Chapter 6
The Blackridge Dominion was nothing like Kael's territory.
Where the Silver Fang Pack was all sharp angles and military precision, Blackridge was ancient—a fortress carved into a mountainside, draped in mist and crawling with ivy so old it had turned to stone.
Dominic led me through corridors lit by blue-flame sconces, past wolves who stopped and stared with open shock as I passed. Their gazes weren't hostile. They were *awed.*
"Word spreads fast," Dominic said without turning. "Every wolf in my dominion felt your awakening. They know what you are."
"I don't even know what I am," I said.
He stopped before a massive oak door and turned to face me. Those storm-gray eyes held mine with an intensity that made my wolf stir.
"You are a pure-blood Lycan. The last of a bloodline thought extinct. Your kind ruled before the packs existed—before Alphas, before hierarchy. You are *older* than all of it."
"My mother was a regular wolf. My father—I never knew him."
"Your mother was a carrier." Dominic's voice softened—barely. "The Lycan gene can lay dormant for generations, suppressed by certain bonds or marks. Whoever was bonded to you before—his claim was acting as a seal."
Kael. Kael's false mate bond had been *suppressing* my wolf.
The realization hit me like a physical blow. Three years. Three years of being told I was defective, wolfless, broken—and all along, it was *his* bond that caged me.
"The moment you severed the connection," Dominic continued, "your wolf broke free."
I leaned against the stone wall, breathing hard. "He never marked me. How could an unmarked bond—"
"A contracted mate bond still carries spiritual weight. Especially one sealed with blood." Dominic studied me. "Your mother's blood was on that contract, wasn't it?"
Yes. It was.
My mother had unknowingly sealed my wolf inside me the day she signed my life away.
"Come." Dominic opened the door. "You need rest. Tomorrow, we begin training."
The room beyond was beautiful—vaulted ceilings, a fireplace already crackling, a bed so large I could have drowned in it. But luxury meant nothing when your world had been unmade and rebuilt in forty-eight hours.
"Dominic."
He paused in the doorway.
"Why are you really helping me?"
He was quiet for a long moment.
"Because I knew your father."
Before I could ask anything else, he was gone.
I didn't sleep that night. I sat on the balcony, watching the moon—full, silver, impossibly close—and felt my wolf unfurling inside me like a creature stretching after centuries of confinement.
*What was my father?* I asked her.
*A king,* she whispered. *The last Lycan King. And you are his heir.*
Below, in the courtyard, I saw Dominic standing alone in the moonlight, his face turned toward my balcony. He didn't wave. Didn't speak.
But something in his gaze told me he'd been waiting for me—for a very long time.
---
Where the Silver Fang Pack was all sharp angles and military precision, Blackridge was ancient—a fortress carved into a mountainside, draped in mist and crawling with ivy so old it had turned to stone.
Dominic led me through corridors lit by blue-flame sconces, past wolves who stopped and stared with open shock as I passed. Their gazes weren't hostile. They were *awed.*
"Word spreads fast," Dominic said without turning. "Every wolf in my dominion felt your awakening. They know what you are."
"I don't even know what I am," I said.
He stopped before a massive oak door and turned to face me. Those storm-gray eyes held mine with an intensity that made my wolf stir.
"You are a pure-blood Lycan. The last of a bloodline thought extinct. Your kind ruled before the packs existed—before Alphas, before hierarchy. You are *older* than all of it."
"My mother was a regular wolf. My father—I never knew him."
"Your mother was a carrier." Dominic's voice softened—barely. "The Lycan gene can lay dormant for generations, suppressed by certain bonds or marks. Whoever was bonded to you before—his claim was acting as a seal."
Kael. Kael's false mate bond had been *suppressing* my wolf.
The realization hit me like a physical blow. Three years. Three years of being told I was defective, wolfless, broken—and all along, it was *his* bond that caged me.
"The moment you severed the connection," Dominic continued, "your wolf broke free."
I leaned against the stone wall, breathing hard. "He never marked me. How could an unmarked bond—"
"A contracted mate bond still carries spiritual weight. Especially one sealed with blood." Dominic studied me. "Your mother's blood was on that contract, wasn't it?"
Yes. It was.
My mother had unknowingly sealed my wolf inside me the day she signed my life away.
"Come." Dominic opened the door. "You need rest. Tomorrow, we begin training."
The room beyond was beautiful—vaulted ceilings, a fireplace already crackling, a bed so large I could have drowned in it. But luxury meant nothing when your world had been unmade and rebuilt in forty-eight hours.
"Dominic."
He paused in the doorway.
"Why are you really helping me?"
He was quiet for a long moment.
"Because I knew your father."
Before I could ask anything else, he was gone.
I didn't sleep that night. I sat on the balcony, watching the moon—full, silver, impossibly close—and felt my wolf unfurling inside me like a creature stretching after centuries of confinement.
*What was my father?* I asked her.
*A king,* she whispered. *The last Lycan King. And you are his heir.*
Below, in the courtyard, I saw Dominic standing alone in the moonlight, his face turned toward my balcony. He didn't wave. Didn't speak.
But something in his gaze told me he'd been waiting for me—for a very long time.
---