Defying the Lycan King

Chapter 184: Under Seige

Back in Dravengard, Angelica stepped into Kai’s room with a soft smile, only to find her son already moving.

Kai heaved a heavy sigh, pushed himself up off the bed, reached for the crutch propped against the bedside table, and started for the door without so much as a glance at her.

"And where do you think you’re going?" Angelica asked.

"I don’t have time for you tonight, Mother."

She blinked. There was no charm in his voice. No cocky grin, no teasing lilt, none of the easy mischief that lived in him as naturally as breathing. For the first time she could remember, her baby boy sounded flat and tired and done.

"Kai." She stepped in front of him. "Why have you been avoiding me? Ever since I brought Alicia to see you, you’ve barely looked at me. What is the matter with you?"

Kai stopped and looked at her, and the look was not a kind one.

"Really?" he said. "You’re going to stand there and pretend you don’t know exactly what you did?"

"I am doing what is good for you," Angelica said, lifting her chin. "That’s all I have ever done. You and Alicia have been close since you were children, the pair of you. You might well be soulbonds, Kai, have you considered that? She comes from a good family, a strong line—"

"And who made you the goddess," Kai cut in, "to decide who my soulbond is?"

Angelica’s mouth thinned. "I am trying to protect you," she said. "Surely you don’t want to throw your heart at some werewolf girl, only for her to lay eyes on her true mate one day and vanish, leaving you in pieces. That’s what they do, Kai. They find their mate in an instant and they’re gone in an instant. I won’t watch that happen to you."

"That’s not going to happen."

"And how can you possibly be so sure?"

Kai held her gaze, steady and certain.

"Because Jessica has already found her mate," he said. "And that mate is me."

Angelica’s eyes flew wide. Her mouth dropped open and stayed there, the lecture she had been building dying somewhere in her throat.

"What?" she managed. "I— I didn’t know that. How was I supposed to—"

"No," Kai said quietly. "You didn’t know. Because you were too busy hating her to bother finding out a single thing about her."

***

"I’ll be leaving first thing tomorrow," Jessica said.

She folded another blouse with sharp, precise movements and pressed it down into her open bag. Kai stood a few feet away, leaning on one crutch, watching her with an expression she refused to turn around and see.

"You can’t be serious," he said.

"Oh, but I am." She huffed, not looking up. "I always knew this wasn’t going to work anyway," she muttered under her breath, mostly to herself.

"Really." Kai’s voice sharpened. "So that’s it? You’re not even going to put up a fight for us?"

Jessica turned and stared at him as though he had just calmly announced the moon was a rumour.

"Fight?" She scoffed. "I only fight for things I actually have a chance of winning, Kai. I don’t throw myself at brick walls for sport."

"Nothing is going to change between us," he said, taking a careful step toward her. "I have nothing to do with Alicia. Yes, fine, we had something once, when we were children. Years ago. I haven’t so much as seen the girl in goodness knows how long. She is nothing to me."

"Your mother doesn’t seem to share that view," Jessica said.

She turned her back on him again and pressed her hands flat against the bag.

"We should just reject the bond," she said, her voice quieter now. "But I won’t do it tonight. Not while you’re like this. Let’s meet again once you’ve fully recovered, and then—"

Kai coughed.

A sharp, ragged sound, followed by a low whimper.

Jessica did not turn around. "Stop it," she said. "Stop pretending you’re hurt. I know all your tricks by now, Kai, every single one of them, so you can save your—"

The coughing got worse.

Something in the sound of it changed, went wet and broken and wrong, and Jessica’s stomach dropped. She spun around.

Kai had crumpled to the floor, doubled over, coughing up blood onto the boards beneath him.

Her heart plummeted straight through the floor.

"Oh, goddess. Kai!" She flew across the room and dropped to her knees beside him, her hands hovering helplessly over his shaking shoulders. "What’s wrong? What’s happening to you?"

Kai lifted his head, blood on his lips, and looked at her.

"This," he rasped, "is what the bond does. When you stand there and talk about rejecting it. About leaving." He drew a shuddering breath. "Is that what you want? To kill me?"

Jessica shook her head fast, tears springing to her eyes.

"No. No, never. I’ll never reject the bond, do you hear me? Never. I’ll fight for us, I swear I will, I’ll fight for whatever you want, just please. Please be alright."

***

A few minutes later, the crisis had passed, and Kai lay stretched out on the bed with his head resting in Jessica’s lap.

She stroked his hair slowly, still shaken, while he explained the Lycan bond to her in a low, tired voice. How it tied two souls together once it took root. How a Lycan could waste away from it, could sicken and even die, if their bonded mate turned away and rejected what had formed between them. How it was the greatest gift and the deepest danger of their kind, all wrapped into one.

He was still speaking when the world outside came apart.

Howls erupted across the grounds. Not one or two, but a sudden, rolling wall of them, dozens of Lycan voices rising into the night all at once.

Then came the shouting. Voices breaking out across the palace, sharp with terror.

"Umbras! Umbras!"

And from somewhere out in the dark, a single voice rose above the rest, ragged and furious and final.

"Dravengard is under siege! To arms! Fight to the death, defend your home!"

Kai shot upright on the bed so fast it pulled a wince from him.

"How is this possible?" he breathed, his eyes wide, the blood drained from his already pale face.

"Derek and the gammas rode out tonight to take down the Umbras. Half our forces went with them." His head snapped toward the door. "How in the goddess’s name did they get inside the fortress?"