Deviant Kings: Claimed by The Four Lycan Kings

Adeline’s pov~

"Hey, do you want to—" Sierra started, turning to me with a hopeful look.

Before she could finish her sentence, a massive shadow fell over our desks, blocking out the light entirely.

The chatter in our immediate vicinity died down instantly as a towering figure stepped into the aisle right next to us. It wasn’t the playful Blake or the flashing Zyran.

It was Keiran.

He stood there like a wall of pure muscle and dark authority, his structured charcoal uniform tightly fitting his broad frame. His piercing, lethal eyes didn’t look at Sierra; they locked entirely onto me. He didn’t radiate a loud, aggressive aura like the others, but the sheer, quiet menace radiating off him made the air feel thin and hard to breathe.

Sierra froze beside me, her breath hitching as she instinctively shrank back into her chair.

Keiran reached down, his large, scarred hand placing a blank piece of parchment directly onto my notebook. His voice, when he finally spoke, was a low, gravelly rasp that vibrated straight into my bones.

"You’re with me," Keiran commanded.

It wasn’t a request. It was an absolute mandate from the executioner of the Four Kings.

My breath caught in my throat. Every instinct I had acquired over the past year screamed at me to get up and run, to melt into the shadows and away from the terrifying Lycan standing over me.

Behind Keiran, down in the lowest tier of the amphitheatre, the flock of highborn girls had gone completely silent. I could feel Zyran’s intense, calculating gaze on me. Blake had stopped smirking, his head tilted with a sudden, sharp curiosity. Even Raven had turned around, his jaw locked so tightly a muscle leaped in his cheek, his dark eyes flashing with a silent, warning glare directed at his brother.

Keiran watches everything, Raven had warned me. And now, the executioner had chosen me.

"I..." Sierra stammered beside me, her voice trembling as she looked between Keiran and me. "I can find someone else."

I was left completely exposed.

I steeled my posture, looked at him, keeping my face entirely deadpan.

"I don’t remember agreeing to that," I said, my voice quiet but perfectly steady, cutting through the tense silence of the back corner.

A collective, muffled gasp rippled through the nearby students who were lingering to watch. No one spoke to Keiran like that. No one rejected a mandate from the enforcer of the Four Thrones.

Keiran didn’t flinch. He didn’t growl or flare his aura to crush me into submission. Instead, he leaned down slightly, his massive frame completely cutting off my view of the rest of the classroom. The scent of him hit me, not the recycled colognes of the elite, but something raw and grounding.

"I wasn’t asking, Adeline," he murmured, his gravelly rasp for my ears alone. He used my name, the sound of it heavy and definitive. "The library. Restricted wing. Eight tonight. Don’t make me come looking for you."

My heart did a violent flip against my ribs. The restricted wing. That was exactly where the historical archives were—the ones Raven promised to get me into. How did Keiran know? Was it a trap, or did he see right through my fabricated identity? Or was it just a coincidence?

Before I could answer, Keiran stood up to his full, towering height, turned on his heel, and walked down the steps with effortless, quiet grace.

The moment he reached the front tier, Zyran threw his arm over the back of his chair, a dark, dangerous smirk spreading across his lips as he looked at Keiran. "Well, well. The executioner picks a partner. I didn’t know you liked playing with strays, brother."

Keiran ignored him completely, stood and walked straight out of the double doors without a backward glance.

"Class dismissed," Professor Edward called out, though no one was paying attention to him anymore.

I quickly shoved my notebook and pen into my bag, my hands working automatically as the whispers exploded around me like a flock of startled crows.

"Did you see that?"

"Why her? First Blake, then Raven, now Keiran?"

"She’s touching all the Thrones. Who the hell does she think she is?"

Everyone slowly walked out, but their murmurs followed them.

"Phew, survived day one," Sierra grinned, stretching her arms. "Want to head to the dining hall? I heard they actually have decent coffee."

"Go ahead," I said, packing my notebook away with deliberate slowness. "I need to stop by the library to look for a reference text first."

"Standard overachiever," she teased lightly, standing up. "See you back at the dorms later."

I waited. I waited until Sierra had walked down the steps, and until the majority of the lecture hall had emptied.

When the room finally fell quiet, I zipped my backpack, slung it over one shoulder, and stood up.

I walked down the steps of the amphitheatre, my eyes safely trained on the polished wood of the stairs. The lower tier was empty. The dark leather chairs where the Four Kings had sat were pushed back. Relief washed over me.

I took a step toward the exit doors, only to freeze.

Leaning casually against the heavy stone archway of the door, his arms crossed over his chest, was Zyran. His expensive black leather jacket caught the dim light of the hallway, and his messy dark hair fell perfectly across his forehead.

He was just watching me. And as I stopped dead in my tracks, his head tilted slightly, those bottomless, pitch-black eyes locking onto mine with a terrifying, unreadable intensity.

My instinct was to bolt backwards, to put the rows of wooden desks between us like a shield. But I forced my boots to stay glued to the floor. Running would only confirm I had something to hide. It would make me prey.

So, I just stood there, clutching the strap of my backpack like a lifeline.

Up close, the terrifying aura Zyran carried in the rumours felt different. It wasn’t just raw, predatory malice; it was heavy, suffocatingly dark, and exhausting to be near.

"You’re late for lunch, transfer," Zyran said. His voice wasn’t a growl.

"I had to pack my things," I said, my voice sounding flat, even to my own ears. I kept my gaze levelled at the silver zipper of his leather jacket.

Zyran let out a soft, breathy sound—a laugh that didn’t reach his face. He pushed off from the stone archway, his movements fluid and unhurried as he closed the distance between us. With every step he took, the air grew thicker, carrying the faint, distinct scent of rich dark liquor and cedarwood.

He stopped just two feet away, completely blocking the exit. He was tall, massive, really his shadow completely eclipsing the dim light from the hallway.

"You don’t smell like the others," he murmured, his head tilting as his eyes scanned my face, tracing the dark circles under my eyes, the slight tremor in my jaw that I couldn’t entirely mask. "The highborn girls spend hours bathing in floral oils just to get a glance from us. You smell like... nothing."

"I don’t have money for luxury oils," I said directly, forcing myself to look up, straight into the dark void of his eyes. My heart was thumping a frantic rhythm against my ribs, but I kept my posture straight. "I am just here to study, Lord Zyran. If you’ll excuse me."

Hearing his official title seemed to amuse him, but the amusement was fleeting. His gaze dropped to the faint red mark on my hand, the indentation left by the wire of my notebook where I had pressed my thumb to stay grounded.

Slowly, Zyran reached out.

Panic flared in my chest, a white-hot spark. I braced myself to flinch away, to fight, but his movement was surprisingly gentle. His long, well-manicured fingers didn’t grab me. Instead, the back of his knuckles lightly brushed against the side of my wrist, just above the cuff of my black sweater.

The moment his skin touched mine, a jolt of pure, static electricity snapped through the air.

Zyran froze. I don’t know why. But I definitely saw something flicker in his expression. Shock? Surprise? His pitch-black eyes widened slightly, the dark pupils expanding. I felt his chest expand as he took a sharp, sudden breath, his jaw tightening into granite.

I yanked my hand back as if I’d been burned. "Don’t touch me."

Zyran didn’t snap. He just stared at his own hand, his fingers flexing slightly as if he could still feel the spark. When he looked back up at me, the lazy, bad-boy mask he usually wears was completely gone. In its place was something raw, confused, and intensely human.

"What are you?" he whispered, his voice dropping into a rough, quiet rasp.

"I’m nobody," I said, my voice trembling for the first time. I stepped sideways, dodging past his massive frame.

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