Chapter 161
There was something sacred about mornings like this. Astrid’s soft coos filled the cabin as the pale sunlight slipped through the lace curtains, warming the wooden floors beneath my bare feet. Her tiny fingers wrapped tightly around mine as if the world outside didn’t exist—no politics, no bloodlines, no threats. Just us.
Alexander was in the kitchen, shirtless, because of course he was. Muscles flexed effortlessly with each movement, and his tattoos shifted with the lines of his body like they were alive. He wasn’t humming today—Alexander didn’t hum. That was too… domestic. But there was a rhythm in the way he moved, controlled and lethal, like he was always a breath away from action.
I sat on the rug with Astrid in my lap, brushing her soft curls back from her forehead. Her eyes were bright, unbothered by the weight that pressed on the world around her. She smiled up at me, and for a second, I let myself pretend that was all that mattered.
“She needs to start shifting soon,” Alexander said, his voice gravelly and low as he poured himself a cup of black coffee.
I looked up. “She’s not even crawling yet.”
“Doesn’t matter. She’s half-wolf, half… whatever the hell I am. The signs should be showing.”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
He turned, eyes narrowing. “No. I say that like it’s dangerous. Because it is.”
He crouched beside me, his hand brushing down Astrid’s back protectively. “We still don’t know what she’s fully capable of, Lu. And the pack—” he hesitated, jaw locking, “—they’re getting louder.”
I tensed. “You mean the whispers.”
“They’re not just whispers anymore.”
We didn’t talk much after that. We didn’t need to. The silence between us was weighted with unspoken truths. I knew him too well—the hard set of his shoulders, the way his jaw flexed when he was holding back rage. He’d heard something. Or worse—he’d been challenged.
But I didn’t ask, because I knew his answer would only scare me.
Later, while he went on patrol, I strapped Astrid to my chest and decided to take her for a walk near the edge of the pack’s border. The air was crisp, scented with pine and damp earth, and for a moment, I felt calm again. That fragile sense of normalcy was dangerous though—it made you slow, soft, like prey.
The trails were quiet. Too quiet.
As I rounded the bend near the training field, voices crept into the stillness, hushed but sharp, like knives dragged across stone.
“I’m telling you, she’s not natural. No child should make a full-grown man drop to his knees just by looking at him.”
“She’s just a baby.”
“Is she? Look what she did to Lucy. You saw her eyes—glowing like fire when she tore that man’s throat out.”
“She was protecting her daughter.”
“And that’s exactly the problem. What happens when the kid learns that same instinct? What happens when she protects herself… from us?”
I froze.
I knew that voice. Marcus. One of Alexander’s most trusted warriors. Or so I thought.
I backed away slowly, every protective instinct in me blazing to life. I didn’t confront them. Not yet. Not while Astrid was pressed against me like a heartbeat. I made my way back home, and with every step, a deeper dread took root inside me.
They weren’t just scared.
They were planning something.
By the time Alexander returned, dusk had swallowed the sky and storm clouds were rolling in.
He slammed the door behind him with more force than necessary, jaw clenched, eyes stormy.
“Marcus is dead.”
The words hit like thunder. I stood there, frozen.
“What?”
He didn’t look at me, just peeled off his blood-splattered shirt and tossed it aside. His torso was streaked with crimson. Not his own.
“Found him near the northern border,” he muttered, pouring whiskey into a glass with a steady hand. “Heart ripped out. Like it was… harvested.”
I swallowed hard, a chill crawling down my spine. “That was the one—he was one of the ones talking.”
Alexander nodded slowly, the vein in his temple pulsing. “And someone wanted to send a message.”
I wrapped my arms around Astrid instinctively. “You think someone from the pack did this?”
“I think someone—or something—wanted to remind us she doesn’t belong.”
He handed me a piece of torn cloth wrapped around a rock. Unfolding it made my stomach turn. Written in blood, in scrawled, jagged letters, were the words:
“SHE IS NOT ONE OF US.”
My hands trembled. “This wasn’t just a threat. It was a declaration.”
Alexander’s voice turned cold. “They’re testing me. Seeing how far they can push before I rip them all apart.”
He stood up, walking to the window, knuckles white against the glass. Lightning cracked in the distance.
“We leave?” I asked quietly.
His back was still to me. “No. We don’t run. We rule.”
That was the man I loved. A beast in human skin. One who never begged. Never bent. And never broke.
But even kings fall, and we both knew there was only so much time before someone tried to take our daughter from us.
I rocked Astrid gently, trying to calm the pounding in my chest. But sleep didn’t come easily. I sat in bed long after midnight, staring out into the woods, knowing something was coming. Something worse than whispers.
Then I saw it.
Two eyes—bright yellow, not belonging to any wolf I knew—watching us from the treeline. No movement. No sound. Just... watching.
I blinked, and they were gone.
But the air shifted.
Something was here.
And it had come for her.
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