Baylin settled against the far wall, his posture deliberately relaxed but his eyes still watchful. Old habits. Ember sat on the bench, and he positioned himself between her and his former second—not because he expected a threat, but because the protective instinct was too deeply ingrained to ignore.
“So,” Baylin said. “The mountains.”
“The mountains.”
“All these years.” Baylin shook his head slowly. “I kept expecting you to come back. To challenge your brother for what was rightfully yours. When you didn’t…” He trailed off, something painful flickering in his amber eyes.
“I made my choice.”
“I know. I never understood it, but I respected it.” Baylin’s jaw tightened. “Which is more than I can say for what came after.”
The old familiar tension coiled in his chest. “What happened?”
“What do you think happened?” Baylin asked bitterly. “Your brother is weak, Rykan. He always was. Without you there to balance him, without your father’s guidance…” He spread his hands in a gesture of helpless frustration. “Lysara controls him completely. She and your stepmother have turned the pack into their personal plaything. Anyone who questioned them was driven out or worse.”
Lysara. The female who’d promised herself to him, but had spread her legs for his brother the moment it became clear which way the wind was blowing. He’d thought he was past the pain of her betrayal. He’d thought the years in the mountainsand the happiness he’d found with Ember had burned it out of him. But hearing her name now, spoken so casually, brought it all rushing back.
Ember’s hand found his, her fingers intertwining with his own. She said nothing, asked nothing, simply offered her presence as an anchor.
He clung to that grip.
“I stayed for three years,” Baylin continued. “Telling myself I could make a difference from the inside. That I could protect the ones who deserved protecting. But it was like trying to hold back a flood with my bare hands.” His scarred fingers curled into fists. “They pushed out the old guard one by one. Anyone who remembered what the pack used to be. Anyone who might have been loyal to you.”
“Why didn’t you leave sooner?”
“Because you asked me to stay.” Baylin’s eyes met his, raw and honest. “You asked me to protect them. I tried, Rykan. I tried until there was nothing left to protect.”
The guilt hit him harder than he’d expected. He’d walked away from the pack to prevent a war, but he’d left others to fight the battles he’d refused to face. Baylin had paid the price for his choice.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” Baylin’s voice softened slightly. “You did what you had to do. We all did. I just… couldn’t do it anymore.” He rolled his shoulders, working out tension that had accumulated over years of conflict. “So I left. Wandered. Tried to figure out what a Vultor does when he doesn’t have a pack anymore.”
“And what did you find?”
Baylin gave a hollow laugh. “That the world is very large and very cold when you’re alone in it. I’ve been drifting from settlement to settlement, taking whatever work I could find. Nothing that mattered. Nothing that lasted.” His gaze sharpened. “But you seem to have found something different.”
He looked at Ember—at the female who’d arrived in his territory half-dead and somehow become the center of his world.
“I wasn’t looking for it.”
“The best things rarely come when we’re looking.” Baylin studied them both, something thoughtful in his expression. “The last Alpha’s son, living in a human city with a human mate. I never would have predicted this ending for you.”
“It’s not an ending.”
“No?” Baylin raised an eyebrow. “What is it, then?”
He considered the question. Two weeks ago, he might have called it a willing surrender to a world that wasn’t his, for the sake of the woman he loved. But that wasn’t quite right, was it?
“A beginning,” he said finally. “Something new.”
Ember’s fingers tightened around his.
Baylin was silent for a long moment, his amber eyes unreadable. Then, slowly, he nodded.
“I’m glad. Truly. You deserved better than what they did to you.” His voice roughened. “We all did.”
The silence stretched between them, heavy with shared history and unspoken grief. Then Ember spoke, her voice soft but steady.
