_Pretend You’re My Husband For One Night,_ She Pleaded — The Alpha King Announced, _She’s My Luna._

The rain lashed against the ancient stone walls of the Sinclair estate, mirroring the storm that raged within Lady Genevieve Sinclair’s chest.

The year was 1422, and the damp, oppressive air of the Scottish Borderlands offered no comfort as she stood by the leaded glass window of her bedchamber.

Her fingers gripped the velvet drapes so tightly that her knuckles bled white, knowing that tonight’s midsummer banquet was nothing less than an execution.

Her father, Lord Arthur Sinclair, had perished three months prior in a highly suspicious hunting accident, leaving behind a mountain of forged debts.

These ruinous notes were all held by the cruel and calculating Lord Reginald Ashford, a man whose vast wealth was eclipsed only by his extraordinary depravity.

For weeks, Ashford had suffocated the Sinclair family by freezing their assets and starving their tenants, finally delivering his brutal ultimatum that very morning.

Genevieve was ordered to marry him before the midnight bell tolled at the banquet, or her lands would be seized and her young sister sold into servitude.

There was only one desperate legal loophole available to her, preserved within a dusty, archaic text known as the Times Lex Maritalis.

If she could present a lawfully wedded husband of her own choosing before Ashford claimed her, her mother’s ancestral silver trust would instantly unlock.

This vast fortune would neutralize the debt entirely, but she had no suitors because Ashford had threatened to slaughter anyone who dared approach her.

Desperation is a powerful alchemist that turns noble women into beggars, prompting Genevieve to throw a heavy wool cloak over her emerald silk gown.

She slipped out through the servants entrance into the torrential night, bypassing the brightly lit great hall where Ashford was already holding his court.

She hurried toward the Times Bore and Barrel, a rough tavern on the edge of the fiefdom where mercenaries, exiles, and travelers sought refuge.

The tavern smelled of stale ale, wet dog, and wood smoke while Genevieve kept her hood pulled low with her heart hammering against her ribs.

She needed a man, any man who was brave or foolish enough to sign a piece of parchment, which was when she spotted a mountain of a man.

He sat alone in the darkest corner wrapped in thick dark furs that looked suspiciously like wolf pelts, his sheer size intimidating even while seated.

He possessed broad, corded shoulders and raven-black hair falling around a granite jawline, but it was his striking amber eyes that caught her breath.

A jagged silver scar ran down the left side of his face as a testament to violent battles he had clearly won, radiating an aura of absolute danger.

Every other patron in the tavern instinctively gave his table a wide berth, but Genevieve swallowed her terror and decided he would do nicely.

She approached his table with the rustle of her silk hidden beneath her cloak, and though he did not look up, a low vibrating hum resonated from him.

“I have gold,” Genevieve whispered with a voice trembling despite her best efforts, causing the stranger to slowly raise his head to lock eyes with hers.

An electric shock shot down her spine as the air grew heavy with the scent of pine, ozone, and impending rain, thick with an overwhelming intensity.

“I have no need for gold, little bird,” his voice rumbled in a deep, gravelly baritone, “and this is no place for a highborn lady.”

“You don’t understand,” she pleaded, stepping closer to close the distance between them. “I need your help. Pretend you’re my husband for one night.”

The stranger’s eyebrows rose in surprise as complete silence enveloped their corner of the tavern for a moment before he repeated the word thoughtfully.

“Just on paper,” Genevieve rushed on, pulling a heavy leather pouch from beneath her cloak and dropping it onto the wooden table with a loud clink.

“Five hundred gold crowns. Tomorrow morning, when the magistrate validates the union, you take the gold and leave, and I will annul the marriage by dusk.”

He stared at the gold, then back at her face, inhaling deeply as if tasting her very scent on the air while a strange shadow crossed his features.

Dominic Warwick, the alpha king of the northern clans, had spent a century searching for his fated mate while disguised to root out silver smugglers.

He expected a political assassination, not a mate smelling of wild heather and absolute terror walking up to him to offer gold for a fake marriage.

His wolf howled in the back of his mind, demanding that he claim her immediately, but Dominic simply leaned forward to eclipse the candlelight.

“Who are you hiding from, little bird?” he asked softly, prompting her to whisper Lord Reginald Ashford’s name with a tear finally escaping her eye.

“If I am not wed by midnight, he takes my home and my sister,” she pleaded, noting how Dominic’s lips curved into a dark, predatory smile.

“Keep your gold,” Dominic said, standing up to tower over her at six and a half feet of pure lethal muscle. “I will sign your parchment.”

The village church was empty save for the flickering tallow candles and Father Bartholomew, who shook violently as Dominic slammed the iron door shut.

“Lady Genevieve,” the priest stammered, looking at the giant beside her, “you cannot be serious. Lord Ashford will burn this parish to the ground.”

“Lord Ashford does not own God, Father,” Genevieve said firmly, producing the marriage ledger while her hands shook. “Marry us now. Midnight approaches.”

Father Bartholomew hastily muttered the Latin rites, rushing through the sacred vows as if the devil himself were breathing down the back of his neck.

When the time came to sign, Genevieve penned her elegant signature before handing the quill to the stranger, whose large fingers dwarfed the feather.

He wrote two bold, sharp words that felt heavy and powerful on her tongue when she tested them: Dominic Warwick.

“Now,” Dominic said, turning to her with a gaze that dropped to her lips for a fraction of a second, “we have a banquet to attend, wife.”

They walked back to Castle Ashbourne with Genevieve clinging to his massive arm, noticing with quiet bewilderment that Dominic radiated unnatural heat.

The great hall was a riot of color, music, and gluttony where nobles gorged on pheasant while Lord Reginald Ashford sat upon a raised dais.

Ashford was a sallow, cruel-looking man with thinning hair and a permanent sneer, flanked by his personal guard of notorious Black Dog mercenaries.

The heavy oak doors groaned open, causing the music to cease and the chatter to die as Genevieve stepped into the light with her chin held high.

Beside her walked Dominic, who had shed his wet fur cloak to reveal a pitch-black leather tunic that stretched taut over his broad chest.

Ashford stood up and knocked his silver goblet over, spilling dark wine across the white linen tablecloth like blood as his face purpled with rage.

“Genevieve, what is the meaning of this?” Ashford hissed. “Who is this filthy savage?”

“Mind your tongue, Lord Ashford,” Genevieve said, unrolling the parchment. “I present to you my lawfully wedded husband, Dominic Warwick.”

She explained how the Times Lex Maritalis unlocked the Sinclair trust, making his claim null and void while the hall erupted into scandalous whispers.

Ashford’s eyes narrowed into venomous slits as he dismissed Dominic as a common tavern rat with no title or standing to make a valid marriage.

“The ledger is signed by the church,” Dominic spoke for the first time, his deep voice causing several nobles to physically flinch in alarm.

Ashford clenched his jaw and signaled a trembling servant to bring a silver chalice of wine, inviting Genevieve to toast to her newfound happiness.

Genevieve reached for it, but Dominic’s impossibly fast reflexes caught her wrist and brought the chalice beneath his nose to test the contents.

His heightened wolf senses instantly caught the bitter, earthy tang of wolfsbane and hemlock masked sweetly beneath the vintage.

“A generous vintage,” Dominic murmured, staring dead into Ashford’s eyes before tightening his grip on the thick silver chalice with his bare hand.

The solid silver began to bend and crush inward like cheap tin, bursting the poisoned wine through his fingers to hiss upon the stone floor.

Dominic tossed the mangled ball of silver at Ashford’s feet with a deafening clatter, declaring that he preferred his drinks without poison.

“Kill him!” Ashford shrieked, all pretense of civility vanishing as six Black Dog mercenaries drew their broadswords and rushed forward.

Genevieve screamed and reached for a carving knife, but Dominic gently pushed her behind him and stepped inside the guard with blinding speed.

A sickening crack echoed through the hall as he snapped a mercenary’s wrist and threw the armored man across the room like a rag doll.

The remaining five hesitated in absolute disbelief before attacking in unison, only to be dismantled by Dominic with a brutal, terrifying efficiency.

Within seconds, the elite mercenaries were groaning in bloody heaps while the lords and ladies cowered beneath the banquet tables.

Lord Hugh Chamberlain, the king’s appointed magistrate, stepped forward from the trembling crowd to demand order in the name of the crown.

“Arrest this man!” Ashford screamed, pointing a shaking finger. “He has shed blood in a sovereign hall! He is an animal!”

Chamberlain looked at the broken bodies and explained that unless the man possessed noble blood for a trial by combat, he must be hanged.

Genevieve felt her world collapse, realizing she had dragged an innocent stranger into her mess only to watch him sentenced to die.

“Dominic, run,” she whispered, tugging at his leather tunic. “Please, run.”

Dominic looked down with a softened storm in his amber eyes, reaching up to gently cup her cheek with a profoundly intimate gesture.

“I told you, little bird,” he said softly, “I sign my name and I keep what is mine.”

Suddenly, the heavy oak doors of the great hall were blown off their iron hinges with the force of a thunderclap that shook the room.

Through the dust and splintered wood marched a dozen giants wearing heavy plate armor adorned with the crest of the legendary direwolf.

At their head was Cedric, Dominic’s beta, who ignored the screaming nobles and dropped to one knee in absolute submission alongside his warriors.

“My king,” Cedric spoke over the stunned silence, “the perimeter is secured. The silver smuggling routes in Lord Ashford’s lower vaults have been seized.”

“King?” Ashford gasped, backing up against the dais as the human guise began to slip from Dominic, whose eyes shifted to a blinding gold.

The suffocating pressure of his alpha aura slammed into the room, forcing every human to their knees under the crushing weight of his dominance.

Genevieve stood completely unaffected, staring at her fake husband in absolute shock as the dual-toned voice echoed with a beast’s growl.

“You smuggle silver into my lands, Ashford,” Dominic declared, “and worse, you dare threaten what belongs to me.”

“It’s a sham!” Ashford whimpered from his knees. “She tricked you! It’s a fake marriage to steal my gold!”

Dominic’s arm wrapped around Genevieve’s waist to pull her against his burning chest as he turned to the entire hall of kneeling nobles.

“She is not a trick,” Dominic announced, his voice booming like thunder. “She is not a sham. She is not just my wife. She is my Luna.”

Lord Reginald Ashford remained pressed against the cold stone floor, utterly broken by the invisible weight of the alpha’s command.

Genevieve could barely process the reality that the man she hired for five hundred gold crowns was the legendary alpha king of the northern clans.

Dominic’s glowing golden eyes slowly faded back to amber as the pressure lifted, allowing the human nobles to scramble away like frightened mice.

“Cedric,” Dominic ordered, “take Ashford and his surviving dogs to the dungeons and send word that the silver smuggling route ends tonight.”

Turning back to Genevieve, the terrifying warlord melted away into the intensely focused man who gently traced the line of her jaw.

“Are you harmed, Genevieve?” he asked softly, speaking her name like a sacred prayer.

“You are the Lycan king,” she stammered, trying to catch up with her reality.

“I am Dominic,” he corrected gently, “and you are my mate. The fates designed you for me, little bird.”

“But the marriage was only supposed to be for one night,” she whispered, her heart hammering wildly against her ribs.

“I do not sign contracts for a single night, Genevieve,” he replied, his lips brushing her ear to send sparks down her spine. “You are mine.”

Before dawn broke, the Sinclair estate was under Lycan protection while Genevieve’s sister Beatrice was safely secured in a reinforced carriage.

The journey to the northern reaches took five days through dense, primeval forests and jagged mountain passes into a land of perpetual winter.

They arrived at the fortress of Caerlaverock, a monolithic citadel carved directly into a glacier-capped mountain and fortified by black stone.

As Dominic’s massive black destrier rode through the portcullis, thousands of Lycans in the courtyards erupted into cheers and howled into the sky.

However, not all eyes held reverence as they spotted the hostile stares of the Lycan Council elders standing atop the grand stone staircase.

Leading them was Lord Balthazar, a towering silver-haired Lycan whose eyes burned with cold disdain as he addressed the king.

“My king,” Balthazar said, dripping with insolence, “you bring a fragile, scentless human to Caerlaverock, and the whispers say you intend to seat her.”

Dominic stepped in front of Genevieve to block the biting wind, declaring that the bond was fated and she was already his Luna.

“Fated?” Balthazar scoffed, stepping down a stair. “She is a Sinclair, from the very family whose lands harbor the silver mines bleeding our kin dry.”

Genevieve’s blood ran cold as she stepped out from behind Dominic, denying the existence of any silver mines on their agricultural estate.

“Do you play the fool or are you truly ignorant?” Balthazar sneered, revealing that her uncle Frederick had been funneling raw silver to Ashford.

The revelation hit Genevieve with sickening clarity, exposing her uncle’s conspiracy behind her father’s hunting accident and the sudden debts.

Dominic’s growl shattered the tense silence, causing the stones beneath their feet to vibrate with his ancient, primordial fury.

“Her uncle’s sins are his own,” Dominic roared with eyes flashing gold. “She is my mate. Do you wish to challenge my claim, Balthazar?”

Balthazar’s eyes shifted briefly to a yellow glow before the elder backed down with a stiff, mocking bow, introducing a treacherous condition.

“The ancient laws dictate that any Luna must prove her worth through the trial of the blood moon in the cursed forest,” Balthazar smiled.

Dominic’s jaw clenched tightly because the trial was designed for Lycans and would mean a death sentence for a human.

“Then she is no Luna,” Balthazar countered, looking directly at Genevieve. “And she has no place on the throne.”

Genevieve saw the desperate fear in Dominic’s eyes, knowing he would start a civil war to protect her and lose his kingdom in the process.

“I accept,” Genevieve’s voice rang out clearly and unswervingly, shocking Dominic into absolute silence.

“I will prove my worth to the pack,” she told Balthazar, “and when I survive, you will kneel.”

For three days, Dominic paced his grand chambers like a caged beast, trying to forbid her from participating in the deadly trial.

“I survived Ashford and my uncle’s betrayal,” Genevieve whispered fiercely on the final night, cupping his scarred face. “I am your mate.”

Dominic closed his eyes and pressed his forehead against hers, promising to burn the forest to ash if she did not return by dawn.

The trial of the blood moon began at midnight beneath a swollen moon casting an eerie crimson glow over the snow-covered pines.

Genevieve traversed the cursed forest with no weapons, given only a thick fur cloak, a torch, and the grim task of retrieving an ancient chalice.

The cold bit relentlessly through her fur while the unnatural silence was broken only by the crunch of her boots and distant howls.

Deep in the heart of the woods, she found the ruined temple of the first pack, where the silver chalice gleamed upon a stone altar.

“I must admit, niece, I didn’t think you would make it this far,” a smooth, cultured, and horribly familiar voice echoed from the shadows.

Lord Frederick Sinclair stepped out from behind a monolith holding a crossbow, accompanied by Lord Balthazar and three Lycan warriors.

“Uncle Frederick,” Genevieve breathed as horror dawned on her amidst the crimson moonlight.

“Arthur was weak,” Frederick sneered, explaining his treasonous alliance with Balthazar to mine the silver without crown interference.

“Dominic will slaughter you,” Genevieve warned, but Balthazar only growled about staging her death as a tragic failure of the trial.

Frederick raised his crossbow and aimed directly at her chest, bidding her farewell as he prepared to pull the trigger.

Before the iron bolt could reach her, a massive blur of black and gold erupted from the tree canopy to slam into the snow between them.

Dominic stood fully shifted into an eight-foot nightmare of muscle and razor-sharp claws, tearing the embedded crossbow bolt from his shoulder.

He unleashed a roar so filled with primordial fury that the trees themselves seemed to shudder under the terrifying weight of his presence.

“Treason,” Dominic’s voice rumbled through the jaws of the beast as Balthazar shrieked for his warriors to attack the king.

Dominic moved with blinding violence, hurling one traitor against a monolith and disemboweling another with a single sweep of his claws.

Balthazar shifted into a gray wolf to sink his teeth into Dominic’s side, but the alpha slammed the elder into the stone altar to pin him down.

Frederick turned to flee into the woods, but Genevieve grabbed the heavy silver chalice and threw it with all her might to strike him down.

The clearing fell silent as Dominic shifted back into his human form, covered in blood and shivering from adrenaline as he dropped to his knees.

“You followed me,” she whispered, her hands shaking as she touched his bloodied shoulder.

“I will always follow you,” Dominic rasped, gazing up with absolute devotion. “To the depths of hell. I am yours, Genevieve.”

They returned to Caerlaverock by dawn with Dominic holding the silver chalice high while the traitors were dragged in chains behind them.

The fortress erupted into a roar of triumph that shook the mountains, silencing all doubts and cementing Genevieve’s rightful place.

She sat upon the obsidian throne as the true Luna of the northern reaches, having forged her own salvation alongside the king.