*Kieran*
The valley met us like a held breath.
Snow lay heavy on the pines, branches bowed. The sky was a low, sullen gray, the kind that promised more weather.
As soon as we stepped out of the truck, the familiar scents rushed me—smoke, pine, fur, damp earth under frozen crust. Under it all, the hum of my pack.
Home.
My ribs loosened.
Then I caught another scent.
Faint.
Wrong.
Northridge.
Every muscle in my body went tight.
“Inside,” I said to Sage.
She frowned. “What—”
“In,” I snapped.
She shut her mouth and obeyed.
Something in me preened at that.
Idiot.
Once she was over the threshold of my cabin, I took a long, slow breath.
Cassian hadn’t come himself.
But he’d sent his shadow.
Ronan’s scent was threaded through the trees near the outer ring, thin but unmistakable.
He’d beaten us back from town.
Of course he had.
Rafe appeared at my shoulder like a ghost, snow dusting his hair.
“You smell it,” he said.
“Yes,” I growled.
“He didn’t get past the east ridge,” Rafe said. “We made sure of it. Edda had way too much fun dropping snow on him from the trees.”
“Good,” I said.
“Kids are restless,” he added. “They can feel it. The edge.”
“So can I,” I said.
Mara stepped up onto the porch, her breath pluming in the cold.
“You’re back,” she said. “In one piece. I win the bet.”
“What bet,” Sage demanded from inside.
Mara’s eyes crinkled. “Nothing, little herb. I just owe Edda three jars of jam.”
Sage appeared at my side, wrapping her arms around herself against the chill. “Jam encourages betting?” she asked.
“In this economy? Yes,” Mara said. Then, more seriously, “How was your…concrete adventure?”
“Loud,” I said.
“Sticky,” Sage said. “Spicy. Complicated.”
“Ominous,” I added.
Mara’s gaze sharpened. “Northridge?”
“In town,” I said.
Sage filled her in—Ronan in the restaurant, the alley, the threats. Mara listened, face unreadable.
When Sage described Cassian’s “key” comment, Mara’s mouth tightened.
“Old stories waking up,” she murmured.
“What stories,” Sage asked.
“Later,” Mara said. “We have more immediate problems.”
“Ronan’s scent?” I said.
She nodded. “He was sniffing the edges while you two were playing human. Testing. Poking. Looking for cracks.”
“He find any?” I asked.
“Not yet,” she said. “But he will keep trying.”
“We’re not the only ones cracking,” Rafe put in. “Kurt’s been calling Kim again. Screaming about government cover-ups and demon wolves. Word’s spreading. People are…uneasy.”
“How do you know?” Sage asked.
“I have ears,” he said. “And a friend at the gas station who thinks I work construction and likes to talk.”
“What did he hear?” I asked.
“Locals whispering,” Rafe said. “About ‘something big’ up near the hollow. About weird tracks. About ‘government SUVs’—” he nodded at Sage “—showing up more than usual. Kurt’s been waving his beer around in the bar, telling anyone who’ll listen that he saw the devil in your tower.”
“Great,” Sage muttered. “So much for him forgetting.”
“Fear is sticky,” Mara said. “It clings. It spreads.”
“Can we…redirect it?” Sage asked. “With the myth campaign?”
Mara tilted her head. “You have something drafted?”
Sage brightened—just a little. “A rough outline. ‘Legends of the Gallatin.’ Wolves in the mist. Eyes in the trees. Emphasis on wonder, not threat. Partner with local businesses. Make a wolf logo. Sell cheesy mugs.”
Kellan appeared at the bottom of the steps, expression deeply unimpressed. “Mugs,” he repeated.
“Mugs are powerful,” Sage said. “They go in people’s hands every morning. They shape thought.”
He grunted. “Humans are weird.”
“Yes,” Mara agreed.
“But we might as well use it,” I said.
They all looked at me.
“What?” I asked.
“You agreeing to something that involves your face on merchandise is…new,” Rafe said.
“I didn’t say my face,” I muttered.
“That would sell,” Edda called from behind Kellan. “Alpha thirst traps!”
“Don’t say ‘thirst’ in front of the children,” Mara scolded.
“Thirst for *knowledge,*” Edda amended innocently.
Sage choked.
Despite everything—the Northridge scent, the human tension, the prophecy gnawing at the back of my mind—I felt a corner of my mouth lift.
“We need to move fast,” I said. “Before Kurt’s stories harden. Before Cassian turns them into tinder.”
Sage nodded, sobering. “I can work on copy,” she said. “Language. Tone. You can…help with lore.”
“Lore?” Rafe echoed. “Like…make up ghost stories about ourselves?”
“Not entirely made up,” Mara said. “There are…old tales. Things we used to whisper to pups to keep them from wandering too far. We can…reframe.”
“Shadow wolves in the snow,” Sage said, eyes bright. “Lights on the ridges. Singing in the pine breaks. We can emphasize the…mystery. The wildness. Not the…monster.”
“You’re sure this will help?” Kellan asked.
“No,” she said. “But…doing nothing definitely won’t.”
“Humans like stories,” Mara said. “We might as well give them good ones.”
“While we’re doing that,” Rafe said, “we also need to deal with the fact that Northridge is crawling closer. They’re testing hard. Cassian hasn’t crossed, but his pups are everywhere.”
“Eyes on all sides,” I said. “We tighten rotations. No one runs alone. We keep Sage within the inner ring as much as possible.”
Sage bristled. “I can help,” she said. “With patrols. With watching the ridges. I know how to read sign.”
“You’re not trained for pack conflict,” I said. “If it comes to teeth, I need you behind us, not between.”
She folded her arms. “I’m not some porcelain doll.”
“I know,” I said. “You’re glass with a spine of steel. Doesn’t mean you belong on the front lines.”
Her eyes flashed.
“You don’t get to—”
“Enough,” Mara cut in, voice snapping like a whip. “You can fight about who stands where later. Right now, we need information.”
She looked at me.
“You felt it, didn’t you,” she said. “At the treaty stone. At the restaurant.”
“Felt what,” Sage asked.
“The pull,” Mara said. “Between you. The way the air…changed.”
My skin prickled.
“I don’t want to talk about prophecy,” I said.
“Too bad,” she said. “Because prophecy is talking about you.”
Sage’s gaze darted between us. “If someone doesn’t explain soon, I’m staging a coup.”
Mara sighed. “When Kieran was born,” she said, “my grandmother—old and half-mad and seeing too much—held him in her arms and said, ‘This line will stand or fall by the hand of a human with wolf eyes. A woman who walks the border. A bridge when the valley storms.’”
Sage swallowed. “You think that’s…me.”
“I think you’re here,” Mara said simply. “At the right time. In the right place. Doing exactly what we were told to look for. That doesn’t mean the story is written. But it means the stage is set.”
“I don’t…believe in destiny,” Sage said weakly.
“Neither do I,” I muttered.
Mara smirked. “And yet.”
“And yet,” Sage echoed.
Her eyes met mine.
For a heartbeat, everything else—the pack, the threat, the snow—fell away.
Just her.
Just me.
Just something humming under my skin that had no name in either language I spoke.
She broke the gaze first.
“I don’t know how to be…a bridge,” she said. “I don’t even know which side I’m standing on most of the time.”
“You’re not a bridge,” Rafe said. “You’re a person. If you start thinking of yourself as infrastructure, you’ll crack.”
“We put too much weight on things we call destiny,” Mara agreed. “Let the prophecy hum in the background. Focus on what’s in front of you.”
“Which is?” Sage asked.
“Hungry wolves,” Mara said. “Angry humans. Soft hearts. Hard choices.”
“So,” Sage said. “Same as every day.”
“Exactly,” Mara said, smiling.
I exhaled slowly.
“We prepare for winter,” I said. “We watch Northridge. We help Sage plant her stories. We keep the pups safe. We keep each other…from doing anything stupid.”
Rafe raised his hand. “Define stupid.”
“Anything that ends with blood on the stone,” I said.
“Damn,” he muttered. “You’re no fun.”
“You were the one who bet jam on them not coming back in one piece,” Mara reminded him.
He grinned. “And I lost. Best loss I’ve had in a while.”
Sage reached for my hand.
It was a small thing.
Quick.
But the way her fingers slipped between mine, like they belonged there, made my heart stutter.
We had a storm coming.
We had wolves at the borders.
We had humans whispering and prophecy breathing down our necks.
But we also had this.
Her.
Me.
Us.
Maybe that would be enough.
Or maybe it would be the very thing that broke us.
Either way, there was no going back now.
***
That night, sleep didn’t come easy.
My body was exhausted—from the drive, from the edge of city noise, from the constant tension of holding wolf tight under skin.
But my mind ran.
Northridge. Kurt. Ronan’s warning. Cassian’s hunger. Mara’s grandmother’s voice in memory, cracked and sure.
*She’ll have eyes like the old wolves,* she’d said, fingers tracing the air. *See too much. Break too much. Save…maybe. If the boy doesn’t break first.*
I’d been ten.
I’d thought she was talking about some legendary shifter woman. A hunter from another pack. A myth.
I hadn’t pictured a human scientist with a messy bun and a habit of talking to herself in towers.
I hadn’t pictured a woman who wrote field notes in the dirt with a stick for pups who’d never see a blackboard.
I hadn’t pictured someone who could face down Cassian with nothing but a pencil and sheer fury.
The pallet creaked beside me.
Sage rolled, mumbling.
Nightmare.
Again.
Without thinking, I slid closer, wrapped an arm around her waist, pressed my chest to her back.
Her muscles eased under my touch.
She sighed.
“Kieran,” she whispered.
“Yes,” I murmured.
“This is bad idea,” she slurred. “We’re…idiots.”
“Yes,” I agreed softly.
She made a small, breathy laugh.
“’S worth it,” she mumbled.
Heat melted something in my chest.
I rested my forehead against the back of her neck.
“Sleep,” I said.
“’Kay,” she breathed.
Her pulse slowed.
Mine didn’t.
But for the first time since we’d left the valley, the knot between my shoulders loosened.
For a few stolen hours, with snow piling outside and threats circling beyond our scent line, I let myself just…be.
Not Alpha.
Not son.
Not prophecy’s puppet.
Just a man in a bed, holding the woman who’d somehow become the fulcrum of everything.
I fell asleep like that.
And dreamed of nothing.
***