The training wing smelled different from the omega dorms.
Less cabbage, for one thing.
More sweat. Leather. Oil from weapon cleaning. Faint traces of adrenaline and testosterone and pride, clinging to the stone like moss.
Eren chattered the whole way up the stairs, either oblivious to or intentionally ignoring the glances we drew from warriors leaning in doorways or walking past in various stages of undress.
“So then Kellan had me spar with Callum and I totally would’ve taken him if he hadn’t cheated and gone for my ribs, and—oh, this is you.”
He stopped so abruptly I almost ran into him.
We stood before a sturdy wooden door on the third-floor corridor. Second on the right, just like Elyra had said.
My new room.
My new…life.
My stomach did a slow, uneasy flip.
“It’s not the best one,” Eren said quickly. “Kellan didn’t want to bump any of the older warriors until they, you know, prove you won’t burn the place down. But it’s way better than the omega bunks. You have your own door. And a window. With an actual view.”
“I had a window before,” I pointed out.
“Yeah. Of the garbage courtyard.”
Fair.
He bounced on his toes. “Go on. Open it.”
I stared at the door.
My hand felt weirdly heavy.
“It’s just a room,” I muttered. “Four walls. A bed. Probably some splinters.”
“Kaia,” Eren said softly.
I looked at him.
He wasn’t grinning now.
His green eyes were serious. “You deserve this,” he said. “More. But this is a start.”
Emotion lodged in my throat.
I swallowed it down.
“Fine,” I muttered, reaching for the handle before sentiment could choke me. “But if there’s another person’s underwear left on the floor, I’m moving back with Brenna.”
The door creaked as it swung inward.
Sunlight poured over us.
The room wasn’t big.
Ten steps by eight, maybe. A narrow bed pushed against the far wall under a window. A small wardrobe. A chest at the foot of the bed. A rough-hewn desk with a single chair. A shelf with a few folded blankets.
But the window—
The window took up nearly the whole upper half of the outer wall.
It looked east, over the tree line.
Pines marched into the distance, dark and thick. Beyond them, the faint line of the mountain ridge. The sky above it was a pale, washed blue, streaked with thin clouds.
Sunlight spilled through the glass, warming the stone floor, turning the dust motes into golden specks.
I stepped inside like I was entering a shrine.
Ashra made a small, awed noise. *We have a view.*
“I can see the forest,” I whispered.
“And the river,” Eren pointed, coming up behind me to lean on the windowsill. “If you squint. Right there. See the flash?”
I did.
A thin, silver line between the trees, catching the light.
“My parents used to take me there,” I said without meaning to. “Before.”
“Before the run,” he finished quietly.
“Yeah.”
Silence.
He nudged my shoulder. “You can go again now. Whenever you want. No curfew bell for omegas. No chores list.”
“No safety,” I countered automatically. “No middle-of-the-night soup runs with Brenna. No Nana snoring five feet away.”
He smiled faintly. “You sound like you’re going to miss the snoring.”
I was.
I wouldn’t admit it.
“It’s just weird,” I said instead. “Being…alone. Without fifty people breathing in the same room.”
Ashra snorted. *You’re not alone. You have me. And nosy stormboy one floor over.*
I stiffened. “Tiernan’s room is *not* one floor over.”
*No,* she conceded. *He’s two.*
“Why do you know that?” I demanded.
She yawned. *Bond sense. I can feel where he settles when he stops storming around. It hums. Like distant thunder.*
Eren gave me a sideways look. “You’re doing that thing again where you have a conversation in your head and forget I can’t hear both sides.”
“Sorry,” I said. “Ashra’s…chatty.”
He grinned. “Invite me next time. I’ve always wanted to know what goes on in an alpha’s wolf’s head.”
“She’s not an alpha,” I argued.
*Yet,* Ashra said smugly.
Eren’s brow furrowed as he looked around the room.
“They really gave you your own space,” he said slowly. “No roommate.”
“Should they have?” I asked, weirdly stung.
“I just mean—” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Most trainees share. Two to a room. Three if we’re short on beds. Kellan must’ve argued for this. Or Elyra.”
“Or Tiernan,” I said before I could stop myself.
Jealousy flickered across Eren’s face. Quick and ugly.
I blinked.
“What was that?” I asked sharply.
He flinched. “What?”
“That look.”
He scowled. “Nothing.”
“Don’t lie to me,” I said. “You suck at it.”
He huffed. “It’s just…everyone’s talking, you know? About you. And him. The visiting alpha. How he waltzed in and claimed you. How you’re suddenly…important.”
He said the last word like it tasted sour.
Pain pricked behind my ribs.
“I didn’t ask for that,” I said quietly. “Any of it.”
“I know.” He kicked at a crack in the stone. “It’s just…you were *ours*.”
“Yours?” I echoed.
“The omegas’,” he said. “The ones the pack forgot. We looked out for each other. We shared bread and bruises and jokes. Now…” He shrugged helplessly. “Now you’re up here. With warriors. With alphas.”
Guilt twisted in my gut.
“I didn’t choose this,” I said again, because it was the only defense I had. “I’d still be hauling chamber pots if the Goddess hadn’t decided to play cosmic matchmaker.”
“That’s the other thing,” he muttered. “Your mate. Alpha Voss. Everyone’s saying…He’s strong. Good. That you’re lucky. But you’ve barely looked at him without flinching.”
“Maybe because he terrifies me,” I snapped.
“Does he…hurt you?” Eren asked warily.
“No,” I said, startled. “He’s actually—” I stopped myself.
Eren’s eyes narrowed. “Actually *what*?”
“Honest,” I muttered. “Annoyingly so.”
He snorted. “Alphas aren’t honest. They just spin better lies.”
“Not all alphas are Rhys,” I said.
Silence.
We stared at each other.
He looked away first.
“I just…” He exhaled. “I don’t want to lose you to them.”
His words sliced along an old wound.
“I’ve always been ‘theirs’ on paper,” I said. “Rhys made that clear when he assigned me to the omegas. This—” I gestured around the room. “This doesn’t change who held my hand when I was eight. Or who slipped me sweets when I messed up the stew. Or who taught me how to punch without breaking my thumb.”
I stepped closer.
Eren’s breath hitched.
“You’re my friend,” I said firmly. “That doesn’t change because some storm alpha’s wolf decided I smell nice.”
Ashra snorted. *That’s not why.*
*Shut up,* I hissed internally.
Eren searched my face.
“Promise?” he asked, voice small.
I thought of Nana’s warning. Of Lysa telling me not to let them wrap my hilt in their colors.
“I promise to *try*,” I said, because after years with wolves who lied to make things easier, I refused to be one of them. “I can’t control what they do. Or how the pack shifts. But I can control…me.”
He nodded.
Then, impulsively, he hugged me.
I stiffened for a second.
Then my arms moved, wrapping around his back.
His scent—pine and sweat and youth—wrapped around me. Familiar. Comforting.
Ashra made a soft sound. *He’s good. Pack. Not danger.*
*I know,* I said.
We stood like that for a heartbeat too long.
A throat cleared in the doorway.
We jumped apart.
Tiernan leaned against the frame, arms folded, expression carefully neutral.
Something hot and sharp flashed in his eyes before he buried it.
“Am I interrupting?” he asked, voice deceptively mild.
“Yes,” Eren said automatically.
I elbowed him.
Tiernan’s mouth twitched.
“I came to make sure you didn’t collapse in the corridor,” he said. “You were shaking when you left.”
“I’m fine,” I said quickly. “Just tired.”
“Muscle soreness will peak tomorrow,” he said matter-of-factly. “Then ease. Drink water. Eat. Don’t sit in one position too long or you’ll lock up.”
“You sound like my mother,” I muttered.
His expression flickered. “I’ll…take that as a compliment. She was a good woman.”
Awkward silence.
Eren shifted. “I should, uh. Go. Kellan’ll have me running laps if I’m late.”
“You’re excused from evening drills today,” Tiernan said.
Eren stiffened. “What? Why?”
“Because you spent the morning standing in a storm’s blast zone,” Tiernan said dryly. “I don’t need you falling on your face in the sparring ring. Go downstairs. Get food. Then rest. That’s an order.”
Eren’s jaw clenched.
Alphas and orders. Gammas and obedience.
“I’m not your wolf,” he muttered.
Tiernan’s brows rose. “No. You’re not. But right now, you’re under my purview in training. You can disobey if you like. Kellan will be thrilled to hear your thoughts on ranking when he’s got you doing midnight drills.”
Eren paled.
“I’ll…go eat,” he said quickly.
I smothered a laugh.
As Eren slipped past Tiernan, he glanced back at me.
Don’t forget us, his eyes said.
I swallowed.
I won’t, I tried to answer with my own look.
Tiernan watched the whole exchange, jaw working.
When Eren’s footsteps faded down the corridor, he stepped fully into the room, closing the door behind him.
The space shrank.
He leaned against the wood, arms folded again, studying me.
Under that gaze, I suddenly became hyper-aware of my own sweat-streaked face, my tangled hair, the way his shirt still hung loose on my shoulders.
“You smell like ozone and dirt,” he said.
I bristled. “Thanks.”
“It suits you,” he added, mouth curving.
Heat flickered through me.
“Don’t,” I warned.
“Don’t what?” he asked innocently.
“Use that…voice,” I said, waving a hand vaguely.
He tipped his head. “This one?”
My knees wobbled.
Ashra purred. *We like that voice. Ask him to say ‘stormheart’ again.*
*I will set us both on fire,* I threatened.
Tiernan’s smile faded as his gaze drifted to the cord on my wrist.
“You kept it on,” he said softly.
“My parents,” I said. “Nana said Elyra had them pulled from…you know. And kept.”
He nodded slowly. “I remember. After the attack. Elyra wouldn’t let Rhys bury them. She said…they’d earned more than dirt.”
The memory of my mother’s lifeless body in the snow flashed behind my eyes.
I swallowed hard.
“She *owed* them more,” I said. “Not just memories and trinkets.”
“Yes,” he agreed. “She did.”
Silence.
He pushed off the door and crossed to the window, leaning a shoulder against the stone, looking out.
“You have a good view,” he observed.
“Eren said the same thing,” I muttered.
“Eren is smart.”
“He’s wrong about you,” I said before I could stop myself.
Tiernan glanced back, brows up. “Oh?”
“He said alphas lie better,” I said. “But you…don’t. Not well, anyway.”
He huffed a laugh. “I’ll try not to be offended.”
“It’s…strange,” I said, moving up beside him to stare out at the pines. “Hearing you speak to Rhys. To Corin. You push back. You don’t just…bow.”
He shrugged one broad shoulder. “I’m an alpha in my own right. Not a subordinate. I owe them courtesy, not obedience.”
“Must be nice,” I said.
“You bow,” he said quietly. “Even when they don’t deserve it.”
“It’s survival,” I muttered.
“It’s habit,” he countered. “Which we’ll break. Slowly. Carefully. But we will.”
I bristled. “You can’t just—”
“Kaia.” His tone shifted, gentler. “You bowed to Corin when you were eight. To the alpha who sent you to the omegas. To ranked wolves who let their pups throw things at you. You bowed because you were a pup and you were scared and it was all you knew. That was then. This is now. You are not powerless anymore.”
“I still live under their roof,” I said. “Eat their food. Walk their territory. Answer to their rules.”
“Yes,” he said. “For now. But you also have a wolf who snarls at their commands. And a mate-bond to an alpha who doesn’t scare as easily as they’d like. Use it.”
“That’s a lot of words to say ‘weaponize me,’” I said bitterly.
He flinched. “That’s not what I—”
“You talk about me like a blade,” I pressed. “My hilt. My edge. You and Nana both. How long before one of you swings me at someone’s throat?”
His jaw clenched. “If I did, it would be at someone who deserved it. Not a kitchen girl who forgot to bow fast enough.”
“That’s not comforting,” I snapped. “I don’t *want* to hurt people. I just wanted—” My voice broke. I swallowed hard. “I just wanted a wolf. A normal one. To run with. To…not be alone.”
He turned fully then, leaning his hip against the windowsill, facing me.
“You’re not normal,” he said bluntly.
I flinched.
“And nothing I say will make that easier,” he went on. “But you were also never going to be normal. Even if your wolf had come at sixteen. Even if they’d told you about your parents. Your blood was always going to…burn hotter.”
“Great,” I muttered. “So I was doomed either way.”
He exhaled slowly. “Maybe. Maybe the Goddess wove this into you and laughed. Or maybe she looked at two wolves who burned half an army and said, ‘Let’s give their daughter something different. Let’s give her time. Let’s give her a match who knows how to stand in a storm.’”
“You think very highly of yourself,” I said, but my voice lacked heat.
He smiled wryly. “Ask anyone in Stormwake—they’ll tell you I’m an idiot. My Beta calls me ‘reckless with nice hair.’”
I almost smiled.
“What happened?” I asked impulsively. “With your parents. You said…your father nearly killed your mother.”
Pain flickered behind his eyes.
“I did say that,” he said slowly. “And then I told you it was too long a story for your first day.”
“I’m on day two,” I said.
He huffed a breath. “Technicality queen.”
He was quiet for a long moment. The only sounds were distant shouts from the yard below, the faint creak of the building settling.
“When I was ten,” he said finally, “my father met his fated mate. Not my mother. A rogue she-wolf with a gift for illusions. She walked into our territory under a white flag, claiming to seek asylum from a cruel alpha. My father saw her and the bond snapped. Just like that.”
My stomach dropped.
“And your mother?” I whispered.
“She wasn’t his fated,” he said. “They were chosen mates. Bonded by oath. Years of shared battles. Children. Love. But not the Goddess’s thread. To some, that makes it less. To others…” He shrugged. “They say chosen bonds are stronger, because you pick each other every day.”
“What did he do?” I asked.
“He lost his mind,” Tiernan said flatly. “He tried to reject my mother in front of the entire pack. Tried to cast off their years like a cloak. The bond with the rogue overwhelmed him. Made him stupid. He told my mother she was…less. That she’d been a placeholder. That the Goddess had finally given him what he deserved.”
My chest ached.
“What did she do?” I whispered.
“She laughed,” he said, and there was fierce admiration in his tone. “Right in his face. Then she punched him so hard his nose has been crooked ever since. She told him if he thought some shiny new bond could erase decades of war and children and blood, he was the fool, not the Goddess.”
“What about the rogue?” I asked.
“She was a liar,” he said simply. “Her story about seeking asylum was half-true at best. She was a spy. Sent by a rival pack to sow discord. When my father refused to hand over our storm-forged artifacts—old stones with bound lightning—she tried to steal them.”
“And your father?” I asked.
He looked out at the trees again, jaw working.
“He’d already let the bond warp his sense. He…helped her,” he said quietly. “Turned on his own wolves to protect her. Fought my mother. Nearly killed her. She survived because my grandfather—old alpha Voss—threw himself between them and took the killing blow instead.”
I stared.
“The rogue died that night,” he went on. “My mother killed her. My father…broke. The mate-bond backlash nearly destroyed his mind. The pack would have put him down, if not for my mother.”
“She protected him,” I said faintly. “After all that?”
“She loved him,” Tiernan said. “Idiotic, stubborn woman. She told the pack she forgave him. That the Goddess’s games weren’t his fault. That he’d been…puppeted.”
His lips twisted. “She’s always made excuses for him. Even now.”
“Now?” I repeated. “He’s still…alive?”
“Yes.” Tiernan’s mouth tightened. “He spends his days muttering to the storm stones at the mountain’s heart. Half his mind is in the past. The other half is chasing a mate who no longer exists.”
Anger surged through me. “That’s…awful.”
“It is,” he said. “It’s also why I…don’t trust fate. Or the Goddess’s gift.”
“And yet,” I said, heart pounding, “here you are. With a fated mate.”
“Yes.” His gaze locked onto mine. “Here I am.”
Silence fell.
Heavy. Charged.
Ashra prowled inside my chest. *He fears the bond,* she said thoughtfully. *And yet he stays. Interesting.*
“I’m not your father,” Tiernan said quietly. “I will not let some thread of light in my chest turn me into a puppet. I will not throw you away because some other pretty wolf walks into my territory. I don’t…work like that.”
“You don’t know what the Goddess might do,” I said hoarsely.
“No, I don’t,” he agreed. “But I know how I choose. Every day. And if you decide, in five months or five years or five decades, that you want me, Kaia Thorn…I will have chosen you first. Not second. Not as a consolation prize. Not as a fallback because the bond told me to.”
The room spun slightly.
“Stop,” I whispered.
He blinked. “Stop…what?”
“Saying things like that,” I said, my voice ragged. “Things that…sound good.”
“They’re not lines,” he said, pained. “I don’t—”
“I can’t—” I broke off, pressing my lips together hard.
Tears burned behind my eyes.
“I can’t trust it,” I forced out. “Any of it. Not yet. Maybe not ever.”
He inhaled slowly, nostrils flaring.
Pain flickered across his face.
“I know,” he said, voice rough. “I don’t expect you to. I told you—we’re on your timetable. Not mine. Not the Goddess’s. I will keep saying what I mean, though. You can ignore it. Spit on it. Reject it. But I won’t pretend indifference I don’t feel. That would be another lie, and you’ve had enough of those.”
That…tugged at something deep in me.
Honesty.
Bruising, inconvenient, uncomfortable.
But real.
“Why?” I whispered. “Why me? You could have had any number of pretty, well-trained she-wolves. Alphas’ daughters. Lunas’ nieces. Why does the Goddess give the storm alpha the broken girl from the omegas?”
His jaw clenched.
“You’re not broken,” he said, low and fierce. “You’re *forged*. There’s a difference. Broken things shatter. Forged things bend. They take the heat and come out stronger.”
He stepped closer.
I didn’t move.
“The Goddess didn’t hand me a prize,” he said. “She handed me a challenge. A mate with her own mind. Her own scars. Her own wild power. Do you think I’m so arrogant I don’t see that? So blind I don’t realize I’m the one who has to prove himself worthy here?”
My breath stuttered.
Ashra stilled, ears pricked.
“I am not here to fix you,” Tiernan said. “Or save you. Or claim you like a trophy. I am here because something in the marrow of my bones sang when I saw you. Because my wolf looked at you and said, ‘Ours.’ And because my *heart*”—he thumped his chest once, hard—“looked at you and said, ‘Finally. Someone who understands what it is to be used and still stand.’”
Tears slipped, hot and unwelcome, down my cheeks.
He didn’t move to wipe them away.
“You don’t have to forgive your pack,” he said softly. “Or trust me. Or accept the bond. You can keep me at arm’s length forever if that’s what you need. I’ll still be here. Training you. Supporting you. Calling you on your bullshit. Because you deserve at least one alpha in your life who doesn’t use your loyalty as a leash.”
I sniffed, hating the wet sound.
“My loyalty isn’t…easy to earn,” I said thickly.
“I know,” he said. “Good. It shouldn’t be.”
Silence settled again.
Less sharp this time.
“So,” I croaked after a long moment, scrubbing my face with my sleeve. “What you’re saying is…you’re very noble. And self-sacrificing. And long-suffering. And we should all feel terribly grateful.”
He laughed, startled. “Goddess, no. I’m saying I’m stubborn. And selfish. And I want you. But I’m willing to wait.”
Heat curled low in my gut again, mixing with the ache in my chest.
Ashra purred. *We should kiss him.*
*We should not,* I hissed.
*Later,* she amended. *When we’re less…fragile.*
My cheeks burned.
Tiernan’s nostrils flared slightly, as if he could scent the flush.
“I should…let you rest,” he said reluctantly, stepping back. “We’ll pick up again tomorrow. If you’re up to it.”
“I’ll be there,” I said, surprised by how much I meant it.
He nodded once.
“Kaia.”
I looked up.
He met my gaze steadily.
“Thank you,” he said.
“For…what?” I asked, bewildered.
“For not running,” he replied simply.
And then he was gone, leaving my room full of sunlight and silence and the faint, crackling echo of his presence.
I sank onto the bed and stared at the ceiling.
“Well,” Ashra said finally. *We’re fucked.*
I laughed through my tears.
“Yeah,” I whispered. “We are.”
---