3
WREN
The dormitory smelledwrong.
That was the first thought as I lugged my suitcase up three flights of stairs to the tertiary residential wing. It smelled like industrial bleach, stale popcorn, old textbooks, and the chaotic hum of a hundred different magical signatures living in too-close proximity.
In a Northern Pack house, everything was scent-marked. The alpha-beta-omega hierarchy was woven into the building itself, a biological caste system you breathed in with every step. You always knew where you stood.
Here, the air was just air. A dizzying absence of structure. To an omega bred for compliance, the sheer lack of a clear alpha presence wasn't freeing. It was terrifying. Standing at the edge of a cliff in pitch darkness.
I stopped in the hallway in front of room 314, fingers tight around my suitcase handle. My chest was burning, a dull throb beneath my turtleneck.
I had requested a single room on my application. My father had revoked it twenty minutes after submission, switching me to a standard double.
"Solitude breeds neurosis, Wren,"Eleanor had said over the phone when I begged to have it reinstated."You are going to Aldridge to disappear, not to become a hermit. Learn to function in mixed society. We will not fund a private suite for you to wallow. Learn to adapt, or don't bother calling home."
I swallowed the familiar metallic taste of anxiety, reached into my pocket for the keycard the RA had handed me downstairs with a bored sigh, and pressed it to the sensor.
The lock clicked.
I pushed the door open, bracing myself — expecting a wall of supernatural energy from a dominant roommate who would instantly scent my broken tether.
Instead, I got upbeat pop music and cheap jasmine perfume.
The room was a standard cinderblock double: two narrow twin beds, two scarred oak desks, a small kitchenette in the corner. But one entire half had already been claimed. A bright pink faux-fur blanket covered the left bed, fairy lights were being duct-taped around the window frame in a tangled web, and a dozen framed photos were arranged on the desk.
Standing on top of the desk, barefoot and stretching toward the ceiling with tape in her teeth, was a girl with dark brown curls and frantic energy.
I stopped dead. I pushed my senses past the jasmine, looking for a read on her.
Nothing. No magic signature. No heavy shifter scent, no crackle of a witch's aura. No predator in the room at all.
She was human.
My brain stuttered. I had never been alone in a room with a human. The Northern Dynasties kept strict separation — humans were business partners in corporate offices, service staff on the estates, political pawns. Not peers. Not roommates.
The girl spun around and nearly lost her balance, flailing as she spotted me.
"Oh! Hey!" She spat the tape out and jumped off the desk with an uncoordinated thud that made me brace instinctively. Shifters landed silently. Humans did not.
"You must be Wren!" She was already moving toward me, hand extended. "I'm Chloe. I claimed the side with the natural light — I hope that's okay. The RA said first-come, first-served. If you really care about the window, we can rock-paper-scissors, but I warn you, I grew up with three brothers and I play dirty."
I stared at her extended hand.
In shifter culture, introductions were a ritualized dance of power dynamics and scent-testing. You didn't just thrust your hand out without establishing rank. If I'd done this to Trent's father, I'd have been forced to my knees for the disrespect.
But Chloe wasn't a shifter. She didn't care about pedigree or pack standing or the fact that my aura felt like a dying ember. She was a girl saying hello to her new roommate.
"The other side is fine," I said softly, and took her hand.
Her grip was firm, her skin warm and devoid of magic. It was jarring in a way I hadn't expected.
"Awesome." Chloe beamed — a genuine smile with a slight gap between her front teeth. She turned back to her lights. "I was honestly so worried they'd pair me with someone intense. Last year, my roommate was a botanical nymph who kept growing poison ivy through our plumbing. Constant hives. What's your major? I'm investigative journalism. Hence the aggressive need for good light — most of my coursework involves staying up until 4 AM transcribing interviews with politicians who think they're off the record."
"History," I said, the lie sliding out from pure habit.
It was the safe, useless major my mother had chosen three years ago — the perfect non-threatening degree for a future Alpha's mate who was never expected to work.
