Freya’s POV


    “It’s nothing more than favors handed down from the Whitmor line,” I said, my tone deliberately t, deliberately unflinching.


    +8 Pearls


    The words hit Jocelyn like ws across her pride. Her face cracked, the smug confidence shattering in front of Ss‘ gaze. She hadn’t expected me to speak so inly–not here, not in front of him.


    “But those favors,” I continuedzily, folding my arms, “are not yours. They can be given by others just as easily as they can be taken away. Best not to mistake borrowed power for your own strength.”


    Jocelyn’s cheeks flushed crimson. Rage twisted her wolf’s scent, acrid and sharp in the air. She snapped, raising her hand toward me like she might dare strike.


    I didn’t move. I didn’t need to.


    Ss was faster. His hand mped around her wrist with the cold precision of iron jaws. His voice spilled out, low and cial, the kind of sound that made the wolf in my bones shiver.


    “Do you no longer value this hand, Jocelyn?”


    Her breath hitched. I saw the memory sh across her eyes–the time he’d had her throat pinned, his dominance pouring into her veins until she could barely breathe. She knew the risk of defying him. She knew he didn’t bluff.


    “I was only “Jocelyn stammered, her voice high, brittle.“–only angered that Freya belittled the bond between us. As if it


    nothing but… exchange.”


    Ss’s gaze was a stormcloud before lightning. “Exchange?” he murmured, almost thoughtful. “That’s all it ever was. You bartered an <i>eye </i>and received Stormveil’s protection and the Whitmor’s patronage. A transaction, Nothing more.”


    Her entire body went rigid. The weight of his words pressed her into silence.


    Before I could decide whether to sneer or simply walk away, the rumble of engines filled the sky. The air shifted; the Iron Fang Recon training in me red instinctively, cataloging sound, distance<b>, </b>threat. But this was not war–it was spectacle.


    Aurora’s show had ended.


    The Bluemoon Beta’s daughter climbed down from her cockpit, peeling off her helmet with the practiced grace of someone who knew how to court eyes and attention. A flock of journalists surged forward, shing cameras and shouting questions. I could practically smell the money she’d funneled into their pockets–several of those voices were too eager, too rehearsed.


    And behind her, shadowing like a misced sentinel, walked Caelum Grafton


    My chest tightened <i>for </i>the briefest moment, but I refused to let it show.


    “Miss Aurora, are you and Lord Grafton in a rtionship?” one reporter asked.


    Caelum stiffened. I knew that posture. He hadn’t expected the question.


    But Aurora? Aurora was ready. She shed the sweetest smile, leaned toward the microphones, and said, “Yes. Caelum and I are together now.”


    Congrattory shouts exploded from the press line.


    Caelum’s lips pressed thin. His eyes flickered–past Aurora, past the crowd, straight toward me.


    I gave him nothing. No blink, no flinch, not even a shift of scent. To anyone watching, I was stone. Either I hadn’t heard, or I didn’t care.


    And maybe that was what infuriated him most–that I could look at him, my former mate, and give less than ash


    The ache he carried rolled across the space between us like smoke, but I did not inhale it. I turned my head away


    Then another voice rose, sharp and calcted. “Alpha Grafton only finalized his Lunar Severance Phase recently. Some


    might say it’s… quick… to already be courting again. Anyment?”


    +8 Pearls


    Aurora’sugh rang false–sweet. “Caelum and I were friends long before. It was only after his severance that we realized how much we meant to each other. I thank the Fates every day that his ties were broken–otherwise, how could I have found the love of my life?”


    And with those words, she turned, looking directly at me. Her eyes glimmered with mock gratitude, her voice dripping with poison disguised as silk.


    “Freya, I should thank you. Without your severance, I never would have found Caelum.”


    F


    It wasn’t gratitude. It was deration. It was a wolf’s challenge, dressed in mortalnguage.


    Suddenly, every gaze in the courtyard swung to me. Reporters swarmed, closing in like vultures scenting carrion.


    “Freya Thorne, what do you think about Aipha Grafton and Aurora’s rtionship?”


    I let out a single, sharpugh. “No thoughts worth wasting.”


    The man blinked, thrown by the sharpness. Still, he pressed again, his voice eager, overeager–the cadence of someone already bought.


    “Aurora is the first female pilot of the Bluemoon Wing. Do you feel… ufortable.. seeing your former mate with someone so aplished?”


    Ufortable? The word was meant to cut. Instead, it almost made me smile.


    “No,” I answered bluntly. “Not in the least.”


    The reporter’s jaw worked, desperate. “But surely you have an opinion on Aurora’s aerial performance today. After all, she has skills you simply do not.”


    I turned my eyes on him–slowly, deliberately. A soldier’s stare. The kind that made lesser wolyes swallow back their tongues. “Since you’re asking for critique,” I said, “then I’ll give it to you. Her performance was sloppy. She overpowered the throttle, couldn’t hold her speed steady, and needed the others to adjust around her mistakes. Worst of all, her approach speed onnding was reckless. If luck hadn’t favored her, she might’ve overshot the strip entirely.”


    The man froze. His recorder trembled in his hand. The trap he hadid for me had be a noose for Aurora instead.


    Aurora’s face nched, then hardened. “You’re just trying to discredit me!” she snapped, her wolf–scent sour with anger.


    “Exactly,” the reporter chimed in, scrambling to save her. “Miss Aurora is a co–pilot of high standing. Years of flight experience. You cannot dismiss that so easily. Besides, do you even know how to fly?”


    Jocelyn pounced then, her voice sharp with mockery. “Ha! She probably hasn’t even touched a cockpit. Freya can’t fly. She’s nothing more than fists and scars.”


    The words hung in the air–until Ss Whitmor’s voice sliced through them.


    “She wasmander of the Iron Fang Recon Unit,” he said, his tone colder than winter steel. His eyes swept over Jocelyn like she was an insect pinned to ss. “Do you truly believe amander of that caliber wouldn’t know her way around an aircraft?”


    Jocelyn’sugh died in her throat. Her smirk copsed into silence.


    And I stood there, calm and still, though inside, my wolf stretched, prowling beneath my skin. Because in that moment, it wasn’t Aurora’s performance or Caelum’s betrayal that filled me with fire–it was the knowledge that Ss Whitmor, Alpha of the Irond Coalition, had spoken for me.


    And in the world of wolves, that meant more than any headline.