Chapter 4
The glass had shattered into a thousand glittering pieces. Adrian hadn't finished his violent outburst in the study. With a terrifying surge of monstrous strength, he had hurled the gasping rogue through the broken window. She landed hard on the cobblestones of the courtyard below, a sickening crack echoing through the chill air.
I didn't stay in the room. Instinct—pure, primal terror—drove my legs. I slipped down the servant’s stairwell and out the side door, pressing my back against the freezing stone wall of the courtyard. Hidden in the deep, damp shadows, I watched.
Adrian stepped through the ruined window frame, dropping down to the courtyard with a heavy, earth-shaking thud. The moonlight hit him, and I clamped a hand over my mouth to stifle a scream. He was expanding. His bones cracked and shifted, his muscles bulging as his inner Lycan tore its way to the surface. Within seconds, he was a towering nightmare of dark fur and glowing crimson eyes.
The rogue scrambled backward, weeping, her manicured hands slipping on the wet cobblestones. She begged for mercy. But the Lycan had none. He didn't just kill her. He slaughtered her. It was a brutal, bloody execution for the crime of disrespecting his property. The sickening crunch of bone and the wet tear of flesh echoed in the silent night. The metallic stench of fresh blood hit my nose, thick and suffocating. As the monster stood over her ruined body, his chest heaving, he let out a deafening roar. It wasn't a roar of grief or lost control. It was a declaration of absolute, terrifying possession.
In that dark corner of the courtyard, the last veil of my denial burned away. I wasn't just trapped in a toxic mate bond. My life was in genuine, mortal danger. If I stayed, his obsession would drown me in blood. I would either die in his cage, or I would become the reason others died.
I had to vanish.
For the next three weeks, I became a ghost preparing for the afterlife. The pack house was tense, the bloody incident swiftly swept under the rug by Adrian's immense wealth and Lycan authority. Up in my cramped attic, a recovering Spring became my only lifeline. Though her back was heavily bandaged and her movements stiff, her loyalty never wavered.
"You can't just run, Mercy," Spring whispered one night, her pale hands trembling as she helped me fold a single spare sweater. "He's a Lycan. His senses are supernatural. He’ll track your scent across the country."
"Then I won't have a scent," I replied, my voice carrying a hollow, calm certainty.
We went to work. Spring used her access as a servant to steal strong scent suppressants from Marcus’s infirmary. But pills weren't enough to fool a Lycan Prince. I needed to smell like the earth itself. Every night, I snuck out to the edge of the territory. I gathered pungent herbs—wild rosemary, sharp mint, and crushed pine needles. I dug up dark, loamy mud from the riverbank.
I spent weeks meticulously learning to mask myself. I scrubbed my skin raw with the harsh mixture, testing the ratios until the floral undertones of my Omega scent were completely buried under the smell of dirt and forest. I packed a small, faded canvas bag. No photos. No carved wooden wolves. Just the clothes on my back, a few stolen dollars, and my survival.
"What if he catches you?" Spring asked on our final night of preparation, tears spilling down her bruised cheeks.
I pulled her into a gentle hug, mindful of her healing back. "Then I'll die free. But I will never live as his pet."
The perfect opportunity arrived on a humid Friday evening. It was the Seattle pack’s annual Come of Age Ceremony.
By nightfall, the territory descended into wild, chaotic celebration. Massive bonfires were lit in the central clearing, the flames roaring high into the starless sky. Thick, choking plumes of woodsmoke drifted through the open windows of the pack house, providing a perfect, natural veil for my scent. The heavy, rhythmic beating of ceremonial drums shook the floorboards, vibrating through the soles of my cheap canvas shoes and drowning out the sound of my footsteps.
Everyone was distracted. The ranked wolves were drunk on cheap ale and the intoxicating energy of the young pups shifting for the first time. Even the two black-suited Lycan guards stationed at the bottom of my stairs were restless. I watched through a crack in the floorboards as they abandoned their strict posts, drawn to the hallway windows to watch the wild, primal dancing outside. The noise was overwhelming their sensitive Lycan hearing, making them irritable and unfocused.
The pack was celebrating the birth of new wolves. I was preparing for the death of my old life.
I pulled the strap of my small bag over my shoulder. I had rubbed the mud and herb mixture into my skin until I smelled like nothing but the forest floor. The suppressants were heavy in my bloodstream, dulling the agonizing ache of the mate bond. My heart drummed a frantic rhythm against my ribs, but my mind was utterly serene.
The chaos outside was peaking. The window of opportunity was wide open. It was time to go.
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