The silver bars hummed with quiet menace, pulsing softly beneath the pale moonlight that filtered through the cracked stone ceiling above. Lyra's fingers hovered inches from them, resisting the instinct to wrap around and shake them like some feral thing. She wasn't feral. Not yet. Not even after everything.
The floor was cold beneath her legs, packed with dirt and dusted in old blood. Her blood. Someone else's. She didn't know anymore. Maybe she didn't care.
But she remembered how she got here. Every vivid moment of it.
They thought she was broken. That she would give in like a good little she-wolf and beg for their protection—or their seed.
She almost laughed.
Instead, she leaned her head against the bars and whispered to herself, "They should've killed me."
Because now she knew their names. Their faces. Their weaknesses.
And she would make every one of them pay.
It had been raining the night they caught her.
Not the soft kind of rain that smelled like moss and dreams—but the violent kind that crashed like fists from the sky, punishing and cold.
Lyra had been running for days, her bare feet torn, her limbs screaming with exhaustion. She didn't know what territory she'd crossed into. She didn't care. She only knew that the scent of hunters was fading behind her and that meant she had a chance. A real one.
Until the trap snapped shut.
Silver spikes. Buried just beneath the surface, waiting.
She'd screamed.
Not because of the pain—but because she had been so godsdamned close.
Then came the men. Four of them. Their faces obscured by cloaks soaked in blood and rain. They didn't speak. Just bound her wrists and threw her into a cage in the back of a transport cart like she was already dead.
She'd blacked out for a while. The pain. The silver.
When she woke, it was to the sound of bidding.
The Auction House was older than sin.
A crumbling cathedral repurposed for flesh trade. Candles flickered along broken archways. The pews were lined with cloaked figures. Alpha-blooded men from every pack across the region. Powerful. Rich. Ruthless.
She'd been dragged into the center like a prize stallion, chains clinking against the marble floor, her body bruised and barely clothed.
"She's fertile," the auctioneer had said. "Confirmed. Pure blood. Unclaimed. Untouched."
A lie. She wasn't untouched—not in the ways they meant. She'd been touched by fire. By death. By survival.
And now, by fate.
The room had erupted into offers—growled promises of coin, land, blood. But only five had truly mattered.
The five who never bid aloud. Only stared.
Each from a different corner of the hall, cloaked in dominance and dripping with menace.
Ronan Thorn, the War Alpha, had been the first to step forward. His voice like gravel, his gaze like a blade. "She'll birth strong heirs. I want her."
His eyes raked her body as if imagining exactly how he'd use it. Lyra had held his gaze, unblinking, as if daring him to try.
Kael Blackwood, the Shadow Alpha, hadn't spoken at all. Just sat there, still and silent, his obsidian eyes taking her apart piece by piece with a look that stripped more than her skin.
She remembered how her pulse had quickened when his gaze had lingered—not with hunger, but calculation. He saw her for what she was: a weapon.
Silas Vane, the Healer Alpha, had looked… pained. Almost sorry. His eyes had flicked to her chains, her bruised knees, the cut on her lip. And then to the floor.
He was the only one who looked away.
Dorian Vale, her cousin—traitor, bastard—had smiled. That soft, poisonous smile he always wore. "She belongs with me," he said silkily. "I'll pay double."
Her blood had roared in her ears.
The memory of his hand shoving her toward the bounty hunters still burned in her bones. And now he wanted to buy her?
She'd spit at his feet.
The room had gone still.
And then… a voice had cut through the silence like smoke over a battlefield.
"Triple," he'd said, lazy and amused.
Lucien Draven.
He hadn't looked at her like the others. No hunger. No cruelty. Just... curiosity.
He stood at the back, leaned against a marble pillar with arms crossed over his chest, one brow raised like he was watching a poorly acted play.
The other Alphas had tensed.
And then the auctioneer, eyes wide with greed, made the call.
"Joint custody," he'd declared. "Five Alphas. One she-wolf. Shared property. Bound by blood and contract."
The room had erupted again, but Lyra? She had only stared at Lucien.
Because for one split second, before they took her away again, he winked.
Back in her cage, she let the memory settle like dust over old wounds.
Five Alphas.
Five marks carved into her skin like brands. One from each of them, seared into her collarbone the night they took her.
They didn't even ask.
Just marked her. Claimed her. As if she were some treasure map or shared bottle of wine.
But wolves didn't share.
Not for long.
And Lyra… Lyra didn't break.
Not for men. Not for Alphas. Not for fate.
She shifted on the ground, curling her knees to her chest, her mind already working.
She'd give each of them what they wanted—just enough. A touch. A kiss. A glance. She'd twist their desires into weapons.
Until they turned on each other.
Until the cage disappeared.
Until she decided who lived and who burned.
She thought of Ronan's brutal stare, Kael's calculating stillness, Silas's almost-boyish sorrow. Of Dorian's betrayal. And then… of Lucien.
The one who didn't fit.
The one who smiled like he'd already read her mind.
The one who hadn't touched her—but left the deepest bruise.
The door to the cage creaked open.
She didn't flinch. Didn't look.
But the scent that rolled in—smoky, pine-sharp, and laced with rain—made her spine stiffen.
"Comfortable?" came Lucien Draven's voice.
She slowly turned her head to meet him.
His eyes gleamed with amusement. But underneath… something else. Something ancient. Something dangerous.
"I've been waiting for you," she said calmly.
Lucien arched a brow. "Yeah? Why's that?"
"Because you're the only one I haven't figured out yet."
He took a step inside, the door shutting behind him with a click.
"And what makes you think I'll let you?"
She stood slowly, every inch of her body radiating control. Her chains rattled, silver links kissing the floor.
"I don't need your permission," she said, stepping closer. "Just your attention."
Lucien's smirk faded slightly. Not in anger—but in interest. Deep, bone-deep interest.
The kind that meant danger.
The kind that meant she was no longer the only predator in the room.
He took another step toward her. Close enough that the silver chains between her wrists brushed his belt.
Close enough that she felt his heat.
"I hope you're ready, little wolf," he said, voice low. "Because I don't play nice. And I don't share well."
He leaned in, brushing his mouth beside her ear.
"You may have marked us. But you? You're already mine."