Chapter 031

The crowd’s noise dulled behind me as I slipped through the side of the field, each step a reminder of every hit I’d taken. My ribs throbbed with each breath, my face burned, and my hair clung to my damp skin like silk ropes. I didn’t wait to see if anyone called after me. I didn’t care.

All I wanted was to disappear.

The corridors inside the packhouse were blessedly quiet. Morning light streamed through the tall windows, painting soft gold across the stone floors. My reflection in one of the glass panes stopped me cold, dirt smudged across my cheeks, a split lip, and blood crusting on my collar.

I looked like I had crawled out of a war.

With this my shitty fighting skills, I’d die before the arrows are even shot into the air.

My hands trembled as I opened the nearest door I could find, a bathing chamber, empty, thank the gods. Steam still lingered in the air, and clean towels were stacked on a nearby table. I shut the door behind me, sliding the bolt into place, my back pressed against it as I finally let out the breath I’d been holding.

The silence pressed in, heavy and fragile.

I turned on the tap, the sound of running water soothing something small and aching inside me. When I caught sight of myself in the mirror again, the tears I’d been holding back finally came.

They burned as they fell, tracking through the grime on my face, mixing with blood.

I hated this, feeling weak, exposed. I had survived worse before, but this humiliation, this audience to my failure, it was different. These people weren’t my enemies. Not yet. But they could be.

I stripped out of my ruined clothes, wincing as fabric brushed over the bruises blooming on my skin. My entire body was painted in shades of blue and purple.

The water was warm when I stepped in. Too warm at first, stinging against open wounds, but I didn’t care. I let it wash over me, let it take the blood and dirt and every ounce of shame with it.

For a long time, I just stood there, palms pressed against the marble wall, eyes closed.

Draven’s expression flashed through my mind—cold and assessing.

Daemon’s, unreadable but edged with something sharp.

And Darius’s… gods, Darius’s stare had burned straight through me.

What had they seen when they looked at me like that?

A weakling? A disappointment?

Or something else entirely?

I hated that I cared.

The water began to cool, but I stayed. The ache in my bones dulled into something softer, heavier, like exhaustion laced with surrender.

I thought of Amelia’s words from earlier—having the attention of the three most powerful Lycans comes with pros and a lot more cons.

She wasn’t wrong. Every look, every whisper, every set of eyes following me—it was becoming suffocating.

And still, I couldn’t run. Not yet.

When I finally stepped out of the bath, the air bit at my skin. I wrapped myself in a towel, wiping the steam from the mirror. The face that stared back wasn’t broken, not completely but it wasn’t the same one that had walked into that field this morning either. I had bruises on my face and neck that were beginning to turn purple.

I dressed in a clean shift I found folded on the counter and slipped out through the back door, careful not to draw attention. Servants passed by carrying linens and trays, too busy to notice me.

I moved like a shadow through the halls, my bare feet silent against the floor. The air smelled of freshly cooked meat and soup, a mix that usually calmed me, but right now it only made me feel very very hungry.

Clara was no where in sight, and I wasn’t even going to bother to go to the kitchen myself, the humiliation for today could lar me a lifetime.

When I finally reached my room, I collapsed on the bed, the towel still damp in my hair. My body hurt in a dozen places, and I should definitely see a healer, I don’t heal as fast as other wolves thanks to my nature.

This entire place was a fortress and I didn’t know where to start searching for the healer so instead, I closed myself willing myself to drift into the peaceful delusion called sleep.

When I finally drifted off, it wasn’t peaceful sleep it was the kind that came after exhaustion had wrung every drop of strength from you. My dreams were a blur of movement and heat, flashes of fists and the sound of bodies hitting the ground. I flinched once, twice, before I realized the noise wasn’t in my head.

It was real.

Something……someone was in the room.

My eyes fluttered open, heavy and slow. For a moment, I didn’t move. The world swayed back into focus, sunlight bleeding through the curtains, casting golden lines across the floor. My heart gave a small, startled kick when I finally saw him.

Darius.

He was sitting in the corner, half-shadowed, elbows resting on his knees, head tilted slightly as he watched me. His expression was unreadable — calm, but not detached. There was something alive in the stillness of him, something sharp that made the air between us hum.

My pulse quickened.

“How long have you been there?” I rasped, my voice rough from sleep.

He didn’t answer at first. His eyes, that strange storm-gray, flicked over my face, lingering for a fraction of a second on the bruise along my jaw.

“Long enough,” he said finally. His voice was low, steady too steady.

I pushed myself up, wincing as pain rushed through my ribs. “You know, it’s creepy to sit and watch people sleep,” I muttered, reaching for the blanket to cover my legs.

“Is it?” His mouth curved slightly not a smile, more like the ghost of one. “You were restless. I thought you might wake in pain.”

That made me pause. “And you care because…?”

He leaned back in the chair, folding his arms across his chest. “Because I don’t like liabilities in the house.”

The sting of his words hit harder than I wanted to admit. I looked away, pretending to smooth the sheets, trying to ignore how the sunlight caught the strands of his hair — how unfairly calm he looked when my entire body ached.

“Well, I’ll try to be less of one,” I murmured.

Something shifted in the air subtle but definite. Darius’s gaze softened, just for a breath. “You held your ground longer than most expected,” he said, voice quiet now. “You’re untrained, but you don’t back down easily. That’s… something.”

I blinked, unsure if I’d heard right. “Was that a compliment?”

He looked away, lips twitching. “Don’t push your luck.”

Silence settled again, thick but not uncomfortable. I studied him from where I sat, the way he filled the space, effortless and composed. He looked like he belonged to another world entirely, and yet he was here, in mine, sitting in the quiet glow of afternoon light as if guarding something he didn’t understand.

“Why are you really here, Darius?” I asked finally. “I doubt it’s just to monitor a liability.”

For the first time, his eyes met mine fully sharp, and searching. “Maybe I wanted to see if you’d wake up.”

The words hung there, heavier than they should’ve been.

I swallowed, suddenly aware of how small the room felt. “Well,” I said after a beat, forcing a weak smile, “mission accomplished.”

He didn’t move right away. His gaze lingered on me one last time, a flicker of thought I couldn’t read before he stood. “Rest, Rain,” he said, heading for the door. “You going to be in a lot more pains by tomorrow.”

He turned to leave, striding across the room in a controlled pace.

I don’t want him to leave.

“Wait” I whispered as he hand reached the door knob, I don’t know what came over me but suddenly I needed him close.

“Stay for a while…..please.” I begged

“Why?” He asked, his back rigid, you could see his muscles move underneath his shirt.

“I just—“