The Alpha King And His Chosen Luna novel Chapter 79

What they buried rises–1

(Caius)

I was finishing the next line of charges when Isla’s scent changed again.

Not fear. Not weakness. Not anything that belonged to panic. It rose hot and wild beside me, threaded with something ancient that struck straight through Vorak and sent him surging hard against my ribs.

I stopped speaking at once.

The hall felt it before they understood it. Heads turned. Bodies stilled. Every instinct in the room reached toward the shift in the air without knowing what name to give it.

I turned to her.

Isla stood where she’d been, but nothing about her was the same as it had been moments earlier. Her body shook in sharp waves that had nothing to do with fear. Her hands were curled partway at her sides as if fighting some new command moving through them. Her breathing came deeper, rougher, pulled from somewhere low in her chest.

Then she looked at me.

Her eyes had changed.

The brown I’d known was still there at the edges, but the center had gone bright amber, lit from within like fire through glass. It wasn’t reflection. It wasn’t candlelight. It was her wolf looking out through eyes that had been denied too long.

Vorak hit me with a force that nearly took my breath.

‘Mine.‘

‘Control yourself,’ I said.

‘Protect her.‘

‘I already am.’

Isla bent forward a fraction.

Pain crossed her face, then anger, then something fiercer than either. The tremor through her body deepened. A sound caught in her throat, not human speech, not yet a growl, something between.

No.

Not in front of them.

Not in this room full of staring wolves and guilty eyes and people who’d already taken too much from her. She would not go through this with an audience.

I moved before thought finished forming.

My arm went around her at once, firm across her middle, catching her as another wave hit. With my other

What they burned unce

hand I took her shoulder and turned her into me, away from the hall, away from the rows of faces straining To watch.

Then I stepped between her and everyone in the room.

My body blocked the sightline of the pack, Rodan, her family, all of them. If they wanted to see her now, they’d look through me first.

No one moved.

No one breathed loudly enough to hear.

Raith understood before I spoke. “Clear space,” he barked.

My wolves acted at once. Boots moved across wood. The front ranks were driven back several paces. Guards repositioned. Anyone leaning forward was forced behind the line again.

Good men.

Isla’s hands seized in my shirt.

I tightened my hold enough to anchor, not enough to trap. She was burning through the fabric now, heat pouring from her skin in waves. Her head pressed briefly against my chest as if instinct had chosen shelter before her mind could catch up.

“Look at me,” I said quietly.

She tried.

Her face lifted, strained, eyes bright amber and wide. Tears stood there from pain, not fear. Her teeth pressed together hard enough to show the shape of them through her cheeks.

“It hurts,” she said.

“I know.”

Another wave hit her.

Her back bowed. Her fingers dug into me. A broken sound left her throat and Vorak lunged again so hard I had to lock my knees to keep him contained.

‘She needs us.’

‘She needs calm.’

‘Take her out‘

‘I will.‘

I looked over my shoulder once.

“Zeron,” I said.

“Yes, Alpha King.”

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