5

SABLE’S POV

I refused to give up after one conversation.

The next morning I went looking for Finn with a box of old toys and a stack of photographs I had dug out of a forgotten drawer.

The wooden wolf he used to sleep with. The little carved moon I had given him on his second birthday and pictures of the three of us laughing in the garden before the war.

I found him in the playroom with Talia.

“Finn,” I said softly, kneeling down. “Look what I brought. Do you remember this?”

I held out the wooden wolf. He stared at it, then at me, then immediately looked at Talia.

“It’s okay,” she told him. “You can look.”

He took it carefully, turned it over once, and set it back down.

“I used to sing to you while you held that,” I said. “Every night. Do you remember any of the songs?”

He shook his head and stepped closer to Talia’s leg.

I pulled out a photograph next. “This is us. You, me, and your father. You were just turning and you had just learned to shift for the first time. Look at your face.”

Finn glanced at the picture for a second, then turned his face to Talia’s side.

“He’s still getting used to you,” Talia said gently. “Give him time.”

“I’ve been giving him time,” I answered. “I just need him to remember something. Anything.”

She smiled lightly and it reminded me of the time we were still little girls playing in the gardens. “He will. You’re his mother. That doesn’t change.”

But every time I tried to spend time with him after that, the pattern stayed the same.

I would ask a question, he would look at Talia and she would have to answer for him or encourage him with a word before he could even move towards me.

One afternoon I sat with them while Finn ate.

“What does he like now?” I asked her.

“Honey cakes,” she said without hesitation. “But only the ones with the little berries on top. He won’t touch them if the berries are missing. He still has bad dreams about battle noises. He sleeps with the window cracked because he likes the sound of the trees at night. He’s afraid of the dark corner near the old storage room. Oh, and he learned to read last year. His favorite story is the one about the white wolf who found her way home.”

The amount of details she gave me felt like tiny jabs to my heart. She knew the shape of his days, while I knew almost nothing.

Dorian was worse. Whenever I tried to talk about us, he always found somewhere else to be.

“We need to discuss what happens now,” I told him one evening in the hallway.

“I have a meeting with the elders,” he said, already moving past me.

“Then we’ll talk after that.”

“It might run late.”

“Dorian.”

He stopped but didn’t turn around fully. “Sable, the pack needs me present. Things are complicated enough now that you are back, I don’t need any more strain.”

“I’m not a strain. I’m your wife.”

He didn’t answer me. He just kept walking.

I started noticing the way the servants spoke to Talia. They called her Luna without hesitation. They asked her opinion on household matters. They looked up to her the same way they used to look up to me.

And Dorian never corrected them.

One night I waited until the house was quiet and found Talia alone in the sitting room.

“I need to ask you something,” I said.

She looked up from the papers in her lap. “Of course.”

“Are you and Dorian together?”

The question stayed between us for a few minutes.

“No,” she said finally. “Not in the way you’re thinking.”

“Then in what way?”

“Sable, you’ve only been awake a few days. Your body is still weak and your mind is still catching up. Don’t force Dorian to make big decisions while you’re recovering. He’s already carried so much.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“Well, it should. You’ve been gone for five years. He had to keep living, please don’t make this harder than it already is.”

The way she said it felt different. She didn’t sound like the sister who used to braid my hair and keep my secrets. She sounded…colder.

I left the room without another word.

That night I couldn’t sleep, I walked the halls without purpose until I heard some voices coming from near the kitchen. Two servants werespeaking in hushed tones.

“They’re finally setting a date for the Luna ceremony.”

“It’s about damn time. She’s been doing the job for years.”

“I heard the Alpha already approved the arrangements. It'll be on the next full moon.”

I didn’t wait to hear the rest. I went straight to Dorian’s study and pushed the door open without knocking.

He was alone, standing by the window.

“Is it true?” I asked.

He turned.

“Is the pack planning a Luna ceremony for Talia?”

He didn’t look surprised. He just looked tired. “Yes.”

“And you approved it?”

“The pack already considers her my Luna,” he said. “They have for a long time and I’ve been planning to make the arrangement official.”