5.

Rayna POV

Something inside me twists. My grip tightens again on the shovel, even though my arms ache. My throat feels tight, but I manage to speak.

“So what? You want me to say thank you?”

His gaze returns to mine. Steady. Unreadable. “No,” he says. “I didn’t do it for you.”

The words land like a slap, and yet… somehow that’s easier to swallow than if he claimed some noble reason.

I lift my chin. “Then what? Just happened to be out in the woods murdering people?”

His lip curls, just a little. “They weren’t people. They were scavengers. Trained to track scent signatures like yours.”

My blood runs cold. “Like mine?”

“Freshly rejected. Weak. Glowing.” He moves closer, slow, deliberate. “You’re like blood in the water to creatures like that. They smell your pain and come running.”

He’s in front of me now - not close enough to touch, but close enough to make my every nerve stand on edge.

“I’m not weak,” I say, voice tight.

He looks at the shovel. Then back at me. “No,” he agrees. “But you are alone.”

That cuts deeper than anything else tonight. I don’t reply. We stare at each other. His presence fills the shelter like smoke - thick, inescapable, curling under my skin and into places it shouldn’t reach. My wolf stirs faintly, like she recognizes something I don’t.

No. No, no, no.

I shove the thought away.

I force myself to ask, “Who are you?”

He studies me again, eyes darker now. Shadows ripple across his face from the dying moonlight behind him.

“Damon,” he says simply.

The name lands in my chest with the weight of something ancient.

“And what do you want, Damon?”

He tilts his head. “You’re not ready for that answer.”

I narrow my eyes. “Try me.”

His gaze drops to the faint tremble in my hands. “You’re exhausted. Your wolf’s fractured. Your bond is bleeding you out from the inside. You’ll be lucky to stay conscious another hour.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” I mutter.

He ignores the sarcasm.

“I want you alive,” he says.

That stops me. I blink. “Why?”

The corner of his mouth lifts - not quite a smile. Not at all kind. “Because the world isn’t done with you yet, little queen.”

The air in the shelter seems to freeze. My breath catches. For a heartbeat, I don’t move. Don’t speak.

Queen?

My chest squeezes, and then the heat rushes in from humiliation. Rage. That raw, aching place where dignity used to live.

I let out a breathless laugh. Not the kind that means I’m amused. The kind that says I’m breaking.

“Right,” I say, leveling him with a glare. “That’s what this is. A joke.”

He doesn’t react.

I keep going, words spilling sharper now, bitter. “Is that what you do? Stalk broken girls in the woods and call them queen to see how fast they flinch?”

Damon’s expression doesn’t shift. Not even a flicker.

“You called me omega,” I snap, pointing the rusted shovel at his chest. “You can smell what I am. You know what I am.”

“Rank,” he says coolly, “is not the same as blood.”

I freeze. But he doesn’t elaborate. Of course he doesn’t. He just watches me with those inhuman green eyes, like he’s waiting to see what I’ll do next.

I don’t know what I’ll do next. My thoughts are a storm. I can’t tell what’s real anymore. One second he’s saving me, the next he’s twisting my insides with words that feel like prophecy wrapped in poison.

“You don’t know me,” I whisper.

“I will.”

Those two words land like a stone in still water. He’s not being cruel. He’s just being… inevitable.

I turn away, dragging the shovel with me, my hands shaking again.

The cloak slips down my shoulder. I tug it back up, trying to gather the last threads of dignity I have.

“You should leave,” I mutter. “Whatever this game is, I’m not playing it.”

There’s a pause. Long. Heavy. “I will… at dawn.”

That makes me look back.

His posture hasn’t changed. He stands like a sentinel in the doorway, the night wrapped around him like it obeys him.

“I can take you somewhere safer,” he says. “Somewhere they won’t find you.”

“‘They’?”

He doesn’t answer. Just glances to the trees.

“The ones who want what’s bleeding inside you,” he finally says. “The ones who know what you are. Even if you don’t.”

I swallow hard.

“I don’t trust you.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you.”

He meets my gaze. “You will.”

The nerve of him. The certainty. Like he already sees the choice I’ll make, hours before I make it.

He steps backward, finally leaving the shelter, but his voice drifts back to me like smoke.

“Rest. Heal what you can. Dawn comes fast.”