Kael stood at the high windows of the council chamber, jaw clenched as the cold sun bled light across the marble floor. The silence pressed in on him—too heavy, too still.
Behind him, the door slammed shut.
“Tell me it isn’t true,” said a voice Kael hadn’t heard in weeks.
He didn’t turn. “You heard what happened, Grandfather.”
Elder Gideon’s footsteps were measured, deliberate. “I heard you severed the bond. In front of the full council. Without warning. Without cause.”
“She wasn’t the Luna I needed.”
“You mean she wasn’t Selene.”
Kael exhaled slowly through his nose. “Selene’s return changed everything.”
“It changed you.” Gideon’s voice grew low and dangerous. “I told the other Elders to hold their tongues. That my grandson had vision. That you—Kael Draven—were forging a future. But now? They call you weak. Erratic. Unfit.”
Kael turned slowly. “They wouldn’t dare.”
“They already are.” Gideon stepped into the light, his silver hair gleaming like a crown. “You abandoned your fated mate, and with her, the future of this pack.”
“I did what was necessary,” Kael snapped.
“Necessary for who?” Gideon snarled. “The pack? The council? Or your bleeding ego?”
Kael’s hands curled into fists at his sides. “I gave Aria everything. She knew what loving me meant. She accepted the risks.”
“And then you tore it all away the moment Selene walked through the gates.” Gideon’s voice dropped to a growl. “Tell me, boy. When you severed the bond, did you even stop to think she might’ve been carrying?”
The words struck like lightning.
Kael’s body went still.
His voice, when it came, was hoarse. “She would’ve told me.”
Gideon barked a joyless laugh. “Would she? You ripped her soul in half in front of half the damn kingdom. You think she owed you a confession after that?”
Kael turned away, facing the stained-glass depiction of the first Alpha Draven. His hands trembled. “There was no sign. No scent.”
“You mean you didn’t look,” Gideon said. “And now she’s vanished.”
“She ran,” Kael muttered. “She’s hiding.”
“Of course she is. You made her a target.”
Kael spun. “If I’d known—”
“You should have known,” Gideon snapped. “But you were too busy chasing ghosts.”
Silence rang through the chamber.
Finally, Kael said, “It’s too late. Even if she was—if she is—it’s over. She won’t come back.”
Gideon stepped close, so close Kael could see the storm building in the old man’s eyes. “Then you’ll bring her back. Or you’ll lose everything. The council is watching. The other Alphas are circling like crows. Your claim to the seat is only as strong as the bloodline you protect.”
Kael swallowed hard. “I don’t know where she is.”
Gideon’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Then find her. Before the wrong people do.”
Miles away, the sky hung low over the city as Aria rinsed a chipped teacup in their cracked sink.
Her movements were mechanical. She couldn’t stop thinking about the tether she still felt at night—thin and silvery, humming just beneath her ribs. She shouldn’t still feel anything, not after a severance that brutal. But there it was.
A phantom ache. A memory the bond refused to erase.
Sometimes it pulsed stronger than others. Like now.
She dried the cup with shaking hands.
Zara entered, setting a brown paper bag on the counter. “Groceries. Don’t ask what I traded for the eggs.”
“Witchcraft?”
“Old honey and a silver ring.”
Aria tried to smile, but it came out crooked. “I felt something.”
Zara looked up, alert. “Kael?”
“I don’t know. Just… pressure. Like I’m being watched.”
Zara moved to the window and peeked between the blinds. “We’ve stayed too long. You were right. We move tonight.”
Aria glanced down at her belly. The curve was more visible now, just enough that coats no longer hid it completely. “It’s getting harder to blend in.”
“Then we stop trying,” Zara said. “Let them underestimate you. Let them forget what a wolf can become when she’s protecting her young.”
At sunset, they packed in silence.
Aria took only what mattered—a book, the ultrasound printout, and the pendant her mother had given her before she died. Everything else could burn.
Zara had arranged transport with an old contact, a rogue courier who owed her favors from a shared prison cell long ago. He wouldn’t ask questions.
Before leaving, Aria took one last look around the apartment. The peeling wallpaper. The scent of candle wax and rusted metal. The place where her child had first kicked.
It had been safety.
Now it was a liability.
Zara touched her arm. “You ready?”
Aria nodded.
No more hiding.
No more waiting for Kael to do the right thing.
He’d made his choice.
Now she would make hers.
In a shadowed corner of the Draven estate, Kael stood over a map of known rogue routes, jaw clenched, eyes red-rimmed from sleepless nights.
She was out there. He could feel it now.
He didn’t know if it was magic or madness, but Aria was alive.
And if she was pregnant… he would find her.
He had to.
Not just for the council.
Not just for the throne.
But because deep down, beneath the guilt and anger and confusion, he missed her.
Her laugh. Her scent. Her strength.
Gideon had been right.
If he didn’t find her soon, he’d lose everything.
