Darius's POV
Every man has a breaking point. Leon found mine with her name on his tongue.
I circled Leon like the predator I had become, my claws digging deep furrows in the snow-covered ground of the training yard. The knight stood with his sword raised, his blue eyes steady despite the terror I could smell rolling off him in waves. But his mouth, his damned mouth, kept running, each word hitting me like a physical blow designed to drive me deeper into rage.
"She whispered my name that night," Leon said, his voice carrying across the space between us with deliberate cruelty. "When I was inside her, when she gave herself to me completely. Do you think she'll ever whisper yours with the same passion?"
The fury burned through me hotter than before, white-hot and consuming. I snarled, deep and sharp, the sound echoing off the castle walls as I gathered myself to spring.
"She doesn't love you," Leon continued, adjusting his grip on his weapon. "She can't. You're a monster, Darius. A beast wearing a man's crown. What woman could love something like that?"
I lunged forward with all the speed and power the curse had given me. Leon swung his sword in a perfect arc, but I ducked beneath the blade, feeling the steel whistle past my ears. The movement only fed the fury burning in my chest, confirming what the wolf already knew, this man was a threat that needed to be eliminated.
I struck back immediately, my massive paw hitting Leon's sword arm with enough force to send the weapon flying. It landed several feet away, half-buried in the snow where he couldn't reach it quickly.
Leon scrambled backward, making a desperate lunge toward his fallen sword. But I was faster, stronger, driven by instincts that brooked no mercy for rivals. I leaped forward, my full weight slamming into him and driving him down into the snow.
He crashed to the ground beneath me, the impact driving the breath from his lungs in a sharp gasp. I pinned him there, my massive paws on either side of his chest, my fangs hovering inches from his exposed throat.
His pulse hammered against his skin, fast and desperate, calling to every predatory instinct I possessed. One bite, that's all it would take.
One quick snap of my jaws and Leon would never again speak Octavia's name, never again claim what was mine, never again threaten the fragile peace I was trying to build with my wife.
"Do it," Leon gasped, his eyes blazing with defiant courage even as death loomed over him. "Kill me. Prove you're exactly the monster everyone believes you to be."
The words should have driven me over the edge, should have been the final provocation that sealed his fate. Instead, they cut through the red haze of my fury just enough to let other sounds penetrate my awareness. Shouting in the distance. My men, crying out in alarm as they witnessed their prince about to commit murder in broad daylight. Their voices rang through the winter air, desperate and commanding.
"Your Highness, stop!"
"Stand down!"
"Don't do this!"
Footsteps pounded across the frozen ground, getting closer with each heartbeat. Soon they would be here, would see what I had become, would witness the beast that lived beneath their prince's civilized exterior.
And then I heard another voice. Her voice. "Darius, no!"
I turned my head just enough to see Octavia running toward us across the training yard, her dark cloak streaming behind her like wings. Her face was pale as winter snow, streaked with tears that caught the morning light like crystals. She was crying, pleading, her voice breaking with desperation.
"Please," she called out, her words carrying across the distance between us. "Don't do this. Please." The sound of her anguish cut through my anger more effectively than any blade could have.
For a moment, I saw myself through her eyes, a massive black wolf with glowing red eyes, pinning a defenseless man to the ground while preparing to tear out his throat. I saw the fear in her expression, the horror, the desperate hope that some part of the man she had married still existed beneath the beast.
That's when the arrow flew. Pain burst along my side like liquid fire, the steel point scraping across my ribs and leaving a burning trail in its wake. I staggered back from Leon, my attention snapping toward the ridge where Leon's mercenaries had positioned themselves, their crossbows trained on the battlefield below.
"Now!" Leon shouted to his men. "While he's distracted!"
My own guards were running toward us from the castle, but they were too far away, shouting orders that went unheeded as Leon's archers prepared to fire again. I wanted to return to my human form butt I couldn't. The rage was still too hot, too consuming, even with Octavia's pleas echoing in my ears. The wolf wanted blood, wanted to finish what had been started, wanted to eliminate the threat once and for all.
Instead, I looked one more time at Octavia's tear-streaked face, saw the mixture of fear and heartbreak written there, and made the only choice I could. I turned and ran. My powerful legs carried me across the training yard and into the forest beyond, blood trailing behind me in the snow like crimson breadcrumbs marking my path.
I didn't stop when I heard Octavia call my name again, didn't pause when Leon's voice rose behind me, didn't slow when the guards shouted orders I had no intention of following. I ran until the castle was nothing but a distant memory, until the sound of human voices faded into the whisper of wind through bare branches. Only then did I allow myself to collapse in a clearing deep in the woods, my sides heaving as I struggled to regain control.
The arrow wound burned like acid, but it was nothing compared to the image burned into my mind, Octavia's face as she watched me nearly kill the man she had once loved. The fear in her eyes, the way she had flinched away from me as if I were truly the monster everyone believed me to be.
Maybe Leon was right, maybe no woman could love something like me. Maybe I was fooling myself to think that Octavia could ever see past the curse to whatever remained of the man beneath.
The thought hurt worse than any physical wound, cutting deeper than claws or arrows or poison ever could. Because in that moment of clarity, I realized that somewhere along the way, I had begun to hope.
And hope, for a creature like me, was the cruelest curse of all.