Rhea

I stayed down for another heartbeat—two—palms flat to the sigiled floor, pretending I was steadying my breath and not my pride. The ring smelled of chalk and iron and burned sage. The wards hummed in the stone, curious and close, the way they always were on training grounds: not just containment, but witness.

I forced myself up.

Brannick—thick-shouldered, scarred, the academy’s Shiftmaster since before I could spell my own name—stood at the edge of the ring with his arms folded. His beard hid most of his expression, but not his eyes. Those were flint.

“What did you feel?” he asked, voice even. He never called me by name once the lesson began; on the floor, you were your breath and your form. Nothing else.

I swallowed against a throat that hated me. “A surge,” I managed. “Not mine. East perimeter.”

His glance flicked beyond me to the tree line, then to the sigils circling the ring. They flared, then settled—like a pulse settling after a sprint.

He knew. Of course he knew. The academy logged every flare within a mile of the wards. That was the point. At Silver Ridge, power didn’t get to lie.

“Class,” Brannick said, still not looking away from me. “Lesson.”

Groans died in throats. Quills hovered over paper. Even the cocky Drakonis exchange student stopped smirking.

“The ring is warded to suppress violent dominance,” Brannick said. “It does not erase it. It reads it. If a flare hits from outside the ring—and the ring responds—what does that tell you about the flare?”

“Strong enough to register,” someone said.

“Close enough to matter,” said another.

“Or bound to the one inside,” said Tessa, not looking at me but absolutely looking at me.

Brannick didn’t correct her. He didn’t need to. The runes at my feet—those thin, eloquent lines of moonsteel—gave themselves away. The lines nearest my shoes still glowed faintly, as if remembering the imprint they’d just drunk.

His eyes softened by a degree. “Breathe. Again.”

I pulled air in, slow and steady, the way he’d taught me when I was twelve and too small to shift without shaking. It steadied me enough to stay upright, to keep the ache in my chest from swallowing my face whole.

The pressure outside the wall didn’t vanish. It hovered. Waited.

Of course it did. They weren’t students anymore—the whole academy knew that. The Caine quadruplets had graduated years ago and left a trail of broken training records and whispered warnings behind them. But the wards didn’t care about transcripts. The wards recognized signature—and their signatures were as unmistakable as a stormfront.

They shouldn’t have been able to push this close. Not without permission. But the outer lattice was built to shape force, not reject it outright. Silver Ridge wanted would-be monsters to practice being gentle.

Maybe I was the experiment.

“Again,” Brannick repeated.

I set my stance, rolled my shoulders, let my breath slide down into my belly. When I reached for my wolf this time, she came slower, not with a violent lurch, but like a tide rising past my ankles. Safe. Contained. Mine.

Power licked the skin over my knuckles. The sigils near my fingertips warmed in answer—there you are. The ring tasted everything. If my heart spiked, it glowed for that too.

And yet the thread in my chest—the one that tugged east, right through stone and ivy and iron—held steady. Not cutting me this time. Just…there. Present the way a heartbeat is present.

I let my partial go at Brannick’s nod and stepped off the chalk as he called the next pair forward. My friends were waiting on the benches built into the ring’s shadow. Lila had that tight, bright look she got before she started a bar fight. Bree was composed enough to be dangerous. Nora looked like she’d cry for me if I let her.

I didn’t. I sat. The wards in the seatback hummed against my shoulder blades like a quiet hand.

“You ok—” Lila started.

“Don’t,” I said, and my voice didn’t break, which felt like a victory. “If you tell me I did great, I’ll throw up on your shoes.”

“Please don’t,” Bree said mildly. “They’re satin.”

Nora slipped her fingers into mine like she always did, a silent I’m here. The skin around her new mark—Ethan’s—was still faintly warm. I felt it like a bruise and then refused to look at it again.

From the ring, Brannick called, “Morgan, you’re not done for the day.”

“I know,” I called back, grateful that my mouth worked.

“Good.” The barest hitch in his tone. “Because your audience hasn’t left.”

I didn’t have to turn to know what he meant. The whole class felt the press at the perimeter now—someone had said their names out loud, and that always made a presence louder. Students snuck looks over shoulders. The older omegas working the equipment pretended they weren’t ready to dive between wolves and trouble.

Lila leaned in. “They’re not inside,” she whispered. “Yet.”

“They’re at the boundary,” Bree murmured. “Which is perfectly legal. And incredibly theatrical.”

“Of course it is,” Lila muttered. “Have you met them?”

I sent a thought out like a dry whisper—not now—and felt precisely nothing in reply. If they had a mind-link with me this early from this afar, I hadn’t found the switch. All I had was that taut, shimmering pull, the way the world wanted to tilt me east whether my legs moved or not.

The bell sigil chimed from the far arch, a clear, layered tone that vibrated the ring. End of period. Students filed out in a low tide of chatter. Brannick dismissed us with a gruff “hydrate,” then flicked his wrist to dim the runes. They faded reluctantly, as if closing their eyes over a story they wanted to keep watching.

I waited until the ring emptied before I stood. Lila rose with me, chin already tilting; Bree smoothed her skirt; Nora squeezed my hand and didn’t let go.

“You don’t have to—” I started.

“Shut up,” Lila said sweetly, linking her arm through mine. “We’re walking you to the gates like queens.”

I didn’t feel like a queen. I felt like a coin dropped between four magnets.

We cut across the training lawn toward the eastern wall. The academy’s campus unfurled in green and silver: glasshouses veined with ward-thread, towers of pale stone fretted with old sigils, banners stitched with the Moon’s phases. Even the shade under the lindens felt curated—gentle, dappled, meant to steady young wolves who shook too hard.

The closer we got to the perimeter, the louder the wards sang. They didn’t hum anymore; they thrummed. The sigil band in the cobbles—slender vines of moonsteel set on the diagonal—lit up one by one under our steps. Emotions bled into them here; that was the academy’s built-in mercy and threat. The lattice glowed for honesty. It glared for lies.

Lila’s mouth curved when she saw the light chasing our feet. “Look at that,” she said. “It likes you again.”

“It didn’t stop liking me,” I said, and somehow that was true. The academy was cruel only when you were cruel to yourself.

We passed beneath the ivy arch and stepped into the shadow of the iron palisade. The gates stood open to the courtyard beyond—not onto the public road yet, just the academy’s own approach, a long ribbon of cobblestone and moongrass where parents took photos and packs measured each other with smiles. The quads were on the far side of the threshold

They weren’t alone. Two wardens flanked the gate-lintel—staff in gray, palms resting on the ward-wands hooked at their hips. Their posture said polite. Their eyes said do not test me.

No one tested wardens at Silver Ridge. The academy had outlived Alphas.

But dominance doesn’t care about policy, it cares about pressure, and the pressure out here was a living thing.

Callum stood in front, the line of his body measured and contained, the way generals in old paintings pretended war was clean. His hair was swept back neat; his black overcoat could’ve cut glass. If he lifted his hand, I knew the entire courtyard would hold its breath until he told it to exhale.

Jaxon stood to his right, less contained, more…coiled. He looked like a shadow pretending to be a man. The kind of stillness you only saw right before lightning hits a tree. He wore black on black, rings dull on his fingers, a tendon ticking in his jaw.

On Callum’s left, Rory’s posture read casual to the untrained eye—hips slanted, hand in a pocket—but his gaze tracked every movement between gate and ring like he was mapping choke points. His shirt sleeves were rolled, veins standing in his forearms, a tell I’d learned already: he wrapped control in charm when he was seconds from coming apart.

Seth lounged against the gate’s side pillar, foot braced, head tipped like he was listening to a song only he could hear. It would’ve looked lazy if his hands weren’t flexing—open, close, open—like he was trying not to grab the bars and rip them out of the earth.

They didn’t say my name. They never did. Their pet names were a problem I couldn’t solve yet. But when they saw me, something in each of them changed the same way. Their faces didn’t go soft. They went certain.

My wolf answered with a shivering want that had nothing to do with romance and everything to do with recognition.

The wardens glanced at me, waiting for a cue. The academy didn’t bow to packs. It bowed to its own rules. If I said no, the gates would keep them where they stood until their wolves chewed through their bones.

I was too tired for theatrics.

“I can speak with them,” I told the wardens, and the sigils under my boots brightened. Truth. Consent. The staff stepped aside with an inclination of the head and a not-unsympathetic look that said good luck, kid.

We stopped with one line of iron between us—academy law: safety first, chaperone always. Lila stationed herself at my shoulder like an armed rumour. Bree took the other side like a verdict in a silk blouse. Nora hovered a step back, hands knotted.

Callum inclined his head first, not at my friends or the wardens, but at me. “Little Luna.”

It shivered down my spine. I hated that.

“Don’t call me that at school,” I said. My voice came out steady. Victory two.

Jaxon’s mouth curved like it hurt. “Sunshine,” he said, softer. “You felt us.”

It wasn’t a question. The wards answered anyway; the sigils at our feet pulsed gently and then went still, like a heartbeat deciding between rest and sprint.

“Everyone felt you,” Bree said coolly. “Hard to miss a storm.”

Rory’s mouth tilted at the edge, acknowledging the strike. “We didn’t mean to spook the children,” he said, like it was a joke and an apology in one.

“You spooked the lattice,” Lila said sweetly. “And you know what the lattice does when it’s spooked?”

Seth’s gaze flicked to the runes twining up the gateposts, looking for the trick she meant. “Shocks you ‘til you stop acting like a feral bastard?”

“That,” Lila said, “and it remembers. So maybe don’t mark the academy with your dominance like tomcats.”

Callum’s eyes slid to her, the faintest respect sharpening them. “Noted.”

The wardens didn’t move. I didn’t either. The iron between us sang softly, metal answering enchantment. I finally forced myself to meet their eyes, one by one, the way you look into a fire so it knows you aren’t prey.

“What are you doing here?” I asked.

Seth’s smile tilted, sincere in a way that made me nervous. “Breakfast was a start,” he said, and didn’t say we’re sorry because Jaxon beat him to it.

“We were out of line last night,” Jaxon said, words short and clean, like he’d cut them himself. “We came to say it to your face. And to tell you we won’t cross your rules again.”

“Not your friend rule,” Rory added, grimacing like the syllables stung. “We’ll choke on it if we have to. We’ll do it.”

“And we’ll keep our distance when you ask,” Callum said. The iron hummed when he said ask, like the gate enjoyed men with power saying please.

I swallowed. “You didn’t keep your distance ten minutes ago.”

“That,” Callum said, the tiniest crease touching the corner of his eye, “was…uncontrolled. We felt you falter. We were already too close. We forced it back.”

He meant their wolves. He meant himself. I’d felt it—the crest, the break. The relief like air.

“You made the ring flare,” I said.

“Unintended,” Rory said. “And we’ll offer reparations to the wardens.”

One of the grays snorted. “You’ll fund three months of lattice oil and like it, boy.”

Rory’s mouth twitched. “Done.”

All of this should have made it easier. The apology. The fact that they’d held themselves outside instead of tearing through. The way the wards reacted to their vows, lighting faintly, then holding steady, as if storing the promise in the academy’s bones.

It didn’t make it easier.

Because the thing gnawing my stomach wasn’t their control. It was mine.

“I can’t keep training if you do this,” I said, and the runes under my toes brightened to a clear, steady silver. “The ring reacts. The class reacts. I react. I need to be able to hear my wolf without hearing yours drown her out.”

Jaxon flinched, then masked it, which told me more than words. Callum didn’t move at all, which told me even more. Seth looked away first; Rory blew out a breath through his nose like he’d wanted to say it himself.

“We’ll anchor farther,” Callum said. “Beyond the outer hedge. We’ll test the limit today and set it. If the wards flare, we step back. If you don’t want us on the road at all, we leave the ridge for the day.”

It was ridiculous that the suggestion calmed the ache in my ribcage. It was more ridiculous that the wards under us warmed.

“Fine,” I said. “But if I feel you pushing through on purpose again, I’ll have Brannick bar you from the perimeter.”

Seth winced like I’d threatened him with salt. “You’re vicious, snowflake.”

Lila glanced between us and lifted her chin. “And you’ll stop playing power games at the gates. If you’re here, you step back when she says space. No posturing at the lattice to make the children whisper.”

Seth looked properly offended. “I am the children.”

“Please,” Lila said. “You were born forty and feral.”

Four sets of eyes came back to me like a tide.

Silence pressed in again—less dangerous this time, but full. Jaxon’s gaze dragged over my face like he was cataloging damage he wouldn’t name. Rory’s mouth softened in a way that made me want to hit something. Seth had stopped flexing his hands; he hooked his thumbs in his pockets like he was afraid of them. Callum stood a fraction less straight, like he’d put a sword down for a minute.

“Anything else?” I asked, because I needed them to go before I leaned forward and put my fingers through the bars.

Jaxon’s throat moved. When he spoke, his voice went low enough that only I—and the lattice—heard it. “Proud of you, sunshine.”

The wards lit under my feet and then dimmed, as if embarrassed on my behalf.

“Don’t—” I started, but my voice came out too soft to be lethal.

“Understood,” Callum said. “We’ll anchor outside the hedge. If you need us, speak to the gate. The wardens will carry the call.”

I nodded, unable to trust my mouth. He touched two fingers to the iron—a soldier’s vow—and stepped back. Rory followed, lifting his hand in a motion that meant I see you in a dozen packs. Seth blew me a kiss because of course he did; the runes pretended not to notice. Jaxon lingered a heartbeat too long and then pivoted away, shoulders tight with leashed heat.

They didn’t look back.

The pressure eased with their distance—slowly, like a bruise deciding not to be purple. My knees swayed. Lila’s hand found my elbow on instinct.

“Breathe,” Bree said softly.

I breathed. The iron cooled. The lattice settled like a cat in a warm window.

Students had clustered under the lindens to watch the show, pretending not to, which was worse. The wardens eyed me with a frankness I didn’t hate.

“You handled that well,” one said.

“Thank you,” I managed, and the sigils under my shoes agreed. Truth.

We turned back toward the training lawn. The academy felt normal again, which was to say: full of a thousand tiny spells designed to keep wolves alive long enough to be wise. A pair of first-years skittered out of our path; the Drakonis boy sized me up and decided to live. The bell sigil chimed again from the tower, a clear reminder that the world didn’t care about my personal catastrophe.

Brannick waited in the shadow of the ring’s arch, arms folded, beard hiding most of his face. When we reached him, he tipped his chin at the colonnade nearest the east wall. A faint silver thread ran from its base into the cobbles like a vein, still brighter than the others.

“Feel that?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

He snorted. “For breathing? Don’t apologize to wards for doing what you’re built for. Apologize when you lie to them.”

“It wasn’t me making the ring flare,” I pointed out.

“It was you making the ring answer,” he said. “That’s the part you own. Learn where you end and where others begin, Morgan. That’s the work.”

He nodded at my friends—unspoken dismissal—and at me—unspoken assignment. “Get water. Be back in fifteen. We run it again until it’s your voice your wolf hears first.”

A laugh came out of me that wasn’t a laugh. “Yes, Shiftmaster.”

We peeled off toward the fountain built into the chapel wall. The water tasted like metal and mint and old moonlight. My hands shook around the cup. Lila took it from me before I spilled it on my boots.

“You’re not alone,” she said, like a threat.

“I know,” I said, hating that my voice almost broke. “Which is the problem and the solution.”

Bree tucked a loose strand behind my ear with the air of someone adjusting a tiara. “Let it be both. You control the ratio.”

Nora didn’t say anything. She just pressed her cool fingers to my wrist, right over the vein that had hammered like a trapped bird since the ring. Steady. Present.

When I looked down, the faint traceries of sigil-light at the base of the fountain glowed a little brighter under us. At Silver Ridge, emotions had a place to go. The lattice drank what would otherwise drown.

“Back in fifteen,” I said, and my voice almost sounded like mine. The idea of stepping into the ring again didn’t feel like walking into a mouth.

We made it two paces before a shadow fell over the path. Brannick again—not with a correction this time, but a folded square of tough paper in his palm. My name wasn’t on it. The academy seal was. The wax smelled faintly of smoke and pine.

“Came down through the ward-line when the flare hit,” he said. “Dean wants you after your next class. And before you ask—no, you’re not in trouble.”

“Then what—”

“Wards logged a bond resonance at ten out of ten,” Brannick said, eyes level. “They want to talk contingencies. Security. Training pods. Options.”

The words hit like a sledgehammer.

Ten.

TEN.

Out of ten.

Not in my head. Not a crush. Not some fever-dream fantasy I’d convinced myself into.

Bond resonance at a perfect score.

That… doesn’t happen. Like, ever.

My chest tightened, the thread inside me pulling so hard it hurt. It hummed, alive and undeniable, like the wards themselves were laughing in my face.

Never happened before. Not once in the history lessons I’d half-dozed through. Not in the whispered stories traded over cafeteria tables. Not in the Moon Goddess’ little “everything happens for a reason” bedtime tales.

And me? Of course it would be me. Of course I’d be the walking glitch in the system.

I dragged a hand down my face. Store that for later, Rhea. Right next to “parents abandoned you in the woods” and “your four mates could eat a rogue alive before breakfast.”

The universe just kept stacking the weird, and I was supposed to… what? Smile pretty and nod?

My wolf purred at the news, smug and satisfied.

I, however, was two seconds away from telling fate to shove its ten-out-of-ten where the sun doesn’t shine.

I nodded until I could breathe again. “Fifteen minutes,” I said, because if I said anything else I’d cry. He grunted approval and left us to the fountain’s quiet.

The campus bell sang once more, cool and sure. The scent of lavender lifted off the quad, a charm woven into the hedges for afternoons like this—overwhelmed wolves, heavy hearts, heads about to split with too much magic. In the distance, beyond the hedge and the road and the first rise of ridge, I felt the four signatures settle like stones placed carefully on the ground.

Far enough.

For now.

I drank. I breathed. I set my feet back on the lane that led to the ring that had humiliated me and saved me in the same hour. The sigils along the path warmed under our steps, taking inventory of what we brought them: fear, fight, a sliver of something that might be hope if I didn’t look at it too hard.

Behind me, Lila’s fingers brushed mine.

The world—my world—didn’t stop breaking and mending. It never would. But as the sigils woke under my feet and the academy’s old magic leaned in to listen, I felt something I hadn’t since the kitchen, since the pub, since the gates:

I wasn’t drowning.

Not yet.

By the time I stumbled into Inter-Realm Geography, my head was still buzzing with Brannick’s words.

Ten out of ten.

Perfect resonance.

A cosmic jackpot I hadn’t bought a ticket for.

I dropped into a seat near the back, slinging my bag under the desk. The runes carved into the classroom walls pulsed faintly with a welcoming glow—etched symbols of different realms, each one humming with its own frequency. Valoria’s spire-sigil shimmered green, Drakonis’ flame bled ember-red, Lycan’Dra’s crowned wolf gleamed silver. Even the Obsidian Wilds’ mark pulsed faint black, like a heartbeat that wanted to devour.

I should’ve been paying attention to the magic around me, but my chest was still humming with their dominance from earlier. The quads weren’t even here, but my wolf had practically gone belly-up when their resonance slammed against the wards.

I curled my hands into fists under the desk. Get it together, Rhea.