The clearing was quiet—too quiet.
Wolves from Moonveil and Silverstone stood shoulder to shoulder, their heads bowed, silence stretching long and heavy beneath the moonlight. The only sound was the wind brushing through the trees like a ghost.
I stood at the edge of it all, apart from them. My presence didn’t belong here—and I knew it. But I came anyway.
I saw her immediately.
Felicia.
She stood at the center, her black dress catching the wind like it was part of the night itself. Her back was straight, her shoulders rigid, but her hands trembled slightly as she clutched a white lily. It was for him. The final gift to a brother she’d lost too soon.
Her sons stood on either side of her—Danny and Max—clinging to her dress. Their young faces were marred with confusion, eyes flicking around uncertainly. They didn’t understand it all. But they knew one thing for sure.
Uncle Orion wasn’t coming back.
Lucien stood a few paces behind them. Ever the sentinel. His presence made something curl tight in my gut. He looked like he belonged there. Protective. Steady. The role I should’ve had, once.
As the warriors began to lower Orion’s body into the earth, I watched Felicia clench her fists, her knuckles white with the effort to stay composed. She was trying to be strong. For her pack. For the boys. For herself.
Then her head snapped up.
She’d caught my scent.
Her body stiffened like a drawn bow. When she turned, her eyes locked on me with nothing but fury.
I braced myself as she moved—storming through the crowd like a blade cutting through silk. Whispers rose in her wake, but she didn’t care. Neither did I.
She stopped just feet away, and for a moment, her anger scorched the air between us.
“What the hell are you doing here?” she hissed. Her voice was low, lethal. “We don’t need you.”
I exhaled slowly, keeping my voice calm, though my throat felt tight. “I came to pay my respects.”
Her laugh was bitter and sharp. “Respects?” she echoed. “Do you think I don’t know, Damien? Do you think I didn’t see what was carved into my brother’s body?”
The accusation hit me like a blow. My posture shifted instinctively, shoulders rising, chest tightening. I wanted to scream that I had no part in it, but I forced the words out with restraint.
“Felicia, I had nothing to do with the attack.”
“Then why,” she snapped, stepping closer, her fury burning bright, “was your pack’s name carved into his skin like a damn brand?”
“I don’t know.” My voice roughened with frustration. “But I will find out who did it.”
She shook her head, as if my promises meant nothing. “I don’t trust you.”
Her words struck harder than she realized.
“Orion is dead because of you,” she said. “Even if you didn’t send the blade, your name was the last thing he carried.”
I opened my mouth—then closed it. What could I say? I couldn’t erase the mark. Couldn’t rewrite what was done.
She turned away, back toward the grave. I hated the way she looked—so broken, so raw. I hated even more that I wasn’t allowed to reach her. Not anymore.
But then I said the thing I hadn’t meant to. The thing that had been clawing at my insides since I first saw Lucien standing behind her.
“What are you and Lucien?”
She spun around so fast it was like I’d slapped her. “Excuse me?”
I didn’t back down. “You’re in his pack. He’s protecting you. Protecting them. What is he to you?”
Her eyes narrowed into slits. “Lucien is my protector. That’s all. He gave me and the boys a safe place when no one else would. That’s all you need to know.”
“You’d be safer in my pack,” I said before I could stop myself.
She scoffed, incredulous. “Safer?” Her voice cracked, bitter with resentment. “With you?”
She took a step closer, fire in her eyes now. “You replaced me, Damien. Do you remember that? You let me walk away and didn’t lift a finger. You let her stay. And now, now, you want to act like I belong to you again?”
“That’s not fair,” I muttered, jaw clenched, guilt punching through me.
“Not fair?” she echoed, her voice rising again. “You chose someone else. And now that I’ve found a place where I’m not treated like a second thought, you suddenly care?”
I ran a hand through my hair, trying to breathe, trying to form words that could make any of it make sense. “I never stopped caring.”
She stilled. Her expression didn’t change, but something in the air between us shifted. A tiny breath, a flinch she wouldn’t let me see.
Then she pulled herself back together, cold as steel. “Then you should’ve acted like it.