The Alpha King's Princess
The Alpha King’s Princess – Chapter 52

My entire body was tense at the news. Werewolves didn’t bite each other to mark each other as mates. We had moon marks. Even if it was a kink, opening your mouth wide to bite someone was a bit extreme. I thought back to the photos from the attacks where people’s throats were ripped out. Francium could have easily done that to Claire if he hadn’t pulled back.

I wondered why he had. The drug seemed to take over good sense. Was it because they were mates?

My stomach turned. I couldn’t be sure that Francium was a part of the attack, but he could have been aiding them in some ways, transporting bodies, and so on. It would explain the b***d and everything else. He was involved. Those pills were probably some version of the substance that was killing werewolves and making them crazy.

I thought back to the women who had been recovered and found to be pregnant. What if this wasn’t a new thing? What if werewolf women had been stolen before, impregnated and their children were used to infiltrate society?

If there are werewolves that are either under the control of vampires or half vampires in some way, then it would have been easy enough to infiltrate Moon Shadow if they were recruited because they seemed to be from an awakened bloodline. Depending on how strong a werewolf was naturally, it was possible that they could mimic the powers of someone from an awakened bloodline.

I didn’t know exactly how the screening and location worked, but I bet I could replace out if I asked enough questions. Maybe it was in the Moon Goddess book and I wouldn’t have to look far.

Maybe by taking the drug, they read as someone from an awakened bloodline. If an awakened bloodline was. just a strong connection to a vampire back in our family trees, it made sense. That was kind of horrifying to think about. Were any of the vampires that were still alive related to me? To Candido? To Francium?

“Hedy?” She asked. “What’s wrong?”

I looked at her, but I couldn’t think of what else to tell her other than what I honestly thought. No matter what was going on between them, no matter how deeply in love Claire was, she had to see reason.

“I know this isn’t going to make much sense, Claire.

But… stay away from him.”

Her eyes widened and she wet pale. “What?”

“Stay away from him. He’s dangerous and there’s no telling what he’ll do to you.”

“But Francium-“

“I think he’s related to all the damage around the school and the attacks.”

Her jaw dropped. “You’ve been eavesdropping into

Candido’s meetings?”

“Always.”

She shook her head. “Well, don’t leave me hanging.”

1 hesitated for a moment, not wanting her to get more involved, but if it helped her see reason, I had no choice but to tell her.

“New Moon has been suffering from a lot of attacks from the vampires. People are being pumped full of this substance that makes them crazy. A whole city in another territory was killed by vampires and werewolves draining people of their b***d.”

Claire turned pale. She seemed to understand what I had already figured out about Francium, but I wanted to be sure that she got it.

“The werewolves’ victims all had their throats ripped out… like someone took a big bite.”

I hoped that was enough to convince her. I didn’t like scaring her, but this was the time to be very scared.

She was involved with a ticking bomb or a double agent. Why would Francium get involved? Was it some sort of revenge against his father? His brothers? What had they offered him?

“It… could be just a coincidence.”

“Unlikely. You said there was b***d in his car.”

“I said it smelled like b***d, and you just said that all the corpses were left in place. Why would anyone cart around a still bleeding body?”

“Guilt? To hid the evidence? To save as a snack later? I don’t know, but you can’t tell me that you don’t think it’s suspicious. You can’t tell me that you think seeing Francium knowing what you know is still a good idea.”

“Francium is too sick to do something like that,” she said softiy. “He’s too sweet.”

“You’re in denial if you’re saying you don’t at least suspect. You said there were other things.”

“….. he’s stronger than he looks.”

I frowned. “What do you mean?”

“He gets stronger sometimes. His strength will wane and then surge.” She flushed. “I just thought he was really turned on the first time, but… it wasn’t just when we were having s*x.”

I swallowed. “What do you mean?”

“He crushed a can in his hand. I’m sure he didn’t mean to do it. He didn’t even seem to realize he’d done it until there was soda everywhere.” She licked her lips.

“It’s like when you first came and you were slowly gaining some of your werewolf strength back.”

I didn’t know what that could mean, but it couldn’t have been good. There’s no way Francium was being poisoned by those pills. They had to be whatever was making werewolf b***d turn to ash.

I bit my l*p and frowned. Or maybe the pills were just like Candido’s b***d and were undoing some sort of damage that Francium was facing. I liked my lips. I was still convinced that Francium was connected to all the attacks, but maybe there was something else I wasn’t seeing.

Could it have something to do with the Blue Moon Pack, or something specific to the New Moon Pack?

Didn’t Francium say that his father wasn’t the b***d relative to the New Moon Pack?

“Have you… met his mother?”

Claire frowned and looked at me. “His mother?”

I nodded. She shook her head. “Why?”

“Have you met his father?”

She scoffed and nodded. “Called me too pretty to be going out with Francium. He was a real jerk and offered up on of his stupid sons.”

“Don’t you think it’s odd that there’s no news about his mother?”

She frowned and nodded. “I’ve never heard anything about her, really.”

I’d have to look into it. I was sure that she would have some answers about the New Moon Pack. If all of the original pack bloodlines had their own gifts of some sort, maybe, just maybe, replaceing out the New Moon gift would lead me to figuring out Francium’s involvement.

“You promise to stay away from him?” Claire bit her l*p. “Claire?”

. it’s not that easy.”

“What do you mean it’s not that easy? He’s dangerous

_”

“I can’t!” She hissed. “I know what you’re saying. I hear you. I get it. Maybe some part of me agrees, but I just… I just can’t.”

Her jaw trembled and her eyes flashed with moonlight. My heart lurched as she whimpered.

“I don’t want to.”

“Claire…” I said slowly. “Are you… Why don’t you want te? Why can’t you?”

She turned to me with tear-filled eyes and pulled up her shirt, revealing the gleaming symbol on her skin, gleaming as if it was written with moonlight.

I met her gaze.

“Claire…”

“He has the same mark on his wrist,” Claire said. “We…

We talked about it. It’s why I met his dad.”

“Does… Does your dad know?”

She shook her head.

. “I was going to tell him, but then

all this stuff with His Majesty happened.”

I grit my teeth. That only made it more complicated. If she and Francium were mates. Maybe there was a way to get Francium to where he belonged: at Claire’s side.

It took Claire’s hand and worried my l*p.

“We’ll… figure something out Claire. I promise.”

My heart stung as she tightened her grip on my hand. “

Thanks, Hedy.”

Claire’s mate was Francium. He was involved with the attacks on our society. It felt wrong to promise to help her get Francium on our side, but I couldn’t help it.

I looked at her moon marks and felt my eyes start to burn as I thought of what Allen said. Only Candido’s mate could possibly stop the ceremony. Moon marks were the true sign of mates, not just the pull. But it didn’t matter.

We sat in quiet for a little while longer, eating and mulling over everything that had been said before Claire started up the car and took us back to the estate.

She came upstairs to my room, helping me further avoid Candido, but he wasn’t at home. I counted myself-lucky.

She sat in a chair across the way with a deep sigh.

I took a seat on my bed and shook my head. There was no easy way to deal with this.

Time was running out and not a single glint of moonlight had appeared on my body.

I looked up at Claire with determination. One of us had to make it out of this with what we wanted.