Claimed by the scarred Alpha

ÉTIENNE

Laurent brought the footage up on the laptop screen, and I hovered over his shoulder, every muscle in my body strung so tight it felt like I might snap.

"There," he said, pointing.

The timestamp showed the corridor outside Séverine’s room, the camera angle catching the door and several feet of stone floor beyond it. For a moment, the feed showed nothing. Empty corridor, dim lighting, the ordinary stillness of an estate at rest.

Then Séverine appeared.

She darted into view, wet hair plastered to her face, robe slipping from her shoulders, every frantic movement spelling out the terror of someone fleeing for her life.

My pulse kicked hard.

I could see she was screaming, but the feed offered only silence, as if the terror itself had been muted.

Her mouth was open. Her eyes were wide. One hand kept reaching over her shoulder as if she expected something to grab her at any second.

She made it perhaps ten feet before something invisible slammed into her from behind.

I watched her body jolt.

I saw her hit the floor so hard that her shoulder bounced off the stone.

The sound reached us a fraction later as a sharp crack.

I flinched, and beside me, Laurent swore under his breath.

Séverine pushed herself up immediately from instinct and pure survival.

She stumbled forward, one hand scraping the wall for balance, and for a heartbeat, I believed she might escape. Then something invisible yanked her clean off the ground.

Every muscle in my shoulders locked.

"What the hell..." Laurent muttered.

Séverine kicked wildly.

Her legs thrashed.

Her fingers clawed at her throat as though invisible hands were squeezing the air from her lungs.

I frowned, hating every second I had to keep watching. Part of me hoped the warlock might finally appear, but another part dreaded Margaux having to relive her nightmare for nothing, with no answers at all.

Laurent glanced at me, but neither of us spoke.

We kept watching.

Then a familiar face, Prim, entered the frame.

For a split second, relief surged through me. Here was a witness. Someone who could help. Someone who might have arrived in time.

But then reality crashed back in. We were dealing with a witch, and the only thing waiting for Prim now was disaster.

I turned to Laurent again. "Was Prim attacked too?"

"No," He whispered. "She was not even at the scene. Which is odd."

I looked back at the feed.

I agreed fully. It was odd because why had... The thought had barely even formed when it died the second I saw Prim’s face.

The relief vanished.

Prim’s expression was uncanny and unsettling to look at.

She was not calm.

Neither was she frightened.

Her eyes only looked empty.

Like someone wearing a mask of humanity, with no idea what real emotions should look like.

Then her voice came through the speakers.

"I am a witch." The words echoed through the room. "...I cannot let you expose me."

"What?" I mouthed at the same time as Laurent.

That sentence landed wrong immediately.

Then Prim walked toward Séverine with slow, deliberate steps.

Without a flicker of hesitation or confusion, she drove her foot into Séverine’s head.

The first was bad enough as the impact snapped Séverine’s head sideways.

The second strike landed even harder.

Something ugly twisted deep in my gut.

Years.

The woman had been in this house for years.

Eating at our table.

Walking our halls.

Living like staff.

Serving the Valcourt family.

I had never once seen that look of violence on her face.

Not once.

The footage rolled on, showing how she toyed with Séverine’s life as if she were nothing but a marionette.

Watching the hand break was bad enough, but then came the choking.

Even worse was the smile.

Goddess, that smile.

Prim then looked directly into the camera as if she knew exactly where it was.

As if she craved being seen.

Wanted her face burned into our memories.

Wanted us to know she had already won.

Then she turned and disappeared from the frame.

Laurent paused the footage.

The room fell silent.

The hum of electronics roared in my ears.

For several moments, neither of us moved.

I stared at the frozen image on the screen.

Prim’s face.

That smile.

That impossible smile.

"Run it again," I said.

Laurent did.

This time I focused entirely on the audio.

Every word.

Every pause.

Every breath.

I hated what it was doing to me.

I could not help but think about Margaux. I thought about her hand in mine barely an hour ago.

About the warmth of our room.

The quiet. The fragile, fucking peace.

The feeling that, for the first time in years, I had allowed myself to stop anticipating disaster.

The guilt hit so hard it nearly made me sick.

I had been upstairs smiling, having the audacity to be relaxed and happy.

And while I was doing that, this was happening.

While I was holding Margaux, Séverine had been fighting for her life.

I should have been here.

I should have known.

I was supposed to protect them.

That was my responsibility.

Not Laurent’s.

Not the sentinels’.

Mine.

The thought settled like lead inside my chest.

And all of this happened because I had not chosen Séverine.

Someone almost died because I chose Margaux instead.

The idea was irrational.

I knew that.

Logically, I knew it.

Yet guilt was never logical.

It simply existed, and once it took root, it spread like wildfire.

The more I dwelled on it, the hotter it burned. Guilt twisted into anger, sharp and vicious, desperate for somewhere to land.

It needed someone to blame. Someone to punish.

"Prim," I said.

Laurent looked at me.

"Étienne—"

"She did this."

My voice sounded strange.

Cold.

The kind of voice that only appeared when I was angry enough to become calm.

"She has been inside this estate for years. She had access to every corridor, every room, every schedule. She knew our routines."

"Something about the footage feels off."

"It cannot be. This is just our ego getting in the way of the fact that we did not figure this out sooner."

"The magic practitioner is supposed to be a man, are they not? Marguax saw it herself. This is not a man."

"This is magic we are talking about. There are fucking several uses for it. She has been cloaking herself and fucking shapeshifting!"

"Then why would she not cloak herself? Why can we see her? What if there were more than one witch? This is magic we are talking about after all."

"I do not know Laurent!"

"Then stop for a second and think."

"I am thinking." I turned toward him. "I am thinking that my wife has been attacked twice."

The words felt sharp in my mouth.

"I am thinking that my fiancée nearly died tonight."

My hands curled into fists.

"And I am thinking that the only face we have on camera belongs to a woman whom I should not question as the perpetrator. She was the personal Omega to both Margaux and Séverine."

Laurent opened his mouth.

I cut him off.

"Do you know what I am tired of?"

His expression hardened.

"No."

"Being one step behind."

The admission surprised even me.

I looked away. On the floor. At the wall. Anywhere except the screen.

"I get very sick when I have to react instead of anticipate and fucking smother."

My voice dropped lower.

"Tired of finding blood after the fact."

I thought of Margaux unconscious.

Thought of Séverine hanging in the air.

Thought of the warlock moving through my home unseen.

"I am tired of waiting for the next attack."

The decision settled inside me.

Not emotional anymore or impulsive.

It was final.

I turned and headed for the door.

Laurent followed immediately.

"Étienne."

"Allow me to investigate this. Do not be brash about it."

I stopped. For one second. One brief second. "What do you mean that I should not be brash!? The one common thread we actually have on camera is an Omega’s face doing the damage with her own hands and feet. So forgive me if I am not currently interested in nuance. There will be grace if she can explain herself. But she will die, and I will do it with my own hands!"

Then I kept walking.

Because the image of Prim smiling into that camera refused to leave my head.

"Sentinels!" I called the moment I entered the corridor.

The response was immediate.

Word had already spread.

Servants lingered in doorways. Staff clustered together, frozen. Fear swept through the house faster than wildfire.

The sentinels arrived within seconds.

I faced them.

Everyone was waiting for instructions. Waiting for certainty.

So I gave it to them.

"Find the Omega Prim and bring her to me. Dead or alive. I do not give a shit."

Their expressions shifted immediately. Some had confusion, shock, and even concern.

None of it mattered.

"Search every room. Every corridor. Every cellar. Every vehicle. Every outbuilding on this estate."

One of them stepped forward.

"Alpha Theodore—"

"She does not leave these grounds."

The authority in my voice silenced him.

"She is a witch. The witch who has been showing her hands lately."

The words echoed through the corridor.

Several people visibly paled, and nobody spoke.

"Tonight she nearly murdered Luna Séverine."

The silence became absolute.

"I bet she has already fled this pack, but I want her found before sundown."