Kael’s POV

The gates loomed ahead. I shifted into a sprint. Boots striking stone. The city guards saw me coming and moved aside without question. They knew better than to stop their Alpha.

“Mira!” I called. She froze. Slowly, she turned. Her expression was unreadable. “You can’t leave like this,” I said. “I have to,” she answered. “You know I do.”

“No. You want to,” I replied. “That’s not the same.”

“I need space.”

“No, what you need is truth,” I cut in. “Running doesn’t solve this. We were something once. Are we really ending it in silence?” Her eyes flickered, hurt flashing like lightning. “You ended it, Kael. Not me.”

I stepped forward. “Then let me fix it.” Her breath hitched. “You think one apology erases everything?”

“No. But that didn’t seal the end. I’d rather fight for us, even if I bleed doing it.” A shadow moved behind the wall. Cyrus emerged with sharp eyes and tense steps, walking toward us like a verdict. “She already made her choice,” he said. “You don’t get to rewrite history now.”

“I’m not rewriting anything,” I said. “But I won’t let her go without a fight.” Mira looked between us. “Stop, both of you.” The bond between her and me stirred faintly. Cyrus felt it, too. I saw it in the way his jaw clenched. “I asked you once,” Cyrus said. “Now I’m asking again. Choose.”

“I didn’t come here to be forced,” she whispered. “You’re not being forced,” I said. “But this moment, it matters. You leave now, there’s no coming back.” Cyrus stepped beside her. “I won’t ask again.”

Her gaze snapped to mine. “I waited for you. Do you know that, Kael?”

“I know,” I said, voice low.

“I believed you’d fight for me. But I was alone. The bond broke, and so did I.”

“I broke,” I said. “I broke, too. I’m not asking for everything. Just a beginning.”

“Words,” Cyrus muttered. “Always too late.”

“No,” I said. “Just finally on time.”

Mira’s breath shook. “You want truth?”

She stepped between us. One hand reached for Cyrus. The other hung in the air near me. “I love both of you,” she said. “In different ways. But I can’t be split anymore.”

“Then choose,” Cyrus said. “Not tonight,” she replied. Cyrus cursed under his breath and stepped back. “You’re afraid.”

“Yes,” she said. “Because loving you both means hurting someone.” Silence. I stepped closer. “Then don’t choose. Not yet. Just stay.” “Stay and be watched? Judged?” Her voice cracked. “Every eye on me, weighing my steps, my gaze?”

“I’ll take the judgment,” I said. “Let them look at me.” Cyrus looked away. Mira turned, walking toward the forest instead of the city road. “Where are you going?” I asked.

“To breathe,” she said. “Alone.”

The trees swallowed Mira’s figure, but I didn’t chase her. Not this time. Instead, I walked a few paces off the road and sat beneath the oldest cedar tree, one whose roots had grown deep into the foundation of Blackridge long before I became Alpha. I closed my eyes. The earth was cold beneath me. Steady. It didn’t rush or tremble. I breathed with it, slow, deliberate.

For years, I’d answered everything with action. Orders. Battles. Calculated silence. But silence wasn’t peace. I followed it inward, stripping back layers of instinct, duty, and anger. What I found wasn’t power. It was pain. The pain of losing her. Of betraying my own heart to protect a title that felt more like a chain than a crown.

Images passed behind my eyes like ghost memories, Mira laughing in the rain, challenging me in the training ring, whispering my name like a secret. Then the silence after the rejection. The dull ache that never left. I had spent so long trying to convince myself I’d done the right thing for the pack that I’d forgotten the cost. Her absence wasn’t just a consequence; it was a wound I kept refusing to treat.

A twig snapped nearby. I didn’t move. The meditation hadn’t given me answers. Not forgiving. But open. And I was no longer chasing Mira, I was preparing to walk beside her, if she’d let me.

“I’ll follow,” Cyrus said. She turned sharply. “No. Both of you, stay.” We watched her vanish between the trees. The wind shifted. Cyrus faced me. “This isn’t over.”

“No,” I said. “It’s just started.” A howl split the night, hers. But it wasn’t a call. It was a warning.

The echo of Mira’s howl faded into the trees, but its meaning hung in the air, sharp, undeniable. She wasn’t calling us. She was drawing a line.

Cyrus tensed beside me. “She’s right, you know,” he said without looking at me. “We’ve both made this worse.”

“I didn’t ask for your insight,” I replied. He finally turned to me, calm and cold. “But you needed it.”

The forest welcomed me like a memory. Branches clawed at my fur, leaves crunching underpay. I didn’t follow her trail like a hunter. I followed it like a ghost.

She didn’t go far.

I found her by the stream, human again, knees drawn to her chest. Minutes passed. Then. “I hate that I still love you,” she said. I exhaled. “That makes two of us.” Mira’s voice cracked. “Why did you let it get this far?”

“I thought I was protecting you. From the Elders. From the war. From me.” She laughed bitterly. “I didn’t need protection. I needed you to believe in me.”

“I do now.”

“Now’s late.”

“I’ll take late,” I whispered. “If it’s still possible.” She looked at me then, eyes rimmed red. “It hurts.”

“I know.”

She leaned her head against my shoulder. Just once. Just long enough for both of us to remember the warmth we’d lost.

“I’m tired, Kael.”

“Then rest. I’ll watch.”

And for once, I meant it. No orders. No vows. Just presence. Because maybe that’s what she needed most. Not an answer. Just someone who stayed.