Reborn As The Lycan King's Fated Mate

Ivy POV

The heavy thud of iron doors opening echoed through the damp stone chamber.

Darius stepped into the flickering torchlight, draped in the majestic robes of the Lycan King. I lifted my head, a desperate plea dying in my throat as I met his eyes. There was no love. Only absolute, freezing disgust.

"Did you really think I would crown a wolfless bastard as my Luna?" Darius's voice echoed off the damp stone walls, shattering my final illusion. "I never loved you, Ivy. I killed Tate. I framed Kyler. You were nothing but a convenient weapon to clear my path to the throne and avenge my beloved Adamaris."

He glanced at my stomach, his lip curling. "Whip her with the silver lash. Thirty times a day until she rots."

He turned and walked away, leaving me drowning in a sea of shattered faith. I screamed his name, a hoarse, blood-choked sound, but he didn't look back.

Before the echo of my scream could fade, a litter carried by Omega servants was lowered into the cell. Sitting upon it, draped in the opulent silks of the Luna Queen, was Denisse. Her useless legs were hidden beneath velvet, but her beautiful face was twisted in a victorious, venomous smile.

"Look at you," Denisse purred, signaling the guard to pause his silver whip. "The great assassin. The loyal lover. You sacrificed everything for a man who despises you."

I thrashed against the silver chains, the metal searing my bones. "I should have aimed that blade at your throat, Denisse!"

She laughed, a high, grating sound. "But you didn't. And now, I get to watch you die. But before you do, little sister, there is one last thing you need to know about the Lycan King you murdered."

She leaned forward, her eyes gleaming with malicious delight. "Did you never wonder why Kyler let you kill him? Why a Lycan King with unmatched power didn't tear you to shreds the moment you drew that silver dagger?"

My breath hitched. The agonizing burn in my collarbones suddenly felt distant, eclipsed by a cold dread pooling in my stomach.

"He knew, Ivy," Denisse whispered, her words slicing deeper than any physical blade. "Kyler knew you were his Fated Mate. He loved you so much that he chose to die by your hand rather than hurt you."

The world stopped spinning. The air vanished from my lungs.

The stench of my own rotting flesh mixed with the suffocating scent of wolfsbane in the Silvermoon Dungeon. Thick silver chains pierced directly through my collarbones, the holy metal burning my skin and completely severing my werewolf healing abilities. I hung there, a broken, wolfless prisoner, my slightly swollen belly a cruel mockery of the future I thought I was fighting for.

I had done it all for him. For Darius.

When my adoptive father, the legendary Gamma Tate, was assassinated, Darius fabricated the royal scent and traces at the crime scene. With my wolfless senses, I couldn't see through the lie. I believed Lycan King Kyler was the tyrant who destroyed my family.

So, I became Darius's blade. I used Kyler's inexplicable leniency toward me to get close. In the Great Hall, I plunged a silver dagger coated in high-grade wolfsbane straight into Kyler's heart. He possessed the terrifying strength of a Lycan King, yet he didn't even raise a hand to stop me.

Because I was wolfless, I had never felt the pull. I had never recognized his scent. I had taken the only soul in this world who truly loved me, the only one who could have given me the Soul's Peace, and I had driven a poisoned silver blade into his heart.

Ivy POV

The realization tore through me, more agonizing than the thick silver chains piercing my collarbones.

*Fated Mate.*

My mind flashed back to the Great Hall. When I drove that silver dagger coated in high-grade wolfsbane into Kyler's chest, the Lycan King hadn't fought back. With his terrifying, unmatched strength, he could have snapped my neck before I even blinked. Instead, he had just looked at me. There was no anger in his eyes, only a profound, tragic devotion. He had recognized my scent. He knew I was his Fated Mate, and he chose to let me kill him rather than harm me.

A phantom wail echoed in the deepest, emptiest part of my soul. I had destroyed the sacred Mate-bond. I had slaughtered the only man who could have given me the Soul's Peace, all for a lie.

"Crying for the tyrant?" Denisse sneered from her opulent litter, her voice dripping with venom. "Don't waste your tears, Ivy. I have one last gift for you before you rot."

She leaned forward, her gaze dropping to my slightly swollen belly. "Did you honestly believe a royal Alpha like Darius would ever touch a wolfless stray like you? That you were carrying his pup?"

My breath caught. The cold dread in my stomach turned to pure ice.

"Darius wouldn't soil his hands," Denisse laughed, a high, grating sound that bounced off the damp stone walls. "He arranged a substitute for that night in the dark. A filthy, wandering Rogue named Stuart Snider. He reeked of rotting flesh, but he was more than happy to breed a blind, desperate fool."

*No.*

The word wouldn't form. The ultimate humiliation crashed over me, suffocating me. I wasn't carrying the pup of the man I thought I loved. I was carrying a Rogue's bastard. I had been nothing but a pawn, a joke, a disposable weapon.

The betrayal, the crushing guilt of Kyler's death, and the searing agony of the holy metal finally broke me. A violent cough racked my body, and thick, dark blood spilled from my lips, staining my torn clothes. My vision darkened. As my spirit shattered completely, I welcomed the suffocating blackness, taking my boundless, burning hatred into the void.

*

I gasped, my lungs expanding violently as if breaking the surface of a frozen lake.

There was no stench of rotting flesh. No suffocating wolfsbane. Instead, the faint, crisp scent of lilies and rain filled my nose-*my* scent.

I blinked against the sudden, blinding sunlight. I was lying on a velvet blanket draped over a chaise longue. Across the room, a pale blue coat hung near a carved oak round table, and a wooden-framed vanity mirror reflected a face I hadn't seen in years.

I wasn't in the Silvermoon Dungeon. I was in my old bedroom at the Russell Estate.

"Miss Ivy? Are you alright? You look like you've seen a ghost."

I whipped my head around. Standing there, holding a stack of fresh towels, was Kaya. My loyal Omega maid. She was young, her face unmarred by the brutal torture that would eventually claim her life. She was alive.

I stared at my hands. They were small, unscarred by silver blades. I was fifteen. I hadn't experienced my first shift yet. I was still the despised, wolfless fifth daughter of the Russell Pack.

The Moon Goddess had given me a second chance.

"Kaya," I choked out, my voice trembling. "What time is it?"

Kaya blinked, startled by my intensity. "It's almost three in the afternoon, Miss."

*Three PM.*

The memory struck me like a physical blow. Today was the turning point of my miserable past life. At three o'clock today, my father's vicious mistress, Jackie, would slip a variant of liquid silver and wolfsbane into the medicine of my adoptive mother, the High Luna Josephine. It was the poison that would permanently blind her and cripple her Inner Wolf.

And tonight... tonight was the night Jackie and Denisse would shove a foul-smelling servant into my room to frame me for infidelity, destroying my arranged marriage to Denver Mason, the third son of the Mason Pack.

My sorrow and guilt instantly hardened into a cold, lethal resolve.

I didn't have time to explain anything to Kaya. I threw off the velvet blanket and sprinted toward the door. I had to get to the Luna's Suite. I had failed Kyler in my past life, but I would not let them destroy the only mother who had ever loved me.

Ivy POV

I didn't stop running until my bare feet hit the polished marble outside the Luna's Suite. I shoved the heavy oak doors open, my chest heaving.

The acrid stench of wolfsbane mixed with a sharp, metallic odor hit my nose instantly. In the center of the grand room, my adoptive mother, High Luna Josephine, lay pale and frail against the pillows. Standing over her was the loyal Omega maid, Kortney, holding a porcelain bowl filled with a steaming, pitch-black liquid to Josephine's lips.

"Stop!" I screamed, lunging forward.

I slapped the bowl out of Kortney's hands. It shattered against the polished oak floor. The moment the black liquid touched the wood, it hissed violently, sending up plumes of stinging white smoke.

Kortney shrieked, stumbling back. "Miss Ivy! What are you doing? That's the Luna's medicine!"

"That is high-grade liquid silver," I snarled, my eyes locked on the burning floor. If Josephine had swallowed that, it would have permanently blinded her and completely destroyed her already weakened Inner Wolf.

I didn't waste another second. I grabbed a pair of heavy shears from the vanity and climbed onto the bed.

"Ivy, my sweet girl..." Josephine whispered, her voice trembling with exhaustion.

"Trust me, Mother," I said softly, before driving the shears into her luxurious velvet quilt. I ripped the fabric open, pulling apart the pristine white cotton.

Kortney gasped, covering her mouth.

Crawling blindly through the stuffing were over a dozen mutated leeches. They were thick, black, and grotesquely bloated with Luna blood. These parasites had been slowly draining Josephine, injecting micro-doses of silver toxin into her system to keep her Inner Wolf dormant. It wasn't a rare wasting disease. It was a calculated assassination.

I grabbed the remaining shards of the broken bowl and poured the last dregs of the liquid silver directly onto the nest of parasites. They writhed and stiffened, dying instantly in the toxic puddle.

"Gather these disgusting corpses," I ordered Kortney, my voice cold and authoritative. "Bury them deep under The Ancient Pear Tree in the courtyard. Tell no one."

As Kortney scrambled to obey, I knelt beside the bed and took Josephine's freezing hands. Tears welled in her beautiful eyes as the horrifying truth dawned on her.

She thought I was the illegitimate daughter of her Alpha husband, Carlton, and his vicious mistress, Jackie. She didn't know the dark truth I had carried since my past life: Jackie, a terrified wolfless woman, had stolen me as an infant to replace her own stillborn, hiring Rogues to slaughter my true parents-Northern Lycan guards. Jackie had no maternal bond with me. When I was six, she deliberately abandoned me in the rotting, Rogue-infested borders of The Dead Lands.

It was Josephine who had tracked my scent. Josephine who had brought me back from the brink of death. She was the only mother my soul recognized.

"Jackie did this," Josephine breathed, her voice hardening as she stared at the dead leeches. The submission that had clouded her eyes for months vanished, replaced by the fierce, undeniable aura of a High Luna.

"Where is Falon?" I asked suddenly, scanning the room.

"She asked for the afternoon off," Josephine replied, her brow furrowing.

A chilling realization washed over me. Falon, the Omega maid in charge of the bedding. In my past life, shortly after Josephine's death, Falon's bloated body was found floating in The Moon Lake. Jackie had silenced her to cover up the leeches.

"Falon isn't coming back," I said quietly, squeezing Josephine's hands. "Jackie bought her, and now Jackie will dispose of her. Mother, you have to fight back. Use your Luna authority. I won't let her hurt you ever again."

Josephine nodded slowly, her grip on my hands tightening with newfound resolve.

I left the Luna's Suite as the afternoon sun began to dip, casting long, bloody shadows across the estate. The first battle was won, but the war was just beginning.

I walked back to my bedroom, my mind calculating the next strike. Tonight, Alpha Derrick Mason and his wife were arriving for a grand banquet to celebrate my engagement to their third son, Denver.

I stood by my window, staring out at the darkening courtyard. I knew exactly what was coming. Denver Mason, fresh from his first shift and arrogant with his new Dire Wolf power, despised the idea of mating a "wolfless" girl like me. Tonight, he and my malicious half-sister, Denisse, would execute their trap. They planned to pump wolfsbane gas into my room, drag my unconscious body out to the Ancient Pear Tree in the courtyard, toss a filthy, stinking servant on top of me in the dirt, and frame me for infidelity right there in the open where every guest could witness my shame.

In my past life, that night had ruined me.

But this time, I was ready. I traced the faint, invisible outline of the pear blossom birthmark on my forehead. Let them come. I was going to tear their arrogant little plot to shreds.