Chapter 5:The King's Court

The castle didn’t whisper when we returned. It roared.

Guards dropped to their knees in the courtyard. Servants pressed themselves against walls, heads bowed. And the air — it was thick with it. Recognition. Fear. *Worship*.

They could smell it on me. White Lycan. Not wolf. Something older. Something that made their wolves submit on instinct.

I was still in Darius’s shirt, his scent wrapped around me, legs shaky from the shift. He carried me through the great hall like I was made of glass and dynasties both.

“Summon them,” he told a guard without looking. “Full court. Now.”

The throne room was obsidian and silver, vaulted ceiling lost in shadow, a single throne on a dais. Not gold. Not gaudy. Black stone carved with snarling wolves. A King’s throne.

Darius didn’t sit.

He stood on the dais and set me on the throne.

Panic shot through me. “Darius—”

“Sit,” he said softly. Not a command. A plea. “Please. Let them see.”

So I sat. In his shirt. Bare legs. Hair wild from running and shifting. I probably looked insane.

The doors opened.

They filed in. Twenty. Fifty. A hundred. Lycans in tactical gear, in suits, in battle leather. All huge. All lethal. All with Darius’s silver eyes. His Beta, a mountain of a man with scars across his throat, led them.

They stopped. Stared at me. At the empty space beside me where their King stood.

Then Darius spoke, voice carrying to every corner.

“My curse is broken.”

The room didn’t breathe.

“The Sacred Cave confirmed it. The marks are gone.” He held up his bare forearms. No white scars. Just skin. “Because my Goddess woke.”

He turned to me, and dropped to one knee.

On the dais. In front of his entire court.

The Lycan King. Kneeling. To me.

“The white Lycan lives,” he said, and his voice wasn’t kingly. It was raw. “She chose me when I was cursed. She bled for me when I was weak. She killed for me when I was slow.”

His silver eyes burned into mine. “Elara of Silverfang is dead. Exiled, rejected, discarded.”

He stood, took my hand, and pressed it to his chest. Over his heart. “Queen Elara of the Forbidden Territory kneels for no one. And from this moment, neither do I. Not unless she asks.”

The silence broke.

The Beta hit his knees first. Fist to heart. “My Queen.”

Then the rest. A hundred Lycans, the most dangerous army on the continent, going to their knees for the wolf-less girl Kade threw away.

“MY QUEEN,” they roared, and the walls shook.

I couldn’t breathe. This was too much. Too big. I was supposed to die in the forest. Not rule one.

Darius must have felt me shaking. He sat on the throne’s wide arm, not on the seat — leaving that for me alone — and pulled me against his side. His arm was a brand around my waist, anchoring me.

“Breathe, little Goddess,” he murmured in my ear, too low for anyone else. “They smell fear. Give them strength instead.”

Strength. Right. I was a white Lycan. I’d ripped a rogue’s head off an hour ago. I could handle this.

I lifted my chin. Forced my voice steady. “Rise.”

They did. As one.

Darius’s thumb stroked my hip. Approval.

“The Alpha of Silverfang sent rogues to kill your Queen,” he told them, voice going arctic. “He failed. She shifted. She slaughtered. And now he’ll pay.”

Growls rolled through the court. The Beta’s eyes went wolf-bright. “Orders, my King?”

“Ready the legions,” Darius said. “Kade wants war for rejecting what was mine. He’ll get it.”

He looked down at me then, and the possessiveness in his gaze nearly undid me. In front of everyone, he tilted my face up and kissed me. Slow. Claiming. Not for show — for *him*. When he pulled back, his voice was wrecked.

“But first,” he told his court, without looking away from me, “we dress our Queen. Because the next time Kade sees her, she won’t be in my shirt.”

His eyes promised vengeance. “She’ll be in a crown.”

A side door burst open. A scout, panting, bleeding. “My King! Silverfang. He’s not alone. He’s calling the Eastern Packs. He’s building an alliance. He says—” the scout swallowed, looking at me — “he says he’s coming to ‘retrieve his mate’ and ‘put down the cursed King’s pet’.”

The room went deadly quiet.

Darius didn’t move. Didn’t even blink. But the temperature dropped twenty degrees.

Then he smiled.

And it was the most terrifying thing I’d ever seen.

“Tell the pup,” he said softly, “that my Queen doesn’t do retrievals.”

He stood, pulling me with him, keeping me tucked into his side.

“She does executions.”

His gaze met mine, and it was full of war and promise and something that looked like love.

“Get ready, little Goddess,” he whispered. “Kade wanted to see what he threw away.”

He kissed my temple.

“Let’s show him.”