The nursery was quiet, but Aria could feel the storm in her chest.
It had been three days since Kael’s exile. Three days of silence from the council chambers. Three days of the pack holding its breath.
But it wasn’t the power vacuum that unsettled her.
It was this room.
The fire crackled softly in the corner hearth, casting flickers of orange across the pale walls. Soft shadows danced above shelves stacked with toys no one had touched, and blankets no one had unfolded.
She held her daughter close, breathing in the scent of warm milk and clove oil. The child was heavier now — her limbs more defined, her gaze far too knowing for someone who hadn’t even seen her first winter.
Aria brushed a fingertip across the baby’s cheek.
Still so quiet.
Still watching everything.
“She doesn’t cry,” Aria murmured, almost to herself. “She barely makes a sound.”
Zara sat nearby in the window alcove, rubbing her swollen belly. Her second pup was due soon, and yet she still found time to hover near Aria like a second heartbeat.
“She’s observant,” Zara said gently. “Not broken.”
Aria looked down.
Storm-gray eyes blinked up at her. The same eyes Kael used to have before bitterness dimmed them. The same eyes Aria saw in the mirror when she was too tired to pretend she wasn’t unraveling.
“She knows,” Aria whispered. “She feels everything I try to bury.”
Zara didn’t argue.
Outside, a wind moaned against the glass panes. The moon hung swollen and bright, a watcher without judgment.
Aria rocked slowly, arms wrapped protectively around her child.
“I still dream of him,” she admitted.
Zara’s expression tightened.
“Not because I miss him,” Aria added quickly. “But because… he’s in everything. He’s in this child. In the silence he left behind.”
The baby shifted in her arms, burrowing closer. Her small hand clutched at the edge of Aria’s tunic and held on like it meant something.
Aria’s throat ached.
“She hasn’t chosen a name,” she said, voice cracking. “I thought it would come to me. I thought the moon would whisper something or the spirits would guide me. But every time I try, I hear his voice in my head. I hear what he said when he tore our bond apart.”
She shut her eyes.
That final day still echoed.
“Let her go,” Kael had said to the council, eyes empty. “She was never my true mate.”
Never his true mate.
But she had carried his child.
And now she sat, months later, trying to erase his name from the girl’s bloodline with nothing but warmth and stubbornness.
“Maybe she’s waiting,” Zara offered. “Maybe she wants to name herself.”
Aria smiled faintly. “That would be like her.”
They sat in silence a while, the only sound the soft crackle of firewood and the baby’s steady breath.
Then, without warning, the child stirred.
She blinked. Reached.
And then, her lips parted.
“Mama.”
Aria froze.
The world tilted.
Zara straightened, eyes wide. “Did she—?”
The child blinked again, more insistent this time. “Mama,” she said, then placed a hand over Aria’s heart.
Aria felt it like lightning.
It wasn’t just a word.
It was a claim.
A declaration.
A bond, forged not by prophecy or pack politics — but by choice.
Tears welled in Aria’s eyes. Her grip tightened protectively around the baby’s small form.
“Yes,” she breathed. “I’m your mama.”
The baby giggled softly, curling into her chest.
Zara laughed, wiping her own eyes. “Looks like she picked her Luna.”
The words echoed.
She picked.
Not fate. Not tradition. Not Kael.
This child had chosen her.
And in that moment, Aria felt something inside her settle for the first time in moons.
She wasn’t alone.
She wasn’t ruined.
She wasn’t waiting for permission to lead, or to love.
She was already everything her daughter needed.
She glanced toward the rune-inscribed wall where the ancestral names were etched. Soon, her daughter’s name would join them — not because it came from a legacy of Alphas, but because she’d carved her own place in it.
“I think I know her name now,” Aria said.
Zara leaned in.
“Alira,” she whispered. “It means chosen flame.”
Zara smiled. “It suits her.”
A quiet knock came at the nursery door.
Maya poked her head in. “The council has requested your presence.”
Aria didn’t move.
“I’ll come when she’s asleep,” she said.
Maya nodded and closed the door behind her.
Zara rose, kissed Aria’s temple, and whispered, “You’ve already won.”
Then she left too.
Leaving just the two of them.
Aria pressed her lips to her daughter’s forehead.
“You saved me, Alira,” she murmured. “Now let me protect you.”
Outside, the wind carried whispers of change.
But inside, one word anchored them both.
“Mama.”
