Deviant Kings: Claimed by The Four Lycan Kings

Adeline’s pov~

At 9:55 PM, the academy went completely pitch black. The wind screamed against the heavy stained glass of the Great Library, throwing jagged, tooth-like shadows across the endless rows of dark bookshelves.

The upper levels were totally empty. The glowing wall crystals had been turned down for the night.

I crept through the stacks, my grey sneakers making zero sound on the stone floor. I had changed back into my oversized black hoodie, and I was sweating every time the massive iron doors at the back of the room creaked.

A glowing violet seal was burned right into the wood—the magical lock keeping everyone out of the royal Lycan wing.

Keiran was standing right in front of it. The faint red glow from a nearby hearth backlit his massive frame. No book. No bag. No school papers. He was just standing there, waiting in the dark with his arms crossed over his huge chest.

His head snapped up the second I walked into the aisle. His dark eyes locked onto mine, glowing faintly and looking incredibly dangerous in the dark.

"You are three minutes early," Keiran rasped. His gravelly voice shattered the silence.

"I don’t like to be late," I said, stopping five feet away.

Keiran didn’t waste time talking. He turned to the iron doors and held out his big, scarred right hand. He didn’t use a key. He just pressed his palm flat against the glowing violet seal. A sharp hiss cut through the air as the magic recognised his royal blood. The violet light flared bright, then shattered into harmless sparks.

The heavy iron locks groaned, and the massive doors slowly swung open. Inside was a dark, echoing vault filled with ledgers, ancient scrolls, and the thick smell of old dust.

Keiran stepped inside, his shadow swallowing the doorway. He paused, looking back over his broad shoulder at me.

"Let’s see what you’re really looking for, Adeline," he murmured.

I stepped across the threshold, and the heavy doors slammed shut behind us with a solid thud. The sound cut off the rest of the school, leaving us in a tight, suffocating silence.

This restricted wing looked nothing like the main library. The towering shelves were packed with leather books wrapped in heavy iron chains. The only light came from glowing green crystals set into the stone arches.

"The Siege of Red River," I said, keeping my voice completely flat as I pulled a blank notebook from my hoodie pocket. "Professor Vance said we needed a tactical analysis. Where are the military archives?"

Keiran didn’t answer. He walked deeper into the aisle, his boots clicking softly on the stone. He moved with the quiet grace of a predator that didn’t need to rush because it knew its prey had nowhere to run.

"You aren’t high nobility," Keiran rasped, his deep voice cutting through the quiet. He stopped by a shelf, but he didn’t look at the books. Those lethal dark eyes stayed glued to me. "You wear blank lapels. You have no house colours. Yet, Raven uses a royal decree to protect you, Blake is tracking you, and Zyran wants to dissect you."

I stood my ground. I refused to let the crushing weight of his Lycan aura force me backwards. "I told the others, and I’ll tell you. It is because of a favour for the House of Dravenmoor. Raven is just honouring a contract."

"Raven honours politics," Keiran countered, stepping closer. His massive frame blocked out the green crystal light, throwing me completely into his shadow. The raw scent of him—crushed pine and winter frost—filled my lungs. "He doesn’t bring wild cards into the lion’s den. And you, Adeline... are a massive question mark."

He leaned down slightly, his eyes scanning my face, watching for the tiniest twitch. He wasn’t looking for a missing file. He was trying to break me. He wanted to see the panicked flinch of a liar.

"A wolf with absolutely no scent doesn’t exist," Keiran murmured, his voice dropping into a low growl that vibrated through the stone floor. "Either you’re wearing a powerful cloaking spell to hide a dangerous identity... or you’re a broken, wolfless defect who somehow cheated the system."

My heart did a violent, frantic flip against my ribs. Flashbacks of smoke and the mocking laughter of the twin Alphas hit me. Trash. Kitchen maid. Defect. The old panic clawed at my throat, begging me to back away and run.

But I forced my spine straight. I kept my eyes flat, cold, and totally unbothered. If I showed fear, he would know he hit a nerve.

"Think whatever you want, Lord Keiran," I said, keeping my voice steady as I looked him dead in the eye. "If my lack of scent bothers your Lycan pride, find another history partner. Otherwise, I have a paper to write."

For a long, agonising second, the air turned to ice. Keiran’s pupils blew wide. His wolf was right under the surface, demanding that I bow down.

I didn’t blink. I didn’t move.

Slowly, the intense glare died down. A look of deep curiosity crossed his rugged face. He stood up to his full height, turned his back to me, and pulled a heavy, dusty ledger from the top shelf.

Clank. He dropped the massive book onto a nearby iron reading table.

"Page 342," Keiran commanded, his voice back to its usual rough rasp. "The Siege of Red River. Let’s see if your mind is as sharp as your mouth, Adeline."

I secretly let out the breath I had been holding, my fingers tightening around my pen as I walked to the table. The first test was over. But as I opened the ledger, I could feel Keiran’s silent gaze tracking my every breath from the shadows.

I pulled out the heavy wooden chair and sat down. Keiran stayed standing, leaning against a stone pillar just a few feet away with his arms crossed. He didn’t open a notebook. He didn’t grab a pen. He just watched me.

I forced myself to focus on page 342. The paper was yellowed and brittle, covered in faded black ink showing old troop movements.

"The tactical flaw wasn’t the front line," I muttered, trying to break the heavy silence as I read the messy battle logs. "The Southern Pack tried to hold the riverbanks, but they forgot about the seasonal floods. They trapped themselves."

"They relied on land they didn’t respect," Keiran rasped from the darkness. "An Alpha who doesn’t understand his environment is just leading his pack to a slaughterhouse."

"Sometimes you don’t get a choice in your environment," I said quietly. My pen flew across the paper as I started the first paragraph. "Sometimes you’re just dropped into the middle of a war you didn’t start."

Keiran didn’t reply right away. I could feel his eyes tracking the steady movement of my wrist, the rhythm of my breathing, the absolute stillness of my body.

Suddenly, he shifted. He stepped out of the shadows and walked right up to the edge of the table. He reached out, slamming his large, scarred hand flat against the open page of the ledger, completely blocking me from reading.

"You don’t smell like fear," he murmured, his gravelly voice dropping an octave, sounding almost deep to my ear. "When Blake cornered you, when Zyran challenged Raven, when I stood over your desk... your heart rate spiked, but you didn’t give off a single pheromone. Not a single drop of submissive scent. Even a human bleeds fear when facing an apex predator, Adeline."

I kept my eyes fixed on his hand, noting the jagged white scar running across his knuckles—the mark of a warrior who fought to kill. "I told you, I don’t have a thing to fear about."

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