[KURAYAMI]
Kazuya Yamashita.
The executioner who stole a life that was never his to take.
The man who ruined lives he should never have touched.
The man who didn't know what consent meant.
The thing is, Yuzuki had been thinking since she had returned to life. She had had a lot of time to think about what had motivated the king to attack Fukada and eliminate them like that.
Her Matsui had been beautiful. Was always beautiful.
But a man like Kazuya Yamashita didn't annihilate an entire pack because of one failed romantic interest. He didn't ruin lives just because a woman told him no.
He took out an entire pack, then made sure no one could ever return by filling the land with traps.
And now, the man was here, dressed to impress even with a frown on his face. Looking at the throne room like Yuzuki had offended him.
It was something that never bothered anyone because everyone knew Queen Kuramitsu and King Kazuya had a longstanding hate for each other. Hell, even they had come here to see if the king and the psycho queen would kill each other today.
Rinko looked at Yuzuki. Then at Ayami, the enforcer Yuzuki was head over heels in love with. But she noticed something.
Yuzuki didn't look at Ayami.
Not once.
Her focus was on King Kazuya. Her blank, cold stare that Rinko had come to learn over the years was there for everyone not to see.
But Rinko saw it. The pure, unfiltered rage behind those cold eyes. The fists that threatened to clench while everyone saw the dangerously composed werewolf queen.
Rinko wondered what this was about.
And in a fleeting, crazier-than-crazy moment, Rinko had one thought that scared the hell out of her and confused her more than Yuzuki's tantrums about Ayami Araki had been.
What if Yuzuki was using Ayami to get to King Kazuya?
That was a dangerous thought. Very dangerous, yet it was the only thing that Rinko could make sense of.
Nothing else made any sort of sense because right now, as the king walked in with Ayami following closely, and Kazuya walked closer to his seat, which was deep in the room where Yuzuki and the other royals were, Ayami's hand lingered on her sword.
Ready to defend her queen.
Ready to fight if Yuzuki asked her to.
"Still sluggish as ever, Kazuya," Yuzuki said.
"Says the woman hiding her face. What are you scared of, Kuramitsu?" Kazuya said as he took his seat.
Ayami followed.
But Yuzuki's eyes never once drifted to the woman. It was like she was not even interested anymore, or maybe not at the moment.
Amaya sat prettily on the consort seat, as she belonged. Like that was her home, and frankly, with Yuzuki already seated on the throne, she was more than excited to be seen by everyone as the woman Queen Kuramitsu loved and wanted beside her.
"You sound scared, Kazuya... is that why you're late?" Yuzuki asked, not mincing her words.
Enforcer Ayami looked unnerved by the woman's tone, but even Ayami Araki knew better than to try shit with Queen Kuramitsu. That woman was on her own level of unhinged and crazy.
Sure, Ayami knew she could try to fight the mad queen of the Seven Kingdoms, but she would lose. If not soon, then later, when the mad woman ripped her heart out and threw her to the ground.
Even Ayami knew where the limits were with Queen Kuramitsu. Still, it didn't make it any easier to sit there and watch the woman talk shit to her king.
"Came hours late because you kept sending scouts to see if the other rulers were already annihilated," Yuzuki said like she was intrigued by how stupid the king was.
Kazuya clearly didn't like that because his nose scrunched up, his hands balled into fists as he stared at the one woman whom he didn't trust with everything he had and didn't have.
"If you missed me that much, you could have just sent someone to pick me up, Kuramitsu," Kazuya said daringly, and Rinko and the Kurayami warriors stepped forward, ready to do whatever their queen wanted.
Of course, the realm's lethal enforcer got up too. Because Ayami, just like Rinko, was simply an executioner for their masters.
"He's not worth it. Stand down," Yuzuki said broadly, and everyone let out gasps as the Kurayami Queen's Guard stepped back in understanding.
The rest of the rulers?
Too shocked to breathe a word. They had known that Queen Kuramitsu was insane, but gods, this woman was untamed, untamable, and every risk that everyone had known her to be.
Yuzuki's royal council, on the other hand, was not even sure what the fuck they were supposed to do.
They knew her so well.
They knew she didn't just wake up and let people see her riled up and shit. And silently they prayed that this wasn't because they had done something, anything, because otherwise they were fucked in all the seven ways to hell.
"If you're done throwing tantrums, shall we begin what the summit is about?" Yuzuki said broadly, and the rulers stared in silence.
They didn't have a thing to say to that, really, and they hoped that King Kazuya respected the situation. Because they had not been invited into Kurayami to fight.
The mad woman's kingdom was already stranger than theirs combined, so there wasn't even a point in trying shit, because they would lose.
And so, the meeting began. The rulers brought forth discussions about the freedom that Kurayami had given them. They learned that it was not just Queen Kuramitsu opening her borders for freedom of trade.
But also to allow their people to interact. To live amongst each other within the rules that they set for every kingdom.
It was a good meeting, until...
"No. Yamashita does not agree to your suggestions. We will open our borders, but only for trade. Nothing more," King Kazuya said sternly, his denial something that had everyone staring at him, confused.
The suggestions everyone had brought forth were beneficial for them. Because then their people didn't have to always be wary about what was happening in the other kingdom. They could visit over the years and live freely.
So why was Kazuya, the man with the second-largest kingdom in the realm after Kurayami, the only ruler opposed to it?
"Are you hiding something in Yamashita that you do not want us to know about?" Yuzuki asked, staring at the Yamashita king.
"Perhaps the Fukada massacre?" Yuzuki added… and Kazuya stilled.
For a moment the king forgot how to breathe and think properly.
He looked at the queen.
At the Queen's Guard.
At the royals who were gathered here.
And fuck if he wasn't sure what to say to that for the first time in so long.
Of course, Queen Kuramitsu had to have known so much about the kingdoms.
She always had her intel and her messengers embedded in the kingdoms. It was hard to tell who was who because no one knew how their kingdoms' secrets even panned out to this woman.
Ayami, on the other hand... looked at Rinko.
And of course, she remembered the mating ball a year ago.
The night Ayami had saved Rinko's sister from the traps in the Fukada pack. Only Rinko could have told her queen about what they saw in Fukada that night.
For a moment, Rinko saw betrayal flash in Ayami's eyes. Rinko, on the other hand, just shrugged, like it was nothing. Like that information was basic and everyone knew about it.
After all, everyone knew the Fukada Pack had been annihilated by King Kazuya. They knew the king had ordered it, but many had been told that it was because the alpha, only known to many as Fukada, had gone against the king.
Only the people inside Yamashita knew Yuzuki's name, Yuzuki Fukada.
The other people knew her as Alpha Fukada.
The alpha who never bent to anyone's will. The woman who did what she believed was right for her people. The woman who defended and protected Fukada with her life.
They feared Alpha Fukada more than they feared King Kazuya of Yamashita.
Because unlike King Kazuya, who had a kingdom to run, Yuzuki had a pack she was willing to die for anytime.
She had.
"Looks like the Yamashita king is having a stroke. We shall resume this meeting in three days. You're all welcome to return... or not. Summit dismissed," Yuzuki said before she walked out first, leaving everyone too stunned to even breathe.
"She is right about the Fukada Pack..."
Yuzuki heard the whispers as she walked away.
Still, she didn't look at Ayami.