Kade's POV
My hands wouldn't stop shaking.
I stood in the chamber behind the great hall, staring at my reflection in the polished glass. Black suit. Clean. Dangerous looking. Exactly what an Alpha was supposed to look like when he was about to bind himself to someone for life.
The problem was that I didn't feel like an Alpha right now.
I felt like something was about to go catastrophically wrong and I had no idea how to stop it.
Three days. That's all the time I'd had since Sienna arrived. Three days of investigating what I'd scented. Three days of pulling old records with Jasper. Three days of realizing that the girl sleeping in my castle was carrying something ancient in her blood.
And today I was supposed to mark her in front of hundreds of witnesses.
Today I was supposed to bind myself to her magically.
Today everything was going to change.
"You look like someone's walking you to execution," Jasper said, appearing in the doorway. My Beta was dressed formally too, his silver hair catching the light. "Not the other way around."
"She's hiding something," I said. "Something powerful. Something that shouldn't exist."
"I know," Jasper answered calmly. "I scented it too. The question is what you're going to do about it."
I didn't have an answer for that.
The great hall was packed when they led me out. Hundreds of wolves. Pack members. Council representatives. Alphas from neighboring territories who'd come to witness the political marriage that was supposed to prove I respected the system.
They had no idea what they were about to watch.
The music started and my entire body went still.
She walked through the doors and everything in me just stopped.
Sienna was wearing white silk that caught the light like she was made of moonlight. Her dark hair was braided with silver thread. She looked ethereal. Untouchable. Like something from an old story that was too beautiful to be real.
But underneath that beauty, I could see it now. The dangerous part. The thing she didn't know about herself yet.
She was powerful.
Not in the way she moved. Not in the way she held herself. But in something deeper. Something that radiated from her like heat.
She kept her eyes down as she walked toward me. That practiced submission. That careful smallness.
It didn't matter. I could see past it now.
She reached the altar and finally looked up at me. Her green eyes were afraid but there was something else underneath. Something that matched the scent I couldn't stop smelling.
The ceremony started. The words were traditional. Ancient. The same words that had bound wolves together for centuries.
I barely heard them.
All I could focus on was her. On the way her hands trembled when the priest asked if she took me as her mate. On the way she whispered yes so quietly I almost didn't hear it.
On the fact that she was terrified and trying so hard not to show it.
When the moment came, when the priest said the words that sealed the bond, I stepped closer.
Her breath caught.
"Trust me," I whispered, and I meant it. I meant every word.
Then I pulled her close and bent my head to her neck.
I could feel her trembling against me. Could feel her heart pounding. Could feel her entire body bracing for something she didn't understand.
My fangs came down and I prepared to mark her.
The moment my fangs touched her skin, it happened.
The scent explosion was like nothing I'd ever experienced. Her false Omega mask didn't just crack. It completely shattered like glass hitting stone. It exploded outward in waves of power so intense that I felt the impact physically.
The real scent underneath was devastating.
Ancient. Primal. Commanding.
It was the kind of power that made Alphas bow. The kind of power that hadn't existed in this world for fifty years. The kind of power that was supposed to be dead and buried with the bloodlines the Council had hunted to extinction.
I pulled back from her neck and looked into her eyes.
She was terrified. Absolutely terrified. Her eyes were wide and glowing now. Actually glowing with gold light that shouldn't have been there.
And she was looking at me like she'd just realized what I'd discovered.
That she wasn't what anyone thought she was.
That she was something the world believed was dead.
That binding myself to her meant I was now tied to the most dangerous thing alive.
The crowd was cheering. I could hear them celebrating. Could hear the happiness about the political union that had just been sealed.
But none of that mattered.
All that mattered was the girl in my arms who was shaking like her entire world had just collapsed. All that mattered was the mark I'd just made on her neck that was glowing with magic I'd never seen before. All that mattered was the fact that my wife was something ancient and powerful and absolutely going to get us all killed.
I pulled her closer and whispered in her ear so only she could hear.
"You're not an Omega."
It wasn't a question.
She didn't answer. Just shook her head slightly, her eyes still locked on mine.
"The Council doesn't know," I continued. "Evangeline doesn't know it's this powerful."
"They'll kill me," Sienna whispered. Her voice was breaking. "When they find out. They'll kill me."
"Not if they don't find out," I said.
The crowd was getting louder. Wolves were pressing closer, wanting to see the newly marked bride. Wanting to celebrate the Alpha King's binding ceremony.
I pulled Sienna close enough that no one could see her face except me. Made it look like we were having an intimate moment when really I was looking at a girl who'd just realized she was carrying a secret that was about to destroy everything.
"We keep this quiet," I said. "Three days until the ceremony is official and the Council witnesses leave. Three days to figure out what we're going to do."
"And after?" she asked.
"After we burn it down," I said, and I meant it. I meant every single word.
Her eyes widened slightly.
The music was still playing. The crowd was still cheering. My pack was celebrating the political marriage that was supposed to keep them safe.
But I was already calculating. Already planning. Already understanding that everything had just changed.
The Council thought they'd given me an Omega bride to keep me controlled.
Instead they'd given me a woman carrying the blood of the Ancients.
A woman whose power was waking up.
A woman who was now magically bound to me in a way that meant if she went down, I went down with her.
My wolf was pacing inside my skin. Not with fear. With something that felt almost like excitement.
Because somewhere in the last three days of investigation and secret research, I'd started to understand something.
The Council wasn't powerful because of their politics or their strategies.
They were only powerful because people believed they were.
And if I stood beside a woman who could command entire species with her will, if I showed the world what she really was, if I let her become what she was meant to be, that belief would shatter.
Sienna was still looking at me like she couldn't believe what I was suggesting.
But I could see it. Could see the moment she understood that I wasn't asking her to hide anymore.
That I was asking her to become.
"What happens now?" she asked, and her voice was steadier now. Like part of her was already accepting what she was.
I looked at this girl who'd walked into my castle three days ago as a servant and was now something that could change the entire world.
"Now we prepare," I said.
And as the crowd celebrated around us and my wolf sang inside my chest, I realized that the Council had made a mistake that was going to cost them everything.
They'd bound me to someone more powerful than any of them.
And I was going to help her burn them down.