The True Blood Alpha was only five years old, yet the entire territory bent to his presence.
The Great Hall of the North Ridge Pack had never felt so heavy. Wolves stood shoulder to shoulder, their backs straight, their heads lowered—not out of fear, but instinct. Even the elders, silver-haired and battle-scarred, were quiet.
At the center of it all stood Kael, the youngest True Blood Alpha born in centuries.
His small frame was wrapped in ceremonial black, the fabric stitched with ancient runes meant to contain power far greater than his body could yet hold. His dark eyes were calm—too calm for a child. The alpha aura around him was not aggressive, but it was absolute, pressing against every wolf in the hall like an invisible command.
This was the day the two packs would merge.
Kael's parents stood behind him—his father, the reigning Alpha, tall and unyielding, and his mother, a Luna whose presence softened the sharp edges of power without weakening it. Across the hall stood the leaders of the Silver Hollow Pack.
And among them… her.
The female from Silver Hollow did not stand straight like the others. One hand rested protectively on her swollen belly, her face pale with strain but glowing with quiet resilience. She was heavily pregnant—only weeks away from giving birth.
No one noticed when Kael's attention shifted.
He had been bored moments earlier. Adults talked too much. Ceremonies dragged on. But suddenly, his chest tightened. His small hand curled into a fist at his side, his brows knitting together in confusion.
Something… felt wrong.
Or rather—new.
The air changed.
A faint warmth brushed against his senses, fragile yet persistent, like a heartbeat that wasn't his own. Kael inhaled sharply, his wolf stirring uneasily beneath his skin.
His eyes locked onto the pregnant woman.
The hall seemed to blur around him. The noise faded. The power in his blood surged in response to something ancient, something written long before he was born.
His father noticed immediately.
"Kael?" the Alpha murmured, placing a steadying hand on his son's shoulder.
Kael didn't answer. He took one small step forward without realizing it.
Inside the woman's womb, the unborn child shifted.
A sudden pulse—soft, instinctive, alive—reached out.
Kael gasped.
It wasn't a voice. It wasn't a thought. It was a pull.
His wolf stirred, not with dominance or aggression, but with recognition.
The Luna's sharp eyes widened. She felt it too—a ripple of energy that brushed against her senses and then vanished. Her gaze flicked to the pregnant woman, then to Kael.
The elders exchanged uneasy looks.
"This is… unusual," one muttered.
The Alpha of Silver Hollow frowned. "What is it?"
Before anyone could answer, the pregnant woman inhaled sharply, her hand tightening over her belly.
For a brief moment—so brief no one else noticed—her unborn child's presence flared, instinctively responding to the overwhelming alpha power in the room.
Kael staggered back half a step.
His father tightened his grip on his shoulder.
"What did you feel?" the Alpha asked quietly.
Kael swallowed. His voice was small, but certain.
"Someone is there," he said. "They're… very quiet. But they're mine."
The hall went completely still.
The words echoed far louder than they should have.
No mating bond formed. No claim. No mark.
Just a thread, ancient and unexplainable, stretching silently between a True Blood Alpha child and a life not yet born.
The elders knew then.
This merge was not just political.
It was fate. The celebration never reached its end.
The drums had barely faded when the air inside the Great Hall shifted—thickening, tightening, as if the walls themselves had begun to listen.
"This cannot be ignored," one of the elders said gravely. "What happened earlier was not coincidence."
Kael stood near his parents, small fingers curled into the heavy fabric of his father's cloak. He didn't fully understand the words being exchanged, only that the warmth he had felt before was gone—and the absence of it left his chest uncomfortably hollow.
"The merge has awakened something," another elder added. "We need certainty."
Silence fell.
Then the doors opened.
Two guards stepped aside as an old man was led into the hall.
He walked with a crooked staff carved from bone and ash, his back bent with age, his eyes hidden behind a strip of dark cloth. Strange symbols were painted across his skin—ancient markings no pack used anymore.
A Seer.
Whispers rippled through the hall.
"We swore never to summon one of their kind again," someone muttered.
"And yet you did," the Seer said calmly, his voice dry as leaves. "Which tells me you are afraid."
He stopped in the center of the hall.
Kael's wolf stirred violently.
Power surged around the child Alpha, uncontrolled, instinctive. The Seer's lips curved—not in fear, but in something closer to awe.
"So young," the Seer murmured. "And already the world trembles."
Kael's mother stepped forward. "Speak carefully."
The Seer lifted his staff and struck it once against the stone floor.
The sound echoed—sharp and final.
"I see blood," the Seer said. "Not spilled yet, but promised. Cities brought to their knees. Packs erased. An Alpha whose howl will fracture the balance of this world."
A sharp intake of breath spread through the hall.
Kael's father stiffened. "You speak of my son."
"I do," the Seer replied. "A True Blood Alpha born to rule… or ruin."
Kael looked up, confusion clouding his young face. He didn't understand destruction. He didn't understand prophecy. He only understood the way everyone suddenly looked at him—as if he were something dangerous.
The Seer turned his blindfolded gaze toward Kael.
"You will bring destruction," he said plainly. "Not out of cruelty. Not out of malice. But because power without restraint always does."
A low growl rumbled from Kael's chest—raw, instinctive.
The Alpha's aura flared, cracking against the hall like a storm pressing to be released.
"Enough," Kael's father snapped. "Is there a way to prevent this?"
The Seer paused.
Then, slowly, he turned his head.
And pointed.
Not at Kael.
But at the pregnant woman standing among the Silver Hollow Pack.
The hall froze.
"There," the Seer said. "Your control."
The woman stiffened, her hand flying to her belly.
"I don't—" she began, her voice shaking.
The Seer stepped closer, his staff tapping the stone with each step. "The child you carry," he said, "is not a weapon. Not a savior. But an anchor."
Kael felt it again.
That warmth.
Soft. Steady. Quiet.
The Seer continued, "Where this Alpha will be born as fire, she will be born as balance. Where his blood demands domination, hers will demand restraint."
The elders exchanged uneasy glances.
"She will not weaken him," the Seer warned. "She will bind him—to reason, to control, to mercy."
Kael's mother's voice was tight. "You are saying a child—unborn—will control a True Blood Alpha?"
The Seer nodded. "Not by force. Never by force. By existence alone."
The pregnant woman's breath came shallow. Inside her, the unborn child stirred, reacting faintly to the overwhelming presence in the room.
Kael took an unconscious step forward.
The Alpha's aura eased—just slightly.
Everyone noticed.
The Seer lowered his staff. "Separate them, and the destruction becomes inevitable. Raise them under the same sky, and the Alpha may yet learn restraint."
Kael's father's jaw clenched. "And if we choose otherwise?"
The Seer's expression darkened.
"Then pray," he said quietly, "that the world survives his adulthood."
The hall remained silent long after the Seer was led away.
Kael stood there, five years old, surrounded by adults who suddenly feared his future.
Across the hall, a woman held her unborn daughter close—unknowingly carrying the only thing fate had placed between a True Blood Alpha and ruin.
And neither child had a choice.