My hands were trembling as I dug my phone out. The screen lit in my palm like a tiny sunrise. I didn't know how long he'd be able to talk; time zones and schedules swallowed minutes.
"Jae," I said when he picked up. His voice crackled into my ear, close and immediate, like a hand at my back.
"Dwyn." He breathed my name like a spell. "How are you—are you okay?"
"I'm fine," I said, then squeezed my eyes shut because the words started to leak. "They want me to be appointed in two days."
There was a long intake of breath from the other end. "What? You—Dwyn, are you sure? That's huge. I mean—wow. You'd be good. You're—Alpha material, honestly. You're fierce and fair and beautiful and—" His voice stuttered into a laugh that had relief and worry braided together. "I'm sorry. I'm babbling. I'm not there. I wish I was there."
"You're here," I said. "I can feel you even when you're not."
A soft chuckle, and then his voice dropped, the way it did when he wanted to be close. "You're scaring me, you know that? Running into the lion's den and telling me after you've already agreed."
"Someone has to," I said. "Cecil's already at the clinic, the triplets slept but they're back home with her. I had to say yes. There's no time for—" My throat closed. "There's no time to be sentimental. I need you to be my calm."
"I'll be your calm," he promised, the sound of his determination in each word. "I'll be your idiot anchor. I'm calling the manager in the morning, see if I can shift practice. If I can—if I can get a day—"
"Jae," I cut in. Soft but sharp. "No. We've already talked about this, Trojan can't lose you. Not for this. They barely let you be. You promised."
"I promised to be there for you, too." He sounded wounded and tender at once. "Don't make me choose."
"You shouldn't have to." I let out a laugh that turned into a sniff. "Listen to me being unreasonable. You stay. You do your thing. Hold down what you can there and—" I paused, thinking of a million tiny things he could do to be close despite the miles—texting me lyrics of songs, sending photos of the vending machine he was about to get tea from, calling me at midnight like a ridiculous person who doesn't care about time zones. "Promise me you'll come the first second your company lets you."
The silence on his line was a held breath. "I promise," he said at last. "I'll come the second they say yes. I'll be there, Dwyn. I won't let you carry it alone."
"Okay." My chest unclenched a fraction. Dawn pressed against my ribs like a reassuring hand. He sounded like he meant it like oxygen. "Tell me when you're to be sworn in properly. I want to hear the words. I want to be there." He chuckled, then admitted softer, "And I want to call you back every hour even if you snap at me for it."
"Of course," I said. "I'll snap, and then I'll try to make you soondae on your return."
He made a ridiculous, grumbling noise that I could practically see. "Okay, I'll take the soondae bribe. But you'd better not be eaten away with worry. Call me at every stupid, inconvenient hour. Send me pictures of everything, your sisters, your mom, your room. Describe everything. I want the boring details."
"Deal," I said, smiling despite the weight. "And Jae?"
"Yeah?"
"Don't forget—no ghosting."
"No ghosting," he promised. "Ever. Scout's honor. We're mates now; I have privileges and penalties."
"Good." I pressed the phone to my chest for a second, feeling him there. "I need to go now."
"I'll be with you," he said.
"You're already with me," I whispered.
I slid the phone back into my pocket, standing a little taller.
Dawn was a restless heat under my ribs, pacing the way a storm does behind a closed window: constant, impatient, impossible to ignore. You were born for this, she whispered—this name, this blood.
Doesn't make it easier, I muttered back, tugging my jacket tighter as if fabric could be armor. The wind off the training fields bit at my cheeks and carried the tang of sweat, wolves, and the faint, metallic tang of the armory. The market stalls were full of new greens, the bakers pushed out loaves that smelled like heaven—but everything felt frayed at the edges tonight, like a page in a book.
Heads lifted as I walked. Some bowed, short and familiar. Others offered that formal nod I hadn't learned to like— I hated it. I wanted to be Dwyn, not the idea of Dwyn.
And then I saw her.
She cut across the lane with the sort of careful haste only someone with fear in their pockets carries. Slim, dark hair in a messy knot, shoulders hunched like she wasn't used to standing tall, eyes that found mine and flinched away like they had been burned.
Something sparked in my chest—recognition. I've seen her before: hovering near Kael when we were younger, the kind of girl who smiles when Kael as much as breathes. A ghost from a pyre I had been forced to watch from the other side of a fence. The sight of her made my stomach twist, a knot of old shame and small, fierce anger.
She hesitated, then stepped into my path. Her hands were doing that thing people do when they're trying to keep their fingers from betraying them—wringing, twisting. Her lips trembled as if forming a name she hadn't been allowed to speak out loud.
"Dwyn," she said, voice low, every syllable like a thread someone had pulled too tight.
I stopped. Very few omegas ever called me that to my face. They bowed, They rarely used the sound of my actual name unless there was something private in it. My skin prickled.
"Yes?" I managed. My voice came out steadier than I felt.
Her throat bobbed. "I—I need to tell you something. About Mera. About—"
She broke off like someone had cut the sentence in half.
Then a sound tore through the lane—three high, ecstatic shrieks, the exact noise of someone who has been holding in too much excitement to their ribs for too long.
"DWYYYYYN!" The names came plated on breath and elbows and sparkly ponytails.
Liora, Viora, and Fiora barreled into me like summer storms. They were nine —little whirlwinds in matching ponytails who still believed the world could be fixed with a hug and shared candy. Their faces were flushed with the sort of joy that makes the rest of your troubles look ridiculous for a blessed, shining second.
"Dwyn! Dwyn! Dwyn!" Liora crowed, hauling my hand.
My breath cracked in half a smile. The ocean of worry I'd been wading through receded by inches under the force of their gravity. I scooped them up because I am still their harbor.
"Careful," I told them, pressing kisses to the tops of their heads. "You'll knock me over one of these days."
"But you're back!" Viora announced, bouncing on her toes. "We told everyone at school, but they didn't believe us. Omega Harley said she thought you had been exiled! Oh Gracie hi."
"Hi Gracie, anyways mom said—" Fiora began, then cut herself off with a conspiratorial grin. "—she said there would be soup if we came to get you. Extra chicken and sausages. Now come on, hurry!"
They tugged me toward home with the urgency only children can manufacture. Warmth pooled in my chest at the thought of my little sisters clustered around the kitchen table. For a heartbeat I let myself fall into that little island of normal.
Then I glanced back.
The omega was gone.
Shadows had swallowed the space she'd occupied—a gap in the market lane where her feet had been—and the memory of her voice hanging like a loose thread. I had the barbaric, helpless urge to wrench that thread and unravel whatever it led to. Instead, I tightened my hold on the triplets and let my face set into something familiar for the road: tired, amused, larger than panic.
"Dwyn?" Liora peered up at me, all earnest folds and earnest questions. "You... you okay? You look like you've been crying."
I blinked. The moisture at my lashes was real; grief had been a steady companion these last twenty-four hours. But I smoothed it away. "Yeah," I lied before I could flinch. "I'm fine. Just... a lot. Let's go home. I'll tell you all about Seoul and my group and about my mate, Jaerin."
Their delight was a balm. They chattered the whole way—about schoolyard conspiracies, about which teacher had the best cookies. Their small lives, so stubbornly ordinary, pulled me forward like a promise.
Dawn settled then, a low, watchful presence under my ribs. Duskthorn—my father—was weak and the whole pack smelled like a yawning wound; Dawn didn't like the way Duskthorn's scent thinned. She nudged, impatient. Jaerin—ripened in my thoughts like a half-remembered melody. I missed the way he smiles and looks at me. We finally agreed to let the mate bond hold but now I missed him.
We walked home with the triplets chattering at my feet, their shadows long in the late afternoon sun. I should have chased after the omega, demanded answers, a name or some clue to hang on to. Part of me wanted to pull every person in the lane into the circle and shake out the truth from them.
But another, wiser part of me—practical, tired—knows the theater of timing. The pack needed me steady. My sisters needed me whole. My father—if he could hear me—needed me alive and sharp.
Still, a cold finger of thought kept tapping at the base of my skull: she wanted to tell me something. Someone had run to find me. The gap where she stood wouldn't stay empty. It was a stitch pulled loose on a garment—if I ignored it, the whole seam would give.
"Dwyn?" Liora's small voice pulled me back. She was studying me like a little surgeon, brow furrowed. "Are you sure you're okay?"
I squatted down until my face was level with theirs. Up close, the triplets' eyes were all bright and earnest and wholly incapable of pretense. Their hands were clumsy as they fumbled with the hem of my jacket, searching for comfort.
"I'm okay," I said, and this time it felt more honest. "I'm home. That's what matters."
They smiled like I'd given them the only answer that mattered, and we crossed the lane toward the cottages where our stories lived in the smell of washing and the sound of someone chopping onions.
But the omega's words—Mera—threaded through every laugh. Dawn noticed the tremor, too. We would not let whatever she had to say be a whisper that only the wind could hear. When the house closed its door behind us and the triplets tumbled toward hot soup and safe laps, I let myself think about Mera only for a moment. I wonder how she's doing.
Whatever waited in the shadows—whatever small, fierce truth the omega had been clutching to her chest—I would not let it unravel my pack.