KIERAN’S POV
Nightfang never truly slept—not with patrols rotating and sentries posted—but the sharp edge of activity had dulled. Voices were lower now. Footsteps softer.
The quiet wasn’t unusual, but in the wake of all that had been revealed tonight, it felt like the kind of hush that followed sothing montous.
As if the ground had shifted, but no one knew how to thread the new path revealed.
Sera and I stayed suspended in that strange bubble as I walked her upstairs to the guest room.
After she slipped her hand from mine earlier, she never reclaid it, but my palm still tingled with her warmth. I shoved my hands in my pockets to resist reaching for her.
The silence wasn’t awkward, but it wasn’t empty. It was full—heavy with everything we hadn’t said yet.
Too soon, we reached the guest room.
She didn’t turn to face imdiately. She rested her palm against the wall and took a deep breath, like she was bracing herself against sothing.
I cleared my throat.
There were a million things I needed to say. My mind scrambled, trying to prioritize, but nothing felt like the perfect first step.
“Sera—” I started, but she cut off as her head snapped up and her eyes widened.
“Please don’t kneel.”
I froze, my lips parted.
“I cannot deal with another kneeling Alpha.” She inhaled, shaking her head. “I was attacked by rogues, fought them off with psychic powers, and transford into a rare silver wolf for the first ti, and that was indubitably the weirdest part of my night.”
A surprised bark of laughter escaped my parted lips, and her lips quirked up.
I shook my head, running my hand across my jaw. “I won’t kneel, but I do owe you an—”
She shook her head again. “No, you don’t.”
She leaned back against the door, tilting her chin to maintain eye contact, inevitably baring her throat.
Like a predator sensing prey, sothing feral surged through at the sight of her pulse fluttering against the sensitive skin of her throat.
I’d been disappointed earlier to see her out of my clothes, but I was beginning to realize that it didn’t matter what she wore—whether she was stark naked or bundled from head to toe—the heat of desire that flared whenever she was near never missed an appointnt.
It would have been so easy for to lean forward, to trap her against the door with my body.
I imagined the soft gasp of her breath catching. Her pulse would increase into a thunderous hamr. Her eyes would darken so much so that you could separate the green from the blue.
Ashar’s low growl rumbled through . ‘Mark. Her.’
That snapped back to reality.
It was a herculean task to ignore him and rein in my wandering thoughts to catch the rest of her sentence.
“...ant it when I said we’re even. No more apologies from you, Kieran.”
My jaw worked, the epistle of an apology I’d been working on dying in my throat.
She slapped her hand over her mouth to stifle a yawn, and I swallowed back anything else I might have said.
“I can’t imagine how exhausted you are,” I said instead. “You should head to bed.”
My feet felt like lead when I took a step back. “Good night, Sera.”
The corner of her lips tipped up a little more. “Sleep well, Kieran.”
She reached behind her and opened the door. Through the crack, I saw Daniel, curled into a ball under her blanket, and a soft smile blood on my face.
“Sera?” Her na slipped out before I could stop myself.
She paused. “Yeah?”
“I’m glad you’re here. That you’re staying.”
Sothing flickered in her eyes, but it was gone before I could label it.
She nodded. “ too.”
I lingered outside the door long after she disappeared inside. The events of the night replayed in my mind with unwelco clarity.
Everything I thought I understood about fate, duty, choice—fuck, my own history—felt unreliable.
As if I’d been navigating the world with an outdated map, only to realize the terrain had shifted years ago and I wasn’t given a heads up.
My feet carried back to the Alpha’s study without conscious thought.
The door was ajar, light spilling out into the hallway. When I pushed it open, only my father was still inside, seated at the table near the window.
A chessboard sat between the two chairs, the black and white pieces aligned in perfect order.
He didn’t look up when I entered.
I shut the door behind and exhaled slowly.
The invitation was clear, but when Christian Blackthorne invited you to play chess, it was never about the ga.
It was about control.
It was his way of determining every move: who spoke, who listened, how conversations flowed. Every word asured. Every silence deliberate.
I crossed the room.
“You’re still up,” I said.
He glanced up then, eyes sharp and assessing. “So are you.”
I took the seat opposite him.
He gestured to the board. “White or black?”
I didn’t hesitate. “White.”
A faint smile tugged at his mouth as he turned the board so the white pieces faced . “Still predictable.”
“I could say the sa about you,” I replied.
That earned a quiet huff of amusent.
We began in silence.
The first few moves ca easily—muscle mory honed by years of gas played late into the night when training and the gravity of my problems left too wired to sleep.
I opened aggressively, pushing my pawns forward, staking space without fully committing.
Father countered with his usual restraint, pieces sliding into position with patient precision.
My mind wasn’t in it. That was instantly obvious.
My attention drifted. My timing lagged. Several tis, I had to force my focus away from Sera and Alina and the night’s events, back to the board, to the clean geotry of strategy and consequence.
“You’re distracted,” Father noted, moving his rook.
‘No shit,’ sat on my tongue, but wisely didn’t pass through my lips.
He looked up at then. “Is that how easily unsettled you plan to be,” he continued, “when you’ll need to stand beside Sera through greater troubles?”
The effect of her na was imdiate.
Sothing in snapped into sharp focus, like a blade drawn from its sheath.
“You an because I’m bound to protect her kind by a centuries-old vow that was kept from ?”
I tried, I really did, but I couldn’t keep the bitterness out of my voice.
Father set his piece down and leaned back, fingers steepled. For a mont, he simply studied , his expression unreadable, an indecipherable weight pressing into that silence.
Then he sighed, sounding tired.
“No. I an, because she’s your mate—or at least, was.”
I went very still.
My hand hovered over the board, a knight suspended mid-decision.
“How long have you known?” I asked, voice barely above a whisper.
“Long enough. Your mother is not the only keen one. There are very few things you can hide from , Kieran.”
“Oh, like you hid my legacy from ?”
He let out a dry chuckle. “Touché. It’s like I said earlier, I didn’t want to burden you with what was essentially a myth, not until I couldn’t put it off any longer.”
I swallowed hard. I knew it wasn’t his fault. How could he have possibly known that, of all people, Sera would turn out to be a silver wolf?
I set the knight down. “Everything about the silver wolf, everything that might help Sera in any way, shape, or form, I have to be privy to.”
He regarded for a while—then he moved his bishop and captured my knight. “Done.”
“One more thing,” I added.
He arched a brow, waiting.
“You had no idea Sera was a silver wolf. I’m the one who failed her; I’m the one who should have been on my knees.”
“Interesting.” Father’s fingers tapped once against the edge of the board. “But the thing is, beyond being a silver wolf or the mother of my grandson, or your ex-wife, Sera is—” He sighed. “Was Edward’s daughter.”
That na hit harder than I expected.
I straightened. “And?”
Father’s hands tightened. His gaze shifted to the window, a distant, reflective look settling over his face.
“I failed more than just Seraphina,” he said, voice so low I had to strain to hear him. “I failed Edward, too.”
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