Chapter 4

Lyra's POV

I couldn't sleep that night; every time I closed my eyes, I saw Leo standing beside Vanessa. I heard his voice telling me things were better before I came back. By dawn, I gave up trying.

 The packhouse was quiet as I left the guest room someone had assigned to me after the celebration. The fact that nobody had even considered placing me in the Alpha suite should have bothered me more than it did; maybe I was too exhausted to care. 

The hallways were nearly empty as I walked toward the third floor. That section of the packhouse had always belonged to the Alpha and Luna. It was where Darius and I had lived after our mating ceremony. It was where Leo had taken his first steps and where I once believed I would spend the rest of my life.

 My footsteps slowed as I approached the familiar door. For a brief moment, I considered turning around, then I pushed it open and stepped inside.

The first thing I noticed was the scent; it was Vanessa's. Her perfume lingered throughout the room, mixed with Darius's scent so thoroughly that it felt impossible to separate them. My stomach twisted; I looked around slowly. 

The furniture was still the same, but small details had changed. New flowers sat beside the window, and different blankets covered the bed. A collection of books rested on the table near the fireplace; none of them belonged to me. I walked toward the wardrobe and opened the doors.

Every personal item I had left behind before exile was gone. For several seconds, I simply stood there staring at the vacant space. A year ago, I packed only what I could carry because Darius promised everything else would remain untouched until I returned. Looking at the wardrobe now, I realized nobody had respected that promise; somebody had gone through my belongings and had decided they no longer belonged here.

I moved through the room checking every cabinet and drawer. The result was the same: nothing. Not a photograph or a piece of jewelry, not even a single trace of the life I once shared with Darius. 

The final blow came when I entered the bathroom and found Vanessa's cosmetics neatly arranged beside the sink. I stared at them for a long moment before letting out a hollow laugh. It was the kind of laugh that escaped when something hurt too much to process properly.

 This wasn't temporary; Vanessa hadn't been staying here occasionally; she had moved in, and she had taken over the room completely. Every corner of the suite carried evidence of all that should have shocked me, but instead, it felt like confirmation of something I had already suspected. Nobody removes another woman's life piece by piece unless they fully expect her never to return.

I left the suite and went downstairs searching for answers. It didn't take long to find one of the house servants. The young woman froze when she saw me approaching; guilt flashed across her face before she quickly looked away.

 "Where are my things?" I asked.

 She shifted uncomfortably. "I don't know, Luna."

 The title sounded strange coming from her, as if it was forced, like she wasn't sure whether it still belonged to me.

 "You do know," I said quietly. "Tell me." 

Her eyes darted toward the staircase. "The storage rooms." 

For a second, I thought I had misheard her. "What?"

 The servant swallowed. "After Lady Vanessa moved into the Alpha suite, your belongings were packed away."

 Lady Vanessa, not Miss Nightfall or Guest Vanessa, but Lady Vanessa. I thanked her before she could say anything else and walked away; the farther I went, the colder I felt.

The storage rooms occupied the oldest section of the packhouse. Dust covered the floors, unused furniture lined the walls, and broken decorations sat stacked in forgotten corners. 

It took several minutes to find the room containing my things. When I finally opened the door, I stopped breathing. Dust filled the space from floor to ceiling, my clothes, books, and paintings. Gifts from previous Luna ceremonies, years of memories reduced to neatly labeled containers.

 Some hadn't even been sealed properly. A framed photograph leaned against a wall with cracked glass across the center. Nearby sat the rocking chair where I used to read stories to Leo. Somebody had tossed another box on top of it, damaging one of the arms. I stood in the middle of the room and stared at everything; this was what my life had become. A collection of unwanted objects hidden away where nobody had to look at them.

"Lyra."

Darius's voice came from behind me. I turned slowly.

He stood in the doorway wearing training clothes, his expression somewhere between confusion and annoyance.

 "What are you doing down here?" he asked. 

For a moment, I couldn't believe the question. I gestured toward the room around me. 

"What does it look like I'm doing?" 

His gaze swept over the boxes. "I was going to tell you."

 I laughed again; this time there was no humor in it. "When?" 

He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. "Vanessa needed space."

 I stared at him. "So you gave her mine." 

"You're making this bigger than it needs to be." 

The words landed harder than he realized because that was always the problem: every hurt, sacrifice, and compromise somehow only mattered when they affected him.

I looked around the storage room one last time before meeting his eyes. 

"Do you know what hurts the most?" I asked. Darius remained silent. "It's not the room." My voice was calm now. "It's not even the fact that she moved in." His brows drew together. I pointed toward the boxes stacked around us. "It's that someone looked at my entire life and decided it belonged down here with broken furniture and forgotten junk." 

Darius exhaled sharply. "They're just things, Lyra. If something's damaged, I'll replace it." 

For several seconds, I couldn't speak, then I nodded slowly because in that moment, I finally understood. To him, they were just things, just like my sacrifices had been, and standing in that storage room surrounded by pieces of a life nobody valued anymore, I realized I didn't want to fight for my place in this pack; I wanted out.