Blackwater City.
The auction house was exactly what you'd expect for a place that sold people: beautiful on the surface and rotten underneath. Chandeliers dripping with fake crystals hung from a ceiling painted with faded gods and goddesses, their smiles looking more like sneers in the flickering light. The air was thick with the smell of expensive cigars and new clothes. Rich folks, most of them from powerful shifter packs, lounged on velvet cushions, drinking amber liquor while they waited for the main event.
I was backstage, shivering in a stupid silken cloth they'd forced me into. It did nothing to fight the chill, or the fear. Through a crack in the heavy curtain, I could see the auctioneer, a weasellly little fat man with a bright smile, hyping up the crowd.
"And now, gentlemen, a rare commodity!" his voice boomed, oily and slick. "Lot 47! Female, nineteen years of age. Healthy, compliant…... and completely wolfless!"
A wave of murmurs and a few cruel laugh rippled through the crowd. Being wolfless in a world of werewolves was like being a car without an engine. Useless. A defect. It's why my own family had finally sold me off. I was a drain on resources, an embarrassment. Might as well get a few Cores for me.
"Do not let her… condition… fool you!" the auctioneer continued, gesturing for me to be brought out. A guard shoved me forward onto the brightly lit platform. I stumbled, my bare feet cold on the wooden stage. Hundreds of eyes looked at me like a piece of meat. "She is sturdy! She can clean, cook, bear children… think of her as the perfect, low-maintenance servant! Or perhaps a… practice wife for a young heir who needs to learn the ropes without any messy complications!"
He winked, and the crowd chuckled. My face burned with humiliation.
"We'll start the bidding at a very modest 20 Cores! Do I hear 20?"
A man in the front row, who smelled strongly of wet dog, raised his paddle. "25!"
"35!" someone else yelled from the back.
"55!"
The bids climbed slowly, lazily. 70 Cores. 80. It was about the price of a good hunting dog. I tuned out,I started staring on a stain on the wall in the distance. This was it. My life was being sold off for less than a fancy rug.
The auctioneer was getting excited. "We have 80 Cores! A steal for such a durable specimen! Do I hear 90? 90 Cores for a lifetime of service!"
He was about to bring the gavel down when a voice cut through the murmur. It wasn't loud, but it carried a weight that silenced the room instantly. It was low, calm, and cold as a winter grave.
"One thousand Cores."
The room went dead silent. You could have heard a pin drop. Then, a wave of shocked gasps and frantic whispers. One thousand Cores? That was the kind of money you'd pay for a prized warrior or a rare-blooded pureblood or a high magic item. Not for a wolfless reject.
All heads, including mine, turned toward the source of the bid. He was sitting alone in a shadowy booth at the very back of the hall. I could barely make him out—just a tall, broad-shouldered person,, his face hidden in darkness. But I could feel his gaze on me. It wasn't hungry or crazy like the others. It was… assessing. Like he was looking at a locked box and trying to figure out what was inside.
The auctioneer was stammering, his face became pale. "M-my lord? One… one thousand Cores? For this… item?"
The man in the shadows didn't move. "You heard me."
No one else dared to bid. The gavel slammed down with a final, echoing crack.
"Sold! To the gentleman from the Nightfang Pack for one thousand Cores!"
Nightfang. The name sent a fresh jolt of terror through me. They were the most feared, reclusive pack in the territory. Rumors said they drank the blood of their enemies and made thrones out of bones.
As guards grabbed my arms to lead me away, the man in the shadows finally stood up. He didn't come to claim me. He just turned and walked out, leaving a room full of stunned silence and one very, very terrified wolfless girl who had just been bought for a king's ransom.
And I had no idea why.
The guards didn't handle me with care. Their grips were like iron bands around my upper arms, half-dragging, half-carrying me off the stage and through a narrow, dimly lit corridor that stank of mildew and despair. The old look of the auction hall vanished, replaced by cracked plaster walls and rough stone floors. The sound of the murmuring crowd faded, replaced by the echo of our footsteps and the frantic hammering of my own heart.
"One thousand Cores," one of the guards, a bear-shifter with foul breath, muttered to the other. "The Nightfang Alpha's finally lost his mind. Or maybe he just needs a new rug."
The other guard, a thinner, weaselly man, chuckled. "Maybe she's got a hidden talent. Can she sing?"
The first guard snorted. "For that price, she'd better be able to shit gold coins."
They laughed, the sound harsh and ugly in the confined space. I kept my mouth shut, with my eyes fixed on the floor, showing fear was like showing blood in a shark tank. My mind was racing, a frantic hamster on a wheel going nowhere. Nightfang Pack.The stories flooded my mind, each more horrific than the last. They were monsters, the kind mothers used to scare their pups into behaving. "Be good, or the Nightfangs will come for you in the night." And now their Alpha had bought me. Why? A wolfless girl was less than nothing to an Alpha of that stature. Was it a mistake? A cruel joke?
We stopped at a heavy metal door. The bear-shifter fumbled with a set of keys, unlocked it, and shoved me inside. I stumbled into a small, windowless room containing only a wooden stool and a small cot with a thin, stained mattress. This was the "holding cell" for the merchandise.
"Get comfortable," the weaselly guard sneered. "Your new master will collect you soon. Try not to die of fright before he gets here. Bad for business." The door slammed shut, plunging me into near-darkness, the only light a faint strip under the door. The lock clicked with a sound of terrible finality.
I sank onto the stool, my legs too weak to hold me. The silence was absolute, pressing in on my eardrums. This was it. The end of the line. I thought of my family—my father's relieved face as they led me away, my stepmother's smug smile. They'd gotten their truce, their land, and their pathetic lives. They'd sold me for peace, and thrown in their defective daughter as a bonus. The bitterness was a sharp, metallic taste in my mouth.
But underneath the fear and the bitterness, a tiny, stubborn spark of something else flickered. Anger. Why should I just lie down and die? I'd spent my whole life being told I was nothing, that I was less than nothing because I had no wolf. I'd been cowed, bullied, and now sold. But I was still alive. And as long as I was breathing, there was a chance. Maybe this Alpha, this monster, had made a mistake. And maybe, just maybe, I could use that.
Time lost all meaning in the dark. It could have been minutes or hours later when I heard the heavy tread of footsteps outside the door. Not the clumsy steps of the guards. These were measured and powerful.My heart leaped into my throat, trying to choke me. I stood up, my back pressing against the cold stone wall, as if I could somehow melt into it and disappear.
The lock turned. The door swung open silently.
He filled the doorway. In the dim light, I could see him properly for the first time. He was even more imposing up close. Well over six feet tall, with shoulders so broad they almost brushed the frame. He wasn't dressed in finery like the other pack Alphas; he wore simple, dark, practical clothing—a black tunic and trousers that seemed to absorb the light, made of a material that looked both soft and incredibly durable. His hair was the color of raven wings, long enough to tie back at the nape of his neck. His face… his face was all hard lines and sharp angles, with a strong jaw shadowed by stubble. But it was his eyes that held me frozen. They were an unusual, piercing shade of silver, like moonlight on a frozen lake. And they were fixed directly on me.
He didn't say a word. He just stood there, looking at me, his expression utterly unreadable. There was no lust in his gaze, no cruelty, no pity. It was pure, intense scrutiny. It felt like he was seeing past the silken shift, past my skin and bones, right down to the very core of me. The silence stretched, becoming a tangible thing, heavy and suffocating.
Finally, I couldn't take it anymore. My voice came out as a ragged whisper. "Why?"
He tilted his head just a fraction. His voice, when he spoke, was that same low, calm rumble I'd heard in the auction hall. It seemed to vibrate right through me. "Why what?"
"Why did you buy me?" I forced the words out, my courage surprising me. "You paid a thousand Cores. For me. Everyone knows what I am. I'm… I'm wolfless." The word tasted like ash.
A ghost of a smile, cold and utterly humorless, touched his lips. It was gone in an instant. "I know what you are."
"Then it was a mistake," I insisted, a desperate hope flaring. "You can nullify the bid. Tell them you meant to bid on the next lot, the pureblood warrior. They'll understand."
"There was no mistake," he said, his tone leaving no room for argument. He took a single step into the room, and the space seemed to shrink around him. He carried an aura of power so potent it made the air hum. This was no ordinary Alpha. This was something else entirely. "You are coming with me to the Nightfang territory. You will be my wife."
The word hit me like a physical blow. Wife?
It was even worse than I'd imagined. I'd thought I was to be a servant, a slave. But a wife? To him? It made no sense.
"A… a wife?" I stammered, my mind reeling. "But… political marriages are for forging alliances with powerful families. My family is nothing. They sold me to you. This gains you nothing!"
"On the contrary," he said, his silver eyes boring into mine. "It gains me exactly what I want. You."
Before I could process that terrifying statement, he turned and gestured for me to follow. "Come. We leave now."
I didn't move. My feet were rooted to the spot. Every instinct screamed at me to run, to fight, to do *something*. But where would I go? Back to my family, who would just sell me again? Into the city, where a wolfless girl wouldn't last a night?
He paused at the door and looked back at me, a flicker of impatience in his gaze. "You have a choice, of course. You can come with me willingly. Or I can carry you. The outcome is the same. The journey, however, will be far less comfortable for you if you choose the latter."
It wasn't a choice at all. It was an ultimatum. I looked from his impassive face to the dark corridor behind him. This was the moment. The moment I stopped being Elara, the wolfless girl from a minor pack, and became… what? The property of the Nightfang Alpha.
Taking a shuddering breath, I forced my legs to move. I walked toward him, my head held higher than I felt. I stopped just a few feet away, close enough to feel the heat radiating from his body, to smell the clean, cold scent of pine and snow that clung to him.
He gave a slight, almost imperceptible nod of approval. "Good."
He turned and started walking down the corridor. And I, with nothing left to lose and a future more terrifying than anything I could imagine, followed my new husband into the darkness.