"Areya, hide!" her mother's voice cracked, raw with terror. As her mother's strong hands shoved her small body into the hollow of a storage chest. The lid slammed, plunging her into darkness.
Through the narrow slats, she watched.
Full of fright. She is so young, yet aware she is aware that something big is coming...
The flames came first.
They licked hungrily at the walls of her home, devouring wood and memory, painting monstrous shadows that danced and writhed across the ceiling.
The air thickened with smoke, every breath burning her throat. Somewhere, her doll lay forgotten in the corner.
Then, boots. Heavy. Merciless.
Men's voices tore through the silence, rough with bloodlust. The air itself carried dominance, so sharp it made her stomach twist. And then the voice. The one that froze her to her bones:
"No mercy."
Her father fought first. His blade caught the firelight, his stance defiant, unyielding. For a moment, he looked like the strongest man in the world.
"Papa…" Areya's whisper stuck in her throat.
But there were too many. Steel and fists and snarls overwhelmed him. The sound when he fell, the wet, final crack, lodged itself in her bones forever.
Her mother screamed his name. She rushed forward, claws bared, teeth gnashing like a wolf cornered. She was brave, too brave. And she fell beside him, crimson spilling across the floorboards.
And then… him.
Through the smoke, through the shifting firelight, Areya saw the boy. Older than her, barely a man. His face was clear. Clearer than anything else she'd ever remember.
Her father choked out a name…
"Kera?"
He stood among the killers, not as a follower but as their crown. Firelight curved his lips into a smile no human should wear. With deliberate calm, he lifted his blade.
Once. Twice. The final strike.
She couldn't close her eyes. They didn't want to...but, the last thing Areya saw was blood pooling toward her hiding place. The metallic stench filled her nose. And that smile...burned into her nightmares, carved into her very soul.
---
She woke with a gasp, lungs clawing for air as though the smoke had followed her across the years. Sheets tangled around her body, damp with sweat. Her fingers dug into her throat, trying to tear the memory loose, but it clung tighter with every heartbeat.
Nightmares.
At twenty-three, she was no longer the trembling child in the chest. She was Alpha. Strong. Feared.
And, yet every night, she saw him.
Kera.
The boy with the smile.
The man she swore she would kill.
And she will.
---
Areya's POV
The clang of steel rang through the training grounds, sharp and clean, like a blade cutting silence in two.
Areya drove her opponent back step by step, her sword a blur, her breath steady. He was bigger, older, a seasoned fighter, but it didn't matter. She'd learned long ago that size and experience crumbled against rage honed into precision.
The man stumbled, and with one final twist, her blade caught his weapon and sent it spinning across the dirt. Her knee pressed into his chest, the tip of her sword hovering just below his throat.
"Dead," she said flatly.
The crowd of trainees and warriors who'd gathered to watch fell silent. For a moment, only her ragged opponent's breathing filled the air. Then they bowed their heads. Respect. Fear. Both.
Areya stepped back, wiping the sweat from her brow. The sun bled across the horizon, painting the training ground in the same shade of crimson she saw in her nightmares.
She hated it. The memory. The fire. The smile. No amount of training, no number of victories, ever erased it.
"Alpha," one of the younger fighters called, eyes wide with awe, "will you lead tomorrow's run against the eastern border?"
She didn't answer right away. Her gaze drifted north, to the distant hills where another clan ruled, the clan of Kera.
The man whose face had lived in her nightmares for thirteen years.
Her voice was calm, but her heart burned like the night of the fire.
"Yes," she said. "I'll lead."
Because every battle brought her closer.
Closer to him.
Closer to the revenge she swore with every breath.
---
The crowd was breaking apart when the air shifted.
It wasn't sound that caught her first, it was scent. A cold, clean edge, sharp enough to cut through the heat and sweat of the training ground. Her chest tightened. She knew that scent. She would never forget it.
Whispers rose before she turned. The younger fighters stiffened, some lowering their heads instinctively.
And then he stepped into view.
Kera.
Not the boy she remembered, the boy who smiled as her world burned, but a man now. Taller, broader, carved from steel and shadow. He carried no weapon, no threat but himself, yet the weight of his presence pressed into the ground like an unspoken challenge.
His eyes found hers at once. Unflinching. Steady. They locked on her with the same calm she remembered …calm that made the fire in her blood boil hotter.
Her hand tightened on her sword hilt. Her throat burned with the words she wanted to scream, but her voice came out flat, edged like glass.
"What are you doing on my lands?"
Kera's lips curved, not a smile, not fully, but enough to slice through the air between them.
"Watching." His voice was deep, controlled, carrying easily over the silence. "I wanted to see if the stories about you were true."
The words weren't mocking, but they weren't praise either. Just cool, measured interest. Like she was prey he'd been tracking for years.
Her warriors shifted uneasily. The tension crackled, a storm threatening to break.
Areya held his gaze, forcing her jaw still when everything inside her wanted to bare her teeth. Rage rose in her chest, but beneath it, something else stirred. Something older, heavier. Something she didn't dare name.
Her pulse hammered.
Her bond stirred.
No.
She shoved it down, every muscle rigid. "Leave," she ordered, voice like a blade.
For a heartbeat, he didn't move. Didn't speak. Only watched her, eyes
unreadable.
And she wished he will decline.
She wish he will prompt her to draw her sword and end him now…
Damning the years of plans and plot to erase him and his entire family off the earth… completely
But then, with the same deliberate calm he'd walked in with, Kera inclined his head.
"Until next time, Alpha."
He turned and left, his presence fading like smoke after fire, gone, but impossible to forget.
The silence he left behind was suffocating.
Areya's grip shook on her sword, though no one else saw it.
Every instinct in her screamed for revenge.
And yet, her body betrayed her with something far more dangerous than hate.