Chapter 3 The Elder’s Death and the King’s Entry into the Game

Elara's POV

I'd been locked in this makeshift stone cell for two days now. The infected wound and raging fever had me trembling from head to toe.

"BANG—"

The iron door flew open, kicked in from the outside.

Hestia stood framed in the doorway, draped in an exquisite black velvet mourning dress, flanked by guards. She looked down at me with obvious disdain.

"Sis, wake up." She covered her nose, her face twisted in disgust. "The Elder, Aiden, is dead. Heart attack. He didn't make it through the night."

My eyes flew open.

Aiden was dead?!

In all of Shadow Pack, Aiden was the only one who'd watched me grow up, the only one who'd spoken up for me at the Full Moon Tribunal! He'd always been healthy—how could he suddenly have a heart attack?!

"You did this." I stared her down.

"Sis, you shouldn't throw around accusations." She dabbed at the corner of her eye with false sympathy, then her expression turned vicious as she hurled several blood-stained papers at my face. "He saw evidence of you conspiring with rogue werewolves. The shock was too much for his poor heart. You literally made him drop dead from rage."

The moment the papers hit my face, I caught a faint, sinister scent.

Rogue werewolf venom from the borderlands! I'd encountered it once during a healing class. This toxin might not kill a young werewolf, but to an elderly werewolf's fragile heart, it was lethal.

She hadn't just used forged evidence to enrage Aiden to death—she'd poisoned him too!

"You evil bitch..." I shook with fury.

"Shut your mouth, you whore!" A guard kicked the iron cage viciously. "Ms. Hestia Sharp was kind enough to plead with the Alpha on your behalf, to let a criminal like you attend Aiden's funeral. Now get the hell out!"

The guards dragged me roughly from the cage and hauled me toward the pack cemetery.

Storm clouds choked the sky. Rain poured down in sheets.

Kevin held an enormous black umbrella over Hestia, sheltering her completely in his arms, unwilling to let a single drop touch her.

I knelt in the downpour, watching this scene with cold eyes.

Just as Aiden's coffin was about to be lowered into the ground—

The air suddenly froze.

A terrifying Alpha pressure descended from above, instantly blanketing the entire cemetery!

This power carried an absolute dominance that made every werewolf soul tremble. Pack members around me dropped to their knees uncontrollably. Even Kevin's face went pale as he struggled against the oppressive force.

A tall, imposing figure slowly entered my field of vision.

He wore an impeccably tailored black trench coat, his features chiseled, his eyes a dark gold.

The legendary, most powerful, and mysterious Alpha of the Duskblood Pack—Lucian Johnson!

What was he doing here?!

Kevin stepped forward, bowing his head slightly in deference to the royal line. "Mr. Johnson, Shadow Pack did not expect—"

Lucian didn't even glance at him.

He paid no mind to Hestia, who stood beside Kevin, casting flirtatious glances his way.

His gaze swept past the crowd and landed on me—bloodied and broken.

I straightened my spine, meeting his eyes unflinchingly through the rain.

Lucian seemed to see straight through to my hatred. The corner of his mouth lifted in an almost imperceptible smile. Then he looked away, his cold stare settling on the Elder's tombstone. He said nothing more.

That brief moment of eye contact ignited something in my frozen chest for the first time—a spark.

He didn't save me.

But his presence felt like handing me a knife in the darkness.

Ancient werewolf law dictated that the royal line could never publicly claim another pack's mate from an existing bond. As long as I still carried Kevin's surname, Lucian couldn't intervene.

I would have to sever this bond myself.

Meanwhile.

James stood beside the coffin, adjusting Aiden's burial clothes.

His hand reached for the 'forged evidence' still clutched in Aiden's dead grip.

The instant his fingers made contact, James froze.

He brought the papers close to his nose. His face went deathly white.

James was a gifted healer. I watched his nostrils flare almost imperceptibly, his expression draining of color.

He'd smelled it.

He'd detected the rogue werewolf-venom residue on those papers, too.

His head snapped up, shocked, his gaze darting between Hestia and me.

Without a word, he folded the poisoned forgeries tightly and slipped them into his sleeve.

My heart leaped. A crack had at last been torn open in this hopeless deadlock.

The funeral ended hastily.

Hestia glanced at the muddy ground with distaste, then leaned against Kevin's chest with a saccharine whine. "Kevin, with Elara here, Aiden can't rest in peace. And... the Luna coronation ceremony is in a few days. I'm afraid I'll be cursed with bad luck..."

Kevin patted her back gently and strode toward me.

"Aiden is dead. No one left in Shadow Pack can protect you now."

Kevin's voice cut through the rain.

I didn't cry. I didn't beg.

Because I knew that in Kevin's power-hungry mind, he was desperate to prove himself to the pack, desperate to clear the Luna position for Hestia. Nothing I said would matter.

Kevin turned to the guards and ordered coldly:

"After the ceremony, strip her of her surname and pack standing."

I threw my head back and laughed—laughed until tears mixed with blood and splattered into the mud.

"Kevin!"

I locked eyes with him and hauled myself upright from the filth:

"You'd better never beg me to come back!"