The Wolf God's Unwanted Luna

Chapter 57: I have a beast

He took a breath and moved on. "Anyway. Back to your test results. While yours were mostly normal, mine weren’t. And that’s where things get interesting."

There it was again. Interesting. I was starting to loathe that word.

"When my saliva made contact with your blood, your cells," his voice gained a strange note of pride, "began to change."

A chill slid down my spine. "Change how, Zaliver?"

His eyes gleamed. "Your cells morphed. Transformed. Whatever was in you, something that had been dormant, it woke up. The new cells were homogeneous."

His tone was light, almost excited, like this was good news. But to me? It sounded like a nightmare.

"Homogeneous?" I echoed, breath catching. "What does that even mean?"

"Identical. Compatible. Undifferentiated," he said smoothly, like he was reading from a textbook.

Compatible?

My stomach turned. Compatible with what?

"What’s been dormant in me?" I asked, the question leaving my lips before I could stop it. "And what are you, exactly?"

I looked at him then, really looked, and it hit me that even now I didn’t truly know what I was dealing with. Sure, he had the dominance of an Alpha, the power of a ruler, the aura of something old and wild. But what if he wasn’t a werewolf at all?

He didn’t flinch. Instead, he watched me for a heartbeat, as if weighing how much I could handle.

Then his chin rose, jaw tight. "Lycan," he said simply.

I blinked. "What?"

"Lycan," he repeated. Like it was the most natural thing in the world.

My head tilted instinctively, lips parting. Was he serious?

"Zaliver," my voice dropped, almost disbelieving, "are you messing with me?"

His expression didn’t waver. "No."

"That’s impossible. Lycans are a myth. A horror story humans came up with to make us seem like monsters!"

"And yet," he said softly, "here I am."

I didn’t realize I was shaking until I clenched my fists. My skin felt too tight, my breath shallow. A part of me wanted to reject what he said outright, but another part, a deeper, older instinct, believed him.

"You’ve seen what I can do, Vivian," he said quietly. "You’ve felt it. I’m not just an Alpha. I command wolves. Not just by rank, but by blood. We’re similar to werewolves, yes, but we’re stronger. Faster. Made of something older. Something more primal."

I backed up a step, needing space to think. Needing to breathe.