Lyra's POV
The fire crackled low, casting gold across the walls of Kaelan's war chamber.
Rain still whispered outside, tapping against the windows like restless fingers a haunting reminder of the night that refused to end.
I sat on the far end of the room, cloak heavy with rain and blood, watching the Alpha who had once haunted my nightmares.
Kaelan Draven stood before the hearth, shirt torn, the wound on his ribs stitched and still seeping through the gauze. Every line of his body spoke of control the kind built from years of leadership, loss, and rage buried under restraint.
But his eyes they were the storm.
"What was that crest doing on a warlock's neck?" I asked, my voice sharper than I intended. "Silverfang's crest died with my family."
He didn't look at me. "Maybe not. Maybe someone's been keeping it alive for their own purpose."
"Purpose?" I pushed. "You think someone staged all this just to make you look guilty? Why? To what end?"
He finally turned, eyes like molten steel. "Because power doesn't die, Lyra. It just changes hands."
My hands clenched in my lap. "You talk like you weren't part of it."
The silence that followed burned hotter than the fire.
He walked closer, the low hum of his aura brushing against mine commanding, infuriating, intoxicating. "You still think I betrayed Silverfang."
"I saw you," I snapped. "That night"
"Did you?" His voice softened, dangerous. "Or did you see what someone wanted you to see?"
I froze.
His tone wasn't angry. It was tired. Haunted.
"I was there, yes," he continued, pacing now, jaw tight. "Ironclaw sent aid when we heard Silverfang was under attack. But by the time we arrived, everything was burning. Your father was gone. Your mother"
"Don't," I whispered. My throat constricted.
He stopped. "You think I don't remember that night? I lost my father in that same war. Whoever planned it… they made sure all sides bled."
I stared at him, my mind spinning.
If he was lying, he was damn good at it.
If he wasn't… then everything I believed in had cracks.
Kaelan reached for something on the desk a piece of parchment stained with water and blood. He tossed it onto the table before me.
It was a symbol I hadn't seen since childhood a silver moon encircled by thorns.
The mark of the Council of Alphas.
My pulse quickened. "Where did you get this?"
"From the warlock's cloak," he said. "Darius confirmed it's genuine."
"The Council was supposed to preserve peace among the packs," I murmured, fingers brushing the ink. "My father trusted them."
Kaelan's voice hardened. "Your father trusted the wrong wolves. That council doesn't exist to protect peace it controls it. They decide who rises, who falls, which packs survive."
The words hit me like a blade.
"They planned Silverfang's fall," he continued quietly. "And maybe Ironclaw's, too."
For a moment, the fire crackled louder than my heart.
I remembered my father's words the night before the attack 'If peace comes at the cost of truth, it is not peace at all.'
And suddenly, pieces began to align the missing scouts, the delayed messages, the way Kaelan had been accused without evidence.
Still, trust wasn't something I could offer freely. Not to him.
I looked up sharply. "Why show me this now? You could've burned it and kept your secrets safe."
"Because you deserve the truth," he said simply. "And because whether you like it or not, our enemies are the same."
I hated how the words made sense.
I hated how his gaze softened when he said you.
But most of all, I hated that part of me the part I thought I'd buried years ago wanted to believe him.
Lightning flashed through the windows, illuminating his face sharp, noble, scarred. He was the ghost of the boy who used to laugh with my brother.
"You're not the only one haunted by ghosts, Lyra," he murmured, as if reading my thoughts.
I turned away before my heart could betray me. "Then let the ghosts guide us to the truth. Because until I know who destroyed my family, you'll never be more than a reminder of what I lost."
He didn't answer.
But as I walked toward the door, his voice came low deep enough to burn.
"Then we find them together."
Kaelan's POV
The storm outside hadn't stopped.
It howled across the mountains, rain slashing against the windows like claws on glass.
I stood before the hearth long after Lyra left, staring into the fire until it blurred into gold and ash.
The parchment with the Council's mark still lay on the table, edges curling from the heat.
That symbol a silver moon wrapped in thorns had haunted me since the first day I took my father's seat.
Now it haunted her, too.
And maybe that was what fate wanted two broken wolves bound by the same scar.
My jaw tightened. Fate. That word again. It mocked me every time I tried to resist her pull.
The door creaked open. Darius entered, dripping from the rain, his cloak dark with mud.
"You found something?" I asked.
He dropped a bundle onto the desk soaked maps, torn letters, the kind of evidence only scavenged from the dead.
"I found a camp near the northern border," he said, voice low. "The rogues weren't rogues. They carried the Council's sigil hidden under burned cloth. Someone didn't want them recognized."
I stiffened. "Survivors?"
"One," Darius replied grimly. "A scout. Barely breathing. He said they were ordered to target Silverfang descendants."
My hands curled into fists.
Descendants.
Which meant Lyra.
I exhaled slowly, forcing my rage back into the pit it belonged. "Does she know?"
"She suspects," Darius said carefully. "But not who gave the order. I thought you might want to tell her yourself."
I turned toward the rain-streaked window, jaw set.
No not yet. Not until I was sure.
Lyra already carried too much blood on her hands that wasn't hers. If she learned that she was being hunted again, she'd run and this time, I wasn't sure I could let her.
"Keep this between us," I said finally.
Darius hesitated. "You think she'll believe you're protecting her?"
I glanced at the fire. "No. But I'll protect her anyway."
When Darius left, silence returne heavy, charged, almost sentient.
I sat at the edge of the table, pressing my fingers against the parchment again.
The ink had begun to fade, but the mark was clear enough to sting.
The Council had been more than politics once a brotherhood of alphas sworn to maintain balance among packs. My father helped create it.
But balance became control, and control turned to tyranny.
And now, decades later, the same power was rising again wearing new faces, new loyalties, and spilling blood to keep its secrets buried.
I rubbed my temples, exhaustion cutting deeper than any wound.
If Silverfang's fall had been orchestrated by the Council… then everything Lyra believed about me, about that night was a lie written in smoke and ash.
I wanted to tell her.
Gods, I wanted to take that weight off her shoulders.
But every time I saw her, words burned to ashes on my tongue.
The bond didn't make it easier. It made everything worse.
When she was near, I could feel every emotion she tried to hide her fury, her grief, her confusion.
And underneath it all… that dangerous spark of want she refused to name.
It mirrored my own.
I dragged a hand through my hair, cursing under my breath.
I was Alpha. I'd spent my life mastering control over men, over monsters, over myself.
But one look from her, and my instincts roared louder than reason.
The memory of her voice replayed in my mind "You'll never be more than a reminder of what I lost."
She had no idea how true that was.
Because when I looked at her, I saw every life that ended that night. Every oath broken. Every ghost I couldn't bury.
She was my punishment and my salvation wrapped in the same fragile body.
A faint knock drew me out of my thoughts.
I didn't need to ask who it was her scent reached me before she spoke.
Rain and wild jasmine. The storm carried her inside before her courage could falter.
"Alpha Draven," she said softly.
Her voice was steady too steady. The kind of calm that only existed to hide the shaking underneath.
I turned slowly, letting the firelight reveal her. She was still in her healer's robe, damp at the hem, hair loose around her shoulders. She looked too small against the backdrop of flame and shadow, yet something in her eyes was unbreakable.
"You shouldn't be here," I said quietly.
"I came because I needed to ask," she said. "If what you told me earlier… if it's true. About the Council."
I hesitated, then nodded once. "It's true."
"Then everything I lost my family, my pack it wasn't just war?"
"No." I met her gaze, and the word came out like a confession. "It was slaughter. A decision made by wolves who wanted power."
Her breath hitched. "And you knew?"
"I found out too late."
She looked away, her throat working as if swallowing glass. "Too late doesn't bring them back."
"I know."
For a moment, neither of us moved. The rain filled the silence, relentless, almost mournful.
Then she whispered, "Why are you helping me?"
"Because," I said, taking a slow step toward her, "the same Council that destroyed Silverfang is hunting Ironclaw next. And because…"
I stopped inches from her, my voice low, rough. "Because you're mine to protect whether you want that or not."
Her breath caught. "You don't get to claim me, Alpha."
"I already have."
The air between us ignited heat, danger, desire.
Her eyes flashed, her wolf rising in defiance. "You think fate gives you that right?"
"No." My voice softened, dangerous. "Fate gave me the bond. But I'm the one choosing not to run from it."
She opened her mouth to speak, then froze torn between fury and something she didn't want to name.
The scent of her pulse filled the room, wild and unguarded. My control frayed.
If I moved even a step closer, I'd ruin everything.
So I did what I never thought I would I stepped back.
"You should rest," I said, turning away. "Tomorrow, we hunt for answers. Not each other."
Her silence was long almost too long. Then, quietly, she said, "Be careful what you find, Kaelan. The truth might kill what's left of us."
And she was gone, leaving nothing but the echo of my name on her lips and the ache that would not fade.