Page 186

Hades

The round table erupted.

Voices clashed like steel in battle, a violent crescendo of rage, disbelief, and barely restrained violence.

"This is blasphemy!" Silas roared again, his fist hammering against the polished wood. "Do you think the other Alpha’s will allow this? That the other packs will stand idle while you make a mockery of our bloodline?"

"Obsidian has thrived because we upheld the natural order!

" Governor Gallinti barked, his voice filled with sheer disbelief.

He turned to the others, his hands gesturing wildly.

Hoping they were all hearing what he was saying.

"This is an insult to our traditions! To our ancestors!

Have we truly fallen so far that we allow a Valmont to sit beside our Alpha? !"

The insult was thick in the air—a Valmont.

They spat the name like venom, like it burned their tongues to say it aloud.

My fingers twitched against the armrest of my chair.

Kael, ever silent, merely observed, his sharp gaze flicking between me and the raging governors, his body taut like a drawn bowstring.

"You are breaking the order, Hades!" Silas sneered, his voice dripping with disgust. "What message does this send to our people? That we kneel to mutts? That we let her—a fucking wolf—dictate our future?!"

The room burned with the weight of his hatred.

Governor Gallinti nodded vehemently, his face twisted in a mix of outrage and desperation. "This will incite rebellion! You cannot—"

"Do you think the warriors will stand behind this decision?" Silas cut in again, relentless. "The gammas will turn against you. The Alphas of the quadrants will see this as weakness!"

He turned sharply, leveling a glare at me as though I was an atrocity.

"That thing—that fucking disgrace—"

A growl ripped through the room.

Low. Deep. Otherworldly.

It was not mine alone.

It was ours.

A sound that curled in the air, wrapping around throats like an invisible noose. A sound that did not belong to a single being—but two.

Me.

And the Flux.

My vision darkened at the edges. The shadows in the room seemed to breathe, the air thickening, pressing down on every chest. The torches on the walls flickered violently, the flames shrinking as if trying to escape.

Silas’ mouth snapped shut.

The others froze.

Their bodies, once moving in heated protest, were now locked in place—trapped by an unseen force. By me.

"Speak those words again," I murmured, my voice a slow, dangerous thing, coiling through the air like a viper. "And I will tear your tongue from your skull."

Silas’ throat bobbed. His fingers twitched, but he did not move.

My body thrummed with power, my wolf raging beneath my skin, the Flux a whisper of violence and ruin curling at the edges of my mind.

I leaned forward slightly, the leather of my gloves creaking as I steepled my fingers.

"You stand here, screaming about tradition like a fool who does not understand history."

The room shook with anger.

Their rage was a storm, whipping through the air with unrestrained violence, but it did not touch me.

It could not.

I was the storm.

Silas looked like he wanted to lunge across the table, but fear rooted him in place. The echoes of my growl still vibrated in the very marrow of his bones, and I saw it—the battle warring in his mind. He wanted to challenge me. To push further.

But the Flux had tasted his insolence.

And it had nearly devoured him whole.

Governor Gallinti still clung to his righteous fury, though even he seemed rattled. His hands trembled as they gripped the table, but his voice did not waver.

"She does not belong here, Hades!" he shouted, trying to regain some semblance of control. "You can growl and snarl all you want, but we all know what this means! If the Elders refuse to acknowledge her, if the Quadrants turn against you, your reign will—"

"My reign?" I cut in smoothly, my voice lethal in its calm. "You think my reign is dictated by your approval?"

Silence.

Not one of them dared to answer.

Even Ambassador Montague, the ever-cunning diplomat, sat still, his expression unreadable. He had yet to speak a word since the eruption began.

Smart.

The others? Not so much.

Silas opened his mouth again, but this time I did not let him speak.

"You are all blind."

I stood, the power of my presence alone snuffing out their breath.

"You sit here, clinging to your precious laws, your dead traditions, your fragile egos. You bicker and scheme, terrified that a single woman has the strength to undo everything you’ve built."

I exhaled slowly, my hands curling into fists before I forced myself to relax.

"She will have a proper place in this fucking court," I said, my voice smooth as a blade against flesh. "One right by my fucking side. And she will be crowned by me."

Silence.

The weight of my words slammed down on them, suffocating, crushing, inevitable.

"Do you know why?"

I let the question hang, let them drown in it.

I let their panic swell.

"Because she is your fucking savior."

Their faces froze.

Governor Gallinti frowned. "What—"

"Because without her," I continued, voice dropping lower, "every single one of you will wither and die within eighteen months."

The air turned glacial.

"You want to use her blood, her essence, her fucking existence to save you," I murmured, voice like smoke and ruin, "yet you spit on the only thing keeping you from perishing."

I stepped forward, watching as their faces twisted—confusion, disbelief, but beneath it all—

Fear.

"She is above you all."

I tilted my head slightly, letting the next words sear into their bones.

"She can live in a place you will never have a chance to touch."

Montegue exhaled slowly, his fingers tapping once against the polished wood. The only sign that he was processing everything I had just revealed.

Gallinti scoffed, but it was weaker this time.

"I could kill her in an instant." Silas demanded, his voice frayed at the edges.

I smirked, my lip twitching, the flux craved yet another soul to devour but I had to hold back. This had to work.

"You can’t be that dense." I smiled.

My amusement did not reach my eyes.

"You thought she was a mere woman?"

I let the words cut through the room, slicing apart every assumption they had made.

"Elysia herself has chosen her."

A beat of silence.

A heartbeat.

Then—

"Lies."

Silas’ voice was weaker now. Shaken. He was trying to cling to his certainty, to deny the inevitable.

"Then go ahead." I spread my arms wide, my voice mocking, daring. "Ignore the Goddess. Ignore her will. Let your arrogance blind you, and let’s see how well it serves you when your bodies start to rot from the inside out."

Gallinti’s face paled.

Montague leaned back in his chair, eyes dark, lips pressing together as if suppressing the first flickers of dread.

Silas, however, was still too foolish to understand.

"You expect us to believe—"

"Believe what you want," I interrupted. "The truth does not require your faith to exist."

I let the words linger, let them sink into their skulls, infect their thoughts.

Let them realize the scope of their mistake.

"You call her a mutt?" My voice dipped lower, the Flux curling at the edges, taunting, whispering of things far worse than death. "You call her filth?"

I took another step forward.

"Then explain why your pathetic bodies will wither without her blood?"

Silas stilled.

I saw it.

The first hint of realization.

He was beginning to understand.

"You hate what she is," I continued, softer now, deadlier, "but you will kneel before her before the year is done."

I turned, my gaze sweeping over them one last time.

"Or you will perish."

Silas’ face twisted with anger, but there was something else now. Unease.

He was scrambling. Grasping for anything to hold on to, any argument that could turn the tide back in his favor. He had ruled these councils with his voice alone for years. A man who dictated the fears of lesser men, shaping their paranoia into weapons.

But now—his weapons were blunted.

"You expect us to fall at her feet because of an anomaly in her blood." His voice was sharp, but the edge was fraying. "This is nothing lucky science---";

Before anyone could react, before Gallinti could echo the sentiment, before even Kael could weigh in—

Montegue spoke and the air shifted.

And it cut through the room like a blade.

"You are wrong, Silas."

Silas stiffened.

Montegue leaned forward, measured, composed, and utterly unreadable.

"This is not a claim to divinity." His fingers tapped once against the polished wood, his eyes sharp as glass. "This is divinity."

A ripple of silence spread through the room.

Governor Gallinti shifted uncomfortably in his chair. Silas, however, was too far gone to let reason in.

"How convenient that the Goddess would bless a Valmont!" Silas spat. "How convenient that you expect us to believe—"

Montegue cut him off with nothing but a look.

Silas fell silent.

It was unnatural. As if the air itself had sealed his lips shut.

Montegue did not raise his voice. He never needed to.

"You are foolish to deny the truth when it is standing in front of you." His gaze swept over the table, his words slow and absolute. "You all are."

I watched as even Gallinti hesitated.

Montegue was no ally of mine. He did not belong to my court. He did not serve my interests. He was a voice of neutrality.

Which meant his words—his acknowledgment—carried weight that even my power could not match.

"The Goddess chose her."

His voice was a whisper of finality, a statement of fact.

"The blood in her veins is the only blood on this earth that the abnormal phases of the moon could never affect. That even the Blood Moon itself bows to."

The weight of his words slammed into the room like an earthquake.

Gallinti inhaled sharply, his fingers clenching around the arms of his chair. Even Kael’s ever-watchful expression shifted, his brows drawing together in thought.

Silas shook his head. Denial.

"This—" his voice cracked slightly, "You cannot expect us to--"

"You will."

Montegue’s eyes were sharp as a dagger. Unrelenting. Unforgiving.

"And you would do well to remember that before you decide to insult her name again."

Silas did not respond.

Because for the first time since this war of words began—he had nothing left to say.

Montegue turned to me then.

His gaze was unreadable, but there was something knowing behind it.

Something like acceptance.

"You understand what this means, don’t you, Hades?"

A pause.

A breath.

"That she is not just your Luna. Not just your wife."

I exhaled slowly, my jaw tightening.

"She is something greater."

Silas looked as though he wanted to retch.

Gallinti looked as though he wanted to pray.

Kael merely watched.

I let the silence stretch.

Let them feel it.

Then, I spoke.

"She will be crowned."

The words were not a question.

Not a plea.

They were law.

Montegue inclined his head, the only sign of approval I would ever get from him.

"Then so it shall be."

And with that—the decision was sealed.