Chapter 4

Three days passed in a haze of anxiety and restless anticipation. Aria tried to maintain her normal routines… but everything felt hollow and performative, as though she was acting out a role in a play whose script she no longer believed. The mark on her hand remained invisible most of the time, visible only in certain lights or when emotions ran particularly high. But she could always feel it, a constant reminder of that moonlit night and the man who had appeared at her window like something out of dreams or nightmares.

Her mother had tried to explain more about the Oath and what it meant to be marked as Luna, but the information came in fragments and warnings rather than clear explanations. There were rules, apparently, ancient protocols that governed how Alphas and Lunas interacted, how power was claimed and challenged, how the shards were sought and won. But those rules felt distant and academic compared to the visceral reality of the mark burning against her skin whenever her thoughts turned to Kieran Blackclaw.

It was on the fourth night after the awakening that he came for her properly.

Aria was in her room, ostensibly studying but actually staring at the same page she had been pretending to read for the past thirty minutes. The house was quiet, her parents having already gone to bed, and Her Sister was lost in her own room with the particular self-absorption that only teenage girls could truly master. The clock on Aria's nightstand read just past eleven, late enough that the world outside her window had settled into the deep stillness that comes in the hours before midnight.

She felt him before she saw him. A presence pressing against her awareness like a hand on her shoulder, familiar despite their limited contact, undeniable in its intensity. The mark on her palm flared to life without warning, glowing so brightly she had to suppress a gasp of surprise. And when she looked up from her useless book, he was there... 

Kieran stood in the center of her room as though he had always been there, as though the walls and locked door and all the mundane barriers of ordinary reality meant nothing to someone of his nature and power. He looked exactly as he had during their first encounter, dark hair falling past his shoulders, eyes that caught and held the light in ways that human eyes should not, tall and powerfully built with that unconscious grace that marked apex predators. But now, seeing him clearly and up close rather than through glass and moonlight, Aria could appreciate details she had missed before.

He was beautiful in a way that had nothing to do with conventional attractiveness and everything to do with the sheer presence he commanded. His features were angular, almost harsh, but balanced in ways that drew the eye and held attention. His mouth was set in a firm line that suggested he smiled rarely and laughed even less. And his eyes, when they met hers with the full force of his attention, held depths that promised danger and protection in equal measure.

"Hello, Aria," he said, and his voice was exactly as she remembered from that single phrase spoken through glass… deep and rich with undertones that resonated in her bones. "I thought we should speak properly, without barriers between us."

Aria stood slowly, her book sliding..., forgotten to the floor. She should have been terrified,or maybe she should have screamed for her parents or grabbed something to use as a weapon or at least demanded to know how he had entered her room without making a sound. Instead, she heard herself say, "You could have knocked on the front door like a normal person."

His mouth twitched, not quite a smile but close enough to suggest he found her response amusing. "I am not a normal person. Neither are you, not anymore. And the time for polite courtesies and mundane protocols ended the moment you awakened and the mark appeared. We operate under different rules now, you and I."

"Rules I did not agree to??! ," Aria replied, forcing steel into her voice despite the way her pulse raced. "Rules that were imposed on me without my knowledge or consent. You have no right to be here, Kieran Blackclaw, regardless of what ancient oaths or mystical marks might suggest."

"I have every right," Kieran countered, though his tone remained calm and almost gentle, as though he was explaining something obvious to a child. "The mark binds us, Aria. You felt it the night we met, felt the connection establish itself whether you wanted it or not. That connection grants me certain privileges and you certain protections. Among those privileges is the right to approach you, to speak with you, to claim what the Oath has declared belongs to me."