Chapter 10 Ayla's Oath

The room was thick with silence long after Dante left. His scent still clung to the air, dark and electric, like the aftermath of a lightning strike. My heart hadn't stopped pounding since he appeared at the door, eyes glowing, lips parted, fists clenched as if the only thing keeping him from touching me was sheer force of will. He didn't say a word. He didn't need to. The way he looked at me... as if he was battling something primal. Something that wanted me.

But what shook me more was that for the first time, I hadn't wanted to run.

I stood there long after he disappeared down the hallway, my hands trembling at my sides, until Ayla finally touched my arm, her voice a soft thread in the dark.

"You okay?"

"No," I whispered. "Not even close."

We sat together in silence, cross-legged on her bed as the candles flickered low. Outside, the wind howled through the trees that guarded the Academy's perimeter. The kind of wind that carried omens. That didn't feel random.

"I've been reading more about the Scarlet Line," Ayla said after a while, her voice calm but urgent. "There's not much left. Most records were erased after the Massacre. But the ones that remain say the heir would be hidden in plain sight, marked not just by blood, but by trials. Betrayal and pain. A broken bond that doesn't break her."

I swallowed hard. "So what... all that I've been through... was destiny?"

"No." Her voice sharpened. "It wasn't destiny. It was injustice. And we're going to make sure you rise from it. On your own terms."

I looked at her then, really looked at the fierce gleam in her eyes and the way her hands were clenched into fists on her knees. She wasn't just offering me sympathy. She was making a promise.

Ayla leaned forward, pressing something small and cool into my hand. A ring. Old silver, etched with a sigil I didn't recognize. "This belonged to my grandmother. She was a Seer. She used it when she made her Oath to the last Alpha of the Scarlet Line before the war. That Oath passed through my blood. And now, I pass it to you."

My throat tightened. "Ayla,"

"I'm not a fighter like you," she said softly. "But I know how to dig for truth, how to break into archives, and how to read the signs everyone else ignores. I don't need a rank or a mate to know who I am. But I choose to stand beside you. Not because of the prophecy. Not because of the bloodline. But because you never gave up when everyone else walked away. Because I believe in the girl who survived the rejection of her mate and came back stronger."

Tears burned behind my eyes.

"I can't do this alone," I said, my voice barely holding together.

"You don't have to." She reached out, took my hand, and wrapped my fingers around the ring. "I swear this to you, Eva Thorn: I will protect your secret, fight beside you, bleed for you if I must. This is my Oath. You will rise. And I will make damn sure of it."

Her words were ancient.

Powerful.

More than friendship. It was magic. Bonded. An alliance of spirit, older than pack law or bloodlines.

The ring burned against my palm. And something shifted inside me and clicked into place.

The world had taken so much from me.

But not this, not her.

And now, I wasn't alone anymore.

I rose from the bed and walked to the window, staring out at the academy sprawled beneath the moonlight. The shadows of the training fields, the flicker of patrol torches in the distance. Somewhere out there, Dante was probably fighting himself again. Maybe wondering what he'd seen in my eyes tonight. Maybe pretending he hadn't felt anything at all.

But I had changed.

And I would keep changing. Because now, I wasn't waiting to be chosen.

I was claiming myself.