Unwanted Luna - Chapter #7 - by Nina Soelian

[Hector‘s POV]

I watched Xander storm back toward the pack house from the training grounds, his figure rigid with barely contained desire for bloodshed. My son had always been predictable in his defiance—wanting what I possessed, coveted my attention, my approval, my respect.

But this? This is different.

Now he's graduated to coveting my future Luna.

The way he'd looked at her, how close was to her, touched her like he had any fucking right… The pattern would be amusing if it weren't so inconvenient.

My son's interest is becoming problematic.

He circled her like a wolf who's caught a scent since childhood, and that particular kind of hunger in his eyes when he looks at her—I recognize it. I've seen it in my own reflection.

I forced myself to turn from the window, crossing to the portrait that concealed my private safe. The painting swung aside at my touch. Inside lay years of patience, of careful planning. Waiting for exactly the right moment.

My fingers trace the edge of the letter on top—delicate feminine script, the paper worn soft from handling. I still remember the desperation in that young woman's voice.

Eloise had stumbled to my borders in the dead of winter, heavily pregnant and terrified out of her mind. Even now, I could picture her—mahogany hair matted with sweat, those distinctive hazel eyes wild with fear, clutching her swollen belly as she begged.

She'd fallen to her knees right there, where the old oak still stands.

"Please, Alpha. I just need sanctuary for my child and myself. There are those who would harm us. I have nowhere else to go"

She'd been clever, I'd give her that. Revealing nothing, offering nothing except subservience in exchange for protection. Just another pregnant omega running from something—an angry mate, a scorned family, debts she couldn't pay.

I'd almost turned her away. But something had made me pause.

Maybe the quality of her dress, torn and muddied but obviously once fine. Maybe the way she spoke, too refined for a common omega. Or maybe my wolf's strange insistence that this one mattered.

I'd given her sanctuary at last, a small cabin at the edge of pack lands.

For five years, she kept her secrets, playing the part of a grateful refugee perfectly. She worked in the kitchens, raised her daughter quietly, never caused trouble. Never spoke of where she'd come from or what she was running from.

I opened the letter, the paper worn soft from years of handling. Eloise'd left it in my office. A couple of days before she was killed.

‘Esteemed Alpha Hector,
By the time you read this, I fear I will be gone. They're closing in—I can feel them watching, waiting. The Queen's assassins are patient, but not infinitely so.
You deserve the truth, after all these years of protection you've unknowingly provided…’

The story had poured out of her in frantic words. She'd served in the Royal court—beautiful, kind, utterly beneath the Lycan King’s station.

The affair had been impossible to resist for both of them.

She was his cherished mistress. His beloved, she'd called herself. When she became pregnant, the King had been overjoyed in secret and heartbroken that he couldn't claim his child openly. But the Queen had discovered everything.

The Queen, whose own son would be heir to the throne, had sworn to eliminate any bastard that might threaten her bloodline's supremacy.

And so the King had sent his pregnant mistress away rather than challenge his Queen directly. Told her to vanish so completely that even he couldn't track her. Until he could find proof of his wife's threats, couldn't risk civil war over a servant's claims.

What a spineless fuck…

At first, I thought it was an elaborate lie. A desperate attempt to secure her daughter's future by claiming royal connection. Servants had bastards all the time—it didn't make them princes or princesses.

I'd nearly burned the letter.

Then Eloise was dead. Ripped apart by "rogues" who struck with surgical precision. Killing only her, leaving five-year-old Daphne sobbing over her mother's body.

No rogue pack was that selective. That controlled.

Still, I didn't believe it. Not fully.

Not until seven years later, when twelve-year-old Daphne had that training accident.

Her shirt tore at the shoulder, and there it was—the silver crescent birthmark, delicate and unmistakable. The mark every Lycan royal bore, impossible to fake, impossible to deny.

I'd seen opportunity where others might have seen a burden. I'd barely contained my triumph that day. Hidden in my pack, dismissed as a worthless omega, was the Lycan King's lost daughter.

And no one knew but me.

Everything changed when Prince Ezekiel died six years ago. The King's only legitimate heir, dead in the battle. No other children. The throne suddenly without a clear successor, and the King quietly, desperately, searching for something. Someone.

Secretly informing only his most trusted Alphas to watch for a girl bearing the royal mark. And so annual unity celebrations that were actually searches in disguise.

Each year, the King would arrive with his entourage, tour the pack, meet the families. Looking. Always looking.

And I had the prize he sought, hidden in plain sight.

During every royal visit, I'd made sure Daphne was elsewhere—sent on errands, kept in the kitchen, assigned to duties far from the main house. The King would search, find nothing, and move on.

The irony was delicious. He was so close, every single time, and I'd simply... waited.

I'd been content to wait until she came of age. Eighteen seemed appropriate—old enough to legally claim, young enough to mold. But then my worthless son found her. Mated her. Destroyed my carefully laid plans in one night of mindless rutting.

The marriage had been my suggestion, of course. Better to keep her bound to my pack through Connor than risk her leaving. And Connor, that sadistic little shit, had made it easy.

His cruelty, his public humiliation of her, his blatant affairs—all of it served my purposes perfectly.

When he'd rejected her at the solstice, I'd moved immediately. The Luna ceremony would bind her to me before anyone discovered what she truly was.

Taking her as my own Luna would bind her to me before her identity was revealed.

Once we were mated, once I'd claimed her in every way that mattered, even the King couldn't object. He'd have to accept me as family, grant me power and position beyond my wildest ambitions.

The attraction I grew to her through these years is merely a bonus.

She's grown beautiful despite the birthmark marring her cheek—or perhaps because of it. That visible imperfection makes her more real, more touchable, more… lovable.

Those hazel eyes that still held such innocence despite Connor's cruelty. The way she still believed in love, in kindness, in fairytales. Her body, soft and unloved for Goddess know how long, practically begging to be claimed properly.

And her kindheartedness even after everything she's endured, is intoxicating in a way I haven't felt in decades. She still believes in goodness. She still trusts.

That kind of purity is rare, and I want it. To be the only one who truly feels it.

My wolf rumbled in approval. ‘Soon.’

A knock interrupted my thoughts. My Beta August entered, bowing slightly.

"Alpha, I've just received word. The royal convoy will arrive three days early. They're changing their schedule for security reasons."

I smiled. Even better. Less time for Xander to poison her against me with whatever game he was playing.

"Double the preparations," I ordered. "Everything must be perfect for the Luna ceremony."

"Of course, Alpha. Anything else?"

I moved to another drawer, pulling out a crystal vial filled with clear liquid.

"Have the kitchen prepare my special Luna ceremony tea," I said, pocketing the vial. "I'll handle the ingredients personally. Family tradition."

Soon, she'll be mine in every way. My wolf, usually dismissive of such matters, practically preens at the thought of claiming the future Lycan Queen.

And Xander? Oh, that brat of a son would learn his place. He could challenge me for many things, but not for a Luna already claimed, already bred.

Pack law was absolute in this.

By the time the King arrived, she'd be thoroughly mated, marked, and carrying my heir. The lost Princess would be mine, and anyone who stood in my way would be crushed.

The game was already won. They just didn't know it yet.