Chapter 7 - THE BETRAYAL IN THE DARK
Chaos erupted in the council chamber. Several elder alphas drew their ceremonial daggers, while Chancellor Vane stumbled backward, pointing a trembling finger at Madeline. "Traitors! Both of you! Seize them!"
Before the royal guards stationed at the doors could move, a deafening explosion echoed from the upper levels of the citadel. The ground shook violently, showering the amphitheater in dust and debris.
"An attack!" Commander Leonidas roared, bursting through the heavy iron doors with a squad of Crimson cavalrymen. "Your Majesty, the western gate has been breached! Rebel forces mixed with rogue mercenaries are swarming the inner bailey!"
Lucius stood up from his throne, his face darkening into a mask of pure fury. "Chancellor Vane," Lucius muttered, his amber eyes locking onto his uncle with lethal intent. "You didn't just invite an uprising... you coordinated it."
Chancellor Vane laughed, a harsh, grating sound, as three masked assassins dropped from the shadows of the vaulted ceiling, landing beside him with drawn blades. "The empire is weak, Lucius! You allowed sentimentality—and this cursed girl—to cloud your throne. The northern packs will bow to us!"
"Kill them!" Vane shrieked.
The assassins lunged forward, moving with unnatural, blood-augmented speed. But Madeline was already shifting. In a flash of blinding white light and cracking bone, the magnificent snow-white wolf materialized in the center of the amphitheater.
With a ferocious roar that rattled the obsidian pillars, Madeline leaped across the chamber, intercepting two of the assassins mid-air and slamming them into the marble floor with bone-crushing force.
At the same time, Lucius transformed. A massive, coal-black wolf—the legendary Night Terror—burst forth from his skin, towering over nine feet tall, dark as a moonless night, with glowing amber eyes that burned with infernal wrath.
The battle was short, brutal, and utterly one-sided. The rebel assassins were torn apart within seconds. But as Madeline turned her glowing silver eyes toward the dais, she realized Chancellor Vane had vanished through a secret stone door behind the elder tier.
Lucius shifted back to human form, pulling a dark tunic over his shoulders as he wiped a streak of blood from his cheek. He looked at Madeline, who stood majestic and untamed in her wolf form.
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"He's heading for the Sunken Vaults," Lucius growled, his jaw clenched. "That's where the ancestral royal weapons—and the core of the empire's power grid—are housed. If he sabotages the core, the entire citadel will collapse into the mountain."
Madeline gave a sharp, affirmative nod, her silver eyes flashing. Together, the King and the White Wolf plunged into the dark tunnels beneath the citadel, racing toward the final confrontation.
