Chapter 3: The Alpha of Shadows

CAIUS

The scent hit me before the wind shifted—like wildflowers after a storm. Soft. Elusive. Wrong for the battlefield.

I inhaled deeply, trying to place it. The delicate floral notes were unmistakable, but there was an undertone, a strange tension to it that didn’t belong in the midst of war. The wind carried the scent of the forest, the dust of the battleground, the sweat of my warriors, but then, there was something else. Something... otherworldly.

The moment the breeze swirled past me, I felt the pull, like a thread gently tugging at the core of me. Something deep inside shifted, like an instinctive, ancient recognition that I couldn’t ignore.

Her.

“Fenrir,” I called out to my wolf, voice rough and low in the stillness of the night. “Do you feel it?”

"I do. But something is missing." Fenrir’s voice echoed low and restless in my mind. My wolf was always in control—vicious, confident, with a touch of arrogance. But now? Now, there was uncertainty, a rare tremor in his words.

A flicker of concern skittered down my spine. I closed my eyes, focusing on the sensation, trying to piece it together. The scent was familiar but distant. Something primal was stirring within me, but something else felt wrong, like a thread pulled out of alignment.

“Her wolf is silent,” Fenrir growled, his words low and dark. “She hasn’t shifted.”

That hit me like a blow to the gut. The girl’s scent was unmistakably wolf—rich with the kind of power that only came from one of us—but it wasn’t right. She was a wolf, yes, but she wasn’t acting like one. The wolf should have been screaming for release, for the freedom of the shift. But it wasn’t. It was... absent. Hollow.

I frowned, staring out across the camp. The night was quiet now, but the wind was still too thick with that scent. I could feel it pressing in on me, like it had taken root in my very blood.

“Lira Fenwick,” I whispered her name, testing it on my tongue. The girl born under the eclipse. She had been nothing more than a whisper among rumors and myths—her name tied to prophecy, to the moon, to something greater than any one of us could fully understand.

She was supposed to be just a legend. A child. But now… now she was real.

The parchment crinkled in my hand, the edges curling as I tightened my grip around it. It was a report from one of my scouts—someone who had tracked her movements in the Duskborne territory. It wasn’t much, but it was enough.

Unshifted. Nineteen. Rare abilities unconfirmed.

And mine.

I could feel Fenrir’s approval—an odd mixture of hunger and satisfaction—that curled in the pit of my stomach. "She’s ours. The bond is there. I feel it."

A growl rumbled in my chest, though it had little to do with my wolf’s restlessness. It was a growl that spoke of a need, a desire I couldn’t shake. She was... mine. The connection was undeniable.

But why was she unshifted? Why hadn’t she embraced her wolf? That was the key, wasn’t it? The bond only worked if she had accepted what she was, if she had embraced the wolf within her. Yet, here she was, unclaimed, untethered, and silent. It made no sense.

I stared down at the map on the table before me, the lines of the Duskborne territory marked with precise ink. It should have been a simple matter to track her down, but she was elusive. Hidden. Too well guarded by the Duskborne Elders, by their secrecy and their strength.

If they were hiding her, there had to be a reason.

And I would find out what.

I crumpled the parchment in my hand, my mind whirling with the possibilities. The Elders knew something. They were keeping her from me. And I would not let that stand.

Turning to Elias, my second-in-command, I kept my tone cold, my face a mask of determination. “We move at dawn.”

Elias was a seasoned warrior, sharp and perceptive, his dark eyes catching the glint of the moonlight reflecting off my silver gaze. He didn’t question me immediately. Instead, he glanced at the men around the campfire, noting the tension in the air, the weight of the command hanging between us.

“Toward Duskborne territory, Alpha?” Elias asked, his voice cautious. He wasn’t afraid to question me, not when it mattered. He understood that sometimes, there was a deeper reason behind my orders that I wasn’t ready to share. But this was different. The urgency was in my every word, in the way my muscles coiled with barely-contained anticipation.

“Yes.” The single word hung in the air, sharp and unyielding.

Elias paused for a moment, his gaze flicking between me and the distant horizon, where the outline of the Duskborne lands loomed, dark and mysterious. “And Lira Fenwick?” He asked, his tone even more cautious now, a thread of something—concern, perhaps—winding through his voice.

I met his gaze, and in that moment, he saw the fire that was burning behind my eyes. The wolf inside me. The hunger. The necessity.

“She comes with us,” I said.

The words felt like a command, a declaration. I would have her. I didn’t know why, not fully. I didn’t know what her place was in this tangled web, or what she had to do with the prophecy, or the eclipse, or whatever it was that tied her to me. But I would have her, and I would understand what she meant. What she was.

Elias didn’t hesitate for long, though I could see the questions still swirling in his mind. “Understood,” he said, nodding once, his voice steady as he passed the orders to the others.

I turned away from him, walking toward the edge of the camp, where the air felt colder. The tension had settled like a shroud around my chest. I didn’t know exactly why Lira Fenwick had appeared in my life, but I could feel it, deep in my soul—the pull of fate, of destiny, tugging at me.

Fenrir was restless, pacing in the back of my mind. He wanted her. He wanted to claim her, to bend her to our will. But I could feel the hesitation in his thoughts, the unease that had settled in his bones. She was different. We didn’t understand her, not yet.

The wolf inside me knew it was only a matter of time. Time before the Duskborne Elders were no longer a barrier, time before Lira would be at my side, bound by the bond we both felt but couldn’t yet fully grasp.

And then, we would have everything.

I stood on the edge of the camp, staring into the night, where the darkness seemed to stretch forever.

Tomorrow, we moved. And with it, the winds of fate would shift.