LOGINLyseraThe 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
LyseraThe second arrow came before I could even breathe.It struck the other side of the carriage with a violent crack, splintering wood and sending sharp fragments flying inward. One grazed my arm. I didn’t feel the pain immediately—just the shock of impact, and the realization settling too slowly.Then another arrow followed.And another.Outside, everything dissolved into chaos. The guards were shouting—real shouting now, not controlled commands but sharp, urgent orders layered over the clash of metal and the thud of bodies hitting the ground.“Ambush!”“Protect the carriage!”“Move—move!”The horses reared violently, the carriage jerking so hard it threw me sideways. My shoulder slammed into the wood. Pain shot through me this time, sharp and immediate.The young guard was already moving. He shoved himself toward the door, one hand bracing against the frame as he reached for his weapon with the other.“Stay down,” he snapped.As if I had any intention of doing anything else. The
Author’s POVThe visiting Alpha arrived just before dusk, his presence announced long before his footsteps ever crossed into the pack house.There was a shift in the air when another Alpha entered foreign territory—an instinctive tightening, a low hum of awareness that ran through the guards and se
Author’s POVHenry stood ankle-deep in water.The lake was small and shallow, the surface barely disturbed except for the faint ripples spreading out from where he stood. The water was cold enough to bite, but not enough to hurt. Pale reeds ringed the edges, bending slightly as though moved by a br
LyseraFor a long while after I fell silent, Healer Apollo said nothing.The room felt strangely small then, as though the walls had crept closer while I was talking. The quiet pressed against my ears until I almost wished he would interrupt me, accuse me of lying, do something to break the tension
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







