Blurb：
When alchemist **Carys Redding** sacrifices eight of her nine-tailed fox lives to save her stepsister **Lacey Carmichael**, she never expects **Lacey** to steal her Veritas Elixir and claim glory at the National Apothecary Championship. But the award comes with a venomous twist: marriage to **Alaric Kingsley**, the disfigured, sterile **Serpent Lord** rumored to wear a leather mask and feast on broken souls.
Betrayed by fiancé **Dalton Montgomery** – who brands her "Worthless" while Bonding with **Lacey** – **Carys** gambles her last life on a lethal pact:
Marry the **Snake Clan's** most feared Beastkin lord
Force **Lacey** to confess her elixir theft publicly
Survive **Alaric's** Primal Shifts and rumors of his violent sterility
But **Alaric** isn't the monster gossip claims. His masked green eyes see through **Carys'** scars, gifting silk flowers for her pollen allergies and vengeance for her stolen tails. As their Bonding ignites forbidden heat (double-mating included for **Snake Clan** consorts), jealous **Dalton** shifts into a feral wolf, clawing at their gates.
Can **Carys** rewrite her fate as **Lady Kingsley**, or will **Lacey's** poison destroy the Nine-Tailed Fox's final life?
**Tropes**: Forced Marriage Masked Villain Romance Stolen Identity Betrayed Heroine’s Revenge
Content：
§PROLOGUE“They say I’m incapable of love, Carys.”
His voice was a low murmur against her ear, a velvet rasp that sent a shiver down her spine.
The scent of him—old books, expensive cologne, and something wild and uniquely his, like a storm trapped in a bottle—filled her senses.
He traced the delicate line of her jaw with a single finger, his touch surprisingly gentle for a man rumored to be a monster.
“Are you afraid?”
She met his gaze in the grand, antique mirror.
His face was half-shrouded in shadow, the other half illuminated by the soft glow of the bedside lamp, revealing a jawline sharp enough to cut diamonds and eyes the color of a twilight forest.
The infamous leather mask that concealed the upper half of his face was still perfectly in place, a stark black against his pale skin.
This was her husband.
Alaric Kingsley.
The Serpent Lord of Nocturne Bay.
A man whispered to be disfigured, sterile, and ruthlessly cruel.
Her savior and, perhaps, her new jailer.
She leaned back, her body pressing against the solid wall of his chest.
“No,” she whispered, her voice steady, betraying none of the turmoil in her heart.
“I’m not afraid of you.”
A slow, dangerous smile curved his lips.
“Good,” he murmured, his hand sliding from her jaw down the column of her throat, stopping just above the frantic pulse at its base.
“Because you have no idea what you’ve just bound yourself to.”
§01
At the National Apothecary Guild Championship, my stepsister became a star with the elixir she stole from me.
Ironic, wasn't it?
The Veritas Elixir, a truth serum of my own design, built her entire career on a lie.
I didn't realize, then, that this single act of theft was about to detonate my entire life.
That this competition was a carefully orchestrated bride selection for the notoriously cruel and disfigured serpent lord, Alaric Kingsley—a man rumored to be naturally sterile.
That night, a formal Bonding Contract from Kingsley Enterprises arrived, demanding the hand of the elixir's creator.
My fiancé, Dalton, panicked.
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The End