DRAVEN
My hand shot out and closed around her throat before she could finish the sentence. I slamd her back against the wall hard enough to rattle the gilt-frad paintings, hard enough that I felt the impact shudder through both of us. She gasped, her eyes going wide, her hands scrabbling at my wrist.
"Who the hell do you think you are?" I snarled, my voice dropping to sothing barely human. My wolf was snarling beneath my skin, furious at the disrespect, at the audacity of a lower-rank putting hands on . "You struck . Your Alpha. That is treason, Morgana."
She tried to speak, but my grip was too tight. Her face was turning red, her nails digging into my arm, but I didn’t care. Couldn’t care. The humiliation of being slapped in front of the High Alpha, of being scread at like I was so insubordinate gamma, had ignited sothing primal and vicious in .
"You will lose everything if you think you can disrespect like that," I continued, my voice shaking with barely controlled fury. "I don’t care what arrangent you have with him. I don’t care what power you think you hold. You are beneath in rank, and if you ever—ever—lay hands on again, I will have you stripped of your position and exiled. Do you understand ?"
Her eyes were bulging now, her face going from red to purple, and so distant part of recognized I should let go before I killed her. But the rage was so strong, so all-consuming, that I couldn’t make my fingers release.
Then the High Alpha laughed.
The sound was rich and dark, genuinely amused, and it cut through my fury like a blade. I turned my head to look at him, my hand still wrapped around Morgana’s throat, and found him leaning back in his chair with a smile that made my skin crawl.
"Oh, this is delicious," he said, his voice warm with entertainnt. "The young Alpha defending his dignity. How refreshing." He waved a hand lazily, as if conducting an orchestra. "But do let her go, Draven. We still need her tongue functional for this conversation, and strangulation does tend to interfere with speech."
His tone was mocking, casual, like he was comnting on the weather rather than watching choke a woman against his wall. But there was an edge beneath it—a warning, maybe, or a test.
I held Morgana’s gaze for another mont, making sure she saw the promise in my eyes, then released her. She collapsed against the wall, gasping and coughing, one hand pressed to her throat. I stepped back, straightening my jacket, forcing my breathing to steady even as my heart hamred against my ribs.
"My apologies, High Alpha," I said, my voice still rough with residual fury. "I don’t tolerate physical assault from subordinates. Regardless of the circumstances."
"No need to apologize," the High Alpha said, still smiling that unsettling smile. "Morgana forgets herself sotis. Don’t you, darling?" His eyes slid to her, cold despite the warmth in his voice. "Forgets that striking an Alpha—even when frustrated—carries consequences. Though I suppose in your defense, young Draven here was woefully inattentive."
It irked the way he referred to as ’young’ even though he looked no older than thirty himself. But all the Allied Packs knew the High Alpha was far more than what t the eye—ancient power wrapped in a deceptively youthful face.
Morgana was still coughing against the wall, one hand pressed to her throat where my fingers had left angry red marks. I turned away from her, dismissing her as I’d dismissed the threat she represented, already refocusing on the High Alpha’s words.
That was my mistake.
Her hand shot out and fisted in my hair, yanking my head back with vicious force. Before I could react, her knee ca up and slamd into my face—once, twice—the impact exploding across my nose and cheekbone like lightning. Pain erupted through my skull, hot and blinding, and I felt my legs buckle beneath .
I hit the floor hard, my knees cracking against the stone, my vision swimming with black spots and stars. Blood poured from my nose, hot and copper-tasting, dripping onto the expensive rug.
Morgana’s grip in my hair tightened, and she wrenched my head up, forcing to look at her. Her face was still blotchy from being choked, her eyes still watering, but there was sothing savagely victorious in her expression that made my blood run cold.
I tried to move, tried to rear up and strike back, my wolf howling for vengeance—
"Alpha, my ass," she hissed, her voice raw and ruined but dripping with venom. "I guess it’s gotten to your head. But what would I expect from a *disgrace* who would lie to an entire pack?"
I froze.
The words hit harder than her knee had, and for a mont I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, couldn’t do anything except stare up at her with growing horror.
"What are you talking about?" I managed, but my voice ca out weak, uncertain, nothing like the Alpha I was supposed to be.
"What am I talking about?" Morgana repeated, her smile widening into sothing cruel and knowing. She leaned down, bringing her face close to mine, her breath hot against my bloodied skin. "I *know*, Draven."
My heart stopped.
"I know it was my daughter’s blood that saved your pack," she whispered, each word sharp as a blade, delivered with surgical precision and absolute malice. "I know the red fever cure had nothing to do with your brilliant leadership or your strategic genius or any of the lies you’ve been telling for the past two years."
The room tilted.
No.
No, she couldn’t—how could she—
"My daughter fed her blood to your dying wolves," Morgana continued, her voice dropping to sothing soft and poisonous, intimate in its cruelty. "Drop by drop, night after night, while you stood by and watched and then took all the credit when they started to recover. You built your entire position on her sacrifice, didn’t you? Let the pack believe you were their savior when really you were just the parasite feeding off her gift."
She released my hair and straightened, looking down at kneeling in my own blood with sothing like satisfaction.
"So don’t you *dare* lecture about disrespect, you pathetic fraud," she said, her voice still hoarse but carrying clearly through the chamber. "Don’t pretend you have any moral high ground when we both know what you are. A coward who stole a helpless girl’s miracle and called it his own."
I couldn’t move. Couldn’t speak. The truth hung in the air between us like a noose, and I could feel it tightening around my neck with every second that passed.
The High Alpha was watching us both with undisguised interest, his expression thoughtful rather than shocked. As if this revelation was rely an entertaining developnt rather than the complete destruction of everything I’d built.
"Is this true, Draven?" he asked, and his tone was almost gentle. Almost curious. "Did you really allow an oga to cure your pack’s plague while taking credit for her work?"
My mouth opened. Closed. My mind was racing, searching desperately for a way out, a lie that would hold, a justification that would make sense—
But there was nothing. No defense. No excuse that wouldn’t make sound exactly like what Morgana had called .
A fraud. A coward. A disgrace.
"I—" I started, then stopped, blood still dripping from my nose, still kneeling on the floor like a supplicant before a throne I’d never actually deserved.
Morgana laughed, the sound harsh and hateful. "No need for all of that. He already knew."
My mouth remained agape, every cell in my body close to imploding from the panic that whirred through . This could not be happening to .
"So you let take credit for her sacrifice on purpose?"
Her eyes narrowed, sharpening. "I sll an accusation there," She warned.
"You—"
"There you are," The High Alpha suddenly cut off, his voice smoothing down to an intrigued purr
We whipped to his direction so we saw a smile far too wide to not be that of the devil. His black eyes had begun to glow with an otherworldly light. "There you are, I have found you." He wasn’t looking at us anymore. He was looking through us, seeing sothing—soone—miles away through a connection I couldn’t perceive.
"Where?" Morgana demanded, her earlier fury forgotten, replaced by sharp focus. "Where is she?"
"North," the High Alpha breathed, and his voice carried a satisfaction that made my stomach turn.
"Althea?" I asked, my voice trembling, strangely with relief, then it sank in. "In the North?" My stomach dropped and so did my voice. "The Hell hound has her. He could be torturing her."
His smile impossibly widened. "It will be nothing compared."
"What?"
"She can’t see ," He drawled, pleasure curling on his tongue. "But she will feel ."
The smile on his face was pure malice, and I felt ice shoot through my veins as understanding crashed over .
"What are you doing?" I demanded, my voice raw. "What are you doing to her?"
"Reminding her who she belongs to," the High Alpha said simply, his eyes still glowing with that otherworldly light, still focused on sothing hundreds of miles away. "The brand isn’t just a mark, Draven. It’s a leash. A chain that binds her soul to mine. And when I pull on it..." His smile widened impossibly further. "She feels every bit of it."
I could see it in his face—the concentration, the focus, the savage pleasure. He was hurting her.
I turned to Morgana, there was a silent satisfaction on her face.
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