The stranger caught the basket before it hit the ground.

His eyes lifted to mine, silver-gray and sharply alert. He wore a dark coat, and strength moved under the fabric when he straightened. Not the swollen strength of men who enjoyed frightening weaker wolves. His power was quiet, dense, impossible to ignore.

My body recognized him before my mind did. Heat unfurled low in my stomach. My pulse jumped beneath my jaw, and every new sense my wolf possessed filled with him—cedar, clean sweat, leather, and the electric scent of an approaching storm.

Mine, she repeated, louder.

No. Men did not belong to me. Men hurt me, owned me, locked me away. I belonged to myself now.

I backed into Alaric’s tomb.

The stranger noticed. His gaze dropped to my bare feet, my torn clothes, and the claw marks along my arms. The hard line of his mouth changed.

“My grandfather said there was a starving girl here.”

Alaric appeared beside him. “I said an irritating thief had invaded my eternal peace.”

“You called her a starving girl six times,” Aunt Maeve said.

The man could not hear them. His eyes remained on me.

“I’m Barrett.” He lowered the baskets rather than approaching. “I brought food.”

His nostrils flared slightly. My scent must have reached him too—rain, fear, and the shame of being caught in such a pathetic state.

I was grateful to him, but the living werewolf before me still filled me with a quiet dread. He caught my tension and stepped back, giving me room.

I waited until he moved several paces away, then knelt beside the basket. Broth steamed inside a sealed jar. There were eggs, roasted potatoes, sliced meat, and soft rolls. Too much. More than Mira had allowed me in a week.

“Slowly,” Barrett warned when I grabbed a roll.

I swallowed hard, my eyes betraying my hunger.

One corner of his mouth moved. “Or don’t.”

I ate too quickly. The broth burned my tongue, but warmth spread down my throat, loosening the knot in my chest. Barrett pretended to study the tombs while I swallowed like an animal.

That kindness warmed me.

Eating strengthened my senses by the minute. I could separate every smell in the damp air: fox tracks beneath the wall, moss drinking rain from stone, Barrett's leather gloves, and the living heat beneath his skin. My wolf kept circling the same fact. This male smelled right. Not safe exactly—an Alpha could never smell harmless—but familiar in a way that made my body ache.

I hated the ache. Need had always been a weapon others used against me. Hunger made me steal. Cold made me obey. Now the mate pull wanted to turn desire into another chain. I dug my nails into my palms and promised myself that even fate would have to ask permission.

A sharp female cry cut through the trees.

Barrett turned. So did I.

“Leave me alone,” a woman snapped beyond the northern row of tombs.

A male laugh answered. “Why come without guards if you don’t want company?”

Barrett ran. I followed before I could think.

We found a young woman backed against an angel-shaped monument. Her copper hair had come loose from its braid. Three males surrounded her, using their bodies to block every escape. Their scents were sour with ale, excitement, and the ugly thrill of holding power over someone.

One had his hand around her wrist.

“Let her go,” Barrett said.

The men froze. Fear flashed across their faces, but the largest recovered quickly.

“We were only talking.”

“She said no,” I told him.

He looked at my rags and laughed. “Did someone’s kennel lose a bitch?”

My wolf surged against my skin.

The world sharpened. I smelled the blood moving beneath his neck. Hunger transformed into a different urge—the need to bite, protect, punish.

“Behind you!” a dead soldier shouted from his grave.

I ducked. A fist passed over my head. I drove my shoulder into the attacker’s stomach, but starvation had stolen most of my strength. He caught my hair and yanked.

Pain flashed white.

Barrett’s roar shook dust from the monuments.

Alpha power crashed over the cemetery. Two males dropped to their knees. The one holding me fought it, perhaps too drunk to understand his danger.

Aunt Maeve pointed frantically. “His left knee was injured. Strike there.”

I kicked the side of his left knee.

He screamed and released me.

The copper-haired woman twisted free and drove her elbow into her captor’s nose. Blood sprayed. She stared at it, then at me.

“Did I do that?”

“Yes.”

“Wonderful.” She hit him again.

Barrett seized the third male by his collar and threw him into the grass. His eyes had turned completely silver, his canines long. Rage poured from him in hot waves, carrying the scent of smoke.

The protective fury should have terrified me. Instead, my wolf pressed toward it. My body answered his power with a tremor that was not fear.

Barrett looked at the hand still tangled in my hair.

“Touch her again,” he told the injured male softly, “and you will lose the hand.”

My heartbeat stumbled.

The men fled as soon as he released his command. The copper-haired woman watched them go, then faced me.

“You’re bleeding.”

Only then did I feel the cut on my shoulder. “It’s nothing.”

“Nothing is not supposed to drip.” She removed her cloak and wrapped it around me. Her scent was orange blossom, steel, and royal confidence. “I’m Sera.”

“Lyra.”

She looked me over. Anger replaced her smile. “Who did this to you?”

“I fell.”

“Repeatedly? Onto a whip?”

I pulled the cloak closed.

Barrett came nearer. The moment his fingers brushed my uninjured shoulder, a shock snapped between us. He inhaled hard. His pupils expanded until only a thin silver ring remained.

The air filled with the rich scent of his arousal, controlled but unmistakable to my wolf.

My face burned.

He snatched his hand back. “Sorry.”

Sera looked between us with widening eyes. “Oh.”

“Don’t,” Barrett warned.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Your face did.”

For the first time in weeks, laughter threatened me. It felt wrong with blood on my skin.

Sera’s humor faded when my knees shook. “You’re coming with me.”

“But you don’t know me.”

“You saved me before you knew my name. That makes us even.”

Barrett reached for me again, slower this time. “There’s a healer nearby.”

Alaric’s voice hissed from behind him. “Careful, girl. Royals build beautiful cages.”

I recoiled so violently that Barrett stopped.

“I can walk.”

I made it three steps.

The cemetery tilted. Strong arms caught me before the ground did. Barrett’s chest was hot against my cheek, his heart pounding fast. His scent wrapped around me, waking instincts that had been drugged and starved for years. My wolf wanted to rub against him, to mark my face along his throat, to find out whether his skin tasted like smoke.

I hated her for wanting anything.

“Put me down,” I whispered.

“As soon as you can stand.”

Sera touched my tangled hair. “Bring her home, Barrett.”

Home.

The word cracked something inside me.

“No cages,” I said, fighting darkness. “Promise.”

Barrett’s hold tightened, enough to keep me from falling. “No cages.”

Behind him, Alaric folded his spectral arms.

“Finally,” he muttered. “Someone is carrying the stubborn creature.”

As the world went black, I heard him add, very quietly, “Don’t drop my girl.”

I woke in warm water and panicked.

My claws shot out. I struck porcelain, splashing lavender-scented water over the floor.

“Easy.” Sera sat beside the enormous bath, sleeves rolled to her elbows. “It’s warm. Test it.”

Warm baths had never existed in Mira’s house. Water was punishment there, drawn from the winter pump and dumped over my head while she complained that feeding me already cost too much.

I lowered my claws into the bath. Steam curled around my fingers.

“No one is angry?” I asked.

“About water?”

“About the mess.”

Sera’s mouth tightened. “If anyone gets angry, I’ll throw them into the tub.”

She washed my hair because lifting my arms reopened the cut on my shoulder. Dirt turned the water brown. Each gentle pass of her fingers made my throat ache. No one had ever touched me with such warmth before.

When she rinsed the last soap from my hair, my wolf made a small, confused sound. Pack wolves groomed one another as comfort after a frightening shift; I knew that from lessons I had never been allowed to practice. Sera's fingers through my hair stirred that buried instinct. Without thinking, I leaned back against her arm.

She said nothing. She only kept combing until my shoulders lowered.

The healer arrived after I dressed in a soft gray tunic. She counted my ribs, treated the infected cuts on my feet, and grew silent over the old scars across my back.

“Long-term wolfsbane exposure,” she said. “That explains the delayed awakening and poor healing.”

Sera’s orange-blossom scent turned bitter with fury. “Someone poisoned her?”

I stared at my hands. “My tonic tasted bitter.”

The healer told me to eat six small meals each day. When she left, servants brought a tray crowded with porridge, fruit, eggs, and toast.

I finished half, then slipped two rolls into my sleeves.

Sera noticed.

Heat climbed my neck. I expected her to demand them back.

She added an apple to each pocket. “For emergencies.”

My eyes burned.

Barrett entered before I could cry. He had changed clothes, but his cedar-and-storm scent reached me first. My wolf rose instantly, rubbing beneath my skin as though my bones were bars.

He stopped on the threshold. His gaze moved over my clean hair, clothes, and bare feet. A low sound caught in his chest.

Sera’s brows rose. “Was that a growl?”

“No.”

“It was.”

“I was clearing my throat.”

“With your wolf?”

His ears reddened. The sight warmed something in me.

“I came to check her injuries,” he said.

“The healer checked them.”

“I am checking the healer’s work.”

“You have no medical training.”

They glared at each other. A laugh slipped from me.

Both turned.

Barrett smiled then—a real one, brief and startling. His scent warmed, and my body answered. My nipples tightened beneath the thin tunic. Heat pooled between my thighs, bewildering and sharp. I had spent years trying to feel less, to need less. Now my awakened wolf wanted with humiliating force.

I folded my arms.

Barrett’s nostrils flared. He looked away so quickly that Sera began coughing to hide another laugh.

“I want my coat,” I blurted.

Sera agreed to return to the cemetery with me. Barrett insisted on joining us.

Outside, the palace grounds spread across the hill in silver stone and dark green gardens. Armed guards bowed as Sera passed. Servants lowered their eyes. A banner displaying a crowned black wolf flew above the highest tower.

I stopped.

“Sera,” I whispered. “Who are you?”

She winced. “Princess Seraphina Blackthorn.”

I looked at Barrett.

“Crown Prince Barrett Blackthorn,” he said.

I nearly climbed the nearest wall.

They followed me to the cemetery, where I found my coat beside Alaric’s tomb. In daylight, the inscriptions were impossible to misunderstand.

ALARIC BLACKTHORN, HIGH KING OF THE NORTHERN WOLVES.

Around him lay princes, queens, generals, and royal consorts.

I had eaten the dead king’s lunch.

“I need to leave,” I said.

Aunt Maeve appeared. “Nonsense.”

"A rogue like me doesn't belong here." I hissed.

Barrett frowned. “Who are you talking to?”

“The dead.” I pointed at Alaric.

Barrett went still.

Alaric materialized beside his tomb, wearing a smug expression. “Tell him his posture has deteriorated.”

“He says your posture is terrible.”

Barrett’s face lost color.

“And he says the woman you brought here last winter had a laugh like a dying goose.”

“I did not say that,” Alaric protested. “It was a strangled goose.”

Barrett whispered, “No one knows she came here.”

The cemetery gate slammed open.

A beautiful woman and a young lady entered with guards at their back. Her black hair was pinned beneath a silver crown, and her authority struck the air before her scent did—white roses, frost, and Alpha blood.

Queen Isolde looked at me as if I were mud on a ceremonial floor. The lady was staring at me from behind her back.

“This is the rogue?”

Sera stepped in front of me. “Her name is Lyra.”

“She trespassed in the royal cemetery, stole offerings, and attacked three wolves.”

“She rescued me.”

“After appearing conveniently where you were endangered.” The Queen’s gaze sharpened. “Rogues survive through deception.”

My stomach clenched. Mira had used the same calm voice before every punishment.

“I’ll go,” I said.

Barrett moved closer, his heat brushing my side without contact. “Mother, she needs treatment.”

“And you need judgment. Both of you have allowed instinct to replace reason.” Her eyes flicked between us, lingering on the way his body angled toward mine. “She leaves before sunset.”

Alaric swore.

Every spirit in the cemetery began talking at once. Their voices rose like a storm inside my skull. Pain stabbed behind my eyes.

Then one dead queen stepped from a cracked monument and stared at Isolde.

“Tell my insufferable granddaughter,” she said, “that the moonstone crown is false. I hid the real one beneath the nursery hearth after Alaric spilled wine on it during our coronation.”

Alaric looked offended. “That was private.”

I pressed a hand to my temple. “Your grandmother says the crown you wear is a copy. The real one is beneath the old nursery hearth because King Alaric spilled wine on it.”

Silence fell.

Isolde touched her crown.

“That story died with them,” Barrett said.

Guards were sent to the abandoned nursery. They returned with a dust-covered silver box. Inside lay a moonstone crown.

No one looked at me as though I were merely a rogue anymore.

They looked afraid.

The Queen recovered first. “One night,” she said. “She may remain one night while we investigate this ability.”

She left. The young lady walker over and looped her arm through Barrett’s.

She was beautiful in a polished, deliberate way.

“Barrett,” she purred. “You disappeared on our date.”

My wolf’s pleasure vanished beneath a flash of possessive pain.

The woman looked me over. “And who is this?”

“Lyra,” Sera said coldly.

“I’m Vivienne Ashford.” Her fingers tightened on Barrett’s arm. “His future bride.”

I waited for Barrett to deny it.

He removed her hand, but too slowly.

Sera scoffed. She grabbed my hand, dragging me right past them.