Chapter 188 – Absent Luna of the Lycan King Novel (Ivy & Kyson)

Filed To Story: Absent Luna of the Lycan King Novel (Ivy & Kyson)

I swallowed as he breathed heavily, and the nearby gardener was pale as a ghost as he looked at Peter and Ester. He reached forward, gripping Peter’s arms.

“Please, no more! She can’t take anymore! Let me take her place.” Peter pleaded.

“No!” Clarice shrieked.

Kyson snarled, his upper l*p pulling back over his teeth, and a sinister glint was in his black obsidian eyes. He tilts his head to the side.

“I’ll allow it,”

“He is a boy!” The gardener defended. I had no idea when he got here, but he obviously cared for Peter.

“He can’t even heal!” Kyson shrugs, turning back to Ester. The whip cracked in the air, and her scream made my blood run cold when Peter escaped the gardener’s clutches and tossed himself in front of his mother. Trey clenched his jaw and looked ahead, the only sign that he disagreed with Kyson’s actions. He was controlled solely now by his rage and hate for the pair. I saw him raise the whip, and I never even registered the movement as I tossed myself in front of my brother.

Peter couldn’t heal, I couldn’t, and I wouldn’t allow Kyson to k**l them. The sentence he gave Ester turned lethal when he had Liam bring out the Wolfsbane. Enough was enough.

I felt the sharp tendrils of fiery pain split up my back and tear my dress and shoulder. I hissed, and my back arched, but I gripped Peter, managing to stay upright as my own scream reverberated around the area.

Pain l**ked up my spine, and l clenched my teeth when I heard a roar. Gold flecks flitted brightly, tainting my vision, and a collective gasp was heard when suddenly Trey smashed into the wall beside Ester. I turned to see Liam trying to hold Kyson back, and leg realized Trey had attacked my mate. Trey got to his feet, and my command rolled over him moments later.

“Stand down!” I snapped at him, and he whimpered, yet just that simple command made me s**k in a harsh breath as I turned to face my mate, who was now staring in h****r at me. He takes a step toward me with outstretched hands before shaking his head.

“Move!”

“She has suffered enough!” I seethed through clenched teeth.

“When I say she has,” Kyson growled, challenging me, but I refused to move. I nod toward the gardener, who comes over a grabs Peter, dragging him away when I start undoing the front of my dress.

“Fine then. I will take her place.” I tell him, popping the b**tons on my dress.

“No!” Kyson snarls.

“You would have allowed Peter. And Peter, I won’t allow it. Therefore, he takes his mother’s place, and I take his. So which is Kyson?” I tell him, letting my dress fall to the ground, leaving me in just my undergarments. Everyone averts their gaze, as I knew they would. Ester groans, and I glance at her and s*****w when I see her flesh sizzling. It must hurt. The one lashing down mine seared up my spine like wildfire, and I wanted to douse my back with water.

“Azalea, move!” and I do. I turn around, offering my back to him, and he gasps where he had struck me instead of Peter. I knew what he saw. Years and years of healed lash marks and one like Ester now had carved in her back.

“Azalea!” Kyson snarls, and I hear him come behind me, his long furry fi**gers wr*pping around my arm as he grabs me and spins me to face him.

“What is Kyson? Can’t bear to see your mark on my flesh yet revel in hers? No! I won’t allow it!”

“Then I k**l her.” he sneers, and Peter screams.

“You said lashes! You are already k*****g her. Look at her!” I screamed furiously in his face. He seemed taken aback but did look at her back, her flesh torn open and blood pooling at her feet.

“Enough. Or I take her place,” I tell him, and he looks at me. His eyes narrowed, and I could see the fury behind them, the argument I knew that was coming, but here with witnesses, he refused to give a show to them. He wanted us a united front, but I would not stand by this a moment more. I never agreed in the first place but understood it had to happen, but he said he wouldn’t k**l her and any more would.

We stood off, neither of us willing to bow to the other, and the air bet**en us became tense.

“No, your place, my King. Landeena’s word is final.”

“Not over me. It’s not my queen. You may be Landeena, but I am your mate, and Alpha hierarchy still holds weight,” he snarls.

“Want to test that theory?” I asked him, though it was a test. I had come to notice he would back down when my title came into play, making me realize I was so much stronger than him. He seemed surprised, and his eyebrows rose, yet my assumption was correct hierarchy the Alpha was always most assertive, the most dominant in a mate bond but not against a Landeena, and that realization was eye-opening when he took a step back from me.

“Just remember, you may have power. That doesn’t mean you know how to use it.”

“Yet, Kyson, not yet, but I think you and I both know you are dreading the day lyrics do,” I tell him, and he growls.

“Release her, ” he snaps before turning his gaze back to me. “Cover up,” he snaps, turning on his heel and storming off.

Kyson POV

Angry was an understatement. Azalea had just pulled rank over me. Well, not fechnically. I knew she didn’t command me. Despite that, the threat was the same. And for Ester and her son, it aggravated me as I stormed off toward my office. I was sick and tired of coming second with her over everything. Weeks! looked after her, and she stood up for the person responsible for putting her in that state in the first place.

Damian was waiting in my office for me when I opened the door, looking over the paperwork at my desk. He looks up at me as I step inside and shut the door behind me. He gives me a disapproving look as ! move toward my bar and pour myself a drink.

“What is that look for?” I asked him.

“Do you have to ask?” he says, leaning back in his chair. I pass him his drink, and he takes it, sipping it.

“Azalea?” he asks, and I growl, my Lycan side p**ssing beneath my skin, and I only just shifted back on the walk here and didn’t feel like having to tame my anger again.

“Don’t!” I warn him, and he cl**ks his t***ue.

“Your anger and your drinking,” he holds his glass up. “Is getting the better of you!” he snaps at me as I take my seat. I sighed, and Damian got up from his seat before moving around the room and retrieving some pants from the closet behind the door. He tosses a black pair of shorts to me, and I snatch them from the air before setting my glass of whiskey down on my desk.

“How did you go?”I ask him, pushing my chair out so I can pull them up my legs.

“I want to send someone to Crux. Maybe check out the brothels, and see if they can get any intel,” Damian says just as Liam wanders into the room as I am doing up the draw-string, and I slump heavily in my chair.

“Ah, you should be with Azalea,” I tell Liam, and Liam shrugs.

“Well, I am here. And Trey is with her,” Liam answers nonchalantly before moving toward my bar area. Instead of grabbing a glass, he takes the entire bottle before walking over, topping up my glass, then tip ping the bottle to his l*ps.

“Saving that liver of yours, my King,” he says, sending me a wink. I pick up my glass and sip it, turning my attention back to Damian, who I had sent off to look into the council finances, and Alpha Dean’s and Al pha Brock’s pack finances while I was dealing with Ester and Peter.

“So you think they still have something to do with the missing children?” I ask, also agreeing. I have thought that for a while, all of us had suspicions about that pack. Yet we still had to prove our theories.

“Yes. Well, I don’t believe Ester was going around killing children. But even after you commanded her the other day …” Damian pauses.

“Half commanded her. I wouldn’t call it a full command after what Gannon told me,” Liam chuckled, and we both looked at him.

“What? Gannon said she didn’t even break out in a sweat. So I would hardly call that a command,” Liam says, making my brows pinch because he was right. She put up no fight at all to my persuasion when I questioned her.

“Hmm. Interesting,” I mutter.

“Interesting? I don’t trust the bitch. Too much doesn’t add up.” Liam says, and he was right. We were barely at the tip of the iceberg,

“What do you think of Trey?” I ask him.

“Ferret Face? I will admit I had him pegged wrong, but Ester…” He shakes his head.

“Too much makes little sense and can’t be verified. And you saw how shocked Trey was to learn he had a nephew. And about Marrissa,”

“Yes, I have to admit the whole Marrissa thing makes little sense to me. Why wouldn’t she come for ward? It makes no sense. Because if Peter was Landeena, she would have known we would have protected him. So why not tell us?” Damian says with a shrug.

He had a point. Landeena’s hold immunity, so who was she hiding him from?

“You think Ester is lying?” I ask them, and they both nod.

“Not completely, but I think a lot of it is half-truths. Marrissa worked here for a few years and tried nothing against Claire. Marrissa started in the gardens here with Tanner before she moved toward the cas tle, even so, she still had plenty of time to attack the kingdom. So why did it take her two years to do it, Kyson? That makes no sense to me.”.

“Hmm, you’re right. That sounds shady. Ensure someone is posted with Ester at all times. And Peter. I want them off castle grounds and under guard until this is figured out.”

“And what about Crux? Can I send a few men to check out these two places?” he picks up a piece of pa per from the pile.

– “Deluxe night and the midnight tricks gentleman’s club?” Liam plucks the paper from his fi**gers.

“I volunteer myself, my King. I will test these girls out, don’t you worry.” Liam states.

“Surveillance. Not a test run,” Damian scolds.

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