10
Lord Allard waits not another moment before following his queen’s orders, herding the other adults out of the room. But the boy remains. I stare at him, willing him to go too. To let me die in peace. But he only sits up, perched on the edge of the table now, and sets the crown on the wood.
The door shuts behind us, and then it is just me, the queen, and the boy. “You didn’t need to let it go that far,” he says rather cheerfully.
“Yes, I did.” The queen watches Evie’s back until it vanishes through the door. “Your fiancée needed to learn a lesson too.”
I nearly choke at that, frozen upon the tile floor as I stare between them.
“Not quite my fiancée yet,” he corrects, “ Your Majesty .”
“Soon enough, Sinclair. It’s time you become accustomed to your future.” The queen turns to me then, slashing a hand through the air and bringing an end to the casual conversation. “Now, little Bitten one, I require your ears. This is important for you to hear, but I won’t force you to listen.”
Why not , I think, when you have already forced everything else?
As though she can hear me, the queen says, “There will be a choice to make at the end of this. You must make it alone. Two paths lie before you, and where one leads to greatness, the other leads to death. Nod if you understand.”
I don’t move, though the magical release on my neck feels as if a weight has been lifted. Relief pounds through me.
“I will not command you, but I do need you to acknowledge that you hear me.” Her tone darkens, imperceptible to anyone else’s ears. I nod.
“Very good. You have found yourself in a strange world, I’m sure. The things you’ve endured over the last two days have no doubt been pure torment. That is not the fault of anyone, but a gift of the moon, sun, and stars.”
I glare. Have no choice but to glare. These past few days have been anything but a gift. They’ve been torture.
The rest of my limbs remaining locked, the queen steps around me as if I’m a felled tree in the road. She continues to the tapestry behind the boy. It displays the universe in metallic stitching. Planets, constellations, and a web of threads that I have no way to interpret.
“We come from a lineage of those before humans, in a time between human and dinosaur when Superiors alone ruled the earth. You’ve heard of most, I’m sure.
Vampires, faeries, sirens. Each more sinister and deadly than the last. Well, the faeries were a people of nature.
They were born—evolved, if you’d like—of the ordinary.
There were the earthen fae, the water sprites, the flame wielders.
” As she speaks, she points to a different thread.
They interconnect from the moon to Earth to the stars, knotting over so many times that it’s inconceivable they could ever be separated.
“There were also the beastly faeries,” she says, sounding at once proud and judgmental.
“Legend has it that a great star crashed to Earth, and the dust carried to the forests of every continent. From the dust grew bears that could think like humans, panthers that could speak, and wolves that could transform. As wolves do, we have since stuck with our packs. Our courts . We do not stray for anything.”
Werewolves.
She glances at me, and I blink in understanding.
Only then does she continue. “Of course, thousands upon thousands of years can destroy even the ageless. The licentious vampires have been chased to the darkest corners of the world. The lewd sirens remain in the murky depths of the seven seas. And the wicked faeries… well, no one knows what happened to the other faeries. They vanished when the first human appeared. As though the mere presence of humans was enough to eradicate the lot of them. But we wolves…” She grins.
“We have remained strong in numbers and power through the Seven Courts of the Wolf Regents. Seven continents. Hundreds of territories. Thousands of packs. And seven regents to unite them all.”
“Wonderful introduction, Mother,” the boy drawls, his tone sharper than his smile. He winks at me. “Perhaps the Wolf Queen of North America would now like to bow.”
“Enough, Sin. In a few years, you will be the one giving this speech and deciding who lives and dies. It’s important for you to be aware of how ruling truly works.”
“I haven’t gone through the Ascension Rite yet,” he says. “Perhaps you could wait until I’ve been properly declared an Alpha before we continue down the princely route.”
“You are an Alpha. The eyes never lie.” The queen’s black eyes darken into pools of inky night. “Red for power. For leaders. For Alphas. And one day, black. For king.”
The boy—Sin—stifles a yawn with his hand. “Eyes can change.”
“Unless you’re preparing to cast aside your own hierarchal privilege, the eyes do not lie.
” The queen whirls back around, once more facing me.
“Which brings me to our new Bitten one.” She removes her crown, setting it on the table before wandering toward my body.
“It has always been important for us Superiors to keep our bloodlines intact. To remain with those who have been gifted from the heavens. Bitten werewolves—while adding to our numbers—do not add to our strength. That is why it’s forbidden to bite a human outside of approval from a regent.
” She tilts her head. “But you… you are different, Vanessa Hart.” From her pocket, she retrieves a bronze mirror and holds it before my face, repeating, “The eyes do not lie.”
Sure enough, molten purple swirls in the irises of my wolfish face. I gulp. Shut my eyes. She said red for power. She said black for king, presumably for any regent. But what about my own?
“No one has been Born or Bitten with purple eyes before,” Sin says, voice lower, softer now. “Instructor Alvarez couldn’t find records of a single one throughout all of history, even amongst our nobility.”
“Exactly.” The Wolf Queen doesn’t remove her gaze from mine, though she stows the mirror in her pocket. “Vanessa seems to be wholly original. Untested potential, if you will. And you,” she purrs, glancing at her son as a smile twists her lips, “shall be our first test.”
He stills, and a dark shadow of contempt sweeps across his expression. “Pardon?”
“Compel her.”
He blinks. I blink. We look at each other for a moment—for a breath—before he quickly looks away. “No.”
“We need to know where she lies within the ranks of court. I have compelled her successfully. She is, thus, below the regent. You are an Alpha—and in our hierarchy, you exist directly below only myself—and I am commanding you to compel her, Sinclair. Now. We need to know how to treat her. How to use her.”
How to use me?
He steps forward, and my muscles tense. I brace myself for the worst. For another round of humiliation.
Sin crouches before me, stroking long, dexterous fingers through my fur, and his eyes flash bloodred as they crash into my own. He murmurs, “Sit up.”
My bones crunch at the words. My body contorts into the fastest position possible.
I sit—once more like a dog—and my spirit cracks further.
Embarrassment slices through me, deeper than last time.
I am a puppet. I am their marionette. He flinches for the briefest of moments, but with my wolfish senses, I still track the movement.
It doesn’t matter, however. He returns to his mother’s side.
“Excellent,” the queen says. She snaps her finger, and behind me, the doors creak open.
Gentle footsteps clack across the floor.
A young man with yellow eyes trails down the aisle.
He wipes his hands on an apron tied around his waist. Beads of sweat drip from his forehead—they smell like fear.
“Anthony, be a dear and compel this wolf to stand.”
Her voice deepens when she speaks the order, and I understand immediately that it is another compulsion. Anthony looms over me, a dazed look in his burning, golden eyes, as he orders, “ Stand .”
I shut my eyes and grit my teeth. Wait for them to use and use and use me until I am a husk of who I once was, but—
I do not stand.
My bones do not obey.
Anthony’s auburn brow furrows. His pale forehead creases with effort. “ Stand ,” he repeats. Harsher, crueler. “Stand up now .”
I do not. Victory floods my limbs, and warmth tingles up my spine. I do not stand.
“That is all,” the queen says easily, her eyes narrowing on me. “You may go, Anthony.”
“Yes, my queen,” Anthony says, and then he retreats from the throne room with clumsy, hasty steps.
The Wolf Queen approaches me with a knowing, sinister smile.
All the victory I felt seconds ago melts away under her stare.
“Untested potential,” she says, as though the words carry a weight greater than even her throne.
“You are above many in the wolf hierarchy. As such…” She seems to ponder this.
“As such, Miss Hart, you will not yet be moved to another pack. Typical court etiquette would see you sent off to a territory in the south, where you would be raised as a soldier within a modest pack. But you are special. You are different .” She licks her lips.
“If you so choose it, you will start and end your training in Castle Severi.
“New packs will be chosen during the Ascension Rite on winter solstice—when the universe will solidify your truest potential—and I am offering you the fortune of joining the others. Students of nobility and regality, much like my own son, have traveled from all over the world for this one moment. Castle Severi is hosting the Ascension this decade, and you will learn amongst them. You will live amongst them. And at the end, should you become powerful enough, you will be chosen to remain in this court, potentially within Sin’s very own pack. ”
“Which is totally up to Sin,” Sin mutters with an eye roll, but… there’s a lack of venom in his voice. A softness in his gaze. It almost makes me feel… safe.