Dust motes danced like lazy sprites in the few stray beams of lamplight that pierced the gloom. From her perch in the rafters of 'The Grey Pelt', Aella was a creature of shadow and silence. The air below was a thick stew of stale ale, wet fur, and desperation, but up here, it was thin and cold, smelling only of old wood and secrets. She had been motionless for two hours, a predator content in her stillness, her gaze fixed on the two wolves who were her prey.
Connall Stonepelt and Althea Verran. The exiled prince and the lost Luna.
Her initial assessment was laced with the professional cynicism that had kept her alive for a decade. Bonds, attachments, fated mates—they were liabilities. Weaknesses to be exploited. She'd seen it before: a partner hesitating at a critical moment, a target distracted by a lover's plea. Such things got you killed. Down below, her targets did little to change her mind. They didn't act like lovers. There was no soft caress, no whispered endearment. They sat across from each other at a rough-hewn table, a taut, coiled energy radiating from them, a proximity born of grim necessity.
He was a coiled spring, his eyes constantly sweeping the room, assessing threats with a paranoid discipline she could respect. She was a pillar of strained composure, her Luna heritage a mask of calm she wore over what had to be raw terror. They were a mess. A beautiful, volatile, interesting mess.
Then it happened.
It was not a sound or a flash of light, but a sudden, violent harmony of pain. Aella, a connoisseur of suffering, saw it with perfect clarity. A simultaneous, sharp intake of breath. The tendons in Connall's neck went rigid. Althea's eyes screwed shut for a nanosecond. A shared grimace tightened the lines around their eyes and mouths before being brutally suppressed. It was the proof she had been sent to find, the physical manifestation of the rumor that had set the underworld buzzing.
Aella watched, her professional detachment shifting to keen, academic interest, as Connall's hand moved beneath the table. It wasn't a tender gesture. There was no romance in it, only a desperate, functional need. His fingers found Althea's, and the change was instantaneous and electric. She saw the tension in their shoulders dissolve as if a current had been cut. The subtle, high-frequency tremor in Althea's hand vanished. The bloodless pallor of their skin warmed by a fraction. It was a circuit being completed. A current being grounded.
*Not a weakness,* Aella thought, her mind recalibrating years of tactical data. *A conduit. They share the pain, and they share the relief. It's a closed loop of power.*
As if to test her new theory, a lumbering brute of a shifter, reeking of cheap spirits and spoiling for a fight, staggered toward their table. He leered, his mouth opening to spew some drunken insult. Aella's hand rested on the dagger at her hip, but she held back, curious to see the targets react.
She wasn't disappointed.
No words were exchanged between the prince and the Luna. Connall simply shifted his weight, a subtle movement that made his shoulders seem broader, his presence more menacing. At the same time, Althea's gaze, which had been downcast, lifted. Her silver eyes became flint-hard, but it was more than that. Aella saw an ancient authority surface, a flicker of pure Luna command that didn't just challenge the drunk, but judged him unworthy. It was a power that bypassed conscious thought and spoke directly to the brute's primal instincts. He froze mid-step, the slur dying on his lips. He blinked, a flicker of pure, canine fear dawning in his dull eyes, and instinctively veered away, seeking easier prey.
Aella allowed herself a flicker of a smile in the darkness. It wasn't their individual power that impressed her. It was the synergy. The seamless, unspoken coordination. They were two halves of a single, lethal whole.
***
The alley behind the tavern was a slick, foul-smelling canyon of brick and refuse. Aella landed on the rooftop opposite with a whisper of displaced air, melting into the deeper shadows cast by a crooked chimney. The noise of the tavern was a muffled beast behind her. The night was cold and sharp.
She pulled a small, obsidian disc from a hidden pocket in her leathers. It was unnaturally cold, absorbing the faint warmth of her fingers like a tiny vortex of entropy. She brought it close to her lips, her breath frosting in the air.
"Report," she murmured, the single word a low vibration.
The disc hummed, a faint, resonant tone that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. A voice answered, scraped clean of gender or warmth, cold as the void between stars.
"Confirm."
"The bond is genuine," Aella said, her voice flat and professional, even as her mind raced with the implications. "Potent. I witnessed a sympathetic pain flare. They contained it with physical contact. Their coordination is instinctual. They operate as a single combat unit."
There was a moment of silence from the disc, a heavy pause that felt like a mind processing complex variables.
"Your assessment?" the voice asked.
Aella's gaze drifted to the mouth of the alley where her targets had disappeared moments before. "They are not just a prince and his mate," she stated, the conclusion solidifying in her mind. "They are a weapon. Untrained, volatile, but a weapon nonetheless."
***
The cold from the obsidian disc seemed to leech deeper into her fingertips. She waited, expecting the usual sign-off, the order to continue surveillance or to disengage. The silence stretched, becoming unnatural.
"What are my orders regarding the asset?" she asked finally, the word 'asset' a deliberate, professional detachment.
The reply was not what she expected.
"Your mission is no longer observation. It is protection."
Aella's posture stiffened. A flicker of genuine, professional surprise broke through her stoic calm. Protection was not her specialty. She was a scalpel, used for precise intelligence gathering or removal. A bodyguard was a shield, a crude instrument for absorbing damage. This was a deviation. A significant one.
The voice from the disc continued, relentless and absolute. "Guntram Volkov's hunters are clumsy, but numerous. Other interested parties are also in motion. You will be their unseen guardian. Let no one else reach them. They must make it to the Royalist sanctuary."
"Protecting the target is a significant deviation," Aella stated, her tone carefully neutral, but the objection was clear. "My contract was for reconnaissance."
"The contract has changed," the voice replied, a sliver of something like steel entering the distorted sound. "Your loyalty is to me, not to the coin of a fool like Guntram Volkov. He is a pawn."
The final words landed like stones, shattering her understanding of the mission. A pawn. An Alpha who had seized a throne, who commanded a pack of killers, was considered a mere pawn by her employer.
"Ensure the Silvermoon heir survives him."
The disc went silent, its magical resonance fading into the cold night air. It was just a piece of polished rock in her hand now. Aella stood alone on the rooftop, the wind whipping strands of dark hair across her face.
Her employer didn't want Connall Stonepelt dead. They wanted him alive, strong, and aimed like a dagger at the usurper's throat. They were actively working against Guntram, using his own hired spy to do it. Her mission wasn't about verifying a rumor or tracking a fugitive. It was part of a much deeper, more complex game of thrones, and she had just been moved from the sidelines to a critical position on the board. A protector. A shepherd for a weapon in the making. A new, far more dangerous, and infinitely more interesting role.