The training yard is alive with motion. Wolves circle. Alphas spar. Steel glints in the dawn sun.
Lyra walks through it, calm, deliberate. Every step is measured, but the council's suppression of the bond cannot contain what lies beneath.
Caelan feels her before she turns a corner. Not just presence—heat, pulse, desperation, desire—and something sharper: his wolf pressing him forward, warning him to claim her.
He grips the stone railing of the upper balcony, knuckles white, forcing himself to breathe. Not here. Not now.
But the bond doesn't care.
Lyra senses him, too. She smiles faintly, knowing how close she can get before he loses control. A subtle step to the left, her hair brushing the sunlight like a taunt.
And that's all it takes.
The bond flares violently, white-hot and uncontrollable. Caelan's body reacts before his mind can. His claws dig into the stone railing, muscles straining, teeth extending. The wolf screams beneath his skin.
Lyra freezes, pulse spiking, feeling it like a living force pressing against her chest.
Too much… too much…
The air thickens. Other wolves notice it—the tension, the smell of raw power, the almost-imperceptible shimmer of the bond. Whispers ripple through the yard:
"Did you see that?"
"He's… reacting to her."
"They're… bound."
The council's suppression falters against instinct.
Caelan's hand lifts—almost touching her, hovering just inches from her arm. The heat between them is suffocating. Every breath, every movement drags him closer.
"Step back," he growls, voice low, trembling with power and restraint.
"I could," Lyra says softly, deliberate, "but I want to see how far you'll go before you break."
The wolf inside him snaps at the restraint. The bond pulses so violently that it's almost painful, scorching the edges of his senses. His body reacts like fire in a cage—heart hammering, muscles taut, breath shallow.
Lyra tilts her head, daring him, testing his control. She knows.
The world narrows to her heartbeat. To the curve of her neck. To the faint scent of her fear and challenge.
One wrong movement and he will claim her. Publicly. Recklessly. Irrevocably.
And part of him wants to. The wolf wants it.
"Do you even know how much you want me?" she whispers.
He cannot answer. Not with words. His hands twitch. His jaw clenches. Pupils dilate. The near-claim—the thing that has haunted his nights and dreams—presses against him like gravity.
Someone moves nearby. A rival wolf, one of the council's spies, watches quietly from the shadows. Eyes glinting. Notes in hand. The scene is observed, and the danger spikes: if I break now, they'll know.
Caelan jerks back, struggling to separate himself from the bond, from her, from the wolf roaring beneath his skin. He leans against the stone railing, chest heaving.
Lyra takes a small step forward. Testing. Always testing.
"I'm not afraid," she says, though her pulse betrays her. "Not of you. Not yet."
The wolf snarls, frustration writhing through him. He's desperate. Obsessive. And completely exposed.
Caelan turns sharply and strides away before he shatters restraint. His shadow stretches long across the yard. The whispers follow him—the Alpha is compromised.
Lyra exhales slowly, pulse racing. She knows two things:
The council just witnessed a dangerous edge of what connects them.
That edge is growing.
And neither of them will survive the next time the bond flares this strongly.