Chapter 485

** Alaric’s POV **

The problem with being an Alpha in 2026 is that you can no longer pretend politics don’t exist. You can’t just patrol your borders, snap a few necks, and call it leadership. Now it’s all diplomacy and meetings, and not even the exciting ones where there’s the potential of a fight breaking out, or finding your fated mate whilst visiting another pack. Now they’re all virtual.

The sound of pups playing outside filters through to the meeting room, and I let it wash over me. It’s them I’m doing this for, to keep them safe, to give them a future that doesn’t involve fighting just to stay alive. I want them to live, not just survive.

A glowing screen of boxes filled with faces stares back at me from the tablet propped on my desk. Each square holds an Alpha or Beta from a pack that used to circle ours like sharks. Some of them still do, if I’m being honest. They’re just doing it with better manners lately.

Bastian sits beside me, shoulder to shoulder, his arms folded, and his expression hard. He may be my twin, but in some ways we are worlds apart.

On the screen there’s an Alpha with a scar down his cheek, talking, his voice crackling slightly with the connection.

“It’s not just that the hunters have gone quiet,” he said. “It’s how they’ve gone quiet. It’s as if something’s spooked them.”

A low murmur runs through the call.

I lean back in my chair. “You’re suggesting they’re regrouping?”

“I’m suggesting they’re watching,” another Alpha snaps. “I think they’re waiting for an opening.”

“The opening was always us,” I say calmly. “One pack against another. The moment Phoenix, River, and Midnight stopped working against each other and started sharing territory, intel, and resources… the hunters stopped getting easy wins.”

A few of the faces shift, some looking thoughtful, some reluctant, and some pissed.

Bastian’s voice cut in. “It’s proof.”

Silence.

Then an older Alpha on the bottom row speaks, his tone curious. “Proof of what?”

Bastian’s jaw tightens. “That uniting all packs is the only way forward.”

There it is, the real point of this.

I watch the reactions. A flicker of agreement from two. Suspicion from three. A sneer from one Alpha who likes to pretend he’s not one attack away from losing his borders entirely.

I keep my tone smooth. “We’ve spent decades fighting each other because it suited the old rules. The hunters adapted. We didn’t. Phoenix, River, and Midnight just proved what happens when we stop playing by the old rules.”

“Or what happens when you let a goddess into the mix,” someone counters.

There’s a beat of tension, and Bastian’s eyes narrow. “Rumours.”

I don’t correct him, not here, not on this call. Because I’d heard them too. The Luna of Phoenix. The one who burned silver and gold and healed wolves from the inside out.

I’ve never met her, but the stories had even made their way here, to Mountain Ridge, and I’ve learned that stories have a habit of becoming truths.

The meeting drags on for another half hour, filled with strategy and uneasy agreements and the subtle flares of power that came with any attempt at unity. When it finally ends, I shut the tablet off with more relief than I care to admit.

Bastian stands from his chair beside me, already pulling off his shirt. “Run?”

“Please,” I sigh, pushing away from the table. “If I have to look at one more pixelated Alpha pretending his Wi-Fi isn’t the issue, I’ll start a war out of spite.”

Bastian snorts a laugh, which is the closest thing to real laughter he ever does.

We’re halfway out of the lodge when two of our wolves, Jude and Shay, step into our path, both still in human form but oozing with the restless energy of a shift too close to the surface.

Jude is one of our best trackers, broad-shouldered, dark-eyed, always too observant for his own good. Shay is smaller, sharper, with a mouth that runs almost as fast as his wolf. Both of them looked keyed up. That’s never a good sign.

Bastian pauses. “What’s up?”

Shay doesn’t bother with a greeting. “We went into town.”

Jude shoots him a look, like, ‘I told you not to lead with that,’ then turns to me. “We heard something about the new girl at the coffee shop.”

Bastian frowns. “The crazy one that talks to herself?”

“Yeah,” Shay smirks. “Crazy coffee girl, except… she’s not crazy.”

My wolf stirs at that, faint but curious. “Explain.”

Jude takes a breath. “People have been whispering for weeks about her talking to herself, about how she looks like she’s listening to something no one else can hear.”

“That’s not exactly rare,” Bastian says. “Half the humans in town talk to themselves.”

Shay’s eyes flash with his wolf. “This is different.”

Jude nods once. “We watched her closely.”

“And?” I ask, keeping my voice calm, even as my wolf becomes more alert with every word spoken.

“She’s not human,” Shay says. “But she’s not a wolf or a witch either.”

Jude’s gaze holds mine. “We’ve never smelled anything like her. There’s… something under her skin. It smells dark and electric somehow. Like…” He hesitates, searching for the right words. “Like she belongs to another world.”

Bastian’s expression shifts, interest flashing through his usual stone. “Did she notice you?”

Shay grimaces. “Not at first.”

“Then she did, and it was like she’d been pretending not to see us,” Jude frowns.

A warning prickles at the base of my skull. It’s not fear as such, more like awareness.

“Did you approach her?” I ask.

“No,” Jude says quickly. “It didn’t feel wise; we thought it was best that we leave that to you.”

Bastian’s gaze snaps to me. A silent conversation passes between us, one we’ve been having since we were old enough to shift and a witch friend of our mother gave us a blessing… or a warning.

Her eyes had glazed over as she placed a hand on each of our heads.

“Unknown threat. Unknown power. Don’t ignore it,” she had muttered before her eyes returned to normal and she smiled as if nothing had happened.

I exhale slowly and nod. “We will go tomorrow.”

Shay’s shoulders relax and Jude nods once, satisfied.

Bastian turns toward the woods, already kicking off his boots. “If she’s trouble, we’ll know.”

I follow him into the trees, but my mind doesn’t fully come with me. Mountain Ridge doesn’t get surprises. We are the pack other packs avoid. The ones who occupy the higher land and the old mountain passes. The ones who never needed alliances to survive, yet lately the world has been shifting under all of us.

Hunter groups vanishing. Packs uniting. Rumours of goddesses and resurrected wolves, and magic that feels older than the moon. And now a strange girl in a coffee shop, marked by something our wolves can’t name.

My wolf paces with anticipation; he senses the change coming.

When morning comes, I tell myself it is a simple recon mission. Bastian and I don’t need theatrics. We don’t need a parade of pack members or a show of power. We’ll go in, observe, and then leave. That is the plan.

This plan lasts exactly three seconds. The bell above the coffee shop door chimes, and she looks up, and I’m done for.

I’d expected… I didn’t know what I’d expected. Someone unsettling, someone strange, someone who might look wrong in a way humans couldn’t see, but we could.

Instead, I find myself staring at a woman with a mouth made for trouble and eyes that look like they’d seen too much for someone her age.

She is wiping down the counter, pretending she hasn’t noticed us even as her entire body goes still. Her scent hits me, overpowering the bitter coffee and sweet syrups. My lungs stall. It’s not floral or sweet, or anything so simple. It’s like the night air before rain, and something else beneath it. Something I can’t place. Something that makes my wolf slam into the front of my mind in a way he never has before, like he has been waiting for her this whole time with one clear word ringing out… Mine!