The smoke woke me.

Not the heat. Not the sound. The smoke—thick, acrid, crawling under the basement door like something alive.

I jerked upright. My shoulder screamed where the rogue's claws had torn through. The silver cuffs still burned my wrists. But none of that mattered.

Fire.

I scrambled to the door and pressed my hand against it. Hot. Not burning yet, but close.

"Help!" I shouted. My voice was raw from earlier. "Someone—there's a fire!"

No answer.

I slammed my fists against the wood. Pain shot through my bound wrists. The silver seared deeper.

"Please!" I screamed. "I'm locked in—please!"

Silence. Just the crackle of flames somewhere above, growing louder.

My wolf surged forward. Not gently. Not carefully. She threw herself against the cage of my ribs and *howled*.

I felt her strength flood my limbs—wild, desperate, furious.

I stepped back. Braced. Kicked.

The door shuddered but held.

I kicked again. The wood splintered near the lock.

Again.

The bolt tore free. The door flew open.

Smoke poured in. I choked, covered my mouth with my bound hands, and ran.

The basement hallway was already hazy. Orange light flickered from the stairwell. I took the steps two at a time, lungs burning, eyes streaming.

The first floor was chaos. Flames crawled up the walls. Timber groaned overhead. Somewhere, glass shattered.

I didn't stop.

I hit the main staircase and climbed. The second floor—that's where the private rooms were. That's where people would be trapped.

That's where Holden was.

I felt him through the bond. Faint. Muted. But there.

*Holden!*

I screamed it through the bond with everything I had. My wolf threw her voice behind mine, primal and raw.

*Holden, I'm here—please—*

The bond flared. Just once. A pulse of acknowledgment.

He heard me.

Relief crashed through me so hard I stumbled. He heard me. He was coming.

I pushed forward, coughing, half-blind. The hallway split ahead—left toward the guest wing, right toward the main suites.

I went left. Toward where I felt him.

"Holden!" I choked out loud this time. "Holden, where are you?"

Footsteps. Running. Coming closer.

I stopped, pressed against the wall, trying to see through the smoke.

A figure appeared at the far end of the hall.

Holden.

I nearly sobbed.

He stood there, chest heaving, grey eyes cutting through the haze. For one heartbeat, we just stared at each other.

Then he turned right.

Away from me.

"Holden—" My voice cracked. "Holden, wait—"

I stumbled after him. The smoke was thicker here. The heat unbearable. I saw him stop at the entrance to the main suite hallway.

London sat on the floor, one leg stretched out in front of her. Her face was pale, composed. She looked up at Holden with wide, frightened eyes.

"My ankle," she said softly. "I can't walk."

Holden didn't hesitate.

He bent down. Slid one arm under her knees, the other around her back. Lifted her like she weighed nothing.

London's arms came up around his neck.

I stood there, frozen, watching.

*Holden.*

I didn't scream it this time. I whispered it through the bond. Quiet. Broken.

*Please.*

He didn't look back.

He carried her toward the main staircase. Away from me. Away from the flames that were closing in on both sides.

I tried to follow. The ceiling groaned. Something cracked overhead—loud, final.

I looked up just as a beam gave way.

I threw myself backward. The beam crashed down where I'd been standing, sending sparks and burning wood across the floor. The hallway was blocked.

No way forward. No way back.

I turned and ran the other direction. My lungs screamed. My vision blurred. The smoke was so thick now I couldn't see more than a few feet ahead.

I hit a door. Locked. I kicked it open.

A bedroom. Flames already climbing the curtains. But there—a balcony.

I stumbled toward it, shoved the glass door open, and fell onto the stone balcony. Cold air hit my face. I gasped, coughed, tried to breathe.

The balcony overlooked the front courtyard. Two stories down. Stone.

I looked back. The bedroom was an inferno now. Flames licked through the doorway I'd just come through. The hall beyond was collapsing.

No other way out.

I gripped the balcony railing. Looked down. The courtyard swam in my vision.

Two stories. Stone. I'd break something. Maybe everything.

But I'd be alive.

I climbed onto the railing. My bound hands made it clumsy. The silver burned. My injured shoulder shook.

I looked toward the front entrance.

Holden emerged, carrying London. He set her down gently on the grass, away from the building. She clung to him. He knelt beside her, checking her ankle, his hand on her shoulder.

Neither of them looked up.

I opened my mouth to scream his name. To beg him to look. To see me.

The balcony lurched.

I lost my grip.

I fell.

The world tilted. The stone courtyard rushed up. I tried to twist, to land on my side, to do something—

I hit the ground.

Pain exploded everywhere. White. Blinding. My head cracked against stone. My ribs—something snapped. I couldn't breathe. Couldn't move. Couldn't think.

I lay there, staring up at the smoke-filled sky.

Footsteps. Voices. Shouting.

I turned my head—slow, agonizing.

Holden stood at the front entrance, London still in his arms. He was looking at the building. At the flames. At the pack members rushing out.

Not at me.

London's head rested against his chest. Her arms around his neck.

They walked away. Into the cold night air. Into safety.

My vision blurred. Darkness crept in from the edges.

The last thing I saw was them disappearing into the crowd.

Together.

And then there was nothing.

I woke up in pieces.

That's the only way I can describe it. My body was there—I could feel the cold concrete under my back, the ache in my ribs where they'd broken, the throb in my skull—but I wasn't whole. Something was missing. Something vital.

I tried to move. Pain shot through my shoulder. The one the rogue had torn open. Or maybe it was from the fall. I couldn't remember anymore.

Footsteps echoed somewhere above me. Metal scraped. A door opened.

Light flooded in—harsh, fluorescent, blinding after the dark. I turned my face away and squeezed my eyes shut.

"Up," a voice said. Male. Flat. Bored.

Hands grabbed my arms and hauled me to my feet. My legs buckled. They didn't care. They dragged me down a hallway that smelled like disinfectant and something underneath it—something rotting.

I tried to speak. My throat was raw. Nothing came out but a croak.

They threw me into a chair. Metal. Cold. My wrists were strapped down. Silver cuffs again. The burn was familiar now. Almost comforting in its consistency.

A man stepped into view. Older. Grey hair. White coat. He looked at me the way you'd look at a specimen under glass.

"Ariella Morgan," he said. Not a question. A confirmation.

I stared at him.

He pulled a syringe from a metal tray. The liquid inside was dark. Almost black.

"This is going to hurt," he said. Still in that same flat tone. Like he was telling me the weather.

The needle went into my arm.

Fire.

That's what it felt like. Not the fire from the pack house—that had been heat and smoke and chaos. This was different. This burned from the inside out. Like my veins were filled with acid.

I screamed.

No one stopped him.

He pulled the needle out. Capped it. Set it back on the tray with careful precision.

"Wolfsbane," he said. "Concentrated. You'll receive a dose every morning. By the end of the month, your wolf will be silent. By the end of two months, she'll be gone."

I tried to reach for her. My wolf. The part of me that had always been there, always answering, always fierce.

She was there. Faint. Whimpering.

But she was there.

"Please," I whispered. "Please don't—"

"Take her back," the man said.

They dragged me to a cell. Smaller than the last one. No window. No light except what bled under the door.

They locked me in.

I curled up on the floor and pressed my hands to my chest, trying to feel her. Trying to hold on.

She whimpered again. Softer this time.

I closed my eyes and tried not to cry.

---

Time stopped meaning anything.

They came for me every morning. Same man. Same syringe. Same fire in my veins.

I stopped screaming after the first week. It didn't help. It just made my throat hurt.

My wolf grew quieter.

At first, she fought. She snarled and clawed and threw herself against the walls of my mind, trying to break free, trying to shift, trying to do *something*.

But the wolfsbane was stronger.

By the second week, she barely stirred.

By the third, I had to strain to feel her at all.

I started forgetting things.

Small things at first. What day it was. What I'd eaten last. Whether I'd slept or just passed out.

Then bigger things.

The name of the town I grew up in. The color of Mckenzie's eyes. The exact way Holden's voice sounded when he said my name.

I tried to hold on. I repeated things to myself in the dark. My name. My birthday. Mckenzie's laugh. The smell of cedar smoke and winter rain.

But the memories slipped through my fingers like water.

The man in the white coat—Declan, I heard someone call him once—started bringing other tools.

Chemical burns, he called them. Purification treatments.

He painted my skin with something that smelled like bleach and worse. It bubbled. Blistered. Peeled away in strips.

I looked at my hands afterward and didn't recognize them.

Scarred. Mottled. Wrong.

"You won't be recognizable when we're done," Declan said. "That's the point."

I didn't ask why.

I wasn't sure I cared anymore.

---

The Omega came at night.

I didn't know she was an Omega at first. She was just a shape in the dark. Quiet. Careful.

She slid something under the door. Food. Real food. Not the tasteless slop they usually gave me.

I crawled over and ate it with my hands. I didn't care how it looked. I was so hungry.

She came back the next night. And the night after that.

Sometimes she whispered through the door. Soft. Almost too quiet to hear.

"I'm sorry," she said once. "I'm so sorry."

I didn't know what she was apologizing for.

I didn't know much of anything anymore.

---

One night, my wolf stirred.

Not strong. Not like before. Just a faint flutter. Like a dying heartbeat.

But it was enough.

I heard voices through the wall. Muffled. Casual.

Two guards, I thought. Talking.

"—ceremony's in two weeks," one said. "Biggest event Silvercrest's thrown in years."

"Holden and London, right?" the other replied. "Bet it'll be fancy as hell."

"Oh yeah. London's got the whole thing planned out. Decorations, guest list, everything. She's calling it her 'triumph over tragedy.'"

Laughter.

"What about the rogue?" the second guard asked. "The one who set the fire?"

"Taken care of," the first said. "She's not going anywhere."

More laughter. Fading as they walked away.

I lay there in the dark.

Holden and London.

Mate Ceremony.

Two weeks.

I waited for the pain. For the rage. For the heartbreak.

Nothing came.

Just cold. Clean. Final.

My wolf didn't whimper. She didn't howl.

She went silent.

And deep inside me, in the part of me that used to love him, something turned to ash.

I closed my eyes.

And I stopped reaching for him.