Elder Varyn had been watching Kaelen, not the crowd.
He had learned long ago that rooms were dangerous only in how they affected the Alpha standing inside them. People could be managed but power could not.
Kaelen had been holding himself together but barely.
Varyn saw it in the way his shoulders had gone rigid, the way his breathing had slowed into something forced and deliberate.
The curse had been pressing hard, tightening like a noose drawn inch by inch.
Then it stopped.
Not eased, not weakened but stopped.
Varyn's sharp gaze flicked to Kaelen's face. The tension there hadn't vanished, but something else had replaced it, like shock and disbelief.
That alone was enough to alarm him.
Kaelen had lived with the curse his entire life and relief was not an expression Varyn had ever seen on him.
Varyn followed Kaelen's line of sight and found her.
