Chapter 5 — Prince Nate Smiles Too Wide

I wake up in the capital with my heart already racing, like my body knows it’s being observed even when my eyes are closed.

For a few seconds I forget where I am, then the unfamiliar ceiling snaps into focus, the pale stone walls, the thin curtains that smell faintly of soap and sun. Tessa is sprawled across her bed like she fought sleep and lost. Briar is already sitting up, boots on, hair tied back, staring at the door as if it personally offended her.

“You didn’t sleep,” I mumble.

“I slept,” Briar says. “I just don’t trust the morning.”

Tessa groans into her pillow. “Can we trust breakfast?”

“Depends,” Briar replies. “Do you want it poisoned or just disappointing?”

I push myself upright, rubbing my eyes. My throat still feels scraped raw from Mom’s “last” tonic, but under that, there’s something different.

My head is clearer.

Not dramatically. Not magically. Just… like someone loosened a belt around my brain.

I sit very still and try to sense anything in my chest. Anything like the presence I remember from when I was twelve. Warmth. Weight. A curl of something alive inside me.

Nothing answers.

But the silence feels less like a grave and more like a door that might open.

I hate that I’m hopeful. Hope makes you stupid.

Tessa finally sits up, hair a chaotic halo. “Okay,” she says, forcing brightness into her voice, “today we get our schedules, we do our chores, and we don’t get murdered by royal etiquette.”

Briar swings off her bed. “And we don’t drink anything unattended.”

Tessa blinks. “We’re really committing to paranoia.”

Briar’s gaze slides to me. “We’re committing to survival.”

I don’t argue. My stomach still remembers the burn of that mug.

The dormitory’s dining hall is already loud when we arrive. Dozens of girls in neat travel dresses crowd long tables, voices stacking over each other in excited waves. The room smells like sweet rolls and coffee and perfume, too much perfume, the kind meant to cover nervous sweat and desperation.

A group near the front laughs too loudly. A girl with glossy black hair sits at the center like a queen, her posture perfect, her smile sharp.

She’s beautiful in the way a blade is beautiful.

Her eyes land on me, flick down to my wristband, then back up. The corner of her mouth lifts.

Not friendly.

Tessa nudges me. “That’s Selena Crestwood,” she whispers. “Eastern territory. Her dad runs trade routes. She thinks she’s basically already royal.”

Briar snorts. “She smells like entitlement.”

“I can hear you,” Selena calls, voice honey smooth.

Tessa freezes, mortified.

Briar doesn’t even blink. “Good.”

A few girls titter. Selena’s smile tightens. Her gaze shifts back to me, slow and measuring.

“Abigail Barns,” she says, like she’s tasting the name. “Beta’s daughter.”

My spine stiffens at the emphasis. It’s not admiration, it’s categorization. Placing me on a board.

I keep my voice neutral. “That’s me.”

Selena’s eyes flick briefly over my face. “How… exciting. I’ve heard you’re almost eighteen.”

“I’m nearly ancient,” I deadpan.

A couple girls laugh despite themselves. Selena’s gaze cools.

“And yet,” she continues, “I also heard you haven’t shifted.”

The hall seems to hush around that word, like a pack instinctively leaning closer to blood.

Tessa sucks in a breath. Briar shifts, closer to my side, like she’s prepared to throw someone through a table.

Heat crawls up my neck. I keep my expression flat. “You heard wrong.”

Selena’s eyebrows lift. “Did I?”

I hold her stare. “You tell me. Where I come from, rumors are just people chewing on what they don’t understand.”

For a moment Selena looks like she might snap back. Then she smiles, sweet as poison. “We’ll see what the capital understands,” she says lightly, and turns back to her friends as if I’m already dismissed.

Tessa exhales shakily. “Okay. That’s… not great.”

Briar leans toward me. “She just marked you.”

“I’m not a tree,” I mutter, grabbing a roll and biting into it harder than necessary.

But my appetite fades fast. The taste of bread turns to ash in my mouth, because Selena said what everyone is thinking:

Unshifted.

Weak.

Interesting target.

I glance at my schedule again while Tessa pours coffee. The paper feels heavier than it should.

Day One: Orientation, compound chores, etiquette briefing, evening address. Curfew: 21:00.

Day Two: Shifting Demonstration — 10:00.

There’s nothing about the princes on the schedule, like the capital refuses to admit this is a mating circus. As we stand to leave, a bell rings, sharp, official and an attendant strides in with a clipboard and the expression of someone who enjoys assigning misery.

“All summoned females,” she calls. “Courtyard assembly. Immediately.”

The room erupts into scraping chairs and hurried whispers.

Briar murmurs, “Time for the humiliation parade.”

Tessa tries to smile. “Or the… bonding exercise?”

“Sure,” Briar says. “Bonding through shared suffering.”

The courtyard is enormous, stone paths, trimmed hedges, fountains that glitter under the sun. Guards line the perimeter in black armor, silent and unmoving.

At the far end, a platform has been set up. A councilwoman stands on it, flanked by two attendants holding scrolls. Her hair is braided with silver thread, her eyes sharp with authority.

She raises a hand for silence. “Welcome,” she says. “You will all contribute to the daily functioning of this compound during your stay. Discipline and humility are expected.”

A ripple of discomfort runs through the crowd.

Chores. In a royal compound.

The councilwoman continues, “Your assignments will rotate. Some duties will be… less pleasant than others. Do them without complaint.”

Briar mutters, “They say ‘humility,’ I hear ‘control.’”

Tessa whispers, “Maybe they want us to appreciate service.”

Briar gives her a look. “Or they want to see who breaks first.”

Names are read out in groups.

Tessa gets “garden detail,” and she looks like she’s been handed a bouquet. “I love plants,” she whispers fervently.

Briar gets “armory linen and uniform rotation,” which sounds suspiciously like scrubbing sweat out of guard clothes. She looks almost pleased. “Good. Close to weapons.”

I get.

“Abigail Barns,” the attendant reads. “Stable and waste rotation.”

There’s a beat of silence. Then a laugh.

Not everyone, but enough.

Selena’s voice carries from somewhere behind me. “How fitting.”

My face goes hot. My stomach drops. It’s childish, so childish but humiliation doesn’t care about age.

Tessa whips around, eyes wide with outrage. “That’s not fair.”

Briar steps forward before I can stop her. “Funny how ‘random’ assignments always land like insults.”

The councilwoman’s gaze snaps down, sharp. “Do you have a complaint?”

Briar’s voice stays calm. “No. Just an observation.”

“Keep your observations to yourself,” the councilwoman says. “Or you’ll find your assignments… worsen.”

Briar’s smile is thin. “Understood.”

I grab Briar’s sleeve gently. “It’s fine.”

“It’s not,” she mutters, but she steps back.

The councilwoman claps once. “Now. You will report to your assignment supervisors. Dismissed.”

Girls scatter, some relieved, some groaning, some already strategizing how to angle themselves closer to princes.

Tessa catches my arm. “Abby, I can trade. I’ll do stables.”

“No,” I say quickly. “Absolutely not.”

“It’s gross,” she insists, face crumpling sympathetically.

“That’s fine,” I say, though it isn’t. “I’ve lived in a pack. I’ve cleaned worse.”

Briar’s eyes flick over me. “Have you?”

I glare at her. “I will survive horse poop.”

Briar’s voice drops. “I’m not worried about the poop.”

I know what she means.

I just refuse to say it out loud.

The stables are on the edge of the compound, near training fields. The smell hits like a wall, hay, sweat, manure, damp wood. A stablemaster, broad, shouldered and unimpressed, hands me gloves and a shovel without introducing himself.

“You’re late,” he grunts.

“I was assigned ten minutes ago,” I reply automatically.

He gives me a look that says princesses don’t last here. “Stall row three. Don’t leave a mess.”

I bite back a sarcastic comment and get to work.

At first, it’s almost meditative. Scoop, toss, scrape, replace straw. My muscles burn in a way that feels honest, like I’m earning something real instead of being examined for it.

Then the whispers start.

Two girls wander past the stable entrance, giggling behind manicured hands. Their perfume reaches even here.

“Is that her?” one murmurs, not quietly enough.

“The unshifted one,” the other replies. “They put her in the stables. Like she belongs with animals.”

I freeze mid scoop.

Something sharp rises in me, anger, yes, but also humiliation so familiar it feels like an old bruise.

I force myself to breathe and keep moving.

I am not going to cry in royal stables.

I’m shoveling, head down, when a shadow crosses the stall entrance.

I glance up.

Prince Nate stands there like he owns the air.

He isn’t in formal clothing now, just dark training pants and a fitted shirt, sleeves pushed up his forearms. His hair is messier than before, his grin wide and lazy.

And his scent, dominance, confidence, and trouble, floods the small space like smoke.

“Well,” he drawls, leaning against the frame. “If it isn’t our feisty one.”

My grip tightens on the shovel handle. “Your Highness.”

He clicks his tongue. “So polite. I liked you better when you looked like you wanted to bite me.”

I give him a flat stare. “I still do.”

His grin sharpens. “Good. Honesty is refreshing.”

He steps into the stable, unbothered by the smell. His eyes flick to the shovel, then to me, then cruelly, down to my wristband.

“Stable duty,” he says. “Interesting choice.”

“I didn’t choose it.”

He hums. “Sure you didn’t.”

I straighten slowly, sweat at my temples, straw sticking to my sleeves. I refuse to look small. “Did you come here to gloat?”

“I came to see if the rumors are true,” he says brightly.

My stomach drops. “What rumors.”

Nate’s eyes glitter with amusement. “That you can’t shift.”

I go still.

The stable seems to quiet around us, as if even the horses are listening.

“I can shift,” I lie.

Nate tilts his head, studying me. “Can you?”

“Yes.”

He steps closer, invading my space with the casual confidence of someone who’s never been denied anything. “Then do it,” he says, voice still playful. “Right now. Just a little. A claw. An eye change. Something.”

My pulse hammers. The air feels too tight. My wolf remains silent, stubborn as death.

I lift my chin anyway. “No.”

Nate’s grin doesn’t falter, but his eyes sharpen. “No?”

"I don’t perform on command,” I say, voice low. “Not for you. Not for anyone.”

For a beat, Nate looks almost surprised.

Then he laughs, loud, delighted. “I like you,” he declares, like he’s handing me a prize.

“I don’t care,” I snap, and the sarcasm comes out like a reflex, teeth bared.

Nate’s smile widens. “Careful, Abby. People who don’t care are always the most fun to break.”

The words slide under my skin like a cold knife.

Before I can respond, another presence enters the stable, silent, heavy, like a storm cloud crossing the sun.

Nate’s grin fades slightly.

I don’t have to turn to know who it is.

Prince Adrian.

He fills the doorway without trying. Taller than Nate. Broader. Dark hair falling slightly over his forehead, green eyes unreadable. He’s in training clothes too, the fabric stretched across muscle like it was designed to remind everyone what power looks like.

His gaze flicks to me first, not lingering, not soft. Just… assessing.

Then it cuts to Nate.

“What are you doing,” Adrian says.

Not a question.

A warning disguised as boredom.

Nate lifts his hands. “Talking.”

"In the stables,” Adrian says, voice flat.

Nate’s grin returns, a little strained. “Am I not allowed to speak to our guests?”

Adrian steps fully inside, and the space seems to shrink around him. Even the horses shift, restless.

“You’re allowed,” Adrian says. “You’re not allowed to intimidate them.”

Nate scoffs. “Intimidate? Come on. I’m charming.”

Adrian’s gaze doesn’t change. “Leave.”

The single word lands like a slammed door.

My heart does something stupid in my chest, an ugly flutter of relief and… something else. Something warm.

Nate’s eyes narrow. “Since when do you care?”

Adrian doesn’t answer.

He doesn’t have to.

Because even without words, the message is clear: Not here. Not her. Not today.

Nate’s grin turns sharp again, aimed at me now. “See you at the demonstrations,” he says lightly. “Don’t disappoint me, feisty.”

Then he saunters out like he didn’t just try to corner me in a stable.

I exhale shakily, realizing my lungs were locked.

Adrian doesn’t look at me right away. His gaze follows Nate out, jaw tight, then returns to the stablemaster’s direction like he’s checking if anyone else is lurking.

Finally, his eyes land on me again.

“What did he say,” Adrian asks.

The question is calm. Controlled.

But the air around him is not.

I swallow. “Nothing.”

Adrian’s stare holds mine, and I get the unsettling impression he knows I’m lying, not because he can smell it, but because he understands something about fear I haven’t learned to name yet.

“He doesn’t get to corner you,” Adrian says, voice still quiet.

The words slam into me because they’re not flirtation. Not performance. Not charm.

They’re protection.

My cheeks heat. “I can handle myself.”

Adrian’s gaze flicks to the shovel in my hands. “With that?”

I blink, offended. “It’s a perfectly good weapon.”

For the first time, something shifts in his expression, not a smile, not really, but the smallest crack in the wall. Like amusement pressed flat under duty.

“Report to the attendant if he bothers you again,” he says.

“I don’t want to report,” I say quickly. “I don’t want to look.”

Weak. Petty. Like I can’t survive a prince’s attention.

Adrian’s voice cuts in, sharper. “This compound isn’t safe for games.”

My stomach tightens. That sounds like something he knows, not something he’s guessing.

I stare at him. “Because of the rogues?”

Adrian’s eyes flick outward, scanning, alert. “Because of everything.”

Then he steps back toward the doorway.

my heart lurches with ridiculous disappointment. Of course he’s leaving. Of course he doesn’t care. This is just his role, guardian, protector, duty wrapped in muscle.

He pauses at the threshold without turning fully. “Don’t stay out after curfew.”

I blink. “I wasn’t planning to.”

A beat.

Then, quietly, almost reluctantly: “Good.”

And he’s gone.

I stand there, shovel still in my hands, staring at empty air.

Briar was right. He looks like he enjoys breaking bones.

He also looks like he breaks them for the right reasons.

By the time I finish the stables, my arms ache and sweat has dampened my hair at the nape of my neck. I wash at the outdoor pump, scrubbing my hands until my skin turns pink, but the smell clings anyway.

When I return to the dormitory courtyard, Tessa spots me from across the path and hurries over, eyes wide.

“Abby! Are you okay? Briar told me you got,” she glances around and lowers her voice, “visited.”

I roll my eyes. “If by ‘visited’ you mean ‘harassed by Nate,’ then yes.”

Tessa grimaces. “That’s… bad.”

Briar arrives behind her, expression hard. “What happened.”

I tell them, briefly. Nate’s demand. Adrian’s interruption.

Tessa’s face lights up at Adrian’s name. “He defended you?”

Briar’s eyes narrow. “Or he managed his brother.”

“Does it matter?” I snap, then immediately regret it when they both blink at me.

I exhale. “Sorry. I’m just, tired.”

Tessa touches my arm gently. “It matters,” she says softly. “Because no one steps between a prince and his entertainment unless they mean it.”

Briar’s voice is lower. “Or unless they’re worried what Nate might trigger.”

That chills me a little.

Because Briar is always thinking like the world is a trap. And lately, she hasn’t been wrong.

As we head inside, I catch Selena watching us from the staircase.

Her gaze is fixed on me like she’s connecting dots.

Like she saw something.

And in this place, being seen is dangerous.

That night, the dormitory buzzes with new gossip like it’s a currency.

“Did you hear Nate cornered a girl and she blushed so hard she almost fainted?”

“I heard Adrian nearly ripped Nate’s head off for it.”

“Adrian doesn’t care about anyone.”

“Maybe he cares about her.”

I keep my eyes on my plate, trying to disappear. Trying not to feel the stupid, traitorous flutter in my chest when Adrian’s name threads through whispers.

Tessa leans close. “They’re talking about you.”

“I noticed,” I mutter.

Briar’s gaze sweeps the room. “Let them. Talking makes them sloppy.”

I wish I had her ability to turn everything into strategy.

After dinner, we’re dismissed with a reminder about curfew and patrol routes. The councilwoman’s voice is sharp:

“The rogue threat has not diminished. Do not wander. Do not leave dormitory grounds after curfew. The royal guard will not tolerate defiance.”

As the hall clears, I feel it again, that strange lightness in my body, as if every hour away from home makes my blood less heavy.

I press a hand to my sternum when no one is looking, closing my eyes for a heartbeat.

Still silence.

But… not the same silence.

More like something sleeping instead of something dead.

When I open my eyes, I find Selena across the room, watching me with narrowed focus.

And beside her, a girl I don’t recognize leans in to whisper something in her ear.

Selena smiles.

It’s the same smile Mom wears when she’s decided something.

My stomach twists.

Tessa catches my look and frowns. “What?”

“Nothing,” I lie, because I’m tired of sounding crazy.

But as we climb the stairs back to our room, Briar murmurs, “You’re being targeted.”

I stop at the landing. “For what? Being unshifted?”

Briar’s eyes are hard. “For being noticeable. Nate noticed you. Adrian intervened. Now every girl here will decide you’re either a threat or a joke.”

Tessa’s voice is small. “That’s awful.”

“It’s true,” Briar says.

I swallow, my throat still faintly raw from the tonic. “Let them try.”

The words come out firmer than I feel.

In the privacy of our room, I pull Melody’s journal from my bag and open to the wolfsbane note again. I trace the underlined words with my finger like I can absorb courage through ink.

Suppressed shifting response.

My body feels different here. Clearer.

If Mom really meant, this will be the last one, then either she’s finished with me… Or she thinks she doesn’t need to keep poisoning me once I’m inside the capital’s walls.

The thought sends a cold wave through me. I close the journal and tuck it away again, my heart pounding.

Outside our window, the courtyard is lit by torches. Guards patrol in steady patterns. And at the far edge of the training field, a lone figure moves through drills even after dark, precise, relentless.

Adrian.

He looks like he doesn’t get tired.

Like he doesn’t get to stop. I should look away.

I don’t.

Because despite his cold voice, despite his silence, he stepped into a stable that smelled like filth and told a prince to leave.

And no one does that unless they’re either fearless…

Or they’ve already decided what they’ll protect.

I don’t know which one Adrian is.

But as I watch him move in the torchlight, one conviction settles into me with surprising strength:

Whatever is wrong with me, whatever has been done to my body, this place is going to bring it to the surface.

And if Selena and her pretty little smile think they can bury me before that happens?

They’re welcome to try.