LOGINThorne For one suspended heartbeat, neither of us moved.The corridor stretched around us in pale stone and cold light, impossibly quiet after the noise of the council chambers. My footsteps had stopped of their own accord and so had hers.Six feet.That was all the distance separating us.The last time we had stood this close, she had been packing a travel bag inside the pack house.I remembered the sound of the drawers opening, the neat piles of folded clothes and the way she had looked at me and said she wanted to leave.The memory rose with uncomfortable clarity.I'd thrown her into the edge of the table and I'd told her she didn't get to want things.At the time, the words had seemed obvious and necessary, but now they echoed through my mind with a sharpness I hadn't expected.Freya looked at me. Not around me or past me, but at me. She didn't lower her eyes either and she didn't instinctively shrink her shoulders the way she always used to whenever I directed my full attenti
Thorne By the time the capital came into view, I was already in a foul mood. My horse seemed to sense it, tossing his head once beneath the reins before settling again.The trackers had found me before dawn, or rather, the two of them who had managed to salvage what little dignity remained after losing the trail had.They stood outside my camp looking equal parts exhausted and embarrassed."We lost her."Three words were all they had for me. Three completely unacceptable words.I had stared at them for a long moment, convinced I had misheard."You... what?"“Forgive us.” The older tracker kept his eyes lowered. "She realized she was being followed."“What?” My jaw tightened. "How?""We don't know." That answer irritated me even more, but I didn't interrupt. Not yet. "We maintained distance, we left no obvious trail. We even followed standard formation.""And yet..." My voice had gone dangerously quiet. "...you still lost one pregnant woman."Neither of them answered, because they
Freya The inside of the council building had been designed to make people feel small and I knew it the moment I stepped through its doors.The walls stretched impossibly high, carved from pale stone that swallowed warmth instead of reflecting it. Narrow windows admitted thin shafts of cold daylight that never quite reached the polished floor, leaving long shadows across the corridors.Even the silence felt deliberate in a way that felt controlled. It was the kind of silence that reminded you exactly where you stood and who held the power.Years ago, it would have worked on me, but not today.I walked forward without slowing.My footsteps echoed steadily against the stone, each sound swallowed almost as quickly as it appeared.Beside me, Sera kept pace without speaking.We reached a pair of heavy oak doors banded with iron. A council official stood waiting there, a thin man with neatly combed silver hair and robes pressed so sharply they looked capable of cutting skin."My apologies."
Freya The capital had always been loud, not just in sound, but in attention and the deeper Sera and I walked into the city, the more I felt it.It started subtly.A merchant paused halfway through arranging apples on his stall, while a woman sweeping outside her shop stopped for half a second before continuing again. Someone else leaned farther out of an upstairs window than necessary.None of them stared openly. Instead, they looked away the instant my eyes drifted toward them, pretending sudden fascination with fruit baskets, horses, laundry lines, or absolutely anything else.But I knew, I knew exactly what they were seeing.The rejected luna, the woman who had collapsed onto the polished floor of the mating hall while half the capital watched.The woman who had vanished afterward and now she was walking back.I kept my chin level as I took one step, then another, over and over again. My heartbeat hammered hard enough that I could feel it in my throat, but no one else needed to
Freya By the morning of the third day, every part of me hurt. Not enough to stop me, but just enough that I noticed every step.The straps of my bag dug into my shoulders, my boots had rubbed a sore spot against my left heel, and my lower back carried that dull, persistent ache that had become a familiar companion ever since the pregnancy began.I shifted the weight of the bag slightly and exhaled through my nose."Complaining already?" Eliza asked, amusement threading through her voice."I've been walking for three days." I shot back. "You've complained less than I expected." I could hear a snicker in her voice. "I was saving it." I rolled my eyes. She huffed what felt suspiciously like laughter, but said nothing else. The road rose gently beneath my feet, curving around a cluster of old oak trees before disappearing behind a rocky hillside.Caden's map had told me this would be the last bend before the capital came into view and for reasons I couldn't explain, my heartbeat s
Freya By the second day, I stopped listening only with my ears.The road stretched ahead beneath a pale sky, winding between fields that slowly gave way to thicker woodland. The morning had been uneventful. Birds called from the branches overhead, and the steady rhythm of my boots against the packed earth had become almost comforting.It should have felt peaceful. Instead, something sat wrong beneath my skin.Eliza went completely still, not tense or restless, but still, and that was never a good sign. I had learned that silence from her meant more than panic ever could."What is it?" I asked quietly inside my own mind.She didn't answer immediately and she didn't need to.BShe was listening, feeling and waiting for the right answer to give. The hairs along the back of my neck rose and I resisted every instinct telling me to turn around. Instead, I kept walking exactly as I had been.I took one step, then another and another. The road behind me remained empty every time I glanced
Freya's pov “Hold still, Freya. You are going to ruin the braid," Sera said. “I am holding still" Her fingers paused in my hair and she met my eyes in the mirror. “You are holding still? You look like you are having a full conversation inside your head," she sighed. "Whatever you are arguing wi
Mine. Mine. Mine.My wolf screamed over and over, like she had been waiting inside me to scream that word. The Alpha king's grip tightened around my hand. I looked up at him and found that he was already looking at me, his eyes wide. My knees buckled and I quickly caught the bar of the cage with m
Freya's pov Hours, days and weeks passed and Thorne hadn't come to check on me, except for the maids who had brought in food. He locked me in my room, scared that I would leave him.I prayed for a miracle and one day, the miracle came in form of his beta. He took one look at me and hissed. “Luna"
Freya's pov“I'm really sorry. I know you were hoping for a different result but the test shows you are not pregnant," the doctor said softly, like she was scared it would break me. Maybe it did. It wasn't exactly the news I was expecting. I couldn't feel myself for a moment. I just felt numb, w







