Chapter 101
Kross
The throne room blooms around me like a fever dream—velvet banners, torchlight glinting off a hundred polished helms, the low roar of a crowd that thinks it owns the night. My name rings through the chamber with the kind of hunger reserved for legends: Kross Steele, Lycan born to the Steele line, announced as ruler rather than hunted. The chair under me is heavy, carved with wolves and crowns. A cloak falls across my shoulders that smells of cedar and victory. The air tastes of spiced wine and the iron-sweet tang of triumph.
Across from the dais, my father raises a goblet, his face a map of approval. My mother—long absent, fractured by whatever past tore her family at the seams—has slipped back into the circle of our blood as if no time at all passed. Her smile is loud
