Chapter Seven: Blood on the Snow

The first renegade lunged.

Adrian was faster. His massive wolf form crashed mid-jump, snapping jaws closing over the intruder's throat with a sickening crunch. Snow erupted red as the body thudded to the ground, life snuffed out even before it stopped moving.

I took a step back, my heart pounding, as three additional rogues emerged from the trees. Their snarls were harsh, famished. They weren't fighting for borders. They were hungry.

"Elena—run!" Adrian's voice bulldozed through my mind, not words but the very force of the mate bond, Alpha power coursing through me like a lash of a whip.

But I didn't run.

A second rogue launched itself at me, and reflex took over. My father had forbidden me from fighting, but years of secret training on the secret grounds of the Rivera compound had honed my reflexes. I pulled the silver blade from my boot and struck upward when the wolf ran at me. Metal bit through fur and flesh. The rogue howled, moving back, blood inky against the white.

Adrian's silver eyes flashed to me, blazing with equal amounts of fury and awe, as he smashed another attacker to the ground. Bones cracked beneath his weight.

The clearing erupted into pandemonium—snapping, snarling wolves, steaming blood in frozen air. I moved on instinct, dodging claws, striking where I might. My lungs were aflame, my cloak torn, but adrenaline was fire in my veins. I felt alive for the first time—not a pawn, not a daughter. A fighter.

And then there was silence.

The last bandit slipped beneath Adrian's teeth. The forest rested quietly again, except for the foul rhythm of our labored breathing and the snowflakes drifting down like tiny shrouds.

Adrian rolled onto his back, blood streaming down his bare chest, cuts raw across his arms. He was deadly, beautiful, and destructive all at once. His eyes locked with mine, feral with fury.

"You could have been killed," he growled, advancing on me. "I instructed you to run away!"

"I am not unarmed," I snapped, fighting to breathe. My knife still sparkled. My shaking hands still held it. "I won't stand here and let you die for me."

There was a moment of silence, thick with all that wasn't melancholy. His hand lifted, his calloused fingers tracing the line of my throat, his touch trembling with contained hunger.

“You’ll be the death of me,” he whispered.

My breath hitched. “Or the life of you.”

The bond thrummed between us, fierce and undeniable, pulling us closer, closer—until his forehead pressed against mine. For a heartbeat, there was no war, no packs, no blood. Only him. Only us.

Then a sound shattered it.

Voices. Distant, but approaching.

“Tracks—this way!”

My blood ran cold. My father's scouts. If they found us here—with renegade bodies, with Adrian's scent heavy in the snow—everything was over.

Adrian cursed, eyes flashing. He pulled on my wrist, tight. "Run. Now."

"I can't abandon you—"

"You have to." His voice was bitter steel. "If they see us together, it won't just be my blood that gets spilled. It'll be yours."

Boots crunched towards me. I had seconds.

With a last, burning look, I tore away from him, dashing into the woods, every stride splitting me in half.

Behind, the voices rose, laced with suspicion. "Blood—wolves—someone's been here."

I dared not look.

But I knew, as sure as the spark in my blood: they would find something. A body, a stench, a clue. And when they did, the secret that I carried in my breast like a second beat would no longer be mine to hide.