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TWELVE

KAEL

T he council floor had never been so still.

For once, no one was shouting. No posturing warlord pounding his fists on the carved stone table, no veiled threats laced in honeyed tones.

Just murmurs and wine being poured. Silver plates glinting in low firelight.

Winter light trickling through the narrow upper windows like it had forgotten how to shine properly.

Selene was across the room, dressed in pale lavender—subtle, elegant, not quite traditional Fenrir garb but close enough to pass. She was speaking to one of the shifter ambassadors. Kael watched her from where he leaned against the far column, arms crossed, pretending not to pay attention.

She was composed. Courteous. Her tone low and diplomatic. Her posture still too stiff for someone who claimed she didn’t care what anyone here thought—but better. Controlled. Regal, almost.

She had adapted to this world faster than anyone had expected.

The thought was starting to scare him.

Because he’d seen what happened to people who thrived in these halls. What they had to lose to survive here.

Kael’s jaw flexed as the ambassador’s hand drifted a little too close to Selene’s arm again. The noble smiled too easily, too long. Selene didn’t flinch, but Kael’s wolf stirred under his skin like it was listening for trouble.

Still, it was just a harmless conversation.

Just a calm day in court.

Until the scent hit him.

Blood.

Not wine. Not meat. Not the vague iron tang that lingered after training or too many egos collided.

Real. Fresh. Human.

The metallic sting sliced through the perfumed air like a dagger to the ribs—so sharp it stole the breath from his lungs.

Kael moved.

He didn’t think.

Didn’t call for guards.

Didn’t shout.

His body just reacted.

In one heartbeat, Selene was still standing, head tilted, gaze focused, listening politely.

In the next, a flicker of movement.

A shadow breaking from the edge of the gallery. Cloaked. Hooded. Moving too fast to be stopped. A glint of steel in a pale hand.

Kael roared across the chamber.

“Selene!”

But it was too late.

The blade struck.

A sickening, fleshy thud.

The assassin drove the dagger up under Selene’s ribs. Not a slash. A targeted, brutal stab.

Selene gasped. Her whole body jerked, back arching with the impact. For a second, it looked like she might stay upright.

But then blood soaked through the front of her tunic.

A dark, ugly bloom across the fabric.

Her hand clutched at the wound. Her knees buckled.

She stumbled backward.

Kael didn’t remember unsheathing his sword. Didn’t register the movement of shoving aside an intervening noble. He was already there. Crossing the chamber in three brutal strides.

The assassin turned, trying to melt into the crowd. But Kael was faster.

He tackled the man mid-turn, slamming into him with the full weight of fury and fear and instinct. They hit the ground hard—stone against bone, a gasp of breath escaping the attacker.

Kael’s blade came down, not to kill, but to pin.

Steel cracked the floor beside the man’s neck, close enough to leave a bleeding graze.

Close enough to promise death.

“Try to move,” Kael snarled, voice guttural. “Please.”

The man didn’t move.

The court erupted in chaos behind him—guards swarming, nobles shouting, a ripple of shocked silence where Selene had fallen.

But Kael didn’t look away from the would-be killer.

Not yet.

Because Selene’s blood was still fresh on the stones.

And the rage inside him hadn’t peaked.

“Leave him,” Kael snarled at the approaching guards, forcing his wolf down. “Take him to the dungeons. I want to know who sent him.”

His voice was low. Controlled.

But every word was soaked in fury.

He turned.

Selene was still standing but barely. Her hand was pressed tight over the wound, blood slipping between her fingers. Her skin had gone wax-pale, her jaw clenched.

“Selene—”

She blinked at him. “I’m fine.”

“You’re not,” he growled.

He reached her in two strides and swept her into his arms. She didn’t fight it. Not this time. Her head lolled against his chest, and he felt it—the echo of her pain slamming into his ribs like a second heartbeat.

The Blood Mark blazed to life beneath his skin.

It didn’t whisper this time.

It screamed.

The healers had cleared the lesser wing of the citadel in record time. Kael barreled through the doors, voice barking orders, until Selene was laid gently on the obsidian-slabbed table at the center of the room.

“Move,” he snapped at the nearest healer when she hesitated.

Selene’s eyes fluttered open, just for a moment.

“You’re scaring the staff,” she rasped.

He crouched beside her, hands braced on either side of her body. “They should be scared.”

She tried to smile.

It came out wrong.

The healer pressed cool hands to her side. The bleeding had slowed, but the wound ran deep—enchanted steel, if the stench of the blade was anything to go by.

“We can close it,” the healer said. “But she’ll need rest. Time. She was lucky.”

Kael didn’t feel lucky.

He felt raw.

Like his skin didn’t fit right.

Like the rage hadn’t settled.

He stayed there, by her side, as her breathing evened out and the healer wrapped her ribs in charmed linen. The room emptied until it was just the two of them, and the soft hiss of the hearth behind them.

Selene stirred.

Her voice was hoarse. “You didn’t need to carry me like some fainting noble.”

“I didn’t think you’d appreciate being dragged.”

A soft exhale, half laugh, half groan. She opened her eyes fully now, their stormy grey clouded with pain and something quieter beneath it.

“Kael,” she said, and something about the way she said it made his throat tighten.

He couldn’t look away from her. Even bruised and bloodied, she was too much.

Too bright.

Too close.

“You scared the shit out of me,” he said quietly.

Her brow furrowed. “I didn’t mean to.”

“I felt it, Selene. The moment the blade hit you.”

Her lips parted.

“I felt your pain like it was mine,” he continued, voice low and fraying at the edges. “I don’t know if it was the Mark or?—”

He stopped.

Because saying it aloud might make it real. And he wasn’t ready for that.

Neither of them were.

Selene’s hand found his. Not forceful. Not dramatic. Just… there. Warm. Present. Her fingers slid into his palm like they belonged there.

“I’m not leaving,” she said softly.

He shook his head once. “They want you gone. Or dead.”

“Which one do you want?”

Kael met her gaze. And for the first time, he didn’t have a clear answer.

He swallowed hard. “I don’t want you dead. Or...”

Silence stretched.

The fire crackled.

Selene’s thumb brushed the side of his hand once—light, tentative.

The bond between them pulsed again. Not with pain. With want.

“I don’t trust this,” she whispered. “Any of it. But… I don’t want to be afraid of you anymore.”

“You shouldn’t be,” Kael said finally.

But he didn’t say she wasn’t right to be.

Because the way he’d lost control when he saw her bleed—the violence that had surged through him without thought, without mercy…

It lived in him. It was him.

Selene gave a faint nod, eyes falling shut again.

Her breathing evened out.

Kael stayed there long after sleep claimed her, his hand still wrapped around hers, the memory of blood and burning steel echoing in his mind.

And the vow he made in the silence of that room wasn’t spoken aloud.

But it was deadly.

They’d come for her once.

They wouldn’t get a second chance.