POV: Soraya
I wake in softness. That’s my first thought.
Not stone. Not sand. Not straw that smells of mold and regret. Something cool and clean cradles my body—a real mattress, firm under my back, layered with blankets light as air. For a second, I lie perfectly still, afraid that if I move I’ll feel chains.
I don’t. Instead, I hear water.
A quiet trickle, somewhere nearby. A fountain, not a leak. The air holds the faint scent of crushed mint and desert lilies, tempered by something sharper—herbs and salves.
I open my eyes.
The ceiling above me is high, arched, painted with stylized wolves running through starfields of gold. Sunlight filters through carved stone screens, casting patterned light across the walls. Shelves line one side of the room, cluttered with jars and bandages, bowls and pestles.
A healing chamber.
I’m alive!
I turn my head.
A woman sits on a low stool beside my bed, sharpening a dagger with slow, unhurried strokes. She has warm brown skin, curly hair pulled back in a loose knot, and eyes that flick up to me the moment I move.
“Finally,” she says, sliding the dagger into a wrist sheath. “I was starting to think Raevan dragged home a corpse.”
Her tone is dry, but not unkind.
I push myself up on my elbows. My limbs protest, but they work. A light linen shift replaces my torn dress, clean and soft against my skin. My hair has been braided loosely to the side.
“Where—” My voice comes out croaky. I clear my throat. “Where am I?”
“Ashra fortress,” she replies. “South wing healing hall.”
So not a palace exactly, but close enough.
“And you are?” I ask.
She gives a small, almost theatrical bow from her seat. “Vienne. Sometimes I carry trays, sometimes I carry blades. It depends who’s asking.”
“Vienne.” The name is a relief and a weight at once. One of the names Raevan had mentioned in his fragmented warnings. Part of his world. Part of the life I’ve stumbled into.
“I’m Soraya,” I say, then realize how pointless that is. “But you already know that.”
“Hard not to when the king brings you in himself,” she says.
My heart stutters. “King,” I echo faintly.
She quirks a brow. “What, he didn’t mention that while you were fleeing for your lives together?”
“Not in those exact words,” I mutter.
Images flash—sandstorm, rogues, my hands glowing over his wound. The dungeon. His mouth on mine. My cheeks heat.
Vienne’s gaze sharpens, as if she can see every thought parading across my face. She doesn’t comment—yet.
Footsteps approach from the hall.
Vienne rises smoothly, moving to stand a little behind the head of the bed—not deferentially, more like someone positioning herself between me and the door if needed.
The door opens. Three people enter.
I recognize Raevan first, of course. It’s hard not to. Even in a plain dark tunic and wrapped ribs, he commands the space. His hair has been washed; the wild tangle is now just barely respectable. The collar is still at his throat, but his posture makes it look like a choice rather than a shackle.
Beside him walks the man from the border—Kaide, now in full ash-gray armor, helmet tucked under one arm. His expression is alert, eyes constantly scanning.
The third is a woman.
She glides into the room like she owns it. Maybe she does.
Tall, poised, with skin like pale bronze and hair as black as obsidian braided back into an intricate crown, she wears a dress of deep crimson that clings in all the right places and spills like liquid fire around her feet. Fine gold chains drape her shoulders. A wolf sigil gleams at her collarbone, smaller than Raevan’s, but unmistakable.
Her eyes land on me.
I feel the temperature in the room drop.
“Soraya,” Raevan says, stepping closer. There’s something careful in his voice I haven’t heard before, like he’s weighing every word. “Good. You’re awake.”
My mouth is dry again, for entirely different reasons. “Apparently.”
“How do you feel?” Kaide asks, blunt and practical. “Dizzy? Sick? Anything broken we missed?”
“Like I got trampled by a caravan,” I say. “But I’ve had worse days.”
Vienne snorts softly behind me.
Raevan’s lips twitch. “In your defense, the last two days would break most seasoned warriors.”
“Flattering,” I say. “But I’m still trying to decide if I’m actually safe now or just in a bigger, fancier cage.”
A muscle in his jaw jumps.
“You’re in Ashra,” he says. “As long as you’re under my protection, no one shackles you. No pits. No arenas. No being traded as a prize.”
His gaze flicks briefly to the woman in red, then back to me.
“This is Azhara,” he adds. “Daughter of House Dareth.”
Azhara tilts her head, studying me the way someone might study a stain on a rug. Her beauty is undeniable, but there’s steel under it.
“So this is the Saren defect,” she says, tone smooth and cool. “The Zehrael girl causing so much noise at our borders.”
Rage pricks under my skin. “My name is Soraya.”
“Right,” she replies. “Soraya of nowhere.”
Kaide clears his throat, stepping in as if he’s had to mediate this sort of thing before. “We’re still gathering information,” he says. “But from what Raevan told us and what our scouts confirm, Kharad had you chained up in his dungeon. Saren has disowned you. That makes you—”
“Homeless,” I finish.
“Dangerous,” Vienne corrects quietly from behind me. “In the right—or wrong—hands.”
“Which is why,” Raevan says, his tone shifting to command, “she stays here. Under my protection. Under watch, yes, but not as a prisoner. As a guest of Ashra.”
Azhara’s head snaps toward him. “A guest?”
“Yes.”
“In your fortress.” Her brow arches. “In our home. A Zehrael unknown from a rival province with a bloodline no one can explain, brought here by you personally—”
“Azhara,” he warns.
She ignores the warning.
“—and you expect me to simply accept that she will… stay,” she continues, voice turning colder, “under your protection?”
Her gaze slides back to me, icy and assessing.
“What exactly is she to you, Raevan?” she asks. “Prisoner? Asset? Pet?”
My cheeks flare.
Raevan doesn’t flinch. “She’s under my protection,” he repeats, each word clipped. “That’s all anyone needs to know.”
“Is it?” she murmurs.
Kaide exhales softly through his nose. “For now, yes. Council will scream either way, but they scream about everything.”
“Enough,” Raevan says, voice dropping in temperature. It’s not loud.
Everyone still stops.
“Azhara,” he continues, facing her fully now. “You have every right to hate what Zehrael did to your House generations ago. You have every right to question any stranger I bring through our gates. You do not have the right to threaten someone under my protection. Not here. Not like this.”
Silence stretches. For a heartbeat, I think she’ll push back. Then she smiles. It’s not warm.
“As you wish, my king,” she says. “If you say the girl stays, she stays. Under watch. Under scrutiny. Under every eye I can turn on her.”
She glances at me one last time, the message clear: this isn’t over.
Then she turns and sweeps from the room, skirts whispering against the stone.
The space feels less sharp once she’s gone.
Kaide rubs a hand over his face. “You like making my job difficult, don’t you,” he mutters to Raevan.
“Always have,” Vienne says. “Always will.”
Raevan doesn’t respond to either of them. His attention is back on me.
Kaide nods once. “We’ll assign you guards,” he says. “Not to spy. To keep idiots from trying anything stupid. Word will spread fast that you’re under Raevan’s protection, but some people like to test the limits of their king’s patience.”
“And mine,” Vienne adds.
I exhale slowly.
My life is ash and unfamiliar ceilings. My wolf doesn’t know if she wants to curl up or bare her teeth. The man who caught me when I fell is a king with a fiancée who would gladly see me gone.
But I’m not in a dungeon.
I’m not on a dune with my mother’s blood soaking my dress.
I’m not alone. Either way, it’s the only ground I have. So I stand on it.