THE PERKY OMEGA BUILT A RAFT FOR A STRANDED WOLF—SHE HAD NO IDEA SHE WAS SAVING THE ALPHA KING

SHE THOUGHT SHE HAD RESCUED A STRAY WOLF—THEN HE WALKED OUT OF THE FIRE AS THE ALPHA KING

The truth came for Sorrel in flames.

After nine days of floodwater, the river finally began to settle. Refugees crowded into the hilltown, and Sorrel continued caring for injured villagers, orphaned lambs, and anyone else who needed her.

The enormous black wolf never left her side.

Then Lady Vesper Hail arrived.

Vesper was beautiful, wealthy, and certain she belonged beside the Alpha King. She had known Kyle since childhood and arrived expecting to reclaim his attention.

Instead, she found Sorrel.

The penniless bellkeeper was sitting in a temple barn, splinting a shepherd boy’s arm while the giant black wolf lay across the doorway like a furry guard.

Vesper looked Sorrel up and down.

“So you’re the little flood witch everyone is talking about.”

Sorrel merely smiled.

“I’ve never met the king,” she said. “Would you like some soup? You look cold.”

For one second, Vesper didn’t know how to respond.

Then she reached out and grabbed Sorrel’s chin.

The wolf stood.

He didn’t growl.

He didn’t lunge.

He simply rose to his full height.

Every wolf-blooded person in the barn suddenly felt the weight of something ancient and powerful.

Vesper stared into his golden eyes.

And finally, she understood.

“Oh.”

Torin, Kyle’s exhausted beta, appeared behind her.

“Oh, you absolute idiot,” he muttered.

But Sorrel still didn’t know.

Not completely.

That night, she lay in the barn loft beside the wolf, fingers tangled gently in his fur.

She whispered the truth she couldn’t tell anyone else.

“I think I’ve fallen for someone I’ve never even met.”

The wolf remained perfectly still.

Inside him, the Alpha King was panicking.

Tell her.

But before he could reveal himself, fire erupted below.

Someone from Vesper’s escort had returned in the night, angry and humiliated. He poured lamp oil through the barn, intending only to frighten Sorrel.

Instead, the entire loft caught fire.

Sorrel woke to screaming lambs.

And, as always, she tried to save everyone except herself.

The roof collapsed.

The doorway disappeared beneath burning timber.

The lambs were trapped.

And Sorrel was trapped with them.

Then the wolf charged through the flames.

He couldn’t carry an adult woman and two lambs through the burning wreckage.

So Kyle stopped hiding.

The enormous black wolf broke apart in the firelight.

Fur became skin.

Paws became hands.

The scar across his shoulder remained exactly where Sorrel had once found it.

And suddenly, standing before her was a tall, golden-eyed man.

The Alpha King.

Kyle Dravenmore.

He seized the burning beam with his bare hands and threw it aside.

“Out.”

It was the first word Sorrel had ever heard from his human mouth.

She stumbled into the rain.

Kyle carried the lambs behind her.

When Sorrel finally turned around, she stared at him in disbelief.

“You…”

Kyle dropped to one knee.

Sorrel pointed at him.

“You!”

Her face went scarlet.

“I bathed you!”

Kyle closed his eyes.

“I know.”

“I fed you!”

“I know.”

“I told you everything!”

“I know.”

“And you stole my mitten!”

Kyle hesitated.

“…Yes.”

“The lavender sachet?”

“Yes.”

“My ribbon?”

“Yes.”

“My socks?”

“…Also yes.”

Sorrel stared at him in absolute outrage.

Kyle finally lowered his head.

“I was a king,” he said quietly. “And a coward.”

That silenced her.

“I came to your river intending to stay for one hour. Then you shouted at me across a flood and came to rescue me with a door and two barrels.”

He touched the faded blue ribbon still tied around his wrist.

“No one had ever come to rescue me before.”

Sorrel’s anger didn’t disappear.

Neither did her hurt.

“You let me trust you because I thought you couldn’t understand me.”

“I know.”

“That was cruel.”

“Yes.”

She wiped soot from her cheek.

“I don’t forgive you tonight.”

Kyle nodded.

“I won’t ask you to.”

Then she narrowed her eyes.

“And you owe me a mitten.”

“I’ll have a thousand made.”

“I want mine.”

He winced.

“It’s under the third stilt of your house. Along with the sock.”

Sorrel blinked.

“The spoon?”

Kyle looked away.

“…Possibly.”

“The spoon?”

“I was conducting a strategic requisition.”

Despite herself, Sorrel laughed.

It was the same unguarded laugh that had captivated him from the beginning.

And Kyle knew he was completely lost.

He didn’t drag her to the capital.

He didn’t command her to become his queen.

Instead, he moved the royal flood-relief administration to the hilltown, rebuilt Low Marsh with royal timber, and began courting Sorrel openly.

Awkwardly.

Patiently.

Like an ordinary man trying to earn the trust of the woman he loved.

He brought her rare medicinal leeches from the southern marshes.

He repaired the bell tower.

He personally dug the stolen mitten, sock, and spoon out from beneath the third stilt while the entire village watched.

Sorrel stood nearby with her arms crossed, enjoying every second.

And sometimes, at night, the wolf still came to her door.

She would let him in.

He would curl beside her hearth.

And she would fall asleep with her hand buried in his black fur.

Some truths didn’t need explanations.

Eventually, even Lady Vesper understood.

Before leaving for the Grain Rivers, she found Sorrel alone at the dock.

“He never looked at any of us the way that wolf looked at you,” Vesper admitted quietly.

Then she smiled sadly.

“My mother would say you cheated.”

Sorrel laughed.

Vesper looked toward the river.

“Ask him if he was cold. No one ever does.”

Then she left.

Months later, on the first clear full moon of autumn, eleven packs gathered at Low Marsh.

Royal barges filled the river.

The rebuilt bell tower stood behind Sorrel.

And Kyle stood before the entire court with Sorrel’s hand in his.

He didn’t give a grand speech.

He simply said:

“For nine days, I lived here as a wolf.”

He looked at Sorrel.

“And this woman fed me the good end of the fish.”

A few wolves laughed.

Sorrel rolled her eyes.

Kyle smiled.

“She is mine, and I am hers.”

Then his expression became serious.

“And from this night forward, no pack of the Nine Rivers will ever again leave its bellkeeper alone at the water.”

The crowd fell silent.

“Whoever rings the warning bell will ring it with the pack at their back.”

Sorrel’s eyes filled with tears.

Kyle reached for her.

And when they completed their mating bond beneath the rebuilt bell tower, two hundred wolves lifted their heads and howled into the autumn night.

Even Osrich Fen, the old Alpha who had once allowed Sorrel’s family to be cast aside, howled louder than anyone.

The river had taken almost everything from Sorrel.

But it had also brought her a king.

Years later, the strangest sight in the Nine Rivers could still be found at Low Marsh.

A queen’s house stood stubbornly on black-oak stilts above the water.

It wasn’t a palace.

Sorrel refused to live in one.

A one-winged heron watched from the railing like a disapproving butler.

A bell hung above the porch.

And tied to the third stilt below was an old door lashed to two pickle barrels.

The royal shipwrights had offered countless times to destroy it.

Sorrel never allowed them to touch it.

It was the raft that had carried a king.

And beside the door, every winter evening, a gigantic black wolf rested his head in Sorrel’s lap while she repaired the bell rope.

Sometimes his tail thumped the boards.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

Knocking her spool into the river.

Sorrel looked down at him.

“Kyle.”

The wolf stared innocently at the ceiling.

She laughed.

Then she leaned down and kissed the top of his head.

Far below them, the river moved quietly beneath the moon.

Past the old flood marks.

Past the rebuilt bell.

Past the little raft that started everything.

And the bellkeeper who had once stood alone at the water was never alone again.

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