–“Favor and Fire”
The house creaked as it settled into silence. The kind of silence that clung to the skin. I lay in bed, not changing out of my clothes, my eyes burning from tears I hadn’t let fall.
Jonathan came into the room without a word. He didn’t look at me. Didn’t ask if I was okay. He just pulled off his shirt, toed off his shoes, and lay down on the other side of the bed like nothing happened.
Minutes passed. Then—
He sat up.
I kept my eyes closed, my breath shallow.
He stood, grabbed his phone from the nightstand, and walked toward the hallway.
The door clicked softly behind him.
I counted to ten. Then twenty. Then I got up too.
The hallway light was on. I crept toward the end where his voice floated in a hush.
“…I know. I’m handling it. She snapped
Maya’s POVI barely slept that night. My mind was a storm of thoughts, each one louder and darker than the last. I lay on my thin mattress, staring up at the cracked ceiling while Jayden slept beside me, snoring softly with his little mouth open.My wolf was restless, pacing inside me. She will take him if we don’t do something, she growled for the hundredth time that night. We have to act, Maya.I turned on my side, facing Jayden’s peaceful face. His lashes were long and curled against his cheeks. His small hands were balled into fists, clutching the edge of his thin blanket. I reached out and brushed his cheek with my thumb.“Why won’t you tell me what she said to you?” I whispered, my voice catching in my throat.He stirred a little, his brows furrowing, but he didn’t wake up. I pulled my hand back quickly, feeling tears burn my eyes. My wolf whined softly in
Maya’s POVI watched Jayden from across the small living room, my chest tightening. His little hands were pushing his toy cars back and forth on the rug, but there was no excitement in his movements today. The bright orange car he always raced around the house moved slower than usual. He didn’t even make the vroom sounds that usually made me smile.“Jayden,” I called softly, my voice trembling more than I wanted. “What’s wrong, baby? Why aren’t you playing like always?”He didn’t look at me immediately. His small shoulders slumped as he kept rolling the car. Finally, he raised his gaze. “Nothing.”I forced a smile and moved closer, kneeling beside him on the rug. “You know you can tell me anything. Did something happen in school today?”His lips pouted, and he shook his head. “No.”
"You’re Not Her”Maya's POVJayden was lying on his stomach in the living room, his workbook open in front of him, elbows planted into the shaggy rug. His brows were furrowed in a way that made him look older than he was. A pencil dangled loosely between his fingers, tapping in a distracted rhythm against the page. Sunlight streamed in through the windows, lighting up the dust in the air, making everything look warmer than it felt.I sat beside him, legs folded awkwardly beneath me, holding a chipped mug of tea that had long gone cold. The room should’ve felt cozy—it always had before. The soft furniture, the smell of old books and something faintly sweet from the diffuser in the corner. But now it felt tight. Uneasy. Like a guest room I wasn’t supposed to be in.Jayden didn’t look at me. He hadn’t, really, since I walked through the door
“Cracks in Gold”Conan's POV The palace was quiet.Too quiet.My boots landed without echo, my steps swallowed by the thick, gilded silence of the corridor. The walls were polished and warm with candlelight, but it all felt cold to me now. Behind each door, behind every pair of watching eyes, something stirred—suspicion, fear, or worse: questions I wasn’t ready to answer.The scent of smoke still lingered faintly in my clothes. No amount of gold or power could scrub that away.I rounded the corner near the garden vestibule, heading toward the southern wing where the inner offices lay, when I heard the soft click of heels against the floor.I looked up.Samira.She was dressed in pale lavender, a subtle braid running down one shoulder, the gold pins in h
– “Silenced Halls”Conan's POV The doors hadn’t opened yet, but I could already hear them.The voices. Dozens of them, echoing off stone walls—anxious, impatient, too loud for what was supposed to be a council chamber. This room was meant for law and order. For diplomacy and unity.Now it pulsed with fear. I didn't blame them, I was shaking myself. But that didn't mean I'd just let it show.I stood just beyond the threshold, my hands clenched behind my back, listening.“…a warning shot, I tell you—”“No, it was a message—he meant to kill the Alpha!”“What if more of them are already inside the walls?”“If we go public, the court will fall to chaos—” 
“Smoke at the Border”The war room felt colder than when we first entered. The tension hadn't eased—it had thickened. The fire crackled low in the hearth, its glow casting uneasy shadows across the map table as we waited.Then came the knock.The doors opened and the royal guards stepped in—three of them, their uniforms dusted with ash, their armor scratched from forest combat. I recognized Commander Elric by the way he held his helmet under his arm, jaw tight with failure. He wasn’t one to come bearing good news.The Alpha didn’t sit. He stood beside the table, arms folded behind his back, head angled in command. I stayed at his side, silent, listening.“Elric,” the Alpha said.The commander bowed slightly. “We tracked the shooters to the southern ridge. They were fast and seemed trained. We c