Rise of the Alpha
The dagger felt warm in her hand. It had tasted too much blood now to be cold. It pulsed, faintly, as if eager, ready.
Outside, the night wrapped the stronghold in thick silence. No wind. No movement. Just the heavy hush of fate holding its breath.
Liora stood at the door to the Alpha's chambers. Tonight, she had planned to end it. Tonight, there would be no child calling out. No elder whispering warnings. No best friend to pull her back.
But there she was.
"Don't," Nyssa whispered.
Liora turned. The healer stood behind her, barefoot in the cold corridor, cloak hastily thrown over her shoulders, her face pale and determined.
"You shouldn't be here," Liora said flatly.
"And yet I am. Because I knew you'd try this."
Nyssa stepped forward, slowly, like she might spook a wounded animal.
"Why do you want to kill him, Liora? What do you think this will fix?"
"He took everything from me."
"And now you've taken everything back," Nyssa said, voice rising. "The pack follows you. He sleeps beside you. You wear the power like skin. You've won. Why throw it all away for one more drop of blood?"
Liora looked at the dagger. It still pulsed, hungry.
"Because it was never enough," she whispered.
Nyssa's eyes softened. "Then it never will be. That's how revenge works. You feed it, and it keeps starving. But look at you.
You've become what he feared. You've become more than him. Isn't that enough?"
Silence stretched between them. Liora's hand trembled.
Inside the room, Gonzalo shifted in his sleep, muttering her name.
Nyssa stepped closer. "Let it go, Liora. Just this once. Let him live."
The dagger lowered. A breath escaped Liora's lips, shaky, reluctant, exhausted.
She turned away from the door.
"I don't forgive him," she said.
"You don't have to."
They walked away together. Quiet. Heavy with the weight of what didn't happen.
By dawn, the stronghold stirred. Whispers spread, rumors of sounds in the night, a shadow at the Alpha's door. But nothing came of it. Gonzalo rose as usual, unaware that fate had brushed past his throat and spared him.
Liora stood atop the cliffs that morning, the wind pulling at her cloak, the dagger now quiet at her belt. Nyssa stood beside her, arms crossed, watching the horizon.
"So what now?" Nyssa asked.
Liora didn't answer right away.
Below them, wolves gathered for the morning rites. The pack was hers, in all but name.
"We wait," Liora said.
Nyssa tilted her head. "For what?"
Liora's eyes were fixed on the tree line beyond the valley.
Because something was coming. She could feel it in her bones.
A scent on the wind. Faint. Familiar.
Impossible.
And yet...
Her pulse spiked.
Vanya.
But Liora had killed her. She'd made sure of it. She'd burned the body. She'd buried it with curses.
So why did the wind carry that scent now? Why did the trees seem to whisper a name that should no longer exist?
Nyssa noticed the change in her.
"What is it?"
Liora's hand dropped to the dagger.
She didn't answer.
She couldn't.
Not yet.
Because maybe the dead don't stay dead. And maybe some ghosts come back not to haunt, but to burn it all down.