It's complicated

He looked like death. His clothes were torn and bloodstained. Bandages wrapped around his wrists where the wolfsbane chains had burned him. More bandages at his throat, covering the puncture wounds from Candice's fangs. His face was pale, drawn, with dark circles under his eyes deep enough to drown in.

But he was standing. He was breathing. He was alive.

For a moment, no one moved. No one spoke.

Then Kael took a single step forward, his expression caught between hope and terror. "Killian?"

"Is it really you?" Dante's voice was barely a whisper. "Or are you—are you one of those things now? A Wraith?"

Killian's lips curved into the faintest, most exhausted smile. "It's me. I wasn't turned."

Onika's breath hitched. Tears sprang to her eyes. "Oh god. It's really you Alpha."

The room exploded into motion.

Kael crossed the room immediately, pulling Killian into a crushing embrace. Killian gasped—in pain and relief—as his brother held him. "You're alive. You're alive. I thought—we all though