My Fated Mate Is the Scarred Beggar King

At the sacred Moon Ball, I waited for the Moonstone Chalice to choose me as the Luna of Arthur, the Royal Alpha and my childhood love.

But the man on the throne, who looked exactly like Arthur, used dark magic to make the silver light choose a low-level Omega named Diana instead.

He then stepped down, looking at me with greedy eyes.

"You will be my Chosen Mate. You will have my bed, even if you do not have the title."

He wanted me as a cheap mistress just to control my family's powerful army.

When I refused, he crushed the silver amulet Arthur had given me and threatened to strip my rank.

Diana hid behind him, pretending to cry and apologize while stealing my rightful place.

But I felt absolutely no soul connection to this man.

His scent was a disgusting mix of damp earth and rot. This was not the boy who once took a silver dagger to the chest to save my life.

Disgusted by the imposter, I left the castle and wandered into the market, where I saw royal guards brutally kicking a crippled, severely burned beggar.

I ordered them to stop and knelt in the dirt to help the dying man.

But the moment my fingers brushed his ruined neck, a violent shock of pure electricity shot down my spine.

The Recognition was complete.

This broken beggar with a peeled-off face was my true Alpha, Arthur.

I held my fated mate tightly, swearing to make the imposter bleed for every scar on his body.

Chapter 1

Selena POV

The Moon Ball was the most sacred observance of the Royal Pack. From the high, vaulted ceiling, crystal chandeliers dripped a honeyed light upon the silks and velvets of the restless nobility.

We were all waiting for the Moonstone Chalice to glow. Its incandescence would reveal the true Luna, the fated consort of our Royal Alpha.

I stood near the front, my heart a heavy, measured drum against my ribs. I was Selena, eldest daughter of the Gamma. Though bred for the battlefield, tonight I had exchanged my cuirass for a gown of heavy silver cloth, waiting for Arthur to return from the border wars.

But something was profoundly wrong.

The man upon the throne bore Arthur's likeness—the same fall of dark hair, the same breadth of shoulder—but his scent was a corruption. The moment the miasma of damp earth and leaf-rot reached me, a fine, violent tremor ran up the base of my spine, the hairs on my nape standing erect beneath the velvet collar of my gown. This scent triggered no pull, no warmth—only a cold, crawling revulsion that made my wolf snarl in the back of my skull. The soul-bond that had hummed between Arthur and me since childhood was utterly silent.

This was not my Arthur. A cold certainty settled in my gut.