Seraphine POV
The generals were arguing about troop placement when Kael walked in.
Seraphine didn't look up from the maps spread across the table. She was studying formations, calculating angles, trying to figure out how to maximize three hundred warriors against an army twice their size. The numbers were still brutal. Still nearly impossible.
But she was good at impossible.
One of the generals noticed Kael first and straightened. The Alpha gestured with one hand, a clear dismissal. Everyone out.
The generals exchanged confused looks but didn't argue. Rank had its advantages.
As they filed toward the door, Seraphine finally looked up. Kael was standing there with his expression raw and desperate like he'd been torn apart from the inside and was barely holding himself together.
Her heartbeat quickened against her will.
Kael locked the door behind the last general. The click of it echoed through the chamber like a warning.
Don't, Seraphine said before he could speak. Whatever you're about to do, don't.
Kael walked toward her like he was moving through water. Like every step took everything he had.
You need to hear this.
I don't need anything from you.
But her voice was shaking and they both knew it was a lie.
Kael stopped on the opposite side of the table from her. His dark eyes were burning with intensity that made her want to shift and run.
Marcus threatened to take you, he said quietly. Five years ago when your father died. He sent a message saying he'd make you captive. Use you as leverage. Break you to break the pack.
Seraphine's hands went numb.
So I rejected you publicly. Made you seem worthless. If he thought you didn't matter to me, you'd be safe. You'd be beneath his notice.
The words hit like physical blows.
No, Seraphine said. You're lying.
I'm not lying. I've never lied about this. I broke our bond trying to save your life.
She stood up so fast her chair fell backward. The anger she'd been carrying for five years was rising up inside her, threatening to drown her.
Your reasons don't matter, she said coldly. They don't matter because you never told me. You never asked me if I wanted to be saved. You just decided for both of us and broke everything.
Seraphine walked around the table toward the door. She couldn't be in the same room with him. Couldn't breathe the same air. The mate bond was pulling at her, making her want to believe him. Making her want to forgive him.
She couldn't forgive him.
They rejected each other five years ago, she said without turning around. Whatever you meant by it, whatever you thought you were doing, it's over. We're over. Now we have a war to focus on.
She reached for the door handle.
Kael moved faster.
His hand wrapped around her wrist gently. So gently that she could have pulled away without any effort. Could have twisted out of his grip. Could have shifted and destroyed him right there.
Instead she froze.
His touch was bringing back every memory she'd buried. Every moment when he used to touch her like she mattered. Like she was precious. Like she was the only thing in the world that made sense.
Her wolf whimpered inside her chest.
Kael didn't pull her closer. Just held her wrist like it was something fragile and irreplaceable. Like touching her was the most important thing he'd ever done.
I never stopped loving you, he whispered. Not once in five years. Not when I married Lydia. Not when I told myself you were dead. Not for one single moment.
Seraphine's breath caught.
Please believe that even if you hate me.
Then he let her go.
For a second she just stood there, her wrist burning where his hand had been. Her whole body screaming at her to turn around. To look at him. To let herself believe what he'd just said.
But belief was dangerous.
Belief meant five years of anger were built on a lie. Belief meant she'd hated him for loving her. Belief meant the survival she'd built might crumble because he was still hers and she was still his and the mate bond was singing now like it had never been broken at all.
Seraphine ran.
She didn't shift or fight or do anything controlled. She just ran out of the chamber like something was chasing her. Like the truth itself was a predator hunting her down.
She ran through corridors of the pack hall she used to call home. Ran past wolves who stared at her like they didn't understand what they were seeing. An Omega commanding. A rejected mate returning. A girl who should have been dead walking through their halls like a ghost given flesh.
She made it outside into the frozen night air and kept running.
Her legs carried her toward the border where her army was camped. Where Liv would be waiting. Where she could pretend she was still the warrior she'd become instead of the broken girl she'd always been inside.
But as she ran, his words kept following her.
I never stopped loving you.
Not once.
She could feel the truth of it burning through the mate bond like a brand. Could feel him still there in her chest where he'd always been. Could feel the rejection that was supposed to destroy them had only been a cage around love that refused to die.
Seraphine's hands were shaking so badly she could barely run.
She'd come back here for revenge. She'd come back to make him suffer. She'd come back planning to be the woman who'd learned to survive without him.
But she wasn't surviving.
She was drowning.
And the worst part was that he'd just thrown her a rope and she'd run away from it screaming.