The magical exhaustion is a thief. It doesn't just steal my strength; it steals time. I sleep for a full day, a deep, dreamless slumber that feels more like a coma than rest. When I finally wake, it is to the gentle lapping sound of the valley's stream and the sensation of Kael pressing a cup of warm, herb-infused water to my lips. My body still aches with a profound, bone-deep weariness, a stark and terrifying reminder of the price of the magic that now flows through my veins.
The victory of that single, glowing flower feels hollow now, overshadowed by the memory of the absolute collapse that followed. Kael's words haunt me: It's eating you alive. Is he right? Am I just a vessel for a power that will eventually consume me entirely? The thought is a cold stone in the pit of my stomach.
For the next day, an uneasy peace settles over our small sanctuary. I am still too weak to practice magic, my inner well of silver energy feeling frighteningly shallow. Instead, I spend my time studying the journal, committing the words, the symbols, the star charts to memory. Kael, for his part, respects my weakness, his demeanor a familiar, gruff pragmatism. He hunts, he reinforces our small shelter, he keeps watch. We work in a quiet, unspoken partnership, two ghosts haunting the ruins of a forgotten age.
It's a fragile peace, and I know it cannot last. The world outside this valley has not forgotten us. The Iron Hounds are still out there. The Forgemaster is still forging. And Damien… Damien is still Alpha.
The peace shatters on the afternoon of the second day.
I am sitting near the entrance to the witch's workshop, the ancient journal open on my lap, when the sound reaches us. It starts as a faint disturbance on the edge of my senses, a chaotic tremor in the calm energy of the valley. Then it becomes a physical sound: the desperate, crashing footsteps of someone running with reckless, panicked speed. It's followed by the sound of pursuit—the heavy, disciplined tread of multiple shifters, and a sharp, barked command that slices through the tranquil air.
Kael is on his feet in an instant, his body tense, his hand dropping to the hilt of the hunting knife at his belt. He moves silently to the edge of the ravine, the narrow entrance to our sanctuary, and peers through the concealing vines. I hurry to his side, my own heart beginning to hammer a frantic rhythm against my ribs.
A young man, barely more than a boy, stumbles through the fissure into our valley. He can't be more than sixteen or seventeen, his face still holding the soft lines of youth beneath a layer of grime and terror. He is wearing the simple leather tunic of a low-ranked pack member from a neighboring territory, and it is torn and stained. He clutches his arm, blood seeping through his fingers from a deep gash. His eyes are wide with a primal, hunted fear, his chest heaving as he gasps for air.
He has no time to register his surroundings. Hot on his heels, three more figures emerge from the ravine. They are the pursuers. Warriors. They are huge, powerfully built shifters, clad in the hardened leather armor of a pack patrol. Their armor is studded with sharp pieces of obsidian, and the snarling dire wolf head carved on their pauldrons is a symbol I recognize with a jolt of fear. The Stonefang Pack. They are our nearest neighbors to the west, a pack notorious for its aggression, its brutality, and its absolute belief that might makes right.
The patrol leader is a mountain of a man, his face a brutal mask of scars, one ear half-torn away. A cruel, arrogant sneer twists his lips as he sees the cornered boy.
"Nowhere left to run, little thief," the leader snarls, his voice a low, gravelly growl. "You stole from a Stonefang caravan. Did you think you could hide from us?"
"I didn't steal anything!" the boy cries, his voice cracking with terror as he scrambles backward. "I just… I found it on the ground near the road!"
"Lies," the patrol leader spits. He takes a slow, menacing step forward, flanked by his two warriors. "You will be returned to our Alpha for judgment. He will peel the truth from your lying tongue."
The boy is trembling, his eyes darting around frantically for an escape that doesn't exist. He is trapped. Outnumbered. At the mercy of wolves who have no mercy.
And something inside me breaks.
I see myself in him. I see my own terror as I stood before Damien. I feel the echo of my own desperate, unheard pleas for justice. I feel the cold, absolute certainty of a brutal sentence about to be carried out, not because of guilt, but because of power.
Kael places a heavy, restraining hand on my arm. His face is a mask of cold, hard logic.
"We do nothing," he whispers, his voice low and intense. "Not a sound. They are Stonefang. Starting a fight with one of their patrols is suicide. They will call for reinforcements. This sanctuary, our one advantage, will be compromised."
His logic is flawless. It is the cold, hard calculus of survival that has kept him alive for years. He is right. Intervening is insane. It risks everything for a boy we don't know, for a crime we didn't witness.
But I'm not just looking with my eyes anymore. I close them for a fraction of a second, and I reach out with that other sense, the one that can see the life force in things. I focus on the boy. His energy is a chaotic storm of fear, but beneath it, there is a clear, unwavering line of sincerity. He's telling the truth. I focus on the patrol leader. His energy is a muddy, stagnant pool of arrogance, cruelty, and a dark, malicious pleasure in the hunt.
My old self, the meek omega, would have listened to Kael. She would have hidden, her heart bleeding for the boy, but too terrified to act. But I am not her. I am the woman who killed a monster with a silver knife. I am the woman who faced down death and found something more powerful on the other side.
I look at Kael, my own voice just as low, but filled with an intensity that matches his own. "No."
He stares at me, his grey eyes narrowing in disbelief. "Elara, don't be a fool. This isn't our fight. He is not our problem."
"He is cornered," I say, my voice trembling with a cold, righteous anger. "He is afraid. And they are enjoying it. That makes him our problem."
"We will die," he hisses. "They are three trained warriors. I might be able to take one, maybe two, before they bring me down. You are still weak from your little light show. You cannot fight them."
"Maybe I don't have to," I say, though I have no plan, only a burning, unshakeable conviction.
I pull my arm free from his grip. I will not stand by and watch another innocent be crushed under the heel of a bully. I will not become the thing I hate. If this new power means anything, it must mean that I can stand for those who cannot stand for themselves. The memory of the helplessness I felt, the absolute despair of being condemned without a trial, fuels my resolve. It becomes a shield against Kael's cold logic, against my own fear.
This is my first true choice as this new person. Do I follow the path of the pragmatist, the survivor at all costs? Or do I follow the path of the witch, the tender of wild magic, the protector of the things the Alphas of the world have deemed worthless?
The choice is not a choice at all. It was made for me the moment Damien scarred my face.
Ignoring Kael's hissed, desperate whisper of my name, I step out from the cover of the ruins. I deliberately place myself in the open, a clear figure standing between the terrified, wounded boy and the three hulking Stonefang warriors.
The patrol leader stops. He hadn't noticed me. His eyes rake over me, taking in my torn, dirty dress and my slight frame. He sees a stray, a lone female, nothing more. A sneer of contempt spreads across his scarred face.
"This is pack business, stray," he snarls, his voice filled with arrogant dismissal. "Hand over the thief, or we'll walk right through you."