Freya’s POV


    Finished


    Jocelyn Thorne’s face turned the color of ash, as though the blood had been ripped from her veins in one brutal moment. I could almost hear her heart stutter. He… how could he treat her so?


    Her one eye, gleaming with that unnatural brightness she had paid so dearly for, narrowed with disbelief. She had sacrificed it for Ss Whitmor, or so she told herself, wearing that story like a badge of loyalty. But tonight, for me–for my sake–he had turned that cold edge of his de against her.


    I saw the bitterness swallow her whole, especially when the crowd’s stares shifted. Not admiration now. Not envy. Pity. Sympathetic, almost tender. Jocelyn Thorne–raised high on the pride of the Metropolitan branch–was being pitied.


    And Jocelyn had never been one to stomach pity.


    She sucked in a breath, shoulders stiff, trying to hold on to somest shard of pride. “What does she have, Ss?” she demanded, voice sharp with venom. “What about Freya Thorne makes her worth your protection?”


    The wolves closest to us leaned in, hungry for the answer. They’d seen Ss before: cold as iron, ruthless as winter itself. He was not one to extend a shield for free.


    Ss’s reply was soft, but it carried like thunder. “Because she did not leave me behind.”


    The words struck harder than any blow. Jocelyn’s face crumpled, gray and wasted.


    And then his hand found mine. His palm was warm, fingers rough with the strength of a warrior Alpha. The tether between us sparked–dangerous, reckless. “Come,” he murmured.


    My throat caught. Still, I managed to answer, “Alright.” Because I wanted nothing more than to be anywhere but under Jocelyn’s re, anywhere but in the shadow of Caelum’s burning stare.


    We stepped away from the balcony. I did not look back, though I felt Jocelyn’s hatred bite into my skin like icy fangs. So it was because she once left him… and I did not. That single choice had been a gulf she could never cross.


    Behind us, Aurora’s voice rose in sour mockery. “Ss Whitmor speaks words of convenience. Freya is a fool if she believes them. Look at her–barely freed from her Lunar Severance with Caelum, and already tangled with Ss. Marriage, bond, vows–mere toys to her. She treats the sanctity of mating as a child’s game. Caelum, thank the moon you severed her–now she-”


    But Aurora’s voice faltered, falling silent.


    Because Caelum Grafton wasn’t listening.


    No. His eyes were still on me.


    Not Ss. Not the hand holding mine. On me. As though the Alpha of Silverfang had forgotten the entire room, forgotten Aurora wing for his arm, forgotten everything but the sight of me walking away.


    Aurora’s scent spiked bitter and sharp as she clung tighter to him. I felt the possessive edge in her grip even from across the hall. Caelum belongs to me. He will not go back to her. Her resolve was as clear as the storm in her blood.


    But his gaze–his gaze belonged to me.


    Ss led me out of the great hall and into the garden beyond.


    The night was hushed. Lanterns glowed low among climbing ivy. The air was cool, touched with the scent of leaves and blossoms. After the suffocating press of wolves inside–their eyes, their whispers, their judgment–the quiet was like water on parched skin.


    I drew in a breath. “Why here?” I asked.


    His hand loosened, though he didn’t step back. “It’s quieter.”


    6:06 AM <b>P </b>


    Finished


    That was all. A simple answer, clipped and direct. Yet I felt as though he had carved this stillness out for me alone. That he had led me here not because he needed it, but because he knew I did.


    Warmth crept through my chest<b>, </b>confusing, dangerous.


    “Thank you,” I said softly.


    He turned his head, one brow raised. “Thank me?”


    “Yes,” I insisted. “For speaking for me. For–shielding me back there. I know you did it for my sake. Don’t worry. I won’t take your words to heart. I know you didn’t mean them as they sounded.”


    His lips curved in something that was not a smile. “Which words, Freya? The promise of wealth? Or the vow that I would take you as mine, if only you gave me leave?”


    Heat surged to my face. “Both,” I admitted. “Whether it was sympathy or simple chivalry… I understand. I’m grateful. If one day you ever need me, Ss, I’ll return the favor.”


    He studied me then, gaze unyielding, dark as steel. “You think me chivalrous? You think me sympathetic?”


    His voice dropped lower. “Freya Thorne, the Whitmors have never been a family of knights and rescuers. Irond blood runs cold–selfish, obsessive, merciless. Never… chivalrous.”


    His words cut, but not at me. They cut at himself.


    “I have never pitied you,” he murmured. His eyes glowed faint in thentern light. “I have envied you.”


    I blinked. “Envied… me?”


    “Yes.” His tone softened, but it was raw. “Envied your parents. That you had them. That they fought and fell with honor, and left you not with scars but with warmth in your memories. You carry them still. You can look back and feel loved.”


    He exhaled, slow and bitter. “I look back at mine, and feel nothing but hatred.”


    The steel in his voice cracked, just a little, and for the first time I glimpsed not the Irond Alpha, but the boy who had grown in a house of venom.


    “I envy you, Freya. And I respect them–the ones who raised you. They made you who you


    His eyes stayed locked on mine.


    And my heart, traitor that it was, faltered.


    –


    are.”


    How strange to hear him, Ss Whitmor, who had always stood untouchable, who could bend boardrooms and. battlegrounds alike to his will–confess envy of me.


    I thought of my father, Arthur Thorne, and my mother Myra Brown. Of theirughter, their gentle chiding, the fleeting moments we’d stolen between their duties <i>to </i>the Iron Fang Recon Unit. I thought of my brother Eric, who had shielded me in ways he never spoke of.


    Even when loss struck, even when I had stood before the Ashbourne Legion’s Hall of Martyrs, my memories had never been cold. They had been light.


    And I realized–Ss had never known such light.


    For a heartbeat, I wanted <i>to </i>reach for him. To tell him that envy was misced. That he was not bound by his father’s cruelty.


    That I-


    But the words caught in my throat. Because whatfort could I give to a man forged in iron and shadow? What could I say that would not sound like pity–the one thing he imed never to give, and likely would never ept?


    So I stood there, fingers trembling where they brushed his hand, lost between silence and the thunder of my racing heart.


    <b>6.06 </b>


    A Warrior Luna’s Awakening