who never left their side—if Lyra could draw even a scrap of information from him, it could tilt things back in their favor.
Thankfully, the royal brats had not looked too deeply into the Ruins. That, at least, was a small mercy. If they had uncovered even a fraction of what lay buried there, things would have spiraled far beyond his control.
It was then, as the dust of departing hooves settled and silence crept back over the land, that the real reason for the princes’ sudden interest in the Ruins came back to him.
That woman.
His lips curved into a cold, humorless smile. He checked the time, the weight of his thoughts pressing harder with each passing moment, and finally ground out the order, voice like ice,
"Bring that bitch here."
In the silence of the courtyard, only a handful of chosen men remained while the rest of the pack had been ordered to keep their distance. The air was still, yet heavy with an unspoken tension. Everyone knew what tonight was. The initiation of an Omega.
It was tradition. It was law. The rule of the Moonville Pack.
Every time an Omega came of age and her first heat descended, the Alpha would select a group of ’capable’ men for her—never one, never allowing her the chance to form a bond with a single mate. It was known that while an Omega could not mark an Alpha, some part of her, no matter how small, would always remain tied to the first man who claimed her. And so the rule was iron-clad.
Five days of heat. Never one man for more than a night.
Usually, he would choose five men. That had always been enough. But this time, he had chosen ten.
Especially for that Emira.
That wild little bitch.
He had no proof, nothing concrete to point to her, but he was certain she had something to do with what happened to his Alec. The boy had gone to her that night. He knew it. And Alec hadn’t come back the same. Now, with Alec too broken to teach her a lesson himself, the task fell to him.
And tonight, her first heat would be the beginning. The beginning of the life of hell she would live in the Moonville Pack.
His mind flickered back to the girl herself, the way she carried that deceptive softness in every line of her face. Pale skin, dark hair that caught the light like a sheet of silk, eyes bright with defiance even when she held her tongue. So much like her mother-beautiful, almost delicate, the sort who looked as though they would break under the first hard touch. But he knew better. That bloodline carried fire beneath the surface, a sharpness hidden under all that softness.
She would fight. And she would burn.
Which was why breaking her would be all the more satisfying and memorable. After all, his favourite Omega until now had been her mother.
He could feel the tension crawling under his skin, his wolf pacing inside him, restless and hungry. The air around him felt thick, heavy, like the whole night was holding its breath.
Too bad the bitch couldn’t shift.
If she could, he would have taken her in his wolf form first. Pinned her under the open sky, the beast in him claiming her before anyone else touched her. He imagined it for a moment—her small body struggling under him, soft skin scraping against the dirt as his wolf pounded into her until there was nothing left of her fight.
But then another thought slid through his mind.
Why wait for her to shift at all?
So what if she stayed human? He could still let the wolf out, still take her that way. It would be brutal, yes. But it wouldn’t kill her. No, it would only crush her pride, leave her shaking and marked so deep she would never forget.
He smiled slowly at the thought.
Yes. That was what he would do. Once his men had used her, once she was broken and raw, he would shift. He would make her kneel and take her one last time, the beast in him sinking into her until she was nothing but a lesson carved into flesh.
The image made his blood run hotter.
Around him, the chosen men were starting to move restlessly. Some flexed their hands. Others shifted on their feet, eyes bright with hunger. They had been waiting too long, waiting for her, and now the night felt like it was crawling over their skin. The silence was thick, filled with the sound of low breaths and the beating of their eager hearts.
And then it came.
Her scent.
It slid through the air like a spark hitting dry wood-sweet, sharp, heavy with the smell of heat. It filled their lungs, wrapped around their throats, and made every man there tense like a bow ready to snap. Even the Alpha felt his wolf push harder against his skin, a growl curling low in his chest.
The moon was climbing higher. And soon she would be here.
And when the clock struck twelve, she would be theirs.