POV: Rena Vale
Fluorescent strips stutter overhead like panicked eyelids. Static needles crawl over my skin and every instinct screams run—so I do.
I burst into the academy hallway and regret it instantly.
Flicker—buzz—pop.
A row of lights hiccups. Lockers slam in a ripple like an iron heartbeat. A girl shrieks; a tower of history textbooks tumbles off a cart and explodes across the tiles. My pulse punches my ribs out of rhythm, out of control.
“Stop,” I whisper, palms clamping over my temples, as if fingers could dam moonlight. “Stop, stop, please—”
The air tastes metallic. Ozone, fear, hot dust.
The vending machine’s hum jumps into a higher pitch; coins chatter in their slots. My vision silvers at the edges. Lyria lunges up in my mind, ears flat, tail high. Ground. Knees bent. Breathe—
“I can’t,” I rasp.
The lockers on my left slam again—bang, bang, bang—like something trapped behind them wants out. Screams spike on the stairwell. Phone screens flare. Gossip outruns my heartbeat.
“Rena!” Auren’s voice cuts through the mess. He muscles past the students, eyes wild. “Hey—hey.” His hands close over my elbows, warm and familiar. “Look at me. Breathe. I’ve got you.”
“Don’t—” The word tears out of me. Not because I want him gone. Because touch feels like gasoline.
He doesn’t let go. “Rena, focus.” A hand slides toward my shoulder. “In… out… remember—”
A ceiling panel spits sparks. I flinch; the energy spikes, sharp and hot. The floor tips under me. Auren’s arms start to wrap around my shoulders—
—and a solid wall of black steps between us.
“Kai,” I choke.
“Move back,” he says to Auren, still not looking at him. His voice is low enough to sound gentle, edged enough to be law. Both his hands lift to my face, cool and steady, cupping my cheeks like he’s catching the light itself. “Rena.” My name in his mouth is a command and a safety line. “Eyes.”
Silver blur smears the world, but the shape of him stays: hard jaw, focused mouth, storm-gray eyes locked on mine.
“Focus on my voice,” he murmurs. “Only mine. Right here.”
“Students,” I gasp. “I’m scaring—”
“They’re fine,” he lies, smooth as breathing. “You’re with me. In… one, two. Out… one, two, three.”
I grab the numbers like rope. In—one, two. Out—one, two, three.
He leans in a fraction, our foreheads a breath apart but not touching, and the hallway noise thins under his counting.
“Again.”
“In…” Air drags in my chest, tasting like rain and heat and him. “Out…”
“Good,” he says softly. “Stay with me.”
Behind him, Auren’s voice frays. “Let me help.”
“You had your turn,” Kai replies, calm as a blade laid flat. “Back up.”
“I’m not leaving her,” Auren protests.
“You don’t have to leave,” I whisper, eyelids throbbing, “just… don’t touch…”
Students hover in a loose ring, phones up, fingers shaking.
“Why is the Alpha King—”
“Is she his—”
“Shut up—”
Buzz—click—fssst.
The lights above finally steady, flickering once in protest before holding. The lockers go still. The vending machine spits out a single bottle of water with a guilty thunk. Someone sobs behind their hands; someone laughs too loudly and chokes it down.
“Again,” Kai says, still holding my gaze. “In. One, two…”
I pull breath through gritted teeth. Eyes burn. “Out. One, two, three…”
“Good.” His thumbs don’t stroke, but his fingers are warm and grounding. “That’s your line. Stay on it.”
“I’m trying.”
“I know.”
Inside, the glow coils and resists, then unknots a little each time he speaks. Lyria eases, hackles half-lowered. Hold. Don’t reach. Let him hold.
“Rena.” Auren again, closer, pleading. “Please, look at me.”
“Not now,” Kai answers, still not looking away from me. It isn’t cruel; it’s clinical. “She’s stabilizing.”
“I know how to help her,” Auren insists.
“I know how to keep the ceiling on,” Kai says evenly. “Space.”
“Stop fighting,” I whisper, because even the idea of them clashing makes the static in my bones spike. “Please.”
They both go quiet in different ways.
My vision clears by degrees. The silver haze pulls back. My breath evens. My knees remember how to lock without shaking. Lyria stretches in my mind, no longer pressed flat. Better. Hold.
“I hate this,” I manage.
“I know.” His voice is closer than it should be, and that helps more than it should. “It’ll be less awful next time if we learn the edges now.”
“Promise,” I say, because I need someone to.
“I don’t break mine,” he answers simply.
The hallway slowly reassembles itself: a teacher snapping, “Phones away,” nobody listening; the smell of burnt dust; the echo of lockers that didn’t quite slam. Shame rises, hot and sharp.
“Can you stand without me,” Kai asks quietly, “or do you need another minute?”
He’s not testing me. He’s giving me a choice. Tears prick stupidly at my eyes from that alone. “Another minute,” I whisper.
“Take two.”
“I shouldn’t need you like this,” I say, hating how small it sounds.
“You need a tether while your power remembers who it belongs to.” His mouth tightens. “I’m available.”
“That’s not helping me depend less,” I mutter.
“It’s helping you not explode in a hallway.”
“Fair point.”
Auren’s face is a mess of hurt and pride. “Rena,” he says, softer now. “I’m here.”
“I know.” I don’t look at him. The fragile calm feels like glass; one more emotion might break it.
“Everyone, back to class,” Kai says, finally addressing the semicircle around us. He doesn’t raise his voice.
“But—”
“Now,” he adds, and the word moves them.
Students peel off in clumps. A teacher hesitates; Kai tips his head once, and she remembers a stack of papers somewhere else. The hallway exhales.
His palms loosen on my cheeks, hover instead of holding. Cool air brushes skin that already misses his warmth.
“Better?” he asks.
“Manageable.” I sag back against a locker. It doesn’t slam. Small victory. “I didn’t mean to scare them.”
“They’ll live,” he says. “So will you.”
“Not if this keeps happening every time I walk into a crowd.” My voice shakes. “What triggered it?”
His gaze flicks down, then back up. “Proximity.”
“To you?” It slips out.
A muscle jumps in his jaw. He doesn’t insult me with a lie. “To a lot of things,” he says carefully. “But yes. Me too.”
“That’s… complicated,” I say.
“We’ll adapt,” he replies.
Auren drags a hand through his hair. “Everyone’s going to talk,” he mutters. “They already are.”
“They were always going to,” I say, tired.
“They’ll say he—” His throat works as he glances at Kai. “—has something to do with you.”
“They can say what they like,” Kai answers. “They don’t get to touch it.”
Something in my chest unclenches at that. The glow inside quiets to an ember. Lyria’s ears prick. You held. You didn’t break. Good.
“Thank you,” I tell him, under my breath, for the counting, for the lies, for staying.
His eyes catch mine and hold. “You’re welcome.”
“You can go,” Auren says suddenly, defensiveness snapping back into place. “She’s okay.”
“I’ll let her decide that,” Kai replies. Then, to me: “Are you okay enough for now?”
“Enough,” I say. “For a hallway.”
His mouth almost curves. “Then I’ll leave you some quiet.”
He starts to pull away. Panic flickers; I hear myself say, “Wait.”
He pauses, eyes dropping to my mouth, then returning to my eyes. “Yes?”
“What if it happens again in five minutes?” I ask. “What if I can’t stop it?”
“You will,” he says. “And if you can’t, I’m a call away.”
“You put your number in my phone,” I say, almost smiling.
“I did.”
“That’s bossy.”
“That’s careful.”
“Okay,” I whisper.
He leans in just enough that his breath warms the shell of my ear, his voice a private current under the buzz of broken fluorescent lights.
“Your wolf is syncing to mine.”