Chapter 2- The Claim No One Asked For
1014 Words
Kaelin didn’t move. Couldn’t. Not with the weight of the Alpha King’s gaze pinning her like a blade through the chest.
All around her, wolves bowed—some dropping to one knee, others to both. Even Alpha Hark inclined his head.
But not Kaelin.
She stood tall, jaw clenched, heart slamming like a war drum. Her wolf rose inside her, ears flattened and teeth bared, bristling beneath her skin.
Run, the instinct whispered.
Fight, another voice hissed.
Then his voice silenced them both.
“You,” the Alpha King said, low and deep.
Kaelin’s fingers curled into fists.
She didn’t answer.
He stepped forward once, twice—slow and deliberate. Each footfall shook the ground beneath her. When he stopped just a few feet away, his scent hit her like wildfire: smoke, leather, dominance. Pure Alpha.
Her knees almost buckled.
Almost.
“You felt it,” he said, tone like velvet over steel.
“I don’t believe in fate,” Kaelin snapped, forcing the words out. “And I don’t want a mate.”
That caught him off guard.
A flicker of surprise in his eyes. A twitch of his jaw. Then… a slow, wicked smile.
“This isn’t a request.”
Her wolf howled inside her, confused and enraged. Kaelin gritted her teeth and took a step back, every nerve screaming wrong, wrong, wrong.
“Respectfully, Your Majesty,” she bit out, voice cold as the frost beneath them, “go to hell.”
Gasps rippled through the pack. A few wolves paled. One even dropped to the ground in shock.
Kaelin didn’t care.
Let them watch.
She wasn’t about to bow for anyone—Alpha King or not.
Theron’s smile faded.
And the silence that followed was deadly.
Then he stepped even closer, so close she could feel the heat rolling off him like a furnace. His gaze dropped to her neck—the place where her old rejected mark had once glowed—and then to her eyes.
“Who hurt you?” he asked, too quiet.
She didn’t flinch.
“I healed.”
“Your scent says otherwise.”
“My scent is none of your business.”
Their eyes locked, and Kaelin realized too late that she had made a dangerous mistake: she’d challenged him. Directly. And he liked it.
“Name?” he asked.
“Kaelin.”
“Kaelin…” he repeated, testing it like it tasted good on his tongue. “You're coming with me.”
She laughed—sharp and bitter. “Not a chance.”
“You’d defy a royal command?”
“I’d defy the moon if it tried to bind me again.”
The air thickened, heavy with power. Wolves around them couldn’t breathe. Some staggered back, eyes wide.
But the Alpha King… he only looked at her like she was a riddle he’d just begun to unravel.
“You’ll come,” he said finally. “Because I don’t need your permission.”
He turned, just like that, and walked away.
---
Kaelin was still shaking by the time she reached her quarters.
If you could call a drafty stone room with a straw mattress and one threadbare blanket quarters. Her hands trembled as she splashed water over her face, the icy sting grounding her just enough to breathe.
What the hell had just happened?
A mate bond?
With him?
She gripped the edge of the basin so tightly her knuckles turned white. This couldn’t be happening. Not again. Not after everything she’d built, everything she’d clawed out of nothing.
He would ruin her.
She wasn’t some naive omega longing for a fairy-tale ending. She knew what happened when you gave someone your trust—your bond.
They used you. They left you.
She would never be that girl again.
---
The knock at her door came hours later.
Kaelin didn’t answer. She didn’t need to. The scent that drifted through the cracks in the stone was unmistakable.
Theron.
The damn King.
“I’m not going,” she said through the door.
“I didn’t come to argue,” came his voice.
“Then leave.”
A pause. Then, “I wanted to see if you’d packed.”
Her head snapped up.
“I’m not yours,” she hissed, stalking to the door and yanking it open.
He stood there in his battle-worn coat, arms crossed, expression unreadable. Up close, he looked even more dangerous. Not just beautiful—lethal. Like a storm in human skin.
“You are,” he said simply. “You just don’t accept it yet.”
Kaelin stepped forward until they were chest-to-chest. “I’m not some prize to be claimed.”
“No,” he agreed. “You’re a challenge.”
That stung. “Then find someone easier. Some sweet omega who’ll bat her lashes and beg to be marked.”
Theron’s eyes flared gold. “You think I want easy?”
Kaelin’s breath caught as his hand lifted—not to touch her, but to hover, barely brushing the side of her face. “I want real. And real doesn’t bow.”
Her heart pounded.
He was too close.
Too intense.
Too everything.
“Back off,” she whispered.
But his voice only dropped lower. “You can fight me all you want, Kaelin. Run. Rage. Bite. But that bond? It’s already there.”
Her wolf stirred again, drawn and furious.
And for the first time in years… she was afraid.
Not of him. But of what she might feel.
“Get out,” she said.
He held her gaze for one long, agonizing moment.
Then turned and walked away.
---
As soon as he left, Kaelin sank to her knees.
Not in surrender.
But because for the first time in a long time, she didn’t know what came next.
She’d built her life on being alone. On not needing anyone. On surviving without a mate.
But now?
Now the most powerful wolf in the realm had looked at her like she was his.
And worse?
Some traitorous part of her wanted to believe him.
---
- Writer
