The moon hung swollen and red above the forests of Veylor, casting its feverish light across the courtyard stones below my chamber. It was the kind of night that made lesser wolves restless and made kings remember their loneliness. I had ruled the High Pack for barely two years, yet the crown already felt older than I was.
The palace slept. My guards had taken their posts, the council their leave, the last of the servants their silence. Only the wind spoke, and it carried the same whisper it always did, mate. The word clawed through me like an unanswered prayer.
Nineteen years of life, ten of training, two of rule, and not once had the Moon Goddess shown me the one meant to steady my soul. Every Alpha before me had found their mate before ascension; their bonds were blessings that made them whole. I ruled incomplete, a creature half-formed. Power came easily, peace did not.
I paced the length of my chamber, boots echoing against the marble. The night air smelled of pine resin and iron, the scents of my territory. My wolf, Kaen, stirred restlessly beneath my skin.
We should be hunting, he growled.
We have hunted enough.
Then we should be claiming what is ours.
I bit back the snarl. "And what is ours, when fate refuses to answer?"
Kaen went silent, sulking in the hollow where my longing lived.
A knock broke the quiet.
"Enter," I called.
Lucan Ardyn stepped inside, broad-shouldered and smiling despite the hour. His tunic was half-fastened, his hair in disarray. He smelled of worry and of new life.
"It's time," he said. "She's in labor."
The words pulled me from my thoughts like a slap. "Now?"
"Now," he confirmed, laughter bubbling under the nerves. "The healer says the babe is impatient, like her father."
I followed him through torch-lit halls, down to the birthing chamber where his mate, Mira, lay surrounded by women of the pack. The air was heavy with the scent of blood and roses. Mira's cries rose and fell like waves against stone. Lucan went to her side, clutching her hand, whispering words only love makes meaningful. I stood back, useless in the sacred chaos of creation.
When the first thin wail split the air, something in me stilled. The midwife lifted a small, red-faced bundle, slick with new life, and placed her on Mira's chest. Lucan wept openly, pride and awe mingling on his face.
"A girl," Mira whispered, voice hoarse. "Our Selene."
The name seemed to shimmer in the torchlight. Selene. Moon-born. The Goddess's own. I stepped closer despite myself. The child's scent, milk, innocence, something sweet I could not name, wrapped around me like warmth in winter. Her tiny fingers opened, closed, and opened again. When her gaze fluttered toward me, cloudy and unfocused, my wolf pressed forward, silent and reverent.
Kaen murmured within me, She smells of destiny.
I almost recoiled. She's a child, I snapped. Lucan's daughter.
And yet, Kaen said, retreating into the shadows of my mind, the ache quiets.
I looked down at her again, unsettled. The constant hunger that lived beneath my ribs, the yearning for the unknown mate, had dulled to a whisper, as though soothed. I shoved the thought away.
Lucan turned to me, eyes shining. "Come, brother. Meet your goddaughter."
Goddaughter. That, at least, felt safe. I forced a smile and accepted the tiny bundle. She weighed almost nothing, yet she anchored me. Her heartbeat fluttered against my palm like the wings of a bird. "Welcome to the world, little one," I said softly. "May it be kinder to you than it was to your king."
Mira laughed weakly. "Don't curse her already, Darian."
"I don't curse," I murmured. "I promise."
The Moon Goddess's light spilled through the window then, falling across Selene's face. Her eyes opened, blue, impossibly bright, the color of dawn over snow, and for an instant I felt as if the Goddess herself looked through them.
I handed her back before the feeling could take root. "She's strong," I said to Lucan. "She'll make you proud."
"She already has." He glanced at me, expression turning sober. "You'll have all this one day, Darian. A mate, a pup, a home. The Goddess doesn't forget her kings."
I wanted to believe him. But fate, I had learned, answers to no one, not even kings.
That night, long after the cries quieted and Lucan's laughter echoed down the corridor, I stood alone on the balcony. The moon was high, full, watching. "You gave him a daughter," I whispered to the sky. "When will you give me mine?"
The wind carried no answer, only the faintest scent of milk and roses from the chamber below, and with it, a strange sense of peace.