The dining hall was far too large for just the two of us. The long obsidian table stretched between Silas and me like a dark, frozen lake, reflecting the flickering candlelight in a way that made the shadows dance along the walls. I sat at the very edge of my chair, my spine rigid. The midnight-blue silk of the dress Silas had chosen felt heavy, a reminder of the skin it covered—skin that, for the first time in a decade, was free of the purple-rimmed blooms and yellowing aches Julian's men had left behind.
Across the expanse, Silas was a statue of charcoal wool and tension. He hadn't touched his wine. He hadn't even looked at his plate. He simply sat there, his large hands flat on the table, his gold-flecked eyes fixed on the wall behind me.
But I could feel him. Every time I shifted my weight, his pupils would blow wide, tracking the change in my scent.
"He is listening," my wolf whispered. She was restless tonight, a warm, vibrating presence that felt like she was trying to pace inside my very bones. "He's listening to the way our blood moves. He wants to know if we are still afraid."
I am afraid, I told her silently. The silence is gone, and everything is too loud.
The heavy oak doors at the far end of the hall creaked open. To my newly awakened ears, it sounded like a thunderclap.
Two men stepped into the light.
The moment their scents hit me—sharp, metallic, and heavy with the musk of high-ranking Alphas—the world fractured. I didn't think. I didn't decide. My body acted on twenty years of muscle memory.
I bolted.
My chair screeched across the marble floor, but as I lunged toward the corner of the room, a searing, white-hot sensation exploded in my fingertips. It felt like my skin was being threaded with needles from the inside out.
I hit the stone wall and let out a strangled gasp, looking down at my hands.
Black, curved talons had ripped through the delicate silk of my gloves. They were obsidian-sharp, gleaming under the chandelier light, pulsing with a life of their own. I stared at them, my breath hitching in my chest. I had been a "dud" for twenty years; I had never even shifted a hair. To see these lethal, beautiful things sprouting from my own flesh was horrifying—and yet, I felt a sick thrill of power.
I could kill with these. I could make them bleed.
"Ours," my wolf purred, a dark, jagged sound of triumph. "Weapon. Claw. Kill."
"Seraphina."
Silas's voice cut through the predatory fog. He remained seated, but the air in the room shifted. It grew heavy, thick with a power that made the two newcomers freeze where they stood.
"I won't... please," I choked out, my vision blurring. I tried to hide my hands behind my back, terrified that he would see the monster I was becoming. "I'll do whatever you want. I'll be quiet. Just... don't let them start yet."
The silence that followed was deathly.
Silas rose slowly. He didn't look at me yet; he turned his head toward the two men standing by the door.
The broader man on the left had a face that looked like it was made for smiling, though he wasn't smiling now. This was Caleb, the Second. Next to him stood Elias, the Third, a man who looked like he'd been carved from the same stone as the walls, his eyes hidden behind silver-rimmed glasses.
"Caleb. Elias," Silas said. His voice was a low, jagged rasp. "Explain to me why she is trying to disappear into the masonry at the mere sight of you."
Caleb immediately lowered his head. But as he spoke, his tone was light, almost conversational, despite the gravity of the room. "Well, Alpha, I did tell Elias we should have brought flowers. Or at least stopped at the kitchens for some of those lemon tarts. We're a bit much to take in on an empty stomach."
Elias didn't laugh. He simply bowed his head a fraction. "We haven't met the lady yet, Alpha. We came straight from the border reports as ordered."
Silas began to walk toward me. I flinched, pressing my back into the stone, my claws scraping against the rock with a sound like sharpening knives. I looked down at them again, amazed by the way they retreated slightly then slid back out, responding to my fear.
Silas stopped six feet away. He didn't reach for me. He just stood there, his massive silhouette casting a shadow that seemed to shield me from the others. He looked at my hands—at the shredded silk and the black claws—and for a second, a flash of something that looked like pride crossed his face.
"This is Caleb," Silas said. "And Elias. They are here because I commanded it. They are here to train you, Seraphina."
"That's what they always say," I whispered, my voice trembling. "Julian's men... they said a dud deserved to feel the weight of a real wolf's hand."
Caleb's casual posture vanished. He took a single, slow step forward—into the light so I could see his hands were open and empty. "Seraphina," Caleb said, his voice dropping the joking lilt. "I like to laugh. I like to win. But there isn't a man in this pack who finds 'sport' in a lopsided fight. That's not training. That's just being a coward with a title."
Elias stepped up beside him, his expression stern, yet his voice was surprisingly soft—like velvet over steel. "In Shadow-Crest, we train our own so they never have to fear the dark. You are under this roof now. We are here to give you your strength back, not take what's left of it."
I looked at them then, my claws slowly beginning to recede as the immediate panic faded. My wolf was tilting her head, sniffing the air. She didn't smell the sour, rot-like scent of Julian's men. She smelled iron, woodsmoke, and a deep, abiding loyalty.
"They will be your shadows for the next ten days," Silas said, his voice dropping to a terrifyingly quiet register. "They will teach you how to move. How to ensure that no one ever lays a hand on you again without losing theirs. If they so much as raise a hand to you in anger, I will have their heads. Do you understand?"
"Understood, Alpha," Caleb said, giving me a tiny, conspiratorial wink.
"Yes, Alpha," Elias added, his gaze lingering on my face with a quiet, respectful solemnity.
"I can't fight," I said, a final protest, though I looked at the marks my claws had left in the stone. "I'm... I'm still just me."
Silas reached out, his fingers brushing against my knuckles. The "noise" of my panic receded instantly.
"You survived the Silver-Moon for twenty years with nothing but your own will," Silas said, his eyes burning into mine. "That makes you the most dangerous person in this room. They are just going to give you the tools to prove it."
He turned on his heel, his charcoal coat billowing. "Start tomorrow at dawn. I want her to know how to break a wrist by noon. And Elias? Caleb? I will be watching."
I watched him go, my heart still drumming. I looked at my hands—the claws were gone, but the feeling of them remained. For the first time in my life, I wasn't being told to hide. I was being told to grow.