Chapter 10 Evil Stirs
The Broker POV
The name first reached me as a whisper in the Ledger.
Ysara Hartwell.
I had seen thousands of names pass through my domain. Millions. Some burned bright for a moment, some vanished before I blinked… but hers did something I had not felt in centuries.
It hummed.
Ancient magic stirred in the Ledger’s veins. My Golden Ink quivered, and the lines rearranged themselves as if eager to carve her into destiny.
“A Ravelyn,” I murmured, tasting the word on my tongue like a vintage wine uncorked after too long. “Alive.”
I leaned back in my obsidian chair, tapping a fingernail against the edge of the page. A golden ripple fanned outward from her name. It was delicate and wild, and not yet in full bloom. She didn’t even know what she was.
Perfect.
I had intended something simple at first: acquisition, containment, and a tidy entry in my collection. Add her to the Ledger, bind her will, and use her magic to stabilize my Market and the old fractures beneath it. Nothing personal.
But then curiosity pricked me. What did she look like? I typed her name into the human web. A moment later, I found her OnlyFans. And the moment after that, the world as I understood it… shifted.
There she was.
Wild curves that defied divinity, eyes like storm-lit dusk, and lips built for ruin. Power threaded through her poses, soft but unmistakable. Not trained, not aware....yet inherently, dangerously seductive in a way no human could mimic.
My pulse kicked, something I had not felt in two thousand years.
“Magnificent,” I whispered.
I bought a video. Then another. Then all of them. My notifications spiraled into gold as the charges hit my vault. I watched every second, slowly, carefully, and obsessively. I watched the way she smiled at the camera like she knew she could bend the world. I watched the way she whispered to her subscribers as if they were her lovers. I watched the way her hips moved, and how her delicious madness glowed behind her eyes.
I had planned to claim her power. Now I wanted her. Not as a commodity. Not as an entry in my ledger.
As my mate.
The thought startled me. I had not used that word in an age. My bloodline had not mingled with another since the starward wars. But looking at her… the instinct rose like an old god waking.
“She would bear powerful children,” I murmured, my voice thick with assessment. “Ravelyn fertility is unmatched. Mixed with divine blood…”
I smiled slowly.
“They would be unstoppable.”
The air around me crystallized with potential. My skin shimmered faintly, and my golden veins brightened under the surface. When my divinity stirred, the Shadow Market trembled.
I leaned forward, with my hands steepled.
“You are important, little Ravelyn,” I said softly to her frozen image on screen. “More than you know. And when you awaken fully… every realm will hunger for you.”
But I am not every realm. I am the one who decides who wins and who is erased.
I clicked on her latest post. She laughed into the camera, wild and unashamed, with her hips swaying in leather straps she didn’t even realize were ritual knots from the old world. Ravelyns always found their magic, even if they didn’t know its name.
“Such fire,” I exhaled. “Such chaotic madness.”
She would fit perfectly beside an ancient monster like me. My power curled outward, brushing the space between realms, and tasting for her signature. I felt her faintly...like a star half-formed.
And faintly beneath it, the bonds beginning to grow. Lycans. Fae. A demon.
I frowned.
“So you’ve already drawn your first Circle,” I murmured, amused and annoyed in equal measure. “How fast your magic works, little queen.”
I brushed two fingers over her name, it was glowing in the Golden Ledger.
“You will not run from me.”
I snapped the Ledger shut, and stood slowly, letting my full height stretch into the darkness.
“You will be collected.”
And I smiled, sharp and ancient.
“Perhaps even worshiped.”
The Shadow Market shifted eagerly at my back, hungry for its future queen.
And I, the Broker, descended into the depths preparing for war....not for power alone.
But for her.
\~~~~~
Aldric The Exiled Alpha POV
I felt her before I saw her.
A pulse of magic cracked through the leyline beneath my exile cabin, sharp enough to rattle the bones of every creature within a hundred miles. I shot upright, and my breath froze in my throat.
A Ravelyn. Alive.
After all these years of hunting ghosts and rumors, of tearing through villages for whispers, of slaughtering anyone who dared breathe the prophecy back at me… she finally appeared.
And then....worse, sweeter, and fucking infuriating....two familiar signatures flared with her.
My sons. Wyatt. Rafe. Of fucking course. I bared my teeth, and my hands curled into claws as rage boiled through my veins.
“My birthright,” I snarled into the empty shack. “My prophecy. And those insolent pups reached her first.”
I paced the room, and the old floorboards groaned under my weight. The magic kept singing to me. It was sweet, maddening, and perfect. I hadn’t felt anything like this since before my exile. Since before the Conclave decided I was too dangerous to keep crowned. Since they stripped me of my title and tossed me to the outskirts like a rabid dog.
A Ravelyn was the key to reclaiming everything. A Ravelyn was the mother of the next unstoppable generation. A Ravelyn was power incarnate.
Mine. She should have been mine.
I felt my sons’ energies circling around her. It was protective, territorial, and bonded. Disgust turned my stomach. They were always fucking soft. Always sentimental. Always weak.
I would have claimed her the moment she breathed near my territory. I would have locked her down before her magic even sparked. I would have given her purpose. A cage, yes, but a golden one.
She would have shone for me. Not for them.
A low growl rumbled through me as I strode to my ancient desk, yanked my battered laptop open, and typed her name into the human search engine. The Ravelyn’s modern disguise.
YSARA HARTWELL
A heartbeat later, images appeared. Photos. Clips. A link to something called OnlyFans.
My fingers throbbed with heat as I clicked. And I saw her. And the world tilted.
She was too much. Too alive. Too decadent. Too perfectly shaped for a throne and a leash. Every laugh, every smile, and every sway of her hips was a punch to my chest, a reminder that the universe had finally delivered my queen… to the wrong fucking hands.
My sons’ hands.
I bought every piece of content available. Watched her bite her lip in a way that screamed predator disguised as prey. Watched the wild spark in her eyes. Watched her breathe like she could set kingdoms on fire.
“You were made for me,” I whispered, gripping the edge of the desk until wood splintered. “Not for them. Never for them.”
I replayed one clip. Then another. Then all of them. My wolf paced beneath my skin, snarling, thrashing, and slamming itself into my ribs.
"Mine."
He growled the word in a loop, like a chant, like a curse.
“Quiet,” I hissed, though my pulse throbbed with agreement. “I’ll reclaim what is owed.”
I clicked through another post, her laughing, carefree, and completely unaware that kings and monsters were already circling her name like vultures. Unaware that she was the final piece to an ancient prophecy I had murdered half a continent to secure.
Unaware that I would burn entire cities to find her. Then I saw it. Her newest announcement.
I joined a sugar baby site.
Find me if you can.
A slow, delighted smile carved its way across my face. Challenge accepted, little Ravelyn.
But then a new terror hit me....an unacceptable one. If I could find her profile… so could others. My jaw cracked with fury.
The Broker.
That slithering demi-god bastard was probably already putting his gilded claws into the hunt. Always lurking. Always collecting. Always three steps ahead.
“No,” I growled. “She will not sit on his ledger.”
I slammed my laptop shut and stood, sensing Wyatt’s golden presence flare toward her. Rafe’s silver magic coiling protectively around her signature. Disgusting.
“They think they can keep her from me,” I muttered, stepping outside into the cold forest air. “They think they can claim my queen?”
A feral laugh burst out of me. I let my full aura bleed through me, shaking the trees in a ripple of silver fire.
“I will kill them first,” I whispered. “Both of them. Slowly.”
The prophecy said the Ravelyn would have many mates.
But I would make certain I was the only one left standing.
The hunt began tonight.
\~~~~~
Ysara POV
When consciousness finally dragged me back from whatever blissed out, afterglow coma I’d fallen into, the first thing I registered was the sound.
Four men. Whisper panicking.
Hushed voices, sharp breaths, pacing footsteps, and bodies moving with that tense, predatory energy that said someone was about to die and they were deciding who.
I groaned softly and blinked my eyes open. They didn’t notice. Wyatt was shirtless, and pacing near the window, with his golden eyes lit like molten metal. Rafe was leaning over the dresser, with his fists planted, looking like he was about to rip it in half. Kalesh stood near the foot of the bed, and his markings shimmered in agitation. Darken had his hand pressed to his temple, staring at his phone like it had personally betrayed him.
“…the Broker is already moving,” Darken growled.
“And the Exiled Alpha,” Wyatt added.
“Your fucking father,” Kalesh said quietly.
“And possibly the Conclave,” Rafe muttered.
Father? Oh hell no, who the fuck...I sat up abruptly, rubbing my eyes with both hands. The sheets slid down my torso.
All four men froze. And stared. Hard.
At my very naked top half.
A slow, wicked grin curled across my mouth.
“Enjoying the view, boys?”
Wyatt made a strangled noise and snapped his head away so fast he nearly dislocated something.
Rafe whipped around too, muttering a curse.
Darken exhaled once like he’d been punched.
Kalesh didn’t move at all, he just watched me with those feral green eyes, absolutely unashamed.
Typical.
I snorted, swung my legs out of bed, and grabbed the nearest robe, it was black silk, of course. I tied it tight around me and cleared my throat.
“Okay,” I said, planting my hands on my hips. “I appreciate the morning eye contact, really, but what the actual fuck is happening? Explain. Slowly. Preferably without all four of you spontaneously combusting.”
Rafe spoke first, and his voice was low and careful.
“There are… threats moving toward you, Ysara. Powerful ones.”
Wyatt nodded. “The Broker...the ruler of the Shadow Market...knows you exist. He’s obsessed. He wants to claim you.”
“Claim me how?” I asked cautiously.
“Not sexually,” Darken answered. “Well, hell who knows anymore. He definitely wants your power.”
Lovely.
Kalesh added, “And the Exiled Alpha, Wyatt and Rafe’s father, has sensed you. He hunts Ravelyns. He will come.”
A cold ripple slid down my spine.
“Fantastic,” I muttered. “Anything else? Dragons? Vampires? An IRS audit?”
They exchanged uneasy glances.
Wyatt finally sighed. “Ysara… you’re not human. You’re a Ravelyn. A choice-maker. A mate-binder. Your awakening sent a magical shockwave across the region. Every supernatural with the ability to sense you now can.”
Rafe’s eyes softened. “And that makes you a target.”
I stared at them. All four. My four.
My heart thudded once, painfully.
“So,” I said slowly, “what you’re telling me is… I woke up hot, bonded, super magical, and now the supernatural mafia and an unhinged werewolf king want to kidnap me?”
Wyatt nodded grimly.
I blew out a breath.
“Great. Fucking love that for me.”