I press harder, just enough to break skin. A thin line of blood wells up, crimson against his pale throat.
“I can tell you everything!” He’s crying now, tears cutting tracks through the dirt on his face. “The observation points, the reporting schedule, what we’ve documented. I can tell you all of it. Just please—please don’t—“
I hold him there for a long moment, letting him feel how easily I could end this. How much I want to. This male has been watching Lyanna. Cataloging her habits. Reporting back to the same monster who killed her sister and corrupted my pack.
Every instinct in me screams to finish it.
But dead spies don’t talk. And we need information more than I need vengeance.
I release him with a snarl, backing up just enough to keep him pinned with my presence. He scrambles against the tree trunk behind him, pressing himself into the bark as if he could melt through it.
“Don’t run,”I think, projecting as much threat as possible into my stance. My hackles stay raised, teeth still bared.“Stay exactly where you are.”
I throw back my head and howl—not a hunting call, but a pack signal. Location. Assistance needed. Prisoner secured.
Within minutes, I hear answering movement through the trees. Ben emerges first, his own wolf form rippling with barely contained aggression as he takes in the scene. Kari follows in human form, already pulling spelled restraints from her patrol pack.
Ben shifts back, his expression murderous as he takes in the scene. “Restrain him. I want every word recorded.”
As Kari secures the prisoner, I turn and run.
Back toward the Lodge. Back toward Lyanna.
The compound comes into view through the trees, and I see her immediately.
She’s standing on the Lodge porch, wrapped in one of my flannel shirts over her own clothes, arms crossed against the evening chill. Her honey-blonde hair catches the last light of sunset, and even from this distance, I can see the tension in her shoulders.
She heard the howl. She’s been waiting. Watching the treeline for any sign of what happened.
I slow my approach, letting her see me coming. Giving her time to process what she’s looking at.
Her breath catches visibly as I emerge from the shadows. I know what she’s seeing—a massive silver-gray wolf, easily twice the size of any natural animal, with amber eyes that burn with intelligence no beast should possess. Battle-ready. Blood on my muzzle.
I stop at the bottom of the porch steps, holding her gaze.
She descends without hesitation.
“You caught someone.” Her voice is steady, but her hands reach toward me before she seems to realize what she’s doing.
I hold still as her fingers sink into the fur at my neck. The contact sends warmth flooding through the bond.
“I’ve never been this close to you like this,” she says quietly. Her fingers trace through my ruff, across my shoulder, finding the raised scar on my flank from a border skirmish years ago. Clinical. Assessing. The healer cataloging damage even now.
Then her hand pauses over my ribs, feeling the hammer of my heart beneath fur and muscle.
“You’re still you,” she murmurs. “I can feel it.”
I press my head against her palm—brief, deliberate—then step back and let the shift take me. Bones reshape, fur recedes, and Ipull my human form back around me. Guardian training lets me manifest clothes from memory as the shift completes.
I catch her hands in mine, still feeling the ghost of her touch in my fur.
“They’ve been watching us,” I say, my voice rough from the shift. “Faelan’s people. The spy I caught—he’s been documenting everything. Our relationship, our movements, our bond.”
Her face pales, but her grip on my hands tightens. “How much do they know?”
“Enough.” I pull her closer, wrapping my arms around her like I can physically shield her from the implications. “They know what we are to each other. They’ve been reporting back for weeks.”
She’s silent for a moment, processing. Then she looks up at me with those fierce emerald eyes, and I see the healer who faced down a deadly contamination, the diplomat who navigates impossible politics, the woman who chose me despite every obstacle.
