Liora's shoulders ached from the weight of the woman leaning against her.
The road to Fort Dalen sloped gently now, a narrow vein of dirt winding through low hills stitched with thorn and grass. The sun had slipped past its peak, casting long shadows that danced along the trail. Each step was slower than the last—more drag than stride—and still Veyra Halvarin pressed on, half-conscious but iron-willed, her breath hot and shallow against Liora's shoulder.
She'd wrapped the worst of the wounds with linen and sap paste, doing what she could with trembling hands and limited supplies. It wasn't enough. The bleeding had slowed, but it hadn't stopped. The gash along Veyra's ribs wept through the fabric like a mouth too proud to scream.
Liora gritted her teeth and shifted her grip.
"You're heavier than you look," she muttered.
Veyra gave a breathy sound that might've been a laugh—or a wince. "Armor," she rasped. "Try hauling it… while stabbed."
"Try hauling you while you complain about it," Liora shot back, too tired to censor her tongue. Her voice held no real malice, only the dry bite of exhaustion. She adjusted the scarf around her neck—tight, too tight—and felt the faint rattle of the compass beneath it. She reminded herself not to breathe too deep. Not too fast.
She glanced sideways at the Alpha slumped against her. Veyra's face was pale beneath the smears of blood and dust, her war-hardened features softened only by the edges of pain. Her eyes—storm-grey and half-lidded—kept fluttering open, stubborn even now.
A part of Liora almost admired it.
Another part—the careful, guarded part—wanted to run.
This was the Lion's Heir. She should have left her.
But she hadn't.
The road stretched on, but Liora's mind drifted—backward, to a moment not long past, yet already weighted with consequence.
(The previous night)
It had been sometime after dusk when Veyra first stirred. Liora had dragged her into a thicket off the roadside, out of sight, and started a small smokeless fire. Just enough warmth to keep the chill from killing them both. She'd set about cleaning the wounds, tearing one of her spare tunics into strips, mixing what herbs she had into a salve her mother had once taught her—before the collars, before the silences.
She hadn't expected the Alpha to wake so soon.
One moment, the world was still.
The next, a knife was pressed to her throat.
Or rather, the jagged shard of a broken sword.
Veyra's hand trembled with the effort, but her grip was sure. Her eyes, dark with pain and fever, locked on Liora's with a clarity that cut sharper than any blade.
"Where am I?" she growled, voice a rasp of iron and instinct. "Who sent you?"
Liora hadn't flinched. Her heart had kicked like a startled hare, but her body stayed still—every inch of her trained for this.
"I found you bleeding into the grass," she said calmly, eyes narrowing. "If I meant to kill you, you'd already be dead. Try logic."
A flicker passed through Veyra's gaze—recognition, or doubt. Her arm wavered. The shard clattered to the dirt between them.
Silence followed. Just breath. Just firelight.
Liora had leaned back slowly, brushing strands of hair from her face, the copper-pink catching the flicker of flame.
"You're not safe out here," Veyra murmured after a moment, as if she were the one offering protection. "There are worse things than dying soldiers."
"I know," Liora said, quietly.
Veyra studied her again. Something in her expression shifted—not soft, not grateful, but… assessing. She looked at Liora the way soldiers looked at terrain. Like she was trying to measure it. Understand it. Use it.
But Liora knew how to be unremarkable.
She'd let her voice stay flat. Her scent hidden. Her name, unspoken.
And after a long moment, the Lion's Heir laid back down with a grunt, eyes fluttering shut.
The fire crackled low, throwing soft shadows against the brush. Crickets had started to stir beyond the thicket, but Liora barely noticed. Her focus was on the rise and fall of Veyra's chest, the way her breathing hitched now and then, as if her body couldn't quite decide if it wanted to fight or fail.
Liora rinsed her hands in a bowl of cool water and wrung out a cloth, then moved to Veyra's side again. The Alpha's cloak had been peeled back, her tunic cut open along one side. The wound—angry and red-edged—still oozed in places.
She pressed the cloth gently to it.
Veyra hissed through her teeth.
"I said I'd help you," Liora murmured. "Not that it wouldn't hurt."
Veyra didn't answer, but her fingers clenched the earth beside her. Her skin was warm to the touch—too warm. The fever had begun to set in.
Liora worked quickly, applying a fresh layer of salve, then rewrapping the bandage. When she tied the last knot, she sat back on her heels, brushing a strand of windblown hair from her cheek.
"You could've died," she said softly.
"I didn't."
"You still might."
Veyra opened her eyes at that. Even fevered, they were sharp. "You speak plainly."
"I've found it saves time."
Another beat of silence passed, filled with the faint chorus of the night. Liora reached for her scarf and adjusted it, the movement practiced, casual—but her pulse skittered under her skin.
She could feel Veyra watching her.
"Your name," the Alpha said at last.
Liora hesitated. "Does it matter?"
"It will."
A challenge, maybe. Or a promise. Liora couldn't tell.
She looked into those storm-grey eyes—fevered, yes, but lucid now. Alert. Too alert. Veyra Halvarin wasn't just any Alpha; she was trained. Crown-born. Tempered in court and battlefield alike. Even wounded, she saw everything.
And if she got a whiff of what Liora really was…
"I'm just a traveler," Liora said instead, not unkindly. "Call me whatever you like."
A half-smile tugged at Veyra's lips, humor laced with pain. "Mysterious and stubborn. Typical."
Liora arched a brow. "Typical of what?"
"Someone hiding something."
That earned a pause.
Then, instead of bristling or deflecting, Liora leaned forward and whispered, "Good. Then I'm doing it right."
To her surprise, Veyra laughed. A real one, low and rough and almost startled.
Then she winced and muttered, "Don't make me laugh. It hurts like hell."
Liora allowed herself the ghost of a smile—brief, crooked, and gone as quickly as it came. She tucked the salve back into her satchel and banked the fire low.
"You need rest," she said, her voice softening despite herself.
Veyra didn't argue this time.
She only turned her head and murmured, already fading into sleep again, "You smell like wild honey and old smoke… strange…"
Liora froze.
But the Alpha didn't stir again.
She was already dreaming.
And Liora sat in silence beside her, heart thudding against the edge of a truth she couldn't afford to let slip.
(Present)
The road narrowed through a stretch of low stone ridges, their jagged silhouettes casting long shadows as the sun dipped westward. Liora walked ahead, her gaze flicking between the path and the dry underbrush, where thorns crept like hungry fingers over the rocks. Behind her, the sound of Veyra's boots scraping against uneven ground kept time with the soft clink of her sword at her side.
They hadn't spoken in over an hour.
Liora liked it better that way.
Not that the silence was easy. It was the kind that buzzed at the back of her skull—ripe with words unsaid and tension tightly coiled beneath it. She didn't trust Veyra's quiet. Not yet. It was the silence of someone used to command—someone measuring everything, calculating behind stillness.
And though Veyra limped, her posture remained maddeningly straight. Even her shadow refused to stoop.
"She's going to push herself straight into the ground," Liora muttered under her breath—just loud enough to vent, not loud enough to be heard.
Except, apparently, she was.
"I heard that," came Veyra's dry voice.
Liora didn't turn. "Good. Maybe you'll slow down before your leg splits open again."
"It won't," Veyra said, though the edge in her voice had dulled. "You stitched it well enough."
"I stitched it in the dark with rusted hooks and half my water gone. You're welcome."
A pause. Then, to Liora's surprise, a faint exhale that might've been a laugh. Or maybe a sigh. Hard to tell with Veyra—not yet. Not what was real. Not what was armor.
The trees ahead thinned, replaced by scrub grass and clusters of low, bone-colored stones. There was no real trail anymore—just the ghost of one, winding northwest through the open rise.
Liora slowed, lifting a hand instinctively.
Veyra caught up beside her, brow furrowed. "What is it?"
"Quiet," Liora murmured, already crouching low.
The wind had shifted. Beneath the dry rustle of brush, something moved. Not the scattered stir of wildlife. Heavier. Deliberate.
A snort.
Hooves.
Liora's heart jolted.
"There," she said, pointing. "Between those stones."
A shape emerged in the underbrush—dark, broad-shouldered, with reins dragging along the ground. Its coat was nearly black beneath a crust of dried mud. One ear twitched, catching their presence, but the beast didn't bolt.
Veyra stepped forward before Liora could stop her. Limping, but focused.
"Careful," Liora warned.
"She won't hurt me."
The horse shifted again, eyes wide but not panicked.
"That's Neris," Veyra breathed.
"Yours?" Liora asked.
"She was. She was with me when…" Her jaw clenched. "When it happened."
Liora studied the animal now—close enough to see the dried blood on one flank, the saddle shifted and half-unbuckled, leather scratched and worn from a fall or flight.
"She followed you?" Liora asked more softly.
"She's trained for it," Veyra murmured. Her hand was already outstretched.
The horse stepped forward and pressed its nose gently into her palm.
Liora watched them. For all the cold steel Veyra wrapped herself in, there was something raw in her eyes now. Not weakness—something older than that. Relief, maybe. Recognition.
Veyra ran her hand down the mare's neck, fingers moving with the kind of care that had nothing to do with show and everything to do with memory. Neris leaned into the touch, one ear flicking forward, then back, as if listening to the words Veyra wasn't saying.
"She saved me once already," Veyra murmured, not looking away. "Bolted during the ambush. I thought she'd been cut down."
Liora hovered at the edge of the moment, feeling like an intruder. Still, her eyes tracked every movement—measured, wary. "Looks like she found your trail again."
"She always could," Veyra said, voice quieter now.
A pause.
Then she turned, gesturing toward the loose saddle and torn girth strap. "She'll carry one of us, but not both. Not in this state."
Liora looked between Veyra's bandaged leg and the rising slope of terrain ahead. "You need the rest more than I do."
"I'll walk."
"You'll fall."
"I won't."
Liora folded her arms, eyes narrowed. "You're proud. I get it. But I'd rather not drag your royal corpse to the nearest fort."
Veyra gave her a flat look. "You say that like it's not your plan already."
Liora flinched, just slightly—but enough.
Veyra caught it.
Liora's mouth pressed into a hard line. She bent to check the saddle instead, not answering, hands brisk and practiced. She could feel Veyra watching her, that sharp, assessing gaze again—the kind that saw too much and gave away too little.
"I'm not delivering you like a package," Liora said finally, not quite looking up. "I'm getting you somewhere safe. That's all."
"And then?"
"I disappear."
"Where?"
Liora's hands stilled. "Somewhere freer than this."
The wind picked up. It carried dust over the stones and the faint smell of dried blood, old leather, and the earth warming in the late sun. Neris shifted again, restless beneath the weight of quiet things.
"You know," Veyra said, "most people would have left me in that ditch."
"Maybe I'm not like most people."
"No," Veyra said. "You aren't."
It wasn't a compliment. It wasn't an accusation, either. Just truth—hung in the air between them like a blade set on a table, waiting to be named.
Liora tightened the strap with a soft grunt. "We should make camp soon. There's an old waystation about an hour out if the map in my head's still good."
"Then we'll ride until then," Veyra said, shifting her weight slowly. She grimaced, but didn't complain as she climbed into the saddle with practiced ease.
She held out a hand, not for help—but as a gesture of acknowledgment.
Liora didn't take it.
Instead, she turned on her heel and started walking.
"Try not to fall off," she called over her shoulder. "I don't have the patience to catch you again."
Veyra smirked. It was slight, but real.
Neris snorted and followed Liora's pace without command, a quiet rhythm of hoofbeats joining the crunch of boots in dust.
The sun continued its descent, and the road ahead narrowed into silence again.
——
Dusk peeled the color from the world, turning the hills to ghosts and the sky to smoldering ash.
Liora crouched beside the fire she'd coaxed from flint and kindling, shielding the flame with her body as the wind began to stir. It wasn't much—just a shallow glow tucked between a ring of stones—but it was enough to warm her hands and keep the shadows at bay. The air had cooled fast. Night was approaching, and with it, the quiet hum of a thousand unseen things in the grass.
She could feel Veyra's presence nearby, a constant pressure at the edge of awareness. Even when the woman didn't speak, she was hard to ignore.
The Alpha sat a few paces away, one leg outstretched, the other pulled in slightly, arm draped over her knee. Her bandages were clean—Liora had seen to that before setting the fire—but the stiffness in her movements betrayed a lingering ache. The wound was healing, if slowly. But it was the kind of wound that had a memory, the kind that whispered each time you turned wrong or breathed too deep.
"I didn't thank you," Veyra said at last, her voice low and steady, eyes fixed on the fire. The flames painted bronze over her cheeks, catching the sharp line of her jaw.
Liora didn't look up from the small tin pot she was heating. "I didn't ask for thanks."
"No. You didn't." A pause. "But you've risked more than you let on."
The silence that followed wasn't empty—it was thick with unsaid things. Liora stirred the water, watching steam begin to rise. She didn't respond. She couldn't.
Veyra shifted slightly, the gravel under her boot grinding as she leaned forward, elbows to her thighs. "It's strange," she murmured, "how the scent of fire and dust can feel more familiar than court velvet and incense."
Liora glanced up at that, blinking.
"I grew up in the palace," Veyra continued, still not meeting her eyes. "People forget that palaces have their own kind of dirt. They hide it behind silk and wine and ceremony, but it's there—under the polish. The politics rot slower, that's all."
Liora said nothing, but her interest sharpened. The heir was speaking like someone who no longer trusted the floor beneath her feet.
"Before the attack," Veyra said, "the High Council was reviewing three separate petitions for Omega Regulation Reform. That's what they called it. 'Reform.'" She spat the word like it tasted wrong. "But it wasn't reform. It was a gilded leash. Noble houses proposing deeper control under the guise of protection. Select breeding, controlled travel, loyalty testing. All in the name of 'ensuring purity and preventing instability.'"
Liora's stomach twisted. She stared at the pot, her hand still.
"I spoke against it," Veyra said. "Publicly. Strongly. I told them no free soul should be catalogued like livestock. That scent is sacred, yes—but not an excuse to shackle. They smiled. Took notes. Then the next week, someone slit my guard captain's throat and tried to finish the job with me."
Now Liora did look up.
The fire crackled softly between them. Veyra's eyes were hard, but not cruel. Not now. They were full of that same storm Liora had seen when she'd first found her bleeding in the ditch—grey, seared with memory.
"You think it was someone from the council?" Liora asked carefully.
"I think the kingdom's full of people who want a world where Omegas are silent and Alphas rule with unquestioned hunger," Veyra replied. "And I think I made that dream harder to reach."
Liora swallowed, throat tight.
There was a long pause. The sky deepened into ink above them, the stars flickering into place like old secrets daring to be seen. The only sounds were the distant chirp of crickets and the whisper of the wind through dry reeds.
"You're not what I expected," Liora said, voice soft. "From someone with your name."
Veyra huffed a breath, the closest thing to a laugh she'd managed all day. "Most people expect a sword with a crown attached."
Liora gave a faint smile—thin, but real. Then it faded. "What would've happened," she asked slowly, "if the reform had passed?"
Veyra turned to meet her eyes, and there was a shadow of truth behind her answer, heavy with implication. "People like you would disappear."
The words sat between them like iron. Not cruelly said. Just honest.
Liora looked back down into the fire.
She doesn't know, she thought. She doesn't know what I am.
And yet—part of her wondered. Had Veyra scented something already? Had she guessed? Or was this just a conversation—just a moment—where, for once, someone spoke like Omegas mattered?
The suppressant still held.
But the day was thinning.
And if the heir remembered her scent, if the wind shifted wrong, if her voice wavered too sweetly—
She pushed the thought down, deep into the belly of her fear.
Instead, she reached into her satchel and fished out a tin of dried roots. "Drink this. It'll help with the stiffness. Not a cure, but something."
Veyra took it without comment. Their fingers brushed.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
And the fire burned on.
The fire had died to embers by the time Liora moved.
Veyra was asleep—curled slightly on her side, wrapped in the threadbare blanket Liora had insisted she take. Her breathing was slow, steady. There was a slight furrow in her brow even in sleep, as if the weight of a crown she no longer wore still pressed down behind her eyes.
Liora stood silently, her movements precise. She left her satchel in place but slipped the coin purse from within it, tucking it close against her ribs beneath her cloak. Every step away from the camp was measured—careful not to disturb the dried grass or shift loose stones. She didn't look back.
The road was ink-dark and nearly silent. The moon sat low, shrouded behind a thin gauze of cloud, casting only a silver sheen on the edges of the earth. The wind carried the smell of dust and pine. A night for secrets.
She knew this path.
Roughly a quarter mile back along the ridge, the old hollow opened beside the road like a mouth—half-covered by overgrowth, easy to miss unless you were looking for it. She had passed through it seasons ago, before the frost set in. A tiny waystation. Not even a town, really. Just a ring of caravan-worn tents, a single permanent stall bolted under a crooked awning, and a woman who sold remedies from under a leatherbound crate. Most of it was dried junk. But not all.
Suppressants, if you knew how to ask. If you had the coin.
By the time the hollow came into view, the quiet had deepened. A few fires still burned among the scattered tents, throwing orange light against linen walls. Liora kept her hood low, walking with purpose but not haste—one of the thousand tricks of a traveler who didn't want to be noticed.
The vendor was there, same as before. A wiry Beta woman with a braid down to her hip and a single gold hoop through one ear, sitting cross-legged beside her stall and smoking something acrid. Her eyes flicked up as Liora approached but didn't narrow. She didn't smile either.
"Late hour," she said without interest. "You come for nightshade or silence?"
Liora's fingers brushed her pouch, then slid a single silver crown onto the worn wood of the counter. "The white-labeled kind," she murmured. "Same as last time. Two weeks' worth."
The woman tapped ash from her pipe, then nodded and turned to rummage under the crate. Her movements were unhurried, but precise. After a moment, she slid a small waxed pouch across the surface—plain, unmarked.
"This'll hold you steady," she said, finally meeting Liora's eyes. "But it's not a mask forever, girl."
Liora froze. Just briefly. Then she nodded, took the pouch, and tucked it into her belt.
"I'm not trying to wear it forever," she said.
A pause.
Then, softer, "Just long enough."
The woman gave a faint grunt—approval or warning, it was hard to tell—and returned to her pipe without another word.
Liora stepped away, her chest tighter than before. The pouch felt heavier than it should. Her footsteps whispered over packed dirt as she made her way back into the dark, leaving behind the flickering tent and the smell of smoke and oil.
When she reached the camp again, Veyra had not stirred.
Liora slipped down beside the fire's dying glow, quiet as breath, and unwrapped her cloak. The suppressant pouch rested beneath it, hidden between fabric folds. She placed it into her satchel without a sound.
For a long while, she simply sat there, knees drawn to her chest, eyes on the horizon.
The moon had risen higher now—barely clearing the trees—and for a moment its light caught in the lines of Veyra's face, brushing her cheek like a lover's hand.
Liora looked away.
Tomorrow would come.