The words hang in the air like smoke.Because of the child.
For a heartbeat, I forget how to breathe.The council stares in stunned silence, waiting for my reaction.They don't know. No one here knows.
"Remove him," I say evenly. My voice sounds calm, but inside, everything burns.
Damian doesn't fight as my guards drag him away. His gaze stays locked on mine until the doors slam shut.
Kellan steps closer. "Alpha, what does he mean?"
"Nothing."The lie slides out too easily.
I turn away, hiding the tremor in my hands.
In my private chamber, the candles flicker restlessly.I pace the floor, thoughts spinning faster than the wind outside.
He couldn't know.I hid everything : the pregnancy, the birth, the exile.No one from Silver Moon could've seen me after that night.
Unless…
I grab my coat and head for the inner courtyard.
Lyra sits on the fountain's edge, humming softly, water twisting into shapes above her hands. She looks up when she senses me, always senses me.
"Hi, Mama."Her voice is pure light, unaware of the storm forming behind my ribs.
I force a smile. "You shouldn't be out here alone."
She shrugs. "I couldn't sleep. The moon's too loud tonight."
I kneel beside her, brushing her hair back. "Has anyone… spoken to you? Anyone from the Silver Moon pack?"
Lyra frowns. "No. But I dreamed of a man with golden eyes. He called me little wolf."
The world tilts.That was what Damian used to call me.
"Did he say anything else?"
She thinks for a moment. "He said they're coming. That they want the blood that doesn't belong."
My heart stops.
"Lyra," I whisper. "Listen to me. If anyone, anyone, tries to talk to you in your dreams again, you tell me, okay?"
Her eyes widen. "Mama, are we in trouble?"
I press her close, trying to steady my voice. "Not yet."
But I can feel it : something dark moving beyond the border.A pulse in the air, ancient and hungry.
By morning, the sky has turned the color of steel.I stride into the guest wing where Damian waits under guard.He stands by the window, arms crossed, looking more like a prisoner than an Alpha.
"You knew," I say.
He turns, his expression unreadable. "I suspected. The rogues aren't just wolves, Aria. They're mixed bloods : born from experiments the council buried decades ago. They're hunting for something pure to balance their curse."
I stare at him. "And you think that's my daughter."
His silence is answer enough.
I step closer, fury thrumming under my skin. "You lost every right to speak her name the day you exiled me."
He doesn't flinch. "You think I didn't regret it? You think I didn't search for you?"
I laugh once, sharp and bitter. "Regret doesn't erase what you did."
He takes a slow step forward, closing the space between us. His voice drops low. "Then let me fix it."
I can feel his breath now, warm and dangerous.For a moment, the air thickens : memory, tension, a ghost of what we once were.
I push him back. "You don't get to fix anything. You'll leave after the council meets. Then you'll forget this place exists."
His jaw tightens. "And when the rogues find you? When they find her?"
"I'll handle it."
He studies me, eyes dark.
"You always think you can face the world alone. But this time, Aria… it's not the world. It's something worse."
Outside, a horn sounds.Low. Distant. Wrong.
Kellan bursts through the door.
"Alpha, rogues! They've breached the outer border!"
The floor shakes as howls echo from the valley below.Lyra's scream cuts through the air like a blade.
I spin toward the balcony just in time to see dark shapes moving through the fog : twisted, fast, not fully wolf.
Damian grabs his sword. "They're here."
I shift, my bones snapping into the form I was born to fear and to command.
"Then let them come," I snarl.
"This time, they'll learn what kind of monster they created."
In the chaos below, hidden among the rogues, a pair of glowing red eyes watches from the trees : eyes that once belonged to someone Aria thought was dead.