Freya’s POV


    75%


    Finished


    “For now,” I said evenly. In three months, when this so–called protection duty ended, I would be free again.


    But Abel Thorne clearly misunderstood my words.


    “Jocelyn and Alpha Ss share a bond deeper than you imagine. I don’t want to see you cousins tearing each other apart for the same male.”


    My jaw tightened. “Whatever connection Jocelyn Thorne has with Ss Whitmor, it has nothing to do with me.”


    Abel’s lips pressed thin, his eyes weighing me with that patriarchal caution all Stormveil wolves seemed to carry. Atst, he only managed, “Ss is not a man to take lightly. His mind runs dark and deep. Don’t let yourself fall too far to climb out.”


    Once he left, I turned toward the balcony doors, intending to head back to Ss‘ side.


    But before I could step past the threshold, he was already there–Caelum, cutting across the moonlit terrace with that domineering presence that once made me both safe and caged.


    “Freya, we need <i>to </i>talk.”


    I froze, then fixed him with a cold, unflinching stare.


    “Alpha Caelum,” I corrected sharply. “Between us, that familiar name no longer fits. You’ll call me Freya Thorne.”


    Something in my tone made his confidence falter. I saw it in the way his mouth pressed tight, the flicker of unease behind his silver eyes. Still, he steadied himself.


    “I wanted to apologize,” he said, voice low, as if confessing some forbidden weakness. “I didn’t know your parents died as martyrs of the Iron Fang Recon Unit. I thought they were just ordinary logistics. If I had known, I would’ve stood beside you when their ashes were returned to Ashbourne. I would’ve stopped Aurora at the WolfPort gates that day.”


    His words only carved the ice deeper in my chest.


    “So that’s it?” My voice was razor–sharp. “If they hadn’t been martyrs, if they’d simply been ordinary wolves. who gave their lives–then it would’ve been fine for you to ignore me? To let Aurora humiliate me in front of half the Capital?”


    His lips parted, but no answer came.


    “Enough.” I moved to leave, but he blocked my path in an instant, his scent heavy with storm and steel.


    “Tell me, Freya,” he demanded, his voice edged with something desperate. “At the airfield, you said those words–about dragging me from the river, about pulling me out while I was bleeding from eight wounds. What did you mean? How could you possibly know that?” His gaze locked onto mine, unyielding.


    I raised my chin, meeting that piercing look without flinching.


    ????, 75%╚


    Finished


    “What, am I not allowed to call you out for what you are? If I hadn’t pulled you out of that river that night, Caelum, you’d be nothing but a ghost still drifting beneath the current.”


    His expression shifted, shadows hardening across his face.


    “Where did you hear that?” he snapped. “That fall into the ckwater was buried. No one beyond the Silverfang Council knows. You’re saying this to make me believe you were my savior? To manipte my guilt?”


    The breath caught in my throat. I hadn’t expected that. Of all the sins he could carry, I never thought he would twist this into an usation–that I would fabricate a rescue.


    If I’d ever wanted to bind him with debt, I could have spoken of it years ago. I didn’t. I never intended to chain him with gratitude. It was only that Aurora’s cruelty at the WolfPort burned me so raw I let the truth slip out.


    And now–he looked at me as if I were nothing more than a schemer.


    “You think I lied?” A bitterugh broke from my lips.


    Caelum’s brows drew low. “Who else could it be? Aurora was there. She told me. You-”


    He stopped, but his eyes revealed everything. He wanted me to admit it. He wanted me to nod, to say yes, it was a lie. To let him walk away clean.


    “Caelum…” My voice dropped, sharp as a de across the throat. “You don’t want your savior to be me, do you?”


    For a heartbeat, guilt shed in his face, quickly smothered by that Alpha’s mask of pride. “I only want the truth.”


    “The truth?” Myugh was hollow. “What you mean is, you want me to take it all back. To im I never pulled your half–dead body from the current, never bound your wounds, never watched your eyes close and prayed you’d live. That way, when our three–year bond ended in the Lunar Severance Phase, you could look at me with no guilt at all.”


    His silence told me I had struck home.


    “Too bad,” I whispered, stepping past him, eyes colder than the night wind. “I never wanted your guilt. Not then, not now. Your guilt is worth less than ash to me.”


    Something flickered in his expression–pain, anger, confusion. His hand trembled at his side, as if he wanted to seize me, shake me, force me to take it back.


    But he didn’t.


    Instead, his voice broke with restrained fury.


    “So that’s it? You expect me to believe you? That you were the one who dragged me from the river? Don’t delude yourself, Freya. My savior was Aurora. It has always been her.”


    And with that, I realized: worse than his forgetfulness, worse than his betrayal, was this-


    That even faced with truth, Caelum Grafton would choose a lie morefortable to him.