The Omega Bait Who Rose as the Silver Queen
The wind howling through the dense ancient pines of the oak haven borders carried the distinct metallic scent of copper.
Stella Belmont shivered the rusted iron chains biting cruelly into her wrists.
The rough bark of the dead oak tree scraped against her spine offering no comfort against the biting frost of the late autumn night.
She was an omega the lowest ranking member of the Oak Haven pack.
But she had always been loyal.
When Alpha Gregory Hayes had summoned her to the pack house earlier that evening she had foolishly believed it was for an assignment perhaps tending to the winter stores or assisting the healers.
Instead Gregory’s elite guards had ambushed her binding her hands and dragging her to the absolute edge of their territory an area known as the dead zone.
It is for the greater good Stella Gregory had whispered his breath hot and foul against her ear as his men slathered a thick putrid mixture of deer blood and marrow over her woolen tunic.
The rogue wolves have slaughtered six of our patrols.
They are starving desperate.
We need to draw them to a single point to ambush them.
You are serving your pack.
But as the hours ticked by and the freezing fog rolled in Stella realized the horrifying truth.
There was no ambush party waiting in the brush.
There were no Oak Haven warriors poised in the canopy above.
Gregory hadn’t set a trap to catch the rogues.
He had set a table.
Stella was merely a sacrificial lamb an offering meant to appease the savage rogue pack led by the notorious Bartholomew Collins in a desperate bid to buy Oak Haven a few more weeks of peace.
Tears froze on Stella’s pale cheeks.
She tugged at the chains her shoulders screaming in agony.
The iron was forged thick impervious to the strength of an omega who had not been allowed to shift into her wolf form in years.
Then the woods went deathly silent.
The crickets stopped their chirping.
The wind seemed to hold its breath.
From the absolute darkness of the eastern ridge a low guttural snarl reverberated through the earth vibrating up through the soles of Stella’s tattered boots.
They were here.
A pair of sickly yellow eyes pierced the fog followed by another and then another.
Six massive mangy wolves stepped into the moonlight.
They were horrifyingly gaunt their ribs jutting against matted fur but their sheer size and feral desperation made them lethal.
Leading them was Bartholomew a hulking beast missing half his left ear his jaws already slavering at the heavy scent of blood rolling off Stella.
Stella squeezed her eyes shut her heart hammering frantically against her ribs.
She prayed for it to be quick.
She braced for the tearing of flesh the agonizing crunch of bone.
Bartholomew lunged his massive jaw snapping open to tear out her throat.
But the fatal bite never came.
Instead the night sky was torn apart by a roar so deafening so absolute in its dominance that the remaining five rogues instantly dropped to their bellies whimpering.
The obsidian wolf slammed into the rogue leader with the force of a battering ram.
The impact sounded like an explosion of bone and muscle.
Bartholomew was thrown thirty feet through the air crashing through a thicket of dead trees before slamming into a boulder.
He didn’t rise.
The remaining rogues scrambled in pure terror but the obsidian wolf was not alone.
From the treeline a dozen elite warriors shifted seamlessly from their wolf forms into men clad in dark heavy leather and chain mail wielding broad swords that gleamed silver in the dark.
In less than sixty seconds the rogue threat that had terrorized Oak Haven for months was entirely eradicated.
The obsidian wolf turned slowly its massive paws sinking into the frosty mud as it approached the oak tree.
Stella trembled violently pressing herself as far back into the bark as she could.
The wolf stopped inches from her.
Its eyes were a piercing luminescent gold swirling with an ancient terrifying intelligence.
The beast leaned in sniffing the horrific deer blood smeared across her clothes and a low rumbling growl of pure disgust vibrated in its cheSt. Not disgust directed at her disgust at the bait.
Right before Stella’s wide terrified eyes the giant wolf’s bones began to crack and reform.
The shift was agonizingly fast a display of raw power.
Where the obsidian beast had stood a man now rose.
He was breathtakingly tall his body a map of corded muscle and faint silvery battle scars.
His jaw was clenched tight his golden eyes locked intensely onto hers.
One of his guards rushed forward hastily draping a heavy furlined velvet cloak over his sovereign’s shoulders.
My king the guard murmured bowing his head in absolute submission.
Stella’s breath hitched.
This was not a border patrol.
This was Dominic Vane the alpha king of Ethalgard the supreme ruler of the Northern Territories.
And he was staring at her as if she were the only living thing in the foreSt. King Dominic stepped closer the rich velvet of his cloak brushing the frozen mud.
He reached out his large calloused hands gripping the heavy iron chains that bound Stella to the oak.
He didn’t ask for a key.
With a sharp exhale and the flex of his forearms the ancient metal groaned bent and snapped like dry twigs.
Stella collapsed forward her legs numb from the cold and terror.
She prepared to hit the frozen earth but strong arms caught her instantly.
Dominic pulled her against his chest completely ignoring the putrid deer blood that immediately stained his royal garments.
His body radiated an intense unnatural heat that seeped through her frozen skin and the scent of him pine needles wood smoke and rainwashed stone overwhelmed her senses calming the frantic beating of her heart.
You are freezing Dominic stated his voice a deep gravelly baritone that commanded the very air around them.
He pulled his own furlined cloak off his shoulders and wrapped it securely around Stella’s trembling frame.
I I am an omega of Oak Haven Stella stammered her voice raspy and weak.
You shouldn’t.
I know exactly what you are Dominic interrupted softly his golden eyes tracing the tear tracks on her dirt-smudged cheeks.
A strange unreadable emotion flickered in his gaze a volatile mix of absolute rage and profound realization and I know exactly what they did to you.
Before Stella could process his words the sound of snapping branches and heavy footsteps echoed from the western treeline.
Hold your ground a familiar voice shouted.
Alpha Gregory Hayes burst into the clearing flanked by twenty of Oak Haven’s finest warriors.
They charged in with weapons drawn panting heavily doing a spectacular job of looking like a rescue party that had just arrived.
Gregory skidded to a halt his eyes widening in genuine shock as he took in the scene.
He saw the slaughtered rogues the broken iron chains dangling from the oak tree and most paralyzingly the Alpha King himself standing protectively over Stella Belmont.
King Dominic Gregory gasped quickly dropping to one knee a gesture his warriors instantly mirrored.
Your grace we we did not expect you in our territory.
We were rushing to intercept these vile rogues.
They ambushed one of my pack members.
Dominic’s expression turned to stone.
The air pressure in the clearing plummeted growing thick and heavy with the king’s suffocating alpha aura.
Stella instinctively shrank back but Dominic’s hand rested gently on her shoulder a silent promise of safety.
An ambush Alpha Hayes Dominic’s voice was deathly quiet yet it carried over the wind like thunder.
He slowly stepped away from Stella advancing toward the kneeling alpha.
Yes sire Gregory stammered beads of sweat breaking out on his forehead despite the freezing temperature.
They snatched poor Stella from our borders.
We came as swiftly as we could.
Fascinating Dominic sneered stopping just inches from Gregory.
The king gestured lazily to the broken chains still attached to the tree and I suppose the starving rogues took the time to meticulously bolt her to an oak tree with Oak Haven steel.
I suppose they also bathed her in deer blood to make her scent carry across the valley.
Gregory swallowed hard his face draining of all color.
Sire I you used your own kind as bait Dominic roared.
The sudden explosion of sound causing every Oak Haven warrior to flinch.
The king’s eyes flashed a brilliant violent gold.
You chained an innocent woman to a tree and left her to be torn apart because you were too cowardly to hunt the rogues yourself.
She is an omega Gregory blurted out panic making him foolish.
She is the lowest of the pack.
It was a tactical sacrifice to save the lives of my warriors.
By pack law her life is mine to command.
A heavy silence fell over the clearing.
Dominic looked back at Stella.
She looked so small drowning in his massive cloak her eyes wide with the resigned sorrow of a woman who had never known anything but cruelty.
Something primal and fiercely possessive violently snapped into place within Dominic’s cheSt. The mate bond a legendary connection he had long thought himself too ruthless to ever experience was singing in his blood anchoring his very soul to the battered omega shivering in the snow.
Dominic turned his gaze back to Gregory his lips curling into a vicious predatory smile.
Pack law dictates you command your pack Dominic said his tone chillingly even.
But she is no longer of Oak Haven.
Gregory blinked confused.
Sire I haven’t released her.
I am claiming her Dominic interrupted his voice echoing with absolute unquestionable authority.
By royal decree Stella Belmont is now under the direct protection of the crown.
She belongs to Ethalgard.
Gasps rippled through the Oak Haven warriors.
To claim an omega from another pack without trade or negotiation was a severe insult an act of sheer dominance that completely undermined the local alpha.
You cannot do this Gregory protested rising slightly from his knee his pride momentarily overriding his fear.
She is Oak Haven property.
You overstep your bounds king or not.
In the blink of an eye Dominic crossed the distance.
His hand shot out wrapping around Gregory’s throat.
With a terrifying display of strength the king lifted the Oak Haven alpha clean off the ground.
Gregory choked his hands scrabbling uselessly against Dominic’s iron grip.
Listen to me very carefully Hayes Dominic whispered his voice vibrating with lethal intent.
If you or your men ever speak her name again if you ever look in her direction or if you take one step across the borders into my kingdom to look for her I will return to Oak Haven and I will not leave a single stone standing.
Dominic tossed Gregory aside like a piece of garbage.
The alpha hit the dirt coughing and gasping for air while his warriors remained frozen in terror.
The king turned his back on the pathetic display and walked over to Stella.
Without a word he stooped down and swept her effortlessly into his arms lifting her against his broad cheSt. Stella gasped instinctively wrapping her arms around his neck.
Where are we going?
She whispered her voice trembling as the royal guards formed a protective circle around them.
Dominic looked down at her the lethal coldness in his eyes melting away into something fiercely warm and protective.
Home.
The fortress of Ethalgard was not the cold unforgiving stone dungeon Stella had expected.
Nestled deep within the treacherous peaks of the northern mountains the royal estate was a marvel of warm hearths sweeping tapestries and glass conservatories that bloomed with winter roses.
For the first three weeks Stella was treated not as a rescued omega but as a dignitary.
She was given a suite bathed in natural light silken gowns to replace her bloodstained rags and rich nutrient-dense meals that slowly erased the gauntness from her cheeks.
Yet the gilded cage felt like a fragile illusion.
Stella lived in constant agonizing anticipation of the other shoe dropping.
In her experience alphas did not show kindness without demanding a brutal price.
But King Dominic Vane defied every rule she had been beaten into believing.
He visited her every evening never crossing the threshold of her chambers without explicit permission.
He didn’t demand submission.
He demanded conversation.
He asked about her favorite books her dreams before the Oak Haven pack had crushed them and her fears.
He was terrifyingly powerful a man who could level mountains with his bare hands.
Yet he handled Stella as if she were made of spun glass.
It was during one of these quiet evenings sitting by the crackling fireplace in the royal library that Dominic finally broached the subject that hung heavily in the air between them.
You flinch when I say the word mate Dominic observed his deep voice barely rising above the crackle of the logs.
He sat across from her a crystal tumbler of amber liquid resting casually on his knee his golden eyes fixed on her with intense unwavering focus.
Stella swallowed hard her fingers tightening around the woolen shawl draped over her shoulders.
Because omegas do not have mates your grace.
We are utility.
We are bred for labor or in my case for bait.
The goddess does not waste the sacred bond on the weak.
Dominic’s jaw clenched so hard a muscle feathered in his cheek.
The crystal tumbler in his hand let out a dangerous high-pitched whine threatening to shatter under his sudden grip.
The goddess does not make mistakes Stella and the pack that convinced you of your weakness will burn for their deception.
He set the glass down sharply and leaned forward resting his elbows on his knees.
I did not claim you merely to spite Gregory Hayes.
I claimed you because my soul recognized yours the second I dropped into that clearing.
But there is more to this.
Your scent it has been masked suppressed by years of ingesting wolfsbane and silver-laced water.
I had my royal healers analyze the blood drawn from your clothes.
Stella stared at him her heart hammering.
Wolfsbane.
But that is poison.
Why would they slowly poison me?
To keep you from shifting Dominic answered grimly.
To keep your true wolf locked away and I needed to know why.
Oak Haven is a minor territory.
They do not have the cunning to orchestrate a generational suppression without a very lucrative reason.
The heavy oak doors of the library groaned open.
A royal guard stepped inside bowing deeply.
My king the human liaison has arrived as requested.
Dominic nodded.
Send him in.
Stella shrank back slightly as a human man entered the room.
He was older dressed in an impeccably tailored charcoal suit clutching a brass-bound leather briefcase.
He reeked of ink old paper and a faint trace of expensive cigar smoke.
Stella this is Lord Henry Ator Dominic introduced.
He is the head of the Ator estate a real private family of human aristocrats who have secretly managed the financial and genealogical records of the werewolf packs since the signing of the old world pacts in 1842.
The Ator private vaults hold truths that alphas have spent centuries trying to burn.
Henry Ator bowed respectfully to Stella his eyes twinkling with a mix of curiosity and deep reverence.
It is an absolute honor my lady.
When the king requested a deep dive into the Belmont lineage I personally descended into the Ator subterranean archives.
What I found well it explains Alpha Gregory’s treasonous actions.
He unlatched his briefcase pulling out a crumbling yellowed parchment sealed with faded silver wax.
He spread it carefully across the mahogany coffee table.
You are not an omega Stella Ator said his voice dropping to a hushed reverent whisper.
Your great-grandfather was the alpha of the Silver Crest Pack the original rulers of the Eastern Valleys.
The Hayes family did not conquer your ancestors in a fair challenge.
They slaughtered them in their sleep and usurped the territory.
Stella’s breath hitched.
Her head spun wildly.
That’s impossible.
I have no power.
I have no presence.
Because you were poisoned from infancy Dominic growled stepping closer to her his presence a heavy comforting blanket against her rising panic.
Gregory Hayes knew that if the pack ever sensed the royal Silver Crest blood in your veins they would overthrow him.
But he couldn’t kill you.
Killing an innocent royal bloodline outright brings a blood curse upon a pack.
So he enslaved you.
He degraded you.
And when the rogue wolves became a problem he saw an opportunity to let them do his dirty work for him.
The revelation crashed over Stella like an icy tidal wave.
Her entire life the beatings the starvation the agonizing chains in the freezing woods was not because she was worthless.
It was because she was a threat.
She was the rightful heir to the very lands she had been tortured on.
They stole my life Stella whispered hot tears of absolute fury spilling over her lashes.
For the first time in her twenty-two years the emotion blooming in her chest wasn’t fear.
It was rage pure unadulterated blinding rage.
Dominic knelt before her taking her trembling hands in his large warm ones.
And I am going to help you take it back.
But first we must wake your wolf.
The transition was not a secret kept tightly enough.
Whispers of Stella’s true lineage leaked from the royal healers down to the castle staff and eventually into the ears of Lord Gideon Dominic’s notoriously traditionalist military commander.
Gideon despised the idea of the alpha king taking a battered unknown female as his mate believing it made the crown look weak to the southern kingdoMs. When Gideon learned of the Ator archives revelation his prejudice turned to outright treason.
He quietly dispatched a raven to Oak Haven warning Gregory Hayes that the true Silver Crest heir was alive recovering and preparing to reclaim her stolen throne.
Two nights before the winter solstice the betrayal struck.
Dominic had ridden out to the northern ridges to investigate a border skirmish a skirmish secretly orchestrated by Gideon to draw the king away from the fortress.
Stella was left alone in the glass conservatory tending to the winter roses that had become a sanctuary.
The heavy glass doors clicked shut the sound echoing ominously.
Stella turned wiping dirt from her silk dress only to find Lord Gideon standing by the exit flanked by four rogue mercenaries dressed in unmarked leather armor.
A tragic accident Gideon sneered his hand resting casually on the hilt of his broadsword.
The traumatized omega unable to cope with the pressures of the royal court threw herself from the highest balcony of the conservatory.
The king will mourn but the kingdom will be saved from a weak tainted queen.
Stella backed away her heart hammering against her ribs.
The poison had been completely flushed from her system over the past month but she still hadn’t managed to shift.
The mental block built by years of trauma was too thick.
Dominic will know Stella said trying to keep her voice steady though her knees knocked together.
He will tear you limb from limb.
He will have to prove it first Gideon laughed coldly gesturing to the mercenaries.
Take her.
Make it look like a struggle but ensure she goes over the glass railing.
The men lunged.
As the first mercenary grabbed her arm his grip bruising and harsh a terrifying echo rang through Stella’s mind.
It was the same grip the Oak Haven guards had used when they dragged her to the oak tree.
The same brutal dismissive violence.
No.
The word wasn’t spoken.
It detonated inside her soul.
A profound agonizing heat exploded in Stella’s cheSt. The mental walls she had built to survive her slavery violently shattered.
The air in the conservatory abruptly dropped by twenty degrees.
The glass panes frosting over instantly.
Gideon stepped back his arrogant sneer faltering as an oppressive suffocating aura flooded the room.
It wasn’t the dark thunderous dominance of King Dominic.
This was something ancient sharp and blindingly bright.
Stella screamed but the sound morphed halfway through into a deafening bone-rattling roar.
Bones snapped and reformed with terrifying speed.
A shift that carried the raw unrefined power of a royal bloodline suppressed for over two decades.
Where the fragile woman had stood a magnificent wolf now crouched.
She was massive nearly as large as Dominic himself her coat a blinding iridescent silver that seemed to glow with its own internal moonlight.
Her eyes once a soft hazel were now a piercing luminous sapphire.
The Silver Crest alpha had awakened.
The mercenaries froze sheer terror overriding their greed.
But Stella didn’t hesitate.
With a burst of speed that shattered the stone tiles beneath her paws she launched herself at the closest attacker.
She didn’t kill him.
She hit him with the flat of her massive shoulder sending him crashing through a row of marble planters rendering him instantly unconscious.
Gideon drew his sword panic setting into his eyes.
Kill the beaSt. Kill her.
But before the remaining mercenaries could raise their weapons the massive glass dome of the conservatory shattered inward.
A shower of deadly shards rained down as an obsidian blur dropped from the sky.
King Dominic landed with the force of a meteor the impact cratering the floor.
He hadn’t been fooled by the border skirmish.
He had caught the scent of Gideon’s treason the moment he crossed the valley.
Dominic shifted into his human form in a split second his golden eyes blazing with a wrath so absolute it seemed to suck the oxygen from the room.
He didn’t even draw his weapon.
He simply backhanded the nearest mercenary sending the man flying through the frosted glass wall and out into the snow.
Gideon dropped his sword falling to his knees in abject terror.
My king she attacked us.
I was merely defending.
Dominic’s voice was a low lethal vibration that commanded the blood to stop flowing in Gideon’s veins.
Dominic didn’t look at the traitor.
His eyes were fixed on the magnificent silver wolf standing amidst the ruined roses.
Stella panted softly her sapphire eyes locked on her mate.
The mate bond previously a quiet hum in her chest was now a roaring symphony of belonging power and absolute devotion.
Stella stepped forward her massive silver head dropping in a graceful bow of acknowledgement before the silver light consumed her shifting her back into her human form.
She stood tall naked but unashamed her chin held high.
The timid broken omega was gone.
A queen stood in her place.
Dominic quickly shrugged off his heavy velvet cloak and draped it around her shoulders his hands lingering on her skin.
You are beautiful he murmured his voice thick with awe.
He turned back to Gideon his expression hardening into merciless stone.
Treason against the crown is punishable by death.
Treason against your queen means I erase your name from the histories.
Gideon was dragged away his screams echoing into the freezing night but Stella didn’t flinch.
She leaned into Dominic’s side feeling the steady powerful rhythm of his heart.
The next morning the northern winds carried a new scent across the valleys.
King Dominic marched on Oak Haven not with an army but with his queen at his side.
Gregory Hayes was dragged from his pack house stripped of his alpha title and banished to the dead zone in chains.
The very same chains he had once used to bind Stella.
Stella stood on the balcony of the Ethalgard fortress looking out over a kingdom that was finally united.
She had been thrown to the wolves as bait a sacrificial lamb meant to die in the dark.
But the shadows had harbored a king and the darkness had only served to forge her crown.
