(Remi’s POV)

Sleep didn’t come easily.

Every time I shut my eyes, the forest burned again.

Flames swallowing the trees. Screams that broke the night open. The smell of blood, ash, and betrayal twisting together until I couldn’t breathe.

I woke up drenched in sweat, sitting up before I even realized I was crying. My tent felt too small, the air too thick. I pressed a shaking hand to my mouth to muffle the sob that tore out of me.

It had been years, and still… it was like it happened yesterday.

Outside, dawn was only a whisper, the sky still painted in bruised shades of blue and violet. I slipped out quietly, wrapping a shawl around my shoulders.

The camp was half-asleep,guards at their posts, a few early risers tending to embers. Moon’s tent glowed faintly in the distance. I considered going to her but stopped.

I didn’t want comfort. I wanted control.

So I went to the river again. The one place that always reminded me I was still alive.

The water shimmered under the faint light. I knelt by the edge, splashing the cold stream against my face until my heartbeat slowed.

That’s when I heard it,voices.

Low, deliberate, coming from behind the blacksmith’s shed near the trees. I froze.

Atlas.

His voice was unmistakable,calm, deep, sharp as flint.

I edged closer, keeping to the shadows.

“…nothing in the registry?”

Kieran’s answer was tense. “No, Alpha. No record of her name in any known pack. Not in the border settlements either. It’s like she doesn’t exist.”

“She exists,” Atlas said flatly. “People don’t just appear out of nowhere.”

Kieran hesitated. “And if she’s not one of us?”

Atlas didn’t answer right away. When he did, his voice was quieter, but harder. “Then she’s something else. Something I need to understand.”

I clenched my fists so tightly my nails dug into my palms.

The something he needed to understand was me.

They talked a little longer,fragments about the rogues, the Lunar Crest symbol, the burned villages. I caught one name that made my blood freeze.

“Remnants of Silvermoon,” Kieran said. “Some still whisper about their lost Alpha line.”

Silvermoon.

My pack. My curse. My blood.

I couldn’t hear the rest. The world tilted too fast, too suddenly. I pressed my back to the wall, willing myself to breathe.

They’re getting closer.

When the voices faded, I turned and slipped away before either of them could sense me.

By midmorning, the camp buzzed with motion. Training resumed, repairs continued, and the tension of last night began to fade,at least for everyone else.

For me, it never left.

Moon noticed immediately. She always did.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” she said, handing me a bowl of soup near the healer’s tent.

“Just tired,” I muttered, though my hand trembled as I took it.

She frowned. “You’re lying.”

“Moon,”

“Don’t bother denying it. You do that thing with your eyes.”

“What thing?”

“The thing where you stare past people like you’re somewhere else. It’s how I know you’re remembering again.”

I looked down. The steam rose from the soup, curling into the air like phantom smoke.

She sighed, sitting beside me. “You dreamed of the fire again.”

I didn’t answer.

“Remi,” she said softly. “You can’t keep doing this alone.”

I met her eyes then, voice hoarse. “If Atlas finds out who I really am,what I really am,he’ll never stop hunting me.”

“Or maybe he’ll stop doubting you,” Moon said quietly. “You can’t keep pretending to be nothing when you were born to be everything.”

I shook my head, whispering, “Everything I was born to be burned with my pack.”

Before she could respond, a shout rang from the central yard.

“Alpha approaching!”

Moon’s eyes darted toward the sound. “What now?”

I followed her gaze,and froze.

Atlas strode into the healer’s area, flanked by two guards. His presence pulled all attention to him, the sheer command in his step enough to silence the yard. He looked… different today. Controlled. Calculated.

“Remi,” he said, stopping in front of me. “You’re coming with me.”

My chest tightened. “Why?”

His expression gave nothing away. “Because I asked.”

I glanced at Moon, who looked like she wanted to intervene but didn’t dare.

“Go,” she whispered. “I’ll cover for you.”

I followed him out of camp, my pulse pounding.

We walked in silence until we reached the old watchtower ruins beyond the ridge. The forest was quiet here, the air thick with dew and secrets.

Atlas stopped and turned to face me.

“I had scouts search the ridge after the rogue attack,” he began. “They found something.”

He pulled a small metal crest from his pocket and held it up.

A crescent moon carved into silver. My breath caught.

It was identical to the mark burned into my shoulder.

“Recognize it?” he asked.

I swallowed hard. “No.”

He tilted his head slightly, eyes narrowing. “You hesitated.”

“I was surprised,” I said, forcing calm.

“By what?”

“That you’d assume I know anything about some trinket found in the dirt.”

“Trinkets don’t make my wolf react,” he said. “You do.”

I turned away, pretending to study the trees. “You’re imagining things again, Alpha.”

His hand caught my wrist before I could step further. The contact sent a shock through me,raw, magnetic, terrifying.

“I’m done imagining,” he said, his voice low and rough. “You were there that night, weren’t you?”

My heart stuttered. “What night?”

“The night Silvermoon burned.”

The world tilted again. I pulled my hand free. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I know enough,” Atlas said, stepping closer. “I know that your eyes are the same color described in every surviving record. That your power flares when you’re threatened. And that your scent,”

“Stop,” I snapped. “You’re chasing ghosts.”

He didn’t stop. “,matches the last surviving heir of the Silvermoon line.”

The silence after that felt alive.

Every lie I’d built started to tremble under the weight of his words.

I forced a laugh, brittle and hollow. “You’re insane.”

“Maybe,” he said softly. “But if I am, why do you look so terrified?”

I stepped back, needing space, needing air. “You don’t know what you’re saying.”

He took one more step, his voice a low growl. “Then tell me what I don’t know.”

I met his gaze, every instinct screaming to run.

But then something behind him shifted,the faintest rustle. My senses sharpened instantly.

“Atlas,” I said, barely a whisper.

He frowned. “What?”

“Behind you!”

A shadow lunged from the trees,a rogue, its eyes wild, teeth bared.

Atlas moved fast, faster than I thought possible, grabbing the creature mid-leap and slamming it into the ground. Steel flashed as he drew his blade, but the rogue clawed his side, ripping through flesh.

Before I even thought, I was moving. Power surged up from deep inside me, wild and unrestrained. My palms burned silver as I pressed them to his wound.

The rogue snarled again, and with a flick of my wrist, a burst of energy sent it flying back into the trees, dead before it hit the ground.

Silence fell.

Atlas stared at me,at the glow fading from my hands, at the healed gash on his skin.

I could feel the truth hanging between us, heavy and unspoken.

“You,” he began, voice low.

“Don’t,” I said, stepping back. “Please don’t.”

He rose slowly, eyes fixed on me. “What are you?”

I shook my head. “You don’t want to know.”

“I think I already do,” he said.

The way he said it,quiet, certain,terrified me more than any battle ever had.

I turned away before he could see the tears burning in my eyes.

He knows.

Maybe not everything yet, but enough.

And when Atlas wanted answers, he didn’t stop until he got them.

I started walking, fast, before my resolve shattered. Behind me, I could feel his gaze follow every step.

When I reached the edge of the forest, his voice carried after me,soft but unmistakable.

“You can run, Remi. But I’ll find you. Even if it kills me.”

I didn’t look back.

Because part of me already knew,

If he found out the truth,

one of us wouldn’t survive it.