4 ~ Do You Think He’s Ready?

THIRD PERSON’S LIMITED POV (AURELIAN)

Aurelian moved through the ruins of Lunar Temple, his footsteps silent on moss-covered stone. He’d walked this path countless times over the years, knew every crack in the foundation, every place where blood had soaked into the earth and refused to wash away. This place was a graveyard without bodies, a monument to people the world had forgotten.

Two figures waited for him in what remained of the temple’s inner sanctuary. Moonlight spilled through the collapsed ceiling, illuminating them in shades of silver and shadow.

Dylan was one of the figures and he stood with his arms crossed. His expression was serious, thoughtful—so different from the easy charm he wore like armor at the academy.

Beside him, the sage, Kaidora, sat on a fragment of broken altar, her aged hands resting on her knees. Her face was lined with old age and grief, her eyes sharp. She looked up as Aurelian approached, and something ancient and sad flickered across her features.

“You’re late,” she said.

“I had to make sure I wasn’t followed.” Aurelian responded. “Did Tavian confirm the party details?” He asked, turning to Dylan.

Dylan replied, “Eight o’clock. Just the heirs and a few others.”

Aurelian closed his eyes and reached for the power that lived in his blood, the gift the Moon Goddess had granted his people in exchange for their devotion to peace. His bones shifted without pain, his features melting and reforming like wax under heat.

When he opened his eyes again, he wore Dylan’s face—golden hair, bright blue eyes, and that easy smile.

Dylan circled him slowly, examining the transformation with a critical eye. “The hair’s perfect. The eyes too.” He tilted his head. “But you’re holding yourself differently. I’m more relaxed, more… loose. You stand like you’re ready to fight.”

Aurelian forced his shoulders down, letting his posture soften into something less predatory.

“Better,” Dylan confirmed. “Just remember—I flirt when I’m nervous. I make jokes. I touch people casually, like it means nothing.”

Kaidora stood, her movements slow but steady. She approached Aurelian and placed both hands on his shoulders, looking up into Dylan’s borrowed face.

“Tonight is a full moon,” she warned. “The alphas will be at the height of their power. Stronger, faster. And you—” Her grip tightened. “—you will be weaker. Your abilities will drain faster.”

“I know the risks.”

Kaidora’s eyes bore into him. “If they touch you, if they get too close, they might sense what you truly are beneath the disguise. The full moon makes everything more intense—scent, instinct, bond recognition. You must be careful. Keep your distance. Don’t allow intimacy.”

“I’ll be careful,” he said.

“Will you?” Kaidora released him and stepped back, her expression hardening into something ancient and unforgiving. “Or will you hesitate when the moment comes?”

Aurelian’s hands clenched at his sides. “I won’t hesitate.”

“You say that now, in the safety of ruins and moonlight.” Kaidora’s voice cut through the night air like a blade. “But when you’re there, when you see them alive, will you have the strength to do what must be done?”

“I—” Aurelian’s throat closed. “I don’t know if I can kill someone in cold blood.”

The admission hung between them, terrible and honest.

Kaidora’s expression didn’t soften. If anything, it grew colder.

“Then let me remind you,” she said quietly, and there was something devastating in her gentleness, “what cold blood truly looks like.”

She moved to the remnants of the altar and knelt, pressing her palm flat against the stone that had drunk the blood of innocents.

“Your mother, Kaida, was stabbed thrice before they threw her from the cliff. Twice in the stomach. Once in the chest. She was still alive when she fell into the water, still conscious enough to know she was dying. That is cold blood.”

Aurelian’s breath caught.

“Your father, Riven, was killed in front of her. They made her watch as they tore him apart simply because he was human, because he dared to love an omega. That is cold blood.”

“Stop—”

“Your twin brother, an innocent pup,” Kaidora continued relentlessly, “as well as other pups were murdered. Pups who had never harmed anyone, who knew nothing of war or politics or ancient grudges. They died wailing for their parents who couldn’t save them. That is cold blood.”

Hot tears burned in Aurelian’s eyes.

“The elders were killed while they prayed. The healers died trying to protect the wounded. The teachers, the artists, the ones who sang the old songs—all of them slaughtered without mercy, without hesitation, without a single moment of doubt.” Kaidora stood, and moonlight caught the wetness on her own weathered cheeks. “They felt no remorse.”

“So when you stand in their presence tonight, when you see them laughing and alive and completely unaware of the reckoning they’ve earned, remember that cold blood is what they gave us. Justice is what we give them in return.”

Aurelian couldn’t speak. His throat was too tight, his chest too full of grief and rage and the terrible certainty that she was right.

Dylan, who had been silent throughout Kaidora’s recitation, finally spoke. His voice was rough. “They took everything from us. Our families. Our futures. Our right to exist peacefully in the world.” He met Aurelian’s eyes. “You don’t owe them mercy they never showed our people.”

Aurelian turned, his breathing hard, staring up at the broken ceiling and the moon beyond. That same moon had watched the massacre. Had witnessed every scream, every plea, every moment of suffering.

“I’ll do it,” he said finally, his voice steady despite everything breaking inside him.

Kaidora nodded, satisfied. “Good.”

Aurelian cleared his throat. “Before I go—” He hesitated, then continued, “Thank you. For what you did at the academy. If you hadn’t stopped Rhydian from throwing me out at the right time, none of this would be possible.”

Dylan was risking everything to help a cause that wasn’t even originally his. He could have stayed safe, could have lived a normal life far from revenge and danger.

But Kaidora was his mother. The omega clan had been his people too.

“We’re in this together,” Dylan said simply.

Kaidora moved between them, placing one hand on each of their shoulders—her son and the boy she’d raised like a son, bound by shared loss and shared purpose.

“You should go soon. The party will start, and Dylan’s absence will be noticed if you’re late.”

Aurelian nodded and checked his reflection in a fragment of polished metal Dylan handed him. The face looking back was perfect—Dylan’s easy charm, his relaxed confidence, nothing of Aurelian’s sharp edges or carefully controlled rage.

“Avoid physical contact,” Kaidora added. “Especially with the heirs.”

“I understand.”

“And Aurelian—” Kaidora’s voice stopped him as he turned to leave. “Your mother would be proud. Not of the violence to come, perhaps. But of your courage.”

Something in Aurelian’s chest cracked at those words. He nodded, not trusting himself to speak, and stepped away from the moonlight into the shadows between pillars.

Behind him, he heard Dylan’s quiet voice. “Do you think he’s ready?”

And Kaidora’s answer, barely a whisper: “Ready or not, it’s time.”

Aurelian didn’t look back.

He moved through the forest with Dylan’s face and his own burning purpose, heading toward Gravefang Palace where the sons of his enemies waited, completely unaware that death had just accepted their invitation to a party.