The world had learned to breathe again.
But Kael hadn't.
Every dawn came like a knife—gilded, beautiful, and cruel. It reminded him of her, of the light that had devoured her and left him behind. The wolves of the valley whispered her name when the wind moved through the trees. The rivers shimmered gold when touched by sunrise, as if the world itself still remembered the goddess who had chosen to stay.
And yet, Kael remained.
A shadow tethered to the ruins of devotion.
He had rebuilt the borderlands with his hands, stone by stone. The pack followed him still, though they whispered that their Alpha was half ghost, half storm. They said his eyes carried dawnlight, that he no longer slept because dreams would show him her face. They said the sun itself bowed when he walked beneath it.
They were right.
For she had never truly left.
The first time he heard her again, it was a whisper on the wind—a sound that wasn't quite a voice but carried her warmth, her cadence, her ache. Kael.
