登入LeahSomething was wrong with me, and it wasn’t getting better. In fact, it was getting worse.I’d been telling myself for days that the cure needed time. That the noctis bloom had worked, because it had, and that full recovery was just a matter of rest and patience and not using my powers. I’d repeated it to Darien. To Keanu. To myself in the mirror every morning when the face staring back at me looked a little more hollowed than the day before.But today, the lie stopped working.The morning started fine. I ate breakfast with Darien, managed a full plate for the first time in a week, and felt genuinely better for about two hours. I attended a meeting with the village elders about the new housing construction for the refugee families.Then the fatigue hit like a wall I hadn’t seen coming.Not the gradual settling I’d gotten used to, the slow drain that came on like a tide and let me adjust. This was sudden. Violent. One moment I was standing at the construction site watching the buil
DarienShe was dressed, her hair was pulled back. She had color in her face, though not as much as she should have. She looked functional, which was the word I kept using because “healthy” wasn’t accurate and “recovering” was starting to feel like a lie we all told ourselves.“Am I interrupting?” she asked.“Never.” I stood and pulled out a chair for her beside the desk. She sat down and I watched the way she lowered herself into it, carefully, with the controlled precision of someone who was managing their energy expenditure the way you manage a budget, every movement accounted for, nothing wasted.“What are we talking about?&rdqu
DarienI made the calls myself.Not through messengers or formal letters or diplomatic envoys. I picked up the phone and called every alpha, one by one, and offered them the same thing: relocation to the lycan kingdom. Full protection. Housing. Integration into a community that had the walls and the soldiers to keep them safe. I would give them their own sections where they could stay until the threat was over.Every single one said no.Alpha Whitfield, the man who’d hosted the Clearwater survivors before they moved here, told me his pack had been in their territory for generations and he wasn’t abandoning it because of a threat that might not come back. Alpha Reeves, who I’d expected to be the easiest yes, said her wolves had built their community from scratch and that asking them to leave was asking them to surrender everything they’d created. Even the smallest packs, the ones with barely enough wolves to fill a school bus, declined with the stubborn dignity of people who would rath
KeanuI stood at the edge of the clearing one last time.“I’ll be back tomorrow,” I said. Not a threat but a promise. “And the day after that. And the day after that. Until you’re ready to stop hiding and talk to me.”I turned and walked back toward the clearing where I could shift. The golden scales rippled across my skin as I let the transformation take me, the dragon rising from the man with a rush of heat and wind. My wings unfurled and caught the evening air, and I launched into the darkening sky, heading south toward the kingdom.Toward my sister. Who I felt was hiding something from me the same way Tempest was hiding from me, just with less forest and more stubbornness.The women in my life
KeanuI stopped next to a massive oak, pressing my palm against the bark. The tree was ancient. It had probably been here when dragons still flew openly and the world hadn’t yet decided to hunt the things it couldn’t control.I stared out at the dense forest stretching ahead of me, endless, green, full of hiding places that a woman who controlled the elements itself could disappear into forever.“Or is there another reason you’re hiding?” My voice was quieter now. The anger spent. What replaced it was the thing I’d been avoiding since I woke up alone on that moss with her warmth still on my skin and her absence already carved into my chest. “Am I not who you want?”The question hung in the air. I felt it leave my m
KeanuI couldn’t wait until morning.The sky was still dark when I slipped out of the castle, the stars fading at the edges where dawn was thinking about showing up but hadn’t committed yet. The air was cool against my skin, but the heat behind my ears burned steady, the musk a constant reminder that somewhere out there, a woman was pretending I didn’t exist.I wiped behind my ears as I entered the forest. The dampness was worse today. My shirt collar was going to be ruined by noon.“Come out, come out, wherever you are.”My voice carried through the trees and dissolved into the undergrowth. The forest didn’t answer. It never did. I was starting to take it personally.“Hide and seek.” I stepped over a fallen log and ducked beneath a low-hanging branch. “It’s a fun game. I don’t mind playing. But just know, I’m going to find you.”I kept walking. Deeper. Past the first creek, past the boulder field where the moss grew thick as carpet, past the place where I’d swung on vines that now fe
Leah“Who?” I watched as he blinked at me. Like he couldn’t believe I didn’t know who that was.“Asena is a powerful deity of rebirth. Most werewolves come from the Moon Goddess. You have heard about her, right?” Oh, that snarky ass. I nodded my head but could see the hidden smirk in his eyes. “But
LeahThe hot water had washed away the flour, the sauce, and most of the chaos from the kitchen disaster. I stood in front of the mirror in Darien’s bathroom, combing through my damp hair, trying not to think about how comfortable I’d become in this space. How natural it felt to use his shower, to
LeahI led Darien back into the disaster zone that was the kitchen, my heart pounding with a mixture of guilt and something else I refused to examine too closely.“Here, lean down,” I said, guiding him toward the sink.“Is this where you finish me off?” His tone was light, teasing despite the fact
DarienI took a breath, steadying myself. This was it. My chance to do what Cain had suggested. To show interest. To connect with her. "I wanted to ask you something," I said, keeping my tone casual. "You’ve been to the small town built down in the underground bunkers—"She blinked, clearly not exp







