Chapter 43 Bound By An Alliance
Adrian’s POV
Minutes later I pushed open the door to our bedroom and the weight of the paper in my pocket felt like a boulder on my chest.
I looked like a man who’d just lost a war.
I’ve had many reckless nights. But I’ve always been careful to use protection. One reckless night. That’s all it took.
I remember it too clearly.
The night Arabella arrived was the same night everything went to hell. It should be two years already. Or a year and a few months? I can’t tell anymore.
The convoy rolled in at dusk. I stood on the balcony and watched the carriages stop. I didn’t go down to greet her. I didn’t want a bride, especially not a wolfless one forced on me by politics. I wanted to be left alone.
So I locked myself in my study with three bottles of the strongest liquor in the kingdom.
I stayed locked up, and drank until the whole cabinet was empty. Bottle after bottle of anything strong enough to shut Derek up. We had just fought off rogues earlier that same day, and he wanted more blood.
I drank until the room spun, until Derek finally shut up, until the idea of a lifetime tied to a girl who couldn’t even shift didn’t feel like a noose.
You’re probably wondering why I didn’t refuse. Why I didn’t fight back. Trust me, I could have. But the choice was already ripped out of my hands before I was even old enough to understand what “choice” meant.
Some of the council members sat me down and explained everything. How my father owed the North for saving the entire realm…how they stopped the most dangerous rogue our kind had ever faced.
A rogue king who almost sold our species out to human scientists, who nearly handed them our secrets and our weaknesses. The North intercepted him, captured him, and delivered him to my father like a trophy.
And my father’s grand gesture of gratitude?
His mighty reward?
Me. He promised them that their daughter will marry into the royal family. A political alliance was formed over my happiness.
I was the price he paid. I was the bargain struck.
I was the fucking reward he handed over to secure his honor.
How noble of him. The council members told me to seal the alliance, and just let her waste away in my palace. I agreed.
Caroline slipped into my room sometime after midnight the same night Arabella arrived.
Caroline was one of the maids that accompanied Lady Margaret. I had never once looked at her twice. Not ever. Pretty enough, quiet, invisible.
That night the door opened and she walked in wearing nothing but a thin robe. She had no business being in my private wing, let alone my bedroom, but I was too drunk, too raw, too tired to throw her out. I just wanted to feel something that wasn’t rage or disappointment at my father’s promise.
So I took it. Hard, fast, angry, on the rug in front of the fireplace. No words. No tenderness. Just skin and teeth and forgetting that a Wolfless bride was forced on me.
I did it to mock my new bride. But guess who’s been mocked now?
The disgust that hit me when I saw her in my bed the next morning was like a fist to the gut.
The revulsion was so strong I almost threw up on the spot. I shoved gold at her, told her to get out and never speak of it. She left without a fight.
Two days later Lady Margaret marched into council with a smug little smile and “evidence” that I had defiled one of her innocent ladies-in-waiting. She dragged it out for weeks, whispering poison, trying to paint me as reckless and unfit to rule. She thought she could leash me with shame.
I let her talk for a while. Then I reminded every single council member who the king actually was. One by one they remembered they liked their heads attached to their necks. The accusations died overnight.
Caroline vanished the same week. No one saw her again. Not even me.
Until she came back a few days ago with a child.
Until she walks back in with a toddler on her hip and now, a piece of paper is saying that he’s mine.
Right when I’m finally patching things up with my mate.
Come to think of it…she left a year and a half ago. I know wolf pups grow faster than human kids, but this one…he looks older than two. And then there’s the fact that he called me Daddy a few days ago.
Can toddlers even say that at his age?
Or am I just clawing for any excuse to question everything…every timeline, every truth, every damn thing so as to prove that he’s not mine?
I stepped inside our room and closed the door softly.
Kira was asleep, curled into the smallest ball at the very corner of the bed, like she was trying to take up as little space as possible. Moonlight spilled across her face.
Something in my chest unclenched for the first time all night.
She was safe now. And I’ll make sure she stays safe even if it kills me.
I whispered to her, as though we were having a conversation, “I’d rather never mark you and keep you by my side for the rest of my life than mark some random woman and lose you forever.”
I will find a way around that cursed law. I will break it if I have to. I will never put my fangs in anyone’s neck but hers.
I walked over, crouched beside the bed, and just watched her for a long minute. I checked if she was alright…fingers under her nose…to make sure she was breathing steady. I touched her forehead to check if she’s burning up, and then brushed a loose strand of hair off her cheek.
She didn’t stir.
I pulled the heavy blanket higher, tucking it around her shoulders, her feet, every inch I could cover. I pressed the softest kiss to her forehead.
“I’ll make it all go away,” I promised against her skin.
“I’ll fix every single thing that’s trying to hurt you or take your place. I’ll become someone actually worthy of your mark.”
I smiled, small and sad. Maybe that’s why her mark keeps fading. Because I don’t deserve it yet. But I will.
I stood, turned off the lights, and slipped out as quietly as I came.
In the hallway I told the two guards on duty, “No one comes in through these doors. Not anyone. Not even me. I’m not coming back tonight.”
They bowed. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
I walked until I reached the balcony, stripped, and shifted.
Derek exploded out of me the second my paws hit the ground. We ran.
Wind tore through our fur as we leaped into the cold night air. We sprinted faster, deeper into the forest, letting the trees blur past. Derek needed this. I needed this. We needed to outrun the noise in our head, the questions, the fear, the rage.
We ran until our lungs burned and the palace was miles behind us.
Then Derek froze as we came towards the cluster of white Spruces.
Ears forward. Nose high as a scent hit us…familiar, impossible, wrong for this hour and this deep in the woods.
But that’s not just what had me confused. It’s the other scent that drifted by. Faint, almost like whoever it was didn’t want to be discovered. But Derek picked the scent.
What the hell is she doing out here at this time of night? And who is she with?