(Alaric's POV)
She smelled like rain.
Not the sharp bite of an oncoming storm, but the quiet calm that followed after—cool, clean, and unsettling. The scent drifted through my chambers the moment she crossed the threshold, slipping beneath my defenses before I could stop it.
My wolf stirred.
Human, it growled. Too close.
I tightened my grip on the armrests of my wheelchair, forcing the instinct down. Humans had always been allowed within Mooncrest. Servants. Visitors. Physicians. They were harmless. Temporary.
She was neither.
"I didn't ask for a caregiver," I said flatly, keeping my gaze fixed on the tall window overlooking the forest. "I don't need one."
"You need more than you admit," my mother replied calmly.
Her voice carried authority, but beneath it lay something far worse—hope. The kind that demanded disappointment.
Kael remained silent near the door, as he always did. Watching. Guarding. Loyal to a fault. He had dragged me from the blood-soaked snow two years ago, hauled me through agony and denial, and wheeled me through halls I once stalked like a king.
And now this human girl stood in my domain, trying not to look afraid.
"I can leave, if you wish," she said softly.
I turned then, unable to stop myself.
She met my gaze.
No flinching. No pity. Just cautious steadiness, like someone standing at the edge of deep water, aware of the danger but unwilling to run.
Interesting.
"No," I said at last. "Stay."
My mother's relief was immediate, poorly concealed behind composure. She nodded once. "Be civil, Alaric."
The door closed behind her, sealing us inside the room.
Silence stretched.
Mei Lin shifted her weight slightly, hands clasped in front of her. Her eyes took in the space—not greedily, not fearfully, but attentively. She noticed things most did not: the way the furniture was positioned to allow room for movement, the faint scratches on the stone floor, the lingering scent of antiseptic beneath pine and earth.
"I'll do my best not to intrude," she said.
"You already have," I replied.
Her lips pressed together, but she didn't argue. Instead, she moved—quietly, efficiently—straightening what little there was to straighten, adjusting a chair that hadn't been touched in days.
The wolf paced inside me.
She doesn't belong here.
Neither did I.
Two years.
Two years since the snow had turned red beneath my claws. Two years since my strength—meant to protect—had crushed the life from my Luna's body. Her scream still haunted my nights, her scent lingering like a ghost I could never outrun.
I deserved this chair.
I deserved the pain.
I deserved never to walk again.
"You don't look broken," Mei Lin said suddenly.
The words struck like a blade.
I laughed—short, sharp, humorless. "Appearances lie."
She hesitated, clearly weighing her next words. "If you ever need anything—"
"I won't," I snapped.
She flinched.
Good.
Better discomfort than attachment.
Kael cleared his throat. "I'll show you your quarters."
As she turned toward him, something twisted violently in my chest. The wolf surged, restless and angry, claws scraping against my restraint.
Mine, it snarled.
I slammed the thought down with brutal force.
She was human.
She was temporary.
She was nothing.
And yet, as the door closed behind her, the room felt emptier than it had in two years.
I wheeled myself closer to the window. The forest stirred beneath the rising moon, shadows moving between the trees. Wolves shifted patrols, restless and alert.
They felt it too.
The moon rose higher, pale and watchful.
For the first time since the night I lost everything, it did not look away from me.
It watched.
And it waited.