I didn't respond.

She leaned in even closer to him, her arm grazing his as if it were the most natural thing in the world, then slid a glance sideways at me, subtle, almost playful.

"Salveth," she said lightly, "aren't you going to introduce her? She's…"

Salveth's expression stiffened instantly.

It was clear he hadn't expected this.

His eyes flickered toward me, a brief flash of unease, almost panic, before he forced himself back into stillness. Beneath the surface I caught the faint hitch in his scent, obsidian and cold ash gone sharp for half a breath. The lighter went still in his hand.

For a second, I almost laughed.

"Selene Ashford," I said before he could speak, my tone calm and even. "I serve in Alpha Bloodmoor's outer den. The trading-post was full, so we're only sharing a table."

His head snapped toward me.

That flicker of panic vanished as quickly as it had come, replaced by visible relief. He let out a breath, then nodded fast. The lighter resumed its slow rotation.

"Yeah, that's right," he said. "This is Selene. One of my pack's own."

Aurelia smiled slowly.

The kind of smile a wolf gives when it already has its quarry pinned beneath its paw.

"Then Selene must be very capable," she said, tilting her head slightly. "I've never seen Salveth sit at the same table with any she-wolf besides me."

Her tone was light, but every word carried weight.

Then she set her crystal communicator casually beside her wine glass, nudging it forward just enough to be seen. It looked accidental.

It wasn't.

I caught a glimpse of the surface.

Her image-glyph.

It matched Salveth's.

A bonded-pair portrait.

Even their colors today were coordinated. The same tones, the same palette, down to the smallest detail, the matching bands at their wrists. Everything deliberate, curated, costly. The kind of paired presentation that in this world meant more than affection. It meant claim. It meant territory.

Under the warm light of the trading-post, they looked perfect.

Like a portrait of an Alpha and his Luna.

I lowered my gaze, set my chopsticks down carefully, and stood.

I didn't want to stay.

Before I could take a step, Aurelia reached out and seized my wrist.

Her fingers were slender, her nails long and perfectly tended.

They dug into my skin just enough to hurt, just enough to leave a mark, but hidden from Salveth's line of sight. Jasmine and cold copper drifted off her, sweet on the surface, wrong underneath.

"Selene," she said softly, her voice laced with feigned concern, "leaving already? Did I say something wrong?"

Her eyes shimmered, almost as if she were genuinely sorry.

"Let me apologize, all right?"

I didn't have the patience for this.

Didn't have the energy to play along with someone wearing sweetness like a borrowed pelt.

I pulled my hand back sharply, breaking free of her grip. Low in my chest, my wolf bristled, a growl held just behind my teeth.

As I lowered my eyes to check my wrist, I saw it: thin red marks where her nails had dug in, one of them already beading with blood.

Before I could even process it, everything happened in an instant.

Aurelia suddenly lifted her own hand and swung it outward.

A loud smack rang through the trading-post.

A little pup standing nearby was struck across the face.

His cry broke out at once, sharp and piercing as he clutched his cheek, tears spilling as he sobbed without control. Two fingers hooked into the hem of his tunic, twisting the cloth tight, and he couldn't look up.

The whole room went still for a split second. The low music between songs. The clink of silver stopping at three separate tables. The kind of hush that in any pack-held den meant someone of standing was watching.

Aurelia's expression changed just as fast.

Her face turned pale, her eyes widening in exaggerated shock.

"Oh no!" she gasped, covering her mouth. "I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to! Sweetheart, are you all right?"

Salveth was already on his feet.

He crossed the room, apologizing again and again to the pup's parents, his voice urgent and sincere. Without hesitation he drew his communicator and sent a transfer of moon-credits, smoothing it over as quickly as he could. The Alpha tending to the lesser-ranked. Keeping the peace in a public den where the Bloodmoor name hung over every dealing like smoke that wouldn't clear.

Then the little pup suddenly pointed straight at me.

"It was her!" he cried between sobs. "She grabbed that lady's hand and made her hit me! She should say sorry!"

Every gaze in the trading-post shifted.

All at once.

Aurelia turned to me slowly, her eyes filling with hurt, her face trembling just enough to look real. Her fingers drifted to the pale stone at her throat again, holding it like a she-wolf afraid she'd be struck next.

"Selene…" she said softly, her voice fragile, "I don't know what I did to upset you."

She lowered her gaze slightly, as if holding back tears.

"If you have a quarrel with me, please… take it out on me. Don't drag innocent ones into it…"

Whispers began to spread.

Low voices. Judging. Speculating.

I could feel it.

The weight of every stare pressing against my back. In a place like this, where half the room owed something to the Bloodmoor name, the pack's opinion wasn't just opinion. It was verdict.

Salveth turned toward me, his expression darkening instantly. The air around him thickened, his Alpha aura pressing down cold across the table, and somewhere beneath my skin my own wolf flattened low under the force of it.

"What are you standing there for?" he snapped, his voice sharp and cold. "Apologize. Now."

His tone left no room for argument.

"Stop making a scene."

Like I was the problem.

Like I was the one who had shamed him.

Like I was the one who didn't belong.

Backed by the murmured encouragement of the grown wolves crowded around him, the little pup broke free from his parents' hold and rushed toward me. Before I could react, he grabbed my hand and sank his teeth into it. Hard. The pain shot through me instantly, sharp and raw, and he didn't let go. Even his small jaw carried the early strength of a born wolf, and somewhere beneath my skin my own wolf flinched, going low and quiet, refusing to answer a pup.

"Hey—" someone gasped, but no one stepped in.

The more gently Aurelia crouched beside him, coaxing him in a soft, soothing voice, the deeper his teeth seemed to press into my skin, as if her words only fueled his stubbornness. Her scent of jasmine and cold copper drifted sweet over the table, and her tone was all concern, all patience, the picture of kindness.

"Sweetheart, let go… okay? You're scaring me," she murmured, reaching out but never quite pulling him away.

I stood there, frozen.

I couldn't exactly push a pup off me. Couldn't raise my voice. Couldn't bare my teeth without looking like the villain they already believed I was.

So I swallowed everything.

Swallowed the pain. Swallowed the humiliation.

"I'm sorry," I said quietly, forcing the words out as evenly as I could. "I'm sorry, okay?"

The pup finally loosened his grip, stepping back, still sniffling. My hand throbbed where his teeth had broken the skin, a dull, pulsing ache that quickly turned wet. The scent of my own blood rose between us, and I forced my wolf still.

But Salveth wasn't satisfied.

He didn't notice the blood slowly seeping from the bite mark. Didn't notice the way my fingers trembled slightly from the pain. Didn't even glance at me properly.

All he cared about was salvaging someone else's dignity.

He reached out and grabbed my arm just as I turned to leave. His grip carried the weight of an Alpha's aura, and the air around us thickened, pressing down until even the wolves at the next table dropped their gazes.

"Selene," he said sharply, his grip tightening. "Apologize. To Aurelia."

Aurelia immediately put on that same gentle, self-effacing expression, tugging lightly at his sleeve as if trying to stop him. One finger drifted to the moonstone at her throat and touched it, barely, the way someone checks a pin before walking into a room full of watching eyes.

"Salveth, it's fine," she said softly. "Really, it's not a big deal. I'm okay." She paused, lowering her gaze with perfect timing. "It's just the little one… he got hurt, and he's probably scared."

Her words were modest.

Her tone was forgiving.

And yet, they only made everything worse.

Salveth's attention shifted instantly.

His eyes dropped to the back of her hand, where a faint red mark had formed, barely noticeable, nothing compared to the blood on mine.

But to him, it was everything.

Something in his expression softened, almost pained.

Then, just as quickly, it hardened again as he turned back to me.

Before I could react, he grabbed my injured hand and shoved it straight into the bowl of scalding broth that had just been set on the table.

The heat hit me instantly.

The broth wasn't quite boiling, but it was scalding enough. The liquid soaked into the fresh bite wound, salt and heat combining into a sharp, searing pain that shot up my arm like an electric current.

My entire body jerked.

A gasp tore out of me before I could stop it. Deep inside, my wolf threw herself against the cage of my ribs with a sound I had never heard her make, a high, broken keening that had no name.

The pain was unbearable.

It spread, burned, throbbed, every nerve screaming at once. My fingers curled involuntarily, trembling as I tried to pull back, but his grip held me in place for a second longer. An Alpha's grip. The kind that didn't negotiate.

"Selene, what is wrong with you?" Salveth hissed, his voice low but cutting. "You need to be taught a lesson."

My vision blurred slightly from the pain.

Still, I looked up at him.

"Is that who I am to you?" I asked quietly, my teeth clenched so tightly they ached.

I already knew the answer.

But I still asked.

Maybe some part of me hadn't fully given up yet.

Around us, the whispers grew louder. The other wolves at the pack trading-post weren't even pretending to look away anymore.

"Wait… so which one is his actual mate?"

"Are you blind? Obviously the one he's protecting."

"Yeah, look at them. Matching scents, paired marks on their crystals… it's obvious."

Their voices weren't even hushed anymore.

Their gazes shifted toward me, heavy with something worse than judgment.

Pity.

"Hey, enough is enough," a wolf at a nearby table muttered. "Another few seconds and you're going to boil her hand off."

Only then did Salveth hesitate.

I stood there, my lips pale, my body still trembling slightly from the pain, and yet, somehow, I was smiling.

A faint, fragile smile.

I looked straight at him.

And for the first time, something flickered in his eyes.

Unease.

Just for a moment.

Then he let go.

He released my hand as if nothing had happened, reached for Aurelia instead, and took her by the arm.

"Let's go," he said quietly.

And just like that, he walked away with her, her jasmine scent trailing after them while the bitter clove of his own faded toward the door.

Didn't look back.

Didn't say another word.

When I got home, the den felt colder than usual. The hall was dark, the inner latch still drawn the way he always left it, as though guarding the threshold mattered more than the wolf locked within. His obsidian-and-ash scent clung faintly to the walls, stale now, like something already gone.

A notification glowed on my crystal communicator.

He had sent a vial of burn salve to me through a courier-wolf.

I stared at it for a long moment before opening the message that came with it.

[Selene, please stop being so sensitive and antagonizing Aurelia. The two of you are going to be sharing the same den for a long while. I expect you to get along from now on.]

I let out a quiet breath.

So that was it.

That was his solution.

A jar of burn salve in exchange for silence.

For obedience.

For pretending nothing had happened.

For accepting that he would keep both of us in his life, as if we were things an Alpha could arrange however he pleased.

I didn't reply.

I worked the salve into the burn in silence, the cool sting biting at the raw skin, then lay down on the bed. Through the wall I could hear the faint hum of the den-wards cycling through their nightly watch, the low pulse that warded Bloodmoor against intruders. The whole place had been built for the Alpha's safety. Not mine. My wolf lay flat somewhere beneath my ribs, too quiet, the way a beaten thing goes quiet.

He didn't come home that night.

The next morning, the moment I stepped into the front of the Bloodmoor trading-post, I could feel it.

The change.

Eyes followed me everywhere I went. Conversations cut off the second I drew near, only to resume in hushed whispers the moment I passed. The serving-Omegas. The floor runners. Even the old wolf behind the bar who always rumbled a low good-morning wouldn't lift his gaze to mine. Their scents had soured with something close to contempt, and I caught it on every breath.

It felt like walking into a den that had been violently overturned.

As I sat down at my station, Giselle leaned over almost at once, her ledger-scroll curling between her fingers as she twisted it tight. Chamomile and warm cedar shavings, threaded with something anxious.

"Selene… they're saying you tried to take the Alpha for yourself," she whispered. "That his woman caught you at it. It's spreading through every sending-stone thread in the pack."

She slid her communicator-crystal toward me.

An image was moving across its surface.

The feast-hall scene from the night before.

Someone had caught all of it in a crystal orb.

At some point during the chaos, a new mind-link channel had been opened for nothing but this. Message after message scrolled past, speculation, accusation, mockery. The whispers off the floor made permanent, captured and passed wolf to wolf.

They painted me as a concealed Omega who'd tried to scent her way into the bloodline's favor and been dragged into the light for it.

I stared at the crystal, my expression calm, even as something inside me went completely still.

Before I could turn it over further, the front doors swung open.

Salveth walked in.

With Aurelia right at his side.

His scent reached me first, obsidian and cold ash, dried clove, old leather gone bitter, and beneath it the jasmine-and-copper note of her, the two woven so close they were nearly one. The silver lighter rolled across his knuckles in that slow, idle rhythm, catching the high lamps once, twice.

"Pack," he said, his voice clear and carrying the weight of an Alpha's command, "this is your new overseer of the front den. Aurelia."

So that was what he had meant.

When he said we would be sharing the same den for a long while.

He hadn't been exaggerating.

He had brought her straight into the heart of the pack's front operation.

As my superior.

The room fell silent.

Every pair of eyes turned toward me. The air thickened, the faint press of an Alpha's aura settling over the floor, and on instinct half the wolves there dropped their gazes.

For the past several moons, ever since the old overseer broke ties and vanished into the northern ranges, I had carried most of the work alone. Everyone had assumed the rank would pass to me.

It had seemed obvious.

Until now.

Salveth added Aurelia to the inner mind-link thread right there in front of everyone. Almost at once, the two of them sent into it.

Their marks appeared side by side in the thread.

Matching.

A bonded-pair image.

Smiling.

Perfect.

The meaning couldn't have been plainer.

The rest of the morning passed in a haze of whispers and sidelong glances. No one was truly working. Everyone was watching.

Talking.

Judging.

But I no longer cared.

I was leaving.

Before midday, I drafted my letter severing ties from the pack and sent it through the proper channels.

With nothing left holding me to this place, I rose and walked to the back room.

I needed something warm. Something simple.

I steeped myself a cup of honeyed grapefruit tea and watched the steam climb slow off the surface, the scent soft and quieting. Sweet. Light. Nothing like the bitterness I had just walked out of.

I had barely taken two sips when the door opened again.

Aurelia walked in like she held the deed to every stone of it.

Confident. Unhurried. Her jasmine and cold copper filled the small room until it crowded out my own scent entirely.

She fixed herself a cup, then crossed to me and settled into the seat at my side, folding one leg over the other with the ease of a wolf taking a throne that had always been hers.

Her presence pressed against the walls.

When she spoke, her voice was smooth and sweet, but underneath it ran something with an edge.

"Selene," she said, her lips curving faintly, "I know you've been Salveth's little secret for five years. His unclaimed Omega, hidden away where no one could scent you."

She tilted her head, studying me.

"But I'm his Luna now. In the open, before the whole pack."

A pause.

"I'm back," she went on softly, "and it's time the concealed one learned when to slip away."

Her smile didn't waver.

"As long as you keep your mouth shut, the way you always have," she added lightly, "I won't make this any harder for you."

The threat was gentle.

Courteous.

And unmistakable.

As she spoke, Aurelia drew out her communicator-crystal and tapped a stored voice-message, holding it just close enough for my ears to catch.

The recording played.

It was the little pup from the day before.

His voice came through bright, sweet in that practiced, childish way, but there was something smug beneath it, something that had no business living inside innocence at all.

"Auntie Aurelia, wasn't I clever? Don't forget the carved storm-hawk you promised me!"

The message ended on a soft click.

And just like that, everything fell into place.

Every detail. Every movement. Every perfectly timed cry from the night before.

It hadn't been an accident.

None of it had.