“You’re still here,” Raena said quietly, not meeting my eyes.
I looked up from where I sat, wrapping the worn leather around my palms. The training circle was empty except for the two of us, dew still clinging to the grass, morning light pale and hesitant.
“I said I would be,” I replied.
She nodded once. Not in approval—more like she didn’t trust it yet, but she was choosing to let it happen.
We moved without speaking at first. Circling. Testing. This wasn’t like before—no taunts, no sharp blows meant to provoke. The air between us felt slower and quieter, as if we were relearning each other’s rhythm instead of trying to break it. The breath we shared plumed faint in the chill, rising and vanishing before it could turn into fogged words.
Raena struck first, but it was a tap. Barely enough force to move my shoulder. I returned it the same way—a parry without heat.
“You’re holding back,” she said, eyebrow arched.
“So are you.”
Her mouth twitched. “Not the worst thing, for once.”
We kept at it. Sometimes our hands brushed. Once, I caught her wrist and didn’t let go immediately. She didn’t pull away. Between rounds, she tossed me a water flask and asked, “What was your favorite thing before all this?”
I blinked. “All this?”
“The bond. The war. The chaos. Before everything cracked.”
I thought about it. “My uncle’s forge. The sound of metal being shaped. I used to sit there for hours. He let me stoke the fire when I was little.”
Her smile was small but real. “That explains the whole brooding, fire-worship thing you’ve got going on.”
I let out a quiet huff. “Fire doesn’t betray. It just burns.”
She looked at me for a second too long. “So you trust the burn more than the person?”
“Sometimes,” I said. “At least I know what to expect.”
“What about you?” I asked. “What did you love before this?”
She paused, then shrugged. “I used to braid my mother’s hair in the mornings. She’d never let anyone else touch it, not even her attendants. But me—she said I had gentle hands.”
“You do,” I said before I could stop myself.
Raena didn’t reply. But she didn’t look away either. Her eyes flicked to my mouth for the briefest second. The moment balanced on a blade edge, and then the earth turned again.
We trained and she slipped under my guard with a laugh that startled both of us. It was the first time I’d heard it since… since before the cave. Since before everything nearly broke.
She caught me blinking.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing,” I said, shaking my head. “Just—don’t stop laughing like that.”
Her expression shifted. That was something softer. Something that settled deep into my ribs and refused to leave.
She rolled her shoulders out. “It’s strange… how easy this feels right now.”
“Because we stopped trying to win,” I said. “We’re just listening.”
We sat in the grass after, both of us sweat-slicked and breathing hard. The dew soaked the backs of my calves. The day smelled like wet earth and iron. A hawk circled once over the treeline and vanished into the pale.
She leaned back on her hands. “Tell me something you’ve never told anyone.”
I hesitated. Then: “When I was thirteen, I shifted too early. My father beat me for it. Said it meant I was weak.”
Raena’s eyes burned. “He was wrong.”
I nodded. “Doesn’t mean it didn’t stick.”
Her voice was sharper now. “You think that was a weakness? Early shifts are rare—strong. You were never the problem, Silas. He was.”
I clenched my jaw. “He made me afraid of the wolf inside me. I spent years trying to quiet it.”
“You don’t need to anymore,” she said, softer this time. “You don’t need to be quiet here.”
Silence stretched between us again. But this one wasn’t heavy. It was full—waiting. The wind combed the grass, and the leather in my palms creaked like an old hinge deciding to open.
Her hand traced a line in the grass, then stilled. “Do you remember any old stories from when you were small? Not the war tales. Older.”
I rubbed the leather on my palm and felt the memory click.
“My uncle used to hum a ballad when the coals died down. He called it the Moon-Bond and the Ember-Bride. Two Alphas at the border—one Hollowmoor, one Ashfang—met at a cairn and swore a private vow. The next winter, both were dead. He said Ashfang poisoned the oathstone.”
Her head lifted and the morning seemed to sharpen.
The chill thinned, and a path I hadn’t noticed through the trees looked suddenly worn, like feet had used it for years. The story didn’t feel distant anymore. It felt close—like something buried under our feet, waiting for hands brave enough to uncover it.