로그인LyseraI woke up suddenly. My body jerked upright before my mind could catch up, my breath coming out sharp as my eyes snapped open. For a second, everything felt too bright.I looked around, disoriented, my heart still racing like I had been pulled out of something deep and heavy.I was in my room at the pack house. Memories from last night came rushing back all at once. The pacing. The waiting. The way I had tried to force myself to stay awake.My head snapped to the side beside me on the bed, it didn’t look as if anybody slept there. It didn’t look as if Henry joined me in the middle of the night.My gaze moved around quickly, scanning every corner like I expected him to be standing there, watching me.But the room was empty. Completely empty.My chest rose slowly as I sat there, trying to steady my breathing. He didn’t come.I inhaled sharply, trying to sniff the air. Maybe if I concentrated enough I’d pick up his scent. My nose flared slightly as I searched for it. For him. For
LyseraThe night refused to settle. Or maybe it was me.I had been pacing for so long that the distance between the door and the window no longer felt like a space. It felt like a cage I kept walking into over and over again. Back and forth. Back and forth. My bare feet pressed against the cold floor, the chill creeping up through my skin, but I barely felt it.I couldn’t sit.Every time I tried, my body would tense again, forcing me back to my feet like something inside me refused to let me rest.I shouldn’t have said it. The words replayed in my head, over and over again, refusing to stop.“I’ll go through with the mating ritual.”My fingers curled tightly at my sides. What had I been thinking?I stopped mid-step, my chest tightening as the realization settled deeper.I had given him everything.Every-damn-thing.A bitter laugh almost left my throat, but I swallowed it down. It felt too sharp, too close to breaking.“I should have given him half,” I muttered under my breath, my voic
Lysera“Look at him,” I said when Henry stepped into the room. My voice came out tighter than I wanted. “Does Timothy look like someone who tried to help me escape?”Henry’s gaze moved over the bed, taking in the blood, the bandages, the way Timothy lay too still.“He’s injured because my men fought back,” he said.My jaw clenched so hard it hurt.“You still think I convinced him to turn on your guards?” I asked, a small, bitter smile pulling at my lips. “No matter what I say, you won’t believe me. Right?”Henry didn’t answer. He turned and walked out. Just like that. Like I wasn’t even worth arguing with.“Get the young guard,” I heard him order outside.My chest tightened painfully as I looked back at Timothy. He looked even younger like this. Too still and very pale.He had fought for me and nearly died for it. And now, he would be punished for it. He would become a prisoner because of me.Tears burned the back of my eyes, blurring my vision for a moment before I forced them back
Lysera A loud crash ripped through the house and dragged me out of sleep. I jerked upright, my heart slamming hard against my ribs as the sound echoed in my head. For a second, I didn’t move. I just sat there, breathing too fast, my eyes darting around the room as I tried to understand where I was. The walls felt unfamiliar. The bed beneath me was hard. This wasn’t the new room Henry assigned to me in the pack house My mind struggled to catch up with my body. Then it hit me all at once. The forest. The attack. Blood. Timothy. My chest tightened sharply. Another sound followed—heavy footsteps, fast and purposeful, shaking the quiet of the house. “Where is she?” Henry’s voice rang out through the house. “I can smell her all over this house.” Relief came first. He came. He really came to find me. ‘I knew he would.’ My wolf said in my head. I ignored her, because the tone of his voice—rough, furious, unrestrained—sent something uneasy crawling down my spine. I pushed the blanke
LyseraWe had been moving for so long that when we finally stopped, it didn’t feel real.The hunter’s house stood at the edge of nowhere but it was far enough from the forest that the trees had thinned into scattered shadows, far enough from the pack that even the air felt different. Still, quiet and safe… or at least pretending to be.By the time we got there, I could barely feel my legs.I don't remember how long we walked.One moment, I was behind him in the forest, struggling to keep up as he carried Timothy over his shoulder like it was nothing. And the next, we were stepping into his house.The shift felt unreal.The hunter didn’t slow down. He moved straight inside and into one of the rooms, laying Timothy down carefully like he wasn’t the same man who had just tossed him over his shoulder without effort.I stopped at the doorway. My arms felt too light and empty.For so long, I had been holding him up, dragging him, carrying his weight like it was the only thing keeping me mov
LyseraI didn’t get far. At first, I thought I could keep going. I tightened my hold around the young guard, dragged his arm over my shoulder again, and forced my legs to move. One step. Then another and another.But he was getting heavier. Not just heavy but a dead weight.Each step pulled at my bones, at my muscles, at the little strength I had left. My legs trembled beneath me. My breath came out uneven, sharp and loud in the quiet of the forest. My vision blurred at the edges, the trees shifting and tilting in a way that made it hard to focus.I tried, I really tried but my body gave out in the end.My foot caught against something—maybe a root, maybe nothing at all—and I stumbled forward. I kicked the base of a tree in frustration as I lost my balance, and the next second, we both went down hard.The impact knocked the breath out of me again. My grip loosened, and he slipped off my shoulder, hitting the ground beside me with a dull, lifeless thud.For a second, I didn’t move. I j
LyseraI told him everything.Once I started, I couldn’t stop. It poured out of me like something that had been dammed up for years, pressing against my ribs, choking me from the inside. My voice didn’t shake the way I expected it to. It was flat in places, sharp in others, stripped of the softness
LyseraI lay on my back, staring at the pale blue ceiling, my eyes fixed on a single dark spot near the corner where a spider was patiently building its web.It moved with slow, deliberate care—stretching, anchoring, retreating, returning again—its tiny body a quiet rhythm against the stillness of
Lysera The air became charged as Henry’s anger flooded the room, raw and undeniable, until I could taste it on my tongue. Sweat broke out along my spine. My hands began to shake, the cutlery rattling faintly against the plate as his presence bore down on everyone In the great living room. No matt
Author’s POVIsyra returned to the pack house just before nightfall, the sky above bruised purple and gold as dusk settled over the lands. Torches had already been lit along the corridors, their flames flickering softly against stone walls that had always felt like home. She was not giving this pla







