تسجيل الدخولAyla's POVI felt them before I heard them. The bond shifted—all three threads pulling taut, then releasing. The frantic pulse that had me gripping the infirmary table smoothed into something urgent but no longer screaming."They're back," Tala said, tail wagging.I was off the table before she finished. Luna Ria didn't try to stop me this time. I ran down the hallway as fast as I could without crashing into anything.The front door opened just as I rounded the last corner to the entrance hall.Kael entered first. His gaze found me immediately. He looked tired.I slowed as I approached, dread filling my insides.There was a cut above Kael's jaw and dried blood on his hands that I chose not to look at too closely, but he was upright, and he was here.Still, the feeling didn't leave. My knees buckled as I stepped closer. Kael caught me, pulling me upright."Steady now," he said, supporting me.Soren stepped inside next, and the feeling grew."Where's Ryker?" I whispered, anxiety rising.
Kael's POVTime did something strange.One moment it was racing—the chaos of the fight, the rogues, the grey wolf's impossible size, and those too-aware eyes—and then Ryker's paws lost purchase on the crumbling rock, the edge gave way, and time just stopped.I watched it happen. Couldn't move. Couldn't think. Couldn't do the thing I did in every situation—assess, respond, and lead.I just stood there in wolf form, frozen at the boundary, watching the cliff collapse and my brother disappear into the white below."Goddess," I muttered. "There's no way he survives that—"The grey wolf threw its head back and howled. The sound tore through the air and turned my stomach because I recognized it—a victory call. Deliberate. Triumphant. The sound of something that had come here with a specific purpose and accomplished it.As if on cue, the rogues retreated. Every single one, simultaneously, pulled back into the tree line and vanished the way they'd come. They left behind only churned snow, blo
Soren's POVI admitted it—the moment the mind link came through about rogues at the north boundary, something in me settled.Not because I wanted a fight, not exactly. But there was a kind of anger that had nowhere to go inside four walls. It paced and built and turned on itself until it found something to push against. Moving through the tree line toward the north boundary, with Blaze surging hot and ready beneath my skin, I felt it bleed off with every stride.I was still furious at Kael. I could process that eventually, with the patience I applied to everything that cost me.What I couldn't process was the ease of it—the way he'd made the decision and then stood and explained it like a strategy debrief, while I stood there feeling something I hadn't been prepared to feel."You'll process it," Blaze said."Later," I said. "Right now we handle this.""Yes," he agreed. "Later."The north boundary smelled wrong before we reached it.Not just the faint trace from the claw marks—this was
Ayla's POVThe packhouse felt wrong without them in it.Too quiet. Too still—the kind of stillness that wasn't peaceful but hollow, carrying the absence of people who had just been here and weren't anymore.I closed the front door behind me and stood in the entrance hall, listening.Somewhere deeper in the house are footsteps. Back and forth, restless, the rhythm of someone who couldn't make themselves stop moving.I followed the sound and found Luna Ria in the sitting room.She was pacing, arms crossed over her chest, dark hair loose and slightly disheveled in a way I'd never seen before. Her lips were moving slightly."—north boundary, three separate sightings. Jack said to stay inside, but if they've breached the perimeter markers, then the response team needs—"She stilled suddenly and turned.Her face whitened when she saw me.We looked at each other, and I could see she hadn't wanted me to hear that."Ayla." She exhaled my name like something she didn't know she needed to find.
Ayla's POVMy body knew things my mind didn't, and that was the only way I could describe it.Standing in the ring, watching Tracy come at me for the third time, I felt my feet move before I consciously decided to move them — as if something beneath the thinking part of me had been waiting patiently all along for exactly this moment to surface.It didn't feel like fighting. It felt like remembering."That's it," Tala murmured, warm and certain. "Stop thinking and let it come."So I did.I stopped trying to calculate and just moved—let my body lead, letting whatever was stored in muscle and reflex do the thinking. The result was something I didn't fully understand but could feel working. Every movement felt slow to me, yet each one landed quickly and precisely, as if time operated differently inside the ring than outside it.Tracy came in high.My body was already gone—turned through and past her reach before my mind had finished registering the strike.I felt Tracy's frustration in th
Kael's POVIt started the way these things always did — not with a shout or anything obvious enough to stop before it gained momentum.It started quietly, with a shift in the atmosphere of the training field, the stillness of pack members who sensed something coming and angled themselves toward it without being told.I felt it before I saw her.Tracy moved with the calculated ease of someone who had thought the situation through. Every step was measured, her long dark braid over her left shoulder, sharp green eyes fixed on Ayla with an expression that was carefully composed. That was the thing about Tracy — she was too smart to show her cruelty openly."I want a duel," she said.Not loudly. She didn't need to be.The field was already going quiet, and pack members began drifting closer with the instinctive gravity of wolves who smelled a challenge forming.She was looking at Ayla, and Ayla went still beside me."Tracy." My voice came out flat and final. "You know the ruling—""I'm not
Ayla’s POVThe forest is quieter this morning, as if everything is holding its breath, watching me flee from this miserable pack.I ignore the feeling and keep moving.I’ve only taken the basics—the clothes on my back and the money I saved from working at the coffee shop. It isn’t much, but at leas
Ryker’s POVI’m awake before I should be and groan out loud as my eyes flicker open. My head still spins from too much eggnog last night.I press my hand against my head, trying to stop the feeling. I lie there for a second, staring at the ceiling, trying to figure out what pulled me out of a soundl
Ayla’s POVThe closer I get to the packhouse, the louder the world becomes again—voices carry through the trees, followed by laughter and music. It sounds so bright against the darkness and quiet outside that it leaves a coldness under my skin.Every sound inside the packhouse hits my ears wrong; it
Ayla’s POVAlpha Jack and Luna Ria don’t stand in my way when I get up and head toward the door a second time. They know it’s time for me to leave.With one last silent nod, I exit the packhouse and slip into the cold.It’s dark now, the wind howling through the trees in the distance.I head toward







