The blizzard didn’t just bite, it consumed. In the frozen heart of the whispering spine forest, a young woman named Emily Vance was dying. Cast out starving and hunted, she had nothing left to give. That’s when she heard the cry. A lone wolf cub cornered by starving rogues. She had a choice.

 run and survive one more day or use the one secret she had a forbidden magic that would drain her very life force to save him. She chose the cub. And as darkness took her, she was found, not by a savior, but by the most feared wolf in the world, Kelvin Valyrias, the alpha king, and he had just found his son. The cold of the whispering spine forest was a physical entity.

 It didn’t just numb the skin. It burrowed into the bone, seeking the last remnants of warmth to extinguish. For Emily Vance, there was little warmth left. She was a rogue, the lowest of the lowest stain on the snow. Her pack, the Mount Pack, had cast her out three weeks prior. Their alpha, a brutish man named Silas, had declared her a drain on resources.

 She was too small, her wolf too weak, and she ate food that could go to stronger warriors. The final straw had been her curse, a secret she’d guarded until it had betrayed her. Now her ribs were a cage beneath her thin, tattered coat. Hunger was a constant hollow ache that had long since surpassed pain and become a dull, listless companion.

 She stumbled her worn boot, catching on a root hidden beneath the snow. She fell forward, catching herself on hands that were cracked and blue. She didn’t have the energy to weep. A howl split the air sharp and desperate. It wasn’t the organized call of a pack hunt. It was the sound of terror. Emily’s first instinct, honed by weeks of survival, was to run. Hide.

 Whatever was happening, it was dangerous. But then a second sound followed a high-pitched yelp, the unmistakable sound of a cub in distress. It was close, just beyond a thicket of frostcovered pines. It’s not your problem, Emily. Her mind begged her to move to find shelter, to conserve the last few calories she possessed. You can’t even save yourself.

 How can you save anyone else? But the yelp came again, followed by two deep, menacing growls. Emily’s feet against every command from her brain moved. She pushed through the lowhanging branches, her heart a frozen lump in her chest. The scene was stark. In a small clearing, two large mangy rogues, their fur matted with ice and old blood, their eyes burning with a desperate halfmad hunger, were backing a small cub against a rock face.

 The cub was beautiful, a creature of silver and moonlight, its fur pristine against the grime of its attackers. It snarled bravely, its tiny milk teeth bad, but it was trembling so hard it could barely stand. The larger rogue, a scarred brute with one milky eye, snapped its jaws, missing the cub’s throat by an inch.

 Before she could think, Emily grabbed a heavy frozen branch from the ground. “Get away from him!” she shrieked, her voice thin and ready in the wind. The two rogues whipped around, their starved attention, which had been wholly focused on the cub now fixed on her. They were bigger than her, stronger, and in their eyes she saw they weren’t just hungry. They were killers.

 The oneeyed rogue growled a low vibration that shook the air. Fresh meat and an appetizer. It lunged. Emily wasn’t a fighter. She was a healer. But desperation gave her a brief, frantic burst of adrenaline. She swung the branch, connecting with the side of the rogue’s head. It yelped in surprise more than pain, but it stumbled. The second rogue used the opening to circle around her.

 Emily scrambled back, trying to keep herself between the predators and the cub. The silver cub huddled behind her legs, whimpering. “Run!” she screamed at it. “Go find your mother.” But the cub just pressed closer to her as if she were its only hope. The oneeyed wolf lunged again. Emily tried to raise the branch, but she was too slow.

 Claws black and sharp rad across her chest. She screamed as the force sent her flying backward. She hit the rock face, her head cracking against the stone. Black spots danced in her vision. The branch flew from her numb fingers. The two rogues advanced, no longer cautious. They knew she was finished.

 The oneeyed one snapped at her throat, and she rolled its teeth, clamping down on her shoulder instead. The pain was immense, a white, hot, searing agony. She felt the muscle tear, the hot rush of her own blood, melting the snow beneath her. She was going to die here in the snow, defending a cub that wasn’t hers. The second rogue ignored her, turning back to the cowering silver cub. It was over. No.

 A tiny, defiant ember sparked in Emily’s chest. She had one last thing. The curse that had gotten her exiled, the reason the Mountridge pack feared her. Her grandmother had called it Anima Translatio, the transfer of life. Emily could heal. But the healing came at a cost. It didn’t create new energy. It moved it. To heal a scratch on another, she would feel a day’s exhaustion.

 To mend a broken bone, she would be bedridden for a week. To save this cub and stop two fullgrown wolves. It would take everything. Get away from him, she whispered, her bloody fingers pressing into the snow. The oneeyed rogue, sensing a new threat, turned back to her. It opened its jaws for the killing bite.

 Emily closed her eyes and pushed. She didn’t pull the energy from the earth. There was none to be had in this frozen wasteland. She pulled it from the only source she had left the core of her own life. It felt like her soul was being ripped from her body.

 The energy exploded outward, not as a light, but as a wave of pure kinetic force and scalding heat. It wasn’t a healing wave. It was a shield, a concussive blast of her own life essence. The blast slammed into the two rogues, sending them flying backward like ragdolls. They hit the surrounding trees with sickening bone cracking thuds and didn’t move again. They were dead.

 Their life force extinguished by the raw sacrificial power. The silver cub shielded by Emily’s body was unharmed. The clearing fell silent, save for the howl of the wind. Emily gasped, the world tilting. The massive wound in her shoulder was gushing. The cold was gone, replaced by a terrifying, spreading numbness. Her magic had saved the cub, but it had drained her completely. She had used the last of her strength.

 She looked at the little silver cub who was now nudging her face, whining. Go. She breathed her voice, barely a whisper. Be safe. Her vision blurred the edges, turning dark. The last thing she saw was the silver fur of the cub, and the last thing she felt was the snow against her cheek as she fell into unconsciousness.

Alpha King Kelvin Valyriius moved through the forest like a wraith of shadow and fury. The snow did not crunch under his boots. It submitted. He was the supreme ruler of all packs in the Northern Territories, the alpha of alphas and the master of the obsidian claw pack.

 And at this moment, he was gripped by a cold primal fear that surpassed even the blizzard. His son was gone. He shifted alpha king. His beta Silus had reported his voice tight with panic. Prince Leonidis. He shifted early. There was a distraction of fire set at the eastern wall. While the patrols were diverted, he he just ran into the spine.

 Leo, his 5-year-old son, who shouldn’t have been able to access his wolf form for another 2 years, had been scared by the fire and the commotion. He had broken protocol, broken through the fence, and fled into the most dangerous unclaimed territory on the continent, spread the patrols in a fan pattern. Kelvin had commanded his voice a low growl that cut through the blizzard. Find him.

 I want every warrior you have. find my son. But Kelvin hadn’t waited. He ran. He followed the tiny fading scent of his son, a scent of pin needles and ozone that was uniquely Leo. But the wind was stealing it, burying it under new snow. Leo. His roar was inhuman, a sound that sent birds scattering from trees a mile away. He had been tracking for an hour his fear mounting into a soulc crushing dread.

 The whispering spine was rogue territory. Desperate starving rogues who wouldn’t hesitate to kill a lone cub, even the alpha king’s son. Then he scented it. Blood. A lot of blood. And beneath it, the scent of his son, sharp with terror, and something else. A strange electric tang in the air. Like lightning strike and burnt lavender. Kelvin’s speed became a blur.

 He burst through a thicket of pines into a small snow-filled clearing. The sight that greeted him stopped his heart. Two dead rogues, their bodies twisted and broken against the trees. His son Leo in his small, perfect silver wolf form, whimpering and covered in blood. And a woman, she was collapsed, half buried in a snowdrift.

 She was small, dressed in rags, and her scent was faint, diluted by the cold. But he caught it rogue. His hand instinctively went to the hilt of the massive silverlaced blade he carried. His law was absolute. Rogues found in obsidian claw territory were to be executed on site. This one was clearly in league with the two dead ones.

 She had tried to, but the scene was wrong. the blood covering his son. It wasn’t Leo’s. Leo ran to him, yelping, and Kelvin scooped him up, shifting his gaze from the dead rogues to the woman. She was bleeding profusely from a massive bite wound on her shoulder. The snow around her was a crimson stain. The blood on Leo was hers.

 She had been protecting him. Silus Kelter. Kelvin barked into his coms. I have the prince. He is unharmed. I’m at my coordinates. I also have a situation. Two rogue combatants deceased and one unidentified female rogue barely alive. Leo squirmed in his arms, whining, and jumped back to the snow.

 He ran to the unconscious woman and began licking her face, nudging her as if trying to wake her. “Lo, get away from her!” Kelvin commanded his voice hard. Leo growled. His own son, his 5-year-old cub, growled at him, the alpha king. He placed his small silver body protectively over the woman’s chest, bearing his teeth at his father. Kelvin was stunned into silence.

What in the hell had happened here? He approached cautiously. The woman was pale as the snow, her breathing so shallow, it was almost non-existent. She was dying. The electrical smell was coming from her. It was the scent of whatever unnatural force had killed the two large rogues. He knelt his gaze clinical.

 He had to know if she was a threat. He reached out a gloved hand and pushed the matted frozen hair from her face. The moment his skin, even through the leather, brushed her icy cheek, it happened. A jolt like a thousand volts of lightning shot up his arm and exploded in his chest.

 His wolf, a beast of iron and shadow that hadn’t stirred for another in 5 years, rose up and roared a single impossible word inside his skull. Mate, Kelvin recoiled as if he’d been struck. He stared at the half dead rogue, his mind unable to process the information. No, it was impossible. His mate, Isabella Leo’s mother, had died 5 years ago.

 A wolf only got one mate. The moon goddess was cruel, but she wasn’t this cruel. To link him, the king, to a dying, magic wielding, packless rogue, Silas, and two other warriors, burst into the clearing weapons drawn. Alpha King, we stopped taking in the scene. and the dead rogues.

 The prince growling at his father and the alpha king kneeling over a bleeding woman with an expression of pure unadulterated shock. “Sir,” Silas asked cautiously. Kelvin didn’t hear him. He was looking at the wound on her shoulder. It was deep, ragged. She should already be dead from blood loss. “She saved me, Papa,” a small voice said. Kelvin looked down.

 Leo had shifted back to his human form, a small naked boy with silver hair and his father’s fierce green eyes. He was shivering, but he didn’t move from his spot. His small hands clutching the woman’s torn coat. “They were bad wolves,” Leo whispered, tears freezing on his cheeks. “She fought them. She made them go boom, and then she fell asleep.

 Kelvin’s world, which had been built on law, order, and control, fractured. His son was alive because of this woman. This woman was a rogue. This woman was dying. And his wolf was screaming at him a desperate, agonizing howl, “Our mate is dying. Save her! Save her!” He ripped off his heavy winter cloak, a cloak of state trimmed with obsidian wolf fur, and wrapped it around her small, frail body.

 He lifted her as if she weighed nothing. She was so light. “Silus,” Kelvin said, his voice terrifyingly calm. “Get the prince back to the pack house, warm him, lock down the estate, find out who set that fire and the woman, Alfa,” Silas asked, confused.

 “Do we detain her?” Kelvin looked at the woman in his arms, her head lolling against his chest. Her scent lavender and lightning was already sinking into him, calming the frantic beast that was clawing at his insides. “No,” Kelvin said, his voice absolute. “She is not a prisoner.” He started walking, moving faster than his warriors heading directly for the pack hospital. “She is my guest.

” Emily woke to the smell of antiseptic and the muted beeping of a machine. Her first sensation was confusion. Her second was pain. A dull, throbbing echo in her shoulder, a vast improvement from the searing agony she remembered. She tried to move, but her limbs felt like lead. She cracked her eyes open. She wasn’t in the snow.

 She was in a room sterile and white, so bright it hurt her eyes. An IV was taped to her hand, pumping clear liquid into her veins. She was clean. Someone had washed her. She was wearing a soft cotton gown. Her memory rushed back. The cold, the rogues, the silver cub, the push of her magic. She had died. She was sure of it.

 Was this an afterlife? She’s awake. The voice was deep resonant and held an authority that sent a shiver of pure instinctual fear down her spine. She turned her head. Sitting in a chair in the corner of the room was a man. He was large enough to be a mountain, broadshouldered and radiating an aura of absolute power that made the air in the room feel thin. He was dressed in a simple black sweater and dark pants, but he wore them like armor.

 His hair was as black as a raven’s wing, and his eyes his eyes were a piercing forest green. They were fixed on her analytical and cold as ice. This was an alpha, not just an alpha. This was the alpha. “Where? Where am I?” she whispered, her throat raar. “You are in the obsidian claw pack hospital,” he said, his voice flat.

 “You are alive because my healers are the best in the world.” He stood and walked to her bedside, looming over her. Emily had to fight the urge to shrink away. His presence was overwhelming a physical pressure. “Who are you?” he demanded. It wasn’t a question. It was an order. “Emily. Emily Vans.

” “Late of the Mount Pack,” he stated. He wasn’t guessing. “Exiled 3 weeks ago. Why? I I was weak,” she stammered. “A drain on resources. The Alpha King’s eyes narrowed. You killed two fully grown rogue warriors. That is not weak, Emily flinched. I I don’t know what happened. I just wanted to protect the cub.

 The cub, Kelvin said, his voice dropping. Is my son, Prince Leonidis? Emily’s blood ran cold. She had saved the alpha king’s son. She, a rogue, had touched the royal heir. The penalty for that was death. Her act of salvation was in the eyes of Pac Law, an unforgivable crime. “I didn’t know,” she whispered, tears welling. “I swear. I just heard him cry. I didn’t.

 What did you do to those rogues?” He cut her off his gaze, relentless. “What was that energy?” “I I don’t know. It was a lie, and he knew it.” “Do not lie to me, girl,” he growled. The air crackled his alpha power, pressing down on her demanding submission. I am Alpha King Kelvin Valyriius. I can smell the magic on you. It’s the same power that nearly killed you. You are dying.

 My mother, the head healer, says your life force is unraveling. What did you do? Before Emily could answer, the door burst open. Papa. The small silver-haired boy she had seen in the forest, ran into the room, now dressed in warm pajamas. He scrambled onto Emily’s bed before Kelvin could stop him, ignoring his father completely, and carefully hugged Emily’s waist, burying his face in her side.

 “You’re awake,” he chirped, beaming up at her. “I knew you would be. I told Papa you were my protector.” Kelvin’s hard expression faltered a flicker of something complex pain, confusion, tenderness passing through his eyes as he looked at his son. “Leo,” Kelvin said, his voice softer but still firm. “Get off the bed. Our guest is injured.

” “No, she’s warm,” Leo insisted, snuggling closer. “I missed her.” An older woman entered the room, her silver hair matching Leo’s, her green eyes identical to Kelvin’s. She wore the white coat of a healer. This had to be his mother, Lyra. “Kelvin, leave the girl be,” Lyra said, her voice sharp. “You are interrogating my patient.” Her heart rate is erratic. She looked at Emily with a practiced kind eye.

You, my dear, are a medical miracle and a mystery. You used a phenomenal amount of energy. It’s like you tried to empty your own soul. “She saved me, Grandma,” Leo said, his voice muffled by the blanket. Lyra smiled, ruffling her grandson’s hair. “Yes, darling, she did.” Lyra’s gaze returned to Kelvin.

 “The council is demanding a word with you, Kelvin.” Alistair is particularly agitated. They know you brought a rogue into the pack house. They are demanding her immediate execution or banishment. Kelvin’s jaw tightened. Alistister can wait. He won’t, Lyra said sternly. You are the king, but they are your council.

 They see a rogue who by some dark magic killed two wolves and was found with the prince. They are building a narrative and your silence is helping to them. Emily watched the exchange, her terror growing. Counsel execution. This was a nightmare. I’ll I’ll leave. Emily whispered, trying to sit up.

 The movement sent a bolt of pain through her shoulder, and she cried out, collapsing back onto the pillows. “You will do no such thing,” Kelvin commanded. Leo looked up at his father, his eyes wide. You can’t let them hurt her, Papa. She’s good. She’s my friend. Kelvin looked at his son, then at Emily, then at his mother. The weight of his crown was visible on his brow. He was trapped.

 His law demanded her death. His son demanded her safety, and his own wolf, which he was violently suppressing, was snarling at him to stake his claim and kill anyone who dared to even look at her. The mate bonded. He could feel it a thin thrming golden thread, trying to latch onto his soul, but it was weak, just like her. If she died, it would die.

The thought left an acidic taste in his mouth. No one will harm her, Kelvin said, his voice, leaving no room for argument. He looked at Lyra. Keep her alive. Use whatever resources you need. He turned his gaze back to Emily, and his eyes were chips of green ice. You are not a guest.

 Emily Vance, he said, his voice cold and formal, a mask for the turmoil beneath. And you are not a prisoner. You are a patient under my personal protection. You will not leave this room. You will speak to no one but me or my mother. Do you understand? Emily, trapped between the king’s fury, the council’s hatred, and the prince’s adoration, could only nod a silent captive in the Alpha King’s cage.

 200 m away in the desolate windswept peaks of the Serpent’s Tooth Mountains, Margaret Thorne received the news. She survived. The messenger, a nervous rogue, reported, bowing low. The healers of the Obsidian claw pack stabilized her. Margaret shattered the glass in his hand. “She what?” he roared. Margaret Thorne was not just any rogue leader. He was Kelvin Valyriius’s greatest failure.

 5 years ago, Margaret had been Kelvin’s beta, his most trusted friend, his brother in all but blood. But when Kelvin’s mate, Isabella, died in childbirth, Kelvin had retreated, consumed by grief. Margaret saw it as weakness. He saw a king unfit to rule. He had staged a coup challenging Kelvin for the throne. He had lost.

 Kelvin, in a moment of mercy, Margaret had mistaken for weakness, had spared his life, exiling him instead. For 5 years, Margaret had stewed in that hatred, gathering an army of the dispossessed, the exiled, and the bloodthirsty. The fire at the Obsidian Claw wall hadn’t been a random distraction. It had been his doing a calculated ploy to create chaos, allowing his men to snatch the prince.

He would raise the boy as his own, a perfect legitimate weapon to one day use against Kelvin. But the plan had failed because of her. “Who is she?” Margaret snarled. “No one Alpha Thorne,” the messenger said. “A rogue. Emily Vance, cast out from Mountridge for being a weakling.” “A weakling?” Margaret scoffed.

 A weakling killed two of my best trackers and created an energy shield I could feel from 5 mi away. No, she’s something else. He paced his stone chamber, his mind racing, the reports of the energy, the strange life draining magic. It sounded familiar. It sounded like the old legends, the legends of the animasa, the life weavers.

 A bloodline of healers so powerful they could give and take life a line thought to be extinct for a thousand years. If this girl was one of them, she was more valuable than the prince. She was a weapon that could make him invincible. She’s with Kelvin now. Margaret mused a slow, predatory smile spreading across his face. He’ll be trying to figure out what she is.

 He won’t see her as a weapon. He’ll see her as a threat or knowing his noble heart a victim. What are your orders, Alfa? Kelvin thinks I’m hiding. He’s wrong. He’s just given me the key to his front door. Margaret turned to his messenger. Contact our asset inside the Obsidian claw. The sheolf Saraphina. Yes. Saraphina had been his porn for years.

 A highranking warrior in Kelvin’s guard, she was ambitious and bitterly in love with the Alpha King. She had despised the late Luna Isabella and was furious that Kelvin had not chosen her as his new mate. Her jealousy was a tool Margaret had sharpened to a razor’s edge. “Tell Saraphina the plan has changed,” Margaret ordered. “Kidnapping the boy is no longer the priority.

 I want the girl. I want her alive, but if she can’t be extracted, I want her erased. Kelvin cannot be allowed to bond with her. He cannot be allowed to wield that power. Back in the Obsidian Claw Hospital, Emily was slowly regaining her strength. Lyra’s treatments, combined with the nutrient-rich food, were working, but her real healer was Leo.

 The little prince was her constant shadow. He spent hours in her room showing her his toys, telling her about his papa, and sometimes just curling up in his small silver wolf form at the foot of her bed. He was a bright, joyous light in the terrifying darkness of her situation. Kelvin was a different story.

 He visited every day. His presence always preceded by a spike in Emily’s heart rate. He was cold, distant, and official. He asked her questions about her past, her pack, her family. But he never asked about her magic again. And he never ever mentioned what his wolf had screamed at him in the woods. He was fighting the mate Bond with every fiber of his being.

 He couldn’t accept it. A rogue, a weakling, a leech, as her old pack had called her. He was a king. He needed a strong lunar, a warrior, a politician, not a broken bird. But his wolf was going insane. He found himself ordering the kitchens to make her the richest broths.

 He assigned his most loyal warrior, Julian, to stand guard outside her door. Not, he told himself, to keep her in, but to keep the angry council members out. One evening, he was in her room, standing by the window, his back to her. “The council wants you gone, Emily.” He said, his voice quiet. “Elder Alistister is calling for a public trial. They say you’re a dark witch, that you lured my son into the woods.

” Emily’s hands twisted in the blankets. “You know I didn’t. What I know doesn’t matter,” he snapped, turning to face her. It’s what I can prove. And right now, all I can prove is that you’re a rogue who possesses a dangerous unknown power. “It’s not It’s not dark,” she whispered, her voice trembling. “It’s just me.

” “Then tell me,” he pleaded, his control finally cracking. He stalked to her bedside, his green eyes burning into hers. “Tell me what you are.” Because I look at you and I see a dozen laws I am breaking. I see a civil war brewing in my pack. And I see my son who adores you and I I don’t know what to do. The raw agony in his voice shattered her fear.

He wasn’t just a cold king. He was a man in turmoil. A man and a mate. She could feel the pull, too. A strange comforting warmth she felt only when he was near. a warmth that was fighting the life- draining emptiness inside her. “My grandmother taught me,” Emily began her voice, gaining a small measure of strength. She said, “We were life weavers.

 I I can take the pain from someone. I can mend, but it costs me. It takes my energy.” I was exiled because I tried to save a warrior who was gored by a bear. I saved him, but he was in a coma for a day. And I I was bedridden for a month. They said I stole his life. They called me a leech.

 They they drove my grandmother out and she died in the cold. I swore I’d never use it again. But when I saw those rogues and that little cub, I didn’t know what else to do. So I I pushed. I gave it everything I had left. Kelvin stared at her, his expression unreadable. He had heard the legends, “Lifewavers.

 They didn’t just transfer their own life. They were conduits. They could transfer life from anything from the earth, from an enemy or from a willing donor.” Alistister was wrong. She wasn’t a dark witch. She was a miracle, a sacrificial one. Before he could speak, a new scent hit his nose. Sharp, chemical, wrong. It was coming from the hallway.

 He spun around as Julian, his guard, burst into the room, his face pale. Alpha, it’s Saraphina. She She was in the hall. She said she was bringing a message from the council. Kelvin’s eyes darted to the IV bag hanging by Emily’s bed. The clear liquid was not clear. A faint milky substance was swirling at the bottom, just beginning to mix. Get my mother now. Kelvin roared.

 He turned back to Emily. Her eyes were wide with confusion. What? What’s wrong? Poison? He snarled. At that exact moment, the poison hit her heart. Emily gasped, her hand flying to her chest. Her eyes rolled back in her head and she began to convulse. The hospital room descended into chaos.

 Lyra Kelvin’s mother burst in her face, a mask of professional fury. “What is it?” she demanded. “The IV!” Kelvin roared, ripping the needle from Emily’s arm. “Saraphina, it was Saraphina.” Lyra rushed to Emily’s side. The convulsions had stopped, but what followed was worse. a deathly stillness.

 The heart monitor, which had been screeching, flatlined into a single terrifying tone. She’s in cardiac arrest, Lyra shouted, starting compressions. What was in the bag? Kelvin grabbed the IV bag, sniffing it. The chemical tang was sharp. Wolfpain concentrated. And silver nitrate. It’s burning her from the inside out. I can’t fight this, Kelvin, Lyra said, her voice strained as she worked.

 The wolf’s bane I can counteract, but the silver is binding to her blood. Her her unique energy. It’s too weak to fight it. She’s already drained. Kelvin, she’s gone. No. The word was a subterranean growl. He watched his mother try to revive the small, frail woman who had saved his son. the woman who had confessed her deepest secret to him. The woman his very soul was screaming for.

 “Mate, our mate, do not let her die.” “Get out,” Kelvin ordered. “Kelvin, don’t be a fool. It’s over.” Lyra pleaded tears in her eyes. “I said get out,” he roared, his alpha power exploding, slamming the door shut and rattling the glass. Lyra stumbled back, shocked by the force of his command. He was alone with her.

 The monitor’s single unbroken tone was the only sound. He looked at her so pale and still. This was his fault. He had brought her here, a target in his home. He had been so busy fighting the bond, fighting his own laws, that he had failed to protect her. He had lost one mate to the fates. He would not lose another to the treachery of his own pack. You are not dying.

 He whispered his voice rough with an emotion he hadn’t allowed himself to feel in 5 years. I forbid it. He knew what he had to do. It was forbidden. It was madness. It would tie him to her to a rogue in front of his entire pack’s prying senses. It would be a political and personal inferno. He didn’t care.

 He placed his hands on her, one on her heart, one on her forehead. He could feel the last flickering ember of her life drowning in the silver poison. He closed his eyes and pulled on the mate bond, that thin golden thread he had been resisting. He poured his own energy into it, forcing it to life. And then he bit her.

 He sank his teeth into the juncture of her neck and her wounded shoulder, marking her claiming her forging the final unbreakable link of the mate bond. It was an explosion. Emily’s back arched off the bed with a strangled scream. Kelvin roared as his alpha power, his very life essence, flooded her system.

 It was a torrent of molten gold, a tidal wave of pure concentrated life. Outside the room, the entire pack sensed it. Every wolf, from the lowest omega to the highest warrior, stumbled as the power of their alpha king surged. He was claiming a mate. He was forcing a bond. For Emily, it was agony and ecstasy. Kelvin’s power was a wildfire roaring through her veins.

 It met the silver nitrate poison and burned it. It was a war inside her body with her new mate’s power as her champion. She felt his strength, his rage, his love, a desperate, possessive, terrified love that he had kept chained until this very moment. For Kelvin, it was a revelation. He felt her.

 He felt the dregs of her own magic, that beautiful, selfless lavender and lightning. He felt her pain from the rogues, her starvation, her loneliness, her terror. And he felt the tiny, stubborn ember of her will to live. He poured more of himself into her, anchoring her, healing her, binding her. The heart monitor forgotten, suddenly shrieked, the steady tone breaking into a frantic, pounding rhythm. Beep beep beep beep beep beep.

 Kelvin pulled back, breathing hard, his fangs dripping. Emily’s eyes flew open. They were no longer the dull, frightened eyes of a rogue. They were bright, blazing, and infused with the golden light of his power. She gasped a deep, shuddering breath, and her hand flew to the mark on her neck.

 It was already healing a swirl of silver and gold that pulsed with power. She looked at him not with fear but with a dazed profound recognition. “You,” she whispered. “Me,” he confirmed his voice roar. The door flew open. Elder Alistair stood there, his face purple with rage, flanked by two of his council lackeyis and Julian, who looked torn. Behind them, the hallway was filling with shocked pack members.

 What is the meaning of this Valarious? Alistister bellowed. You You marked her. You marked her. A rogue witch. You will address her as Luna. Kelvin snarled, moving to stand between the council and Emily. He was a king defending his throne. She is my mate. This is an abomination. Alistister shouted. You have defiled your bloodline.

 You have spat on the memory of Isabella. The pack will not stand for this. The pack will stand with me. Kelvin countered his voice, dropping to a lethal quiet. And with my Luna, the one who saved your future alpha, the one who was just poisoned by a traitor in your council’s circle, Saraphina. Alistair’s face pald.

Saraphina, that’s a lie. Julian, Kelvin commanded. Find Saraphina. Bring her to the great hall. Now, it seems, he said, his voice laced with ice as he looked at Alistister. We have more than one traitor to deal with. He turned back to Emily, his expression softening for a fraction of a second. He offered her his hand.

 She was weak, trembling, but she was alive. She was thrumming with his power. She placed her small hand in his, his fingers large and calloused, closed around hers. It seems our quiet recovery is over. My Luna, Kelvin said the title a promise and a threat. Can you stand? I can, Emily said, and to her own surprise, her voice didn’t waver.

 The bond was singing in her veins, giving her a strength she had never known. Good, Kelvin said, pulling her to his side. Because the war just began. The great hall of the Obsidian Claw pack house was a cavern of stone and shadow built to intimidate. Tonight it was a pressure cooker. The entire pack was crammed inside their murmurss a low, angry buzz.

 At the front on the alpha’s dis stood Kelvin. At his side, wrapped in one of his cloaks, stood Emily. She was terrified, but the new bond was a living thing inside her. She could feel Kelvin’s steely resolve, his cold fury, and beneath it a thrming protective warmth directed at her. It made her stand taller.

 In the center of the hall, held between two warriors, was Saraphina. Her arrogant demeanor was gone, replaced by a sullen terror. Saraphina of the House of Thorn. Kelvin’s voice boomed, silencing the crowd. You stand accused of the attempted murder of my mate, the Lunar Emily. How do you plead? She is not my Luna.

 Saraphina shrieked, finding her voice. She is a rogue, a leech. He has dishonored us all. He has forgotten his true mate, Isabella. My bond with my late mate is not your concern,” Kelvin said, his voice deadly. “Your treachery is. You poisoned her. You acted in concert with an enemy of this pack.” “She’s lying,” Alistister shouted from the crowd. “There is no proof.

 I have all the proof I need,” Kelvin said. He nodded to Julian, who produced a small sealed vial of the same milky substance found in her quarters. Alpha, Julian stated, along with maps of the pack house and patrol routes. Saraphina’s eyes went wide. She knew she was trapped.

 He made me, she screamed, lunging against her guards, her finger pointing not at Kelvin, but at the main door. He’s coming. He’s coming for all of you. Who? Kelvin demanded. Margaret. Margaret Thorne. Saraphina laughed a wild unhinged sound. You thought he was rotting in the mountains. He’s been here all along. He has an army. He sent me to get the boy. When that failed, he sent me to kill the witch. He knew she was a lifew weaver.

He didn’t want you to have her. A cold dread settled over the hall. Margaret Thorne, the exiled beta. The name was a curse. As if summoned by her words, the pack’s warning siren blared a deep resonant horn that signaled an attack. A warrior burst through the doors, bleeding from a cut on his head.

 Alpha the Western Wall, its breached rogues, hundreds of them there, led by Margaret Thorne. Panic erupted. The pack members scrambled, shouting in fear. Silence. Kelvin’s roar shook the very stones. Warriors to your posts, Julian with me. Lyra, get Leo and Emily to the safe room. Now, “No,” Emily said. Kelvin stopped turning to her in disbelief.

 “What did you say?” “I’m not hiding,” she said, her voice shaking but firm. She clutched the bond, drawing strength from it. “I am your mate. I am a lifew weaver. I am not a coward. I will not hide in a bunker while my our pack is fighting. Alistister looked at her stunned. Kelvin stared at her, a fierce burning pride welling in his chest, eclipsing his fear for her.

 This was not the broken bird he had found in the snow. This was a queen. “Then stay by my mother’s side,” he commanded. “The hospital will be the rallying point for the wounded. You You do what you were born to do. Heal them. But Emily, he gripped her chin, his green eyes burning into hers. Do not drain yourself. You are not alone anymore. You pull from me.

 Do you understand? From me. From the pack. We are your strength now. She nodded, her heart swelling. Good, he said. He kissed her hard and swift. a public declaration in front of their entire world. Now we fight. The battle was brutal. Margaret had spent five years planning this.

 His rogues were disciplined and they were led by warriors who had been exiled from other Pax killers who knew Pack tactics. Kelvin was a storm of fury on the battlefield. He shifted into his wolf a massive obsidian beast that tore through the rogue lines. But for every rogue he took down, two more took its place. Margaret had brought an army. The hospital was quickly overwhelmed.

 Wounded warriors were dragged in, and Emily, with Lyra at her side, went to work. “I I don’t know how,” Emily panicked as a warrior bled out from a stomach wound. “Yes, you do,” Lyra said, pressing Emily’s hands to the wound. “You are his lunar now. You are connected to all of us. Don’t push your life. Pull the packs. Emily closed her eyes. She reached out not just to Kelvin, but to the thrming network of lives she was now bonded to.

 She felt them a thousand threads of light. She gently pulled on that ambient energy and channeled it into the wounded man. The wound stitched itself closed under her hands. The warrior’s breathing evened out. Emily didn’t even feel tired. She felt invigorated.

 She moved to the next and the next, a conduit of the pack’s collective strength. Outside the tide was turning. Kelvin and Margaret finally met in the center of the training grounds, a circle of quiet violence in the heart of the chaos. Kelvin. Margaret sneered, shifting back to his human form. He was scarred larger than Kelvin remembered, and his eyes were wild. You’ve gone soft, mating a leech. You defile Isabella’s memory.

You will not speak her name. Kelvin snarled, shifting as well. They circled each other, blades drawn. They clashed. It was a fight of brothers of two men who knew each other’s every move. But Margaret was fueled by 5 years of hate. Kelvin was fighting for his home, his son, and his new mate. Margaret was a dirty fighter.

 He threw a handful of powdered silver into Kelvin’s eyes, blinding him. Kelvin roared in pain, and Margaret used the opening, sinking a silverlaced dagger deep into Kelvin’s side. Kelvin dropped to one knee, his vision swimming the silver, burning him. The pack dies with you, king.

 Margaret spat, raising his blade for the killing blow. In the hospital, Emily screamed. She felt the bond tear. Kelvin’s pain, the searing agony of the silver flooded her. “He’s dying. He’s dying.” “Emily, no!” Lyra shouted as Emily bolted from the hospital. She ran onto the battlefield, ignoring the fighting around her. She saw Kelvin on his knees and Margaret standing over him, sword raised. “No!” she screamed.

Margaret paused, turning to her with a grin. “The little witch. Come to watch your new mate die.” Emily didn’t stop. She ran her mind, focused on one thing. She reached Kelvin, pushing herself between him and Margaret just as the blade swung down. The blade never landed.

 Emily, standing over her fallen mate, her hand held out, had become a creature of light. When she had run from the hospital, she hadn’t just been running on her own power. She had become the focal point of the entire pack bond. Every warrior fighting every healer, every cub hiding in the safe room.

 Their collective energy, their fear, their rage, and their loyalty to their alpha was pouring into her. And she, the lifewever, was a conduit. The power didn’t just stop Margaret’s blade. It ripped it from his hand and sent him flying backward. “What? What is this?” Margaret stammered, scrambling to his feet. Emily didn’t answer. She placed her hands on Kelvin’s wound. But she didn’t just heal him, she empowered him.

 She took the roaring strength of the obsidian claw pack and mainlinined it directly into her alpha. Kelvin roared as the silver was violently expelled from his wound, his flesh knitting back together, stronger than before. He rose to his feet, his eyes glowing with a golden power that matched Emily’s. He was no longer just an alpha king. He was a god.

This, Emily said, her voice echoing with a thousand voices, is the power of a pack. She turned her attention to Margaret. He was a focal point of darkness. He had no pack, only followers held by fear. She could feel his life, a greedy, selfish thing. She held out her hand. And this is what we do to those who threaten our family.

 She didn’t push life into him. She pulled. Margaret screamed. It was a horrific draining sound. He didn’t die, but his strength, his power, his very alpha essence was ripped from him. He collapsed, aging decades in a second. His hair turning white, his body withering into a frail, weak old man. The raw power she took from him.

 She chneled it, using it to send a wave of healing energy over the battlefield, strengthening her pax warriors and stunning the remaining rogues. The rogues, seeing their leader broken, and the alpha king, rising like a phoenix, threw down their weapons. The siege was broken. Silence fell over the training grounds. The entire pack, wounded and weary, stared at the small woman who stood beside their empowered king, her hand still linked with his.

 Kelvin pulled Emily into his arms, burying his face in her hair. You You saved us. He breathed the bond pulsing between them, a symphony of relief, love, and absolute awe. We saved each other. She whispered her power receding, leaving her leaning on him, but no longer drained. Alistister, the old grizzled elder, walked forward, his face ashen.

 He stopped before them, and in an act that shocked the entire pack, he dropped to one knee. “My Luna,” he said, his voice thick with emotion. “I was wrong. You are not a curse. You are. You are the greatest blessing the goddess has ever given us. One by one, the warriors, the healers, and the council members knelt.

 They bowed not just to their king, but to their new queen. Kelso Emily’s childhood packmate from Mountriidge was among the captured rogues. He had joined Margaret, believing him to be the stronger alpha. He watched in horror and disbelief as the woman they had cast out as a leech was now being woripped. Kelvin raised his voice.

 Margaret Thorne, you are sentenced to the cells of silence where you will live out your days as the weakling you truly are. He then looked at the kneeling pack. Rise. Rise and see your Luna. He took Emily’s hand and held it high. For 5 years, this pack has been strong. But we have been grieving. We have been an alpha without a heart.

 Today, Emily Vance, my mate, my Luna, has healed us. She is the life weaver, and she is our queen. A roar went up from the pack. A sound of loyalty, victory, and joy. Later that night, in the king’s chambers, Emily stood on the balcony, looking out at the mended wall. Kelvin came up behind her, wrapping his strong arms around her waist, pulling her back against his chest.

 “You’re not cold,” he asked. “No,” she whispered, leaning into his warmth. “I don’t think I’ll ever be cold again. I was a fool,” he murmured into her hair. I was so afraid of the bond of losing, of what the pack would think. I almost lost you. But you didn’t, she said, turning in his arms to face him.

 She touched the new mark on her neck. You saved me, Kelvin. You saved me, Emily. He counted his green eyes, soft. You saved my son. You saved my pack. You saved my soul. A small missile launched himself at their legs. and me. You saved me. Leo in his pajamas beamed up at them. Kelvin laughed a deep, rich sound Emily had never heard. He swooped down and lifted Leo, settling him on his hip.

 He Emily and Leo stood together, a perfect, complete family. The starving rogue who had used her last strength to save a cub had never dreamed of this. She had become the heart of the most powerful pack in the world and the mate of the king who had once been her captor and was now unequivocally her home.

 And there you have it, the story of Emily the rogue who became a queen and Kelvin the king who learned to love again. From the frozen edge of death in the whispering spine forest, a new family was forged in magic battle and an unbreakable bond. Emily thought her curse was a weakness. But it turned out to be the very strength her new pack and her new mate needed to become whole.

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