Chapter 18 Luca Varyn
ARYA
My bones snapped all at once. I felt every single snag. But I couldn’t focus on that when I felt my neck cracking from side to side.
Everything looked smaller, closer. The wind felt bare on my skin and the smell. I could smell everything. I looked down at my paw in wonder.
I was HUGE. Bigger than any wolf I’d ever seen, with silver white fur that seemed to glow in the afternoon sun. My senses exploded further. I could smell everything for miles, hear heartbeats, feel the vibration of footsteps through the earth.
And the POWER.
It sang through every fiber of my being. Ancient. Undeniable. MINE.
‘Finally,’ Selene’s voice purred in my head. A deep but low bass. ‘Finally, we’re free.’
I threw my head back and howled.
The sound carried for miles, a declaration that echoed off the mountains. Every wolf in the territory responded, submitting instinctively to the power in that howl.
Even Marcus lowered his head, his Alpha authority nothing compared to what I’d become.
‘We are Moonborne,’ Selene said.’We are the first. The original. The bridge between all. And we are back.’
I felt it then, the fire in the blood roaring in my veins. I was complete.
“Arya.” Ryker’s voice was awed. “You’re… you’re magnificent.”
I turned to look at him through wolf eyes. He should have been afraid. I was easily twice the size of a normal wolf, radiating power that made the air around me shimmer.
He looked in awe if anything. It made something in me warm. The assurance that he would always be here. Always have my back.
He dropped to his knees, almost in reverence.
“You’re a true Moonborne,” Bardon breathed. “I’d hoped, but to see it… you’re everything the prophecy described.”
I tried to shift back, but Lean resisted.
‘Not yet. We’ve been caged for too long. Let us go for a run. It’ll be fun. RUN.’
And god, I wanted to. I wanted to run and never stop, to feel this power coursing through me with every stride.
But—
‘The Lycan King is coming,’ I reminded her. ‘We need to be in control when he arrives.’
Reluctantly, Lean agreed.
The shift back was easier than the first emergence, but still painful. I collapsed onto the grass, naked and shaking, my skin hyper-sensitive to every touch of air.
Helena was there immediately with a blanket, wrapping it around me while carefully not looking directly at me.
“How do you feel?” she asked gently.
“Like I’ve been torn apart and put back together wrong.” I laughed shakily. “Or maybe right, for the first time ever.”
“You did it.” Ryker was beside me, his hand on my shoulder. “God, Arya, you were… I’ve never seen anything like that.”
“Neither have I,” Cyrus said, approaching cautiously. “And I’ve seen a lot in my years. That was pure Moonborne power. Ancient royal bloodline.”
“Which means the Lycan King is going to want her even more,” Bardon said grimly. “That display? He’ll have felt it. Every supernatural being within a hundred miles felt it.”
As if to punctuate his words, a howl sounded in the distance.
Then another.
Then dozens more.
“What is that?” I asked.
Cyrus’s expression was grim. “Every pack in the region. They’re responding to your howl. Acknowledging your power.”
“And alerting every enemy you have to your exact location,” Bardon added. “The Lycan King’s guard will be here sooner than expected.”
He was right.
Less than an hour later, as the sun was beginning to set, they arrived.
But it wans’t what we expected. Instead of the guards and soldiers. The man himself came.
The Lycan King.
I felt him before I saw him, a presence so powerful it made the air thick. Every wolf in the pack must have felt it, instincts screaming to submit or flee.
I did neither.
I stood on the pack house steps, dressed in borrowed clothes, with Ryker on one side and Cyrus on the other. Bardon stood slightly behind, ready to intervene if needed.
The motorcade that pulled up was intimidating. Six black SUVs with tinted windows, all releasing Lycan guards who moved with predatory grace.
And then HE emerged from the center vehicle.
uca luca Varyn. The Lycan King.
He was… devastating. And nothing like I thought he would be.
There was nothing about him that said he was eight hundred years old. If they hadn’t told me his age, I would have assumed he was thirty, thirty five at most, with a face that could have been carved from marble by an artist obsessed with perfection. All perfect angles and sharp edges. Dark hair that fell to his shoulders, eyes that glowed molten gold, a body that radiated lethal power.
He wore all black, perfectly tailored, moving with a confidence that spoke of centuries of absolute authority.
Our eyes met. Black and electric pools that made my lower belly clench. My reaction was visceral, something I had never felt before. I felt heated. Like I’d left the earth’s surface and moved closer to the sun. playing with the fire.
I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t articulate any thoughts as he took a single step forward.
Something SNAPPED into place. Like two perfect pieces of a puzzle.
Something impossible.
Something that made my wolf surge forward and Ryker growl protectively.
The Lycan King smiled, slow and predatory.
“Hello, little Moonborne,” he said, his voice like velvet over steel. Carrying a slight rich accent that made my fingers twitch. “I’ve been waiting a very long time to meet you.”
He took a step forward, and the world shifted off it’s axis. Or maybe that was just me because I felt it. Felt HIM. Felt the connection between us that shouldn’t exist.
Couldn’t exist.
“No,” I whispered as realization dawmed on me.
Lean was howling in my head, recognition and fury mixing.
‘MATE,’ she snarled. ‘He’s our MATE?’
The Lycan King’s smile widened, his eyes blazing with triumph.
“Yes,” he said softly. “Exactly that.”