Aria POV
Pain ripped through every bone in my body.
My wolf was too big. Too powerful. Too ancient to fit inside a girl who'd never shifted before. She was tearing me apart from the inside, trying to force her way out.
Let me OUT! she roared in my mind. We're trapped! We need space!
"I can't!" I screamed back, both out loud and in my head. "I don't know how!"
The car had stopped moving. Damon was shouting something, but I couldn't hear him over the sound of my bones cracking and reforming. My skin burned like it was on fire.
This was worse than any beating Victoria had ever given me. Worse than hunger or cold or loneliness. This was my body betraying itself, trying to become something it didn't know how to be.
Stop fighting me! my wolf snarled. You're making it worse!
"You're hurting me!"
I'm SAVING you! Your body can't contain my power without shifting. Let me out or we both die!
Die. I was going to die in the back of a car with three Alphas who barely knew me, torn apart by my own wolf.
Strong hands grabbed my face, forcing me to focus through the agony.
"Aria! Look at me!" Damon's storm-gray eyes filled my vision. "Breathe! You have to breathe!"
"I—can't—"
"Yes, you can." His voice was firm but gentle. "In through your nose. Out through your mouth. Come on, little mate. Breathe with me."
I tried. Gasped air into burning lungs. Let it out in a sob.
"Good. Again."
Another breath. The pain didn't stop, but I could think around it now.
"Your wolf is panicking," Damon said, his hands steady on my face. "She's never been awake before. She doesn't know what to do. You have to calm her down."
"How?" Tears streamed down my face. "She's too strong—I can't control her—"
"You don't control her. You work with her." Kael's voice came from somewhere nearby. "Stop fighting. Start listening."
Finally! my wolf huffed. The ice prince makes sense for once.
I wanted to laugh, but another wave of pain cut it off.
"Talk to her," Ryker said from my other side. When had he gotten there? "Ask her what she needs."
Taking a shaky breath, I turned my attention inward. What do you need?
Space. Air. Freedom. My wolf's mental voice was still aggressive but less panicked. I've been sealed in a tiny box for nineteen years. I need to RUN.
We're in a car. There's nowhere to run.
Then get me OUT of this metal trap!
"She needs out of the car," I gasped. "She feels trapped."
The car door opened instantly. Cool night air rushed in, and I gulped it down like water.
Damon lifted me out, setting me on solid ground. My legs buckled immediately, but he caught me.
"Can you stand?"
"I don't know." Everything hurt. My bones felt wrong, like they couldn't decide if they were human or wolf.
"The shift is stalled," Kael said, crouching beside me. "She started to shift but stopped halfway. That's why it hurts so much."
"Can she finish it?" Ryker asked.
"Not without training. She doesn't know how." Kael's ice-blue eyes met mine. "Aria, you need to push the shift back. Tell your wolf to wait."
No! my wolf snarled. I've waited nineteen YEARS!
"She won't listen," I whispered.
"Then we have a problem." Kael's expression was grim. "If she keeps trying to shift, you'll be stuck in transition. Half human, half wolf, in constant agony. Is that what you want?"
I looked at him, this cold Alpha who thought I was broken, and felt something snap inside me.
"What I WANT is to go back to this morning when my biggest problem was scrubbing floors!" I shouted. "I want to not be a princess or a mate or the White Phoenix! I want to be normal! I want—"
My voice broke. I wanted so many impossible things.
I wanted Damien to have actually loved me.
I wanted Victoria to have been kind.
I wanted a childhood that didn't include beatings and starvation and sleeping on concrete floors.
I wanted to not be terrified every second of every day.
But wanting didn't change reality.
"I know this is overwhelming," Damon said gently. "But right now, you need to focus. Can you ask your wolf to give you time? Just a few days to learn control?"
I turned my attention inward again. Please. I'm scared. I don't know what I'm doing. Can you wait just a little longer?
Silence stretched between us.
Then my wolf sighed, long and frustrated. Fine. But only because YOU asked. Not because they commanded it.
Thank you.
But Aria? We're going to run soon. With or without permission. I've been caged too long.
The threat was clear. My wolf would cooperate for now, but her patience had limits.
Slowly, painfully, the shift reversed. My bones cracked back into place. The burning faded. The violet power retreated beneath my skin.
I collapsed against Damon, exhausted and shaking.
"It's over," he murmured. "You did it."
"For now," I corrected weakly. "She's going to try again."
"Then we'll teach you to shift properly before she does." Kael stood, all business again. "We're still two hours from Crystal Peak. Can you make it that long without another episode?"
"I'll try."
"That's not good enough. We need—"
"Kael." Ryker's voice cut through sharply. "Look."
I followed his gaze and saw what had caught his attention.
Headlights. Multiple vehicles approaching from behind us on the empty road.
"Who is that?" I asked.
Through the mate bond, I felt all three triplets go rigid with tension.
"Rogues," Kael said quietly. "At least twenty of them."
"How do you know they're rogues?" I asked, fear creeping up my spine.
"Because they're driving Shadowmoon Pack vehicles." Damon's arms tightened around me protectively. "Victoria sent them after you."
My stomach dropped. "Why would she—"
"Because you're a threat to her now," Ryker finished. "And because she knows if you make it to Crystal Peak alive, we'll have her executed for what she did to you."
The vehicles were getting closer. I could hear engines roaring in the night.
"We need to go," Kael said, already moving toward the driver's seat. "Now."
"They'll catch us," Damon argued. "Our vehicle is designed for comfort, not speed. Theirs are built for chasing."
"Then we fight." Ryker's eyes flashed gold with his wolf. "We've faced worse odds."
"Not while protecting her." Kael looked at me, and I saw real fear in his ice-blue eyes. "She can't shift. Can't fight. And if they capture her—"
He didn't finish the sentence. He didn't need to.
Victoria would kill me. Slowly. Painfully. And make sure nobody ever found my body.
"I have an idea," I said suddenly.
"No." All three triplets said it simultaneously.
"You don't even know what I'm going to suggest!"
"It doesn't matter," Damon said. "Whatever plan involves you being in danger is off the table."
"We're already in danger!" I pointed at the approaching vehicles. "In about thirty seconds, we're going to be in a fight. You three can't protect me AND fight twenty rogues at the same time."
"Watch us," Ryker growled.
"I'm not helpless anymore!" Violet power crackled around my hands, responding to my emotions. "I have power now. Let me use it."
"You can't control it," Kael said flatly. "You almost killed yourself five minutes ago trying to shift. And now you want to fight?"
"I want to survive!" I shot back. "And standing here arguing is wasting time we don't have!"
The vehicles were close now. Close enough that I could see shapes moving inside them—large, dangerous shapes that promised violence.
Kael swore. "Everyone in the car. Now. We run."
"We won't make it," Damon said grimly.
"Then we'll die trying."
But before anyone could move, my wolf spoke in my mind with terrifying clarity:
They're not here for you, Aria. They're here for THEM.
What?
Smell the air. That's not Victoria's scent leading them.
I inhaled deeply, and my new wolf senses picked up something that made my blood freeze.
The lead vehicle carried a scent I recognized from tonight. A scent that made bile rise in my throat.
Damien.
My ex-boyfriend was leading the rogues.
And through the mate bond, I felt the triplets' realization at the same moment.
"It's a trap," Kael breathed. "Victoria didn't send them. He did."
"Why would Damien—" I started.
Then I saw it. Saw what my wolf had smelled but my human brain hadn't processed.
Silver. They were carrying silver weapons.
Silver was the only thing that could kill an Alpha permanently.
Damien wasn't here to capture me.
He was here to kill the Moonshadow Triplets and take me back to Shadowmoon as proof of his loyalty to the Rogue King.
And I was the bait that had led my mates into an ambush.