THE LOST PRINCESS OF TYE WOLVES

ARIA POV

The strange moment kept on coming; it wasn't obvious but quiet. Just enough to sit under my skin like a feeling I couldn't explain. I opened my eyes slowly, trying to figure out what had pulled me out of sleep. There was no sound, no movement, nothing out of place. But at that moment I knew it wasn't just ordinary. Like, I had been running, and I just escaped something I couldn't remember. I pressed a hand against my sternum, waiting for my heartbeat to settle, but it didn't. It stayed fast. Uneven. Wrong. A faint image lingered at the edge of my mind. Red. It was not clear enough, nor was it a memory, just a color. It was deep, burning wrong in a way I couldn't explain. Then it was gone. Just like that. I blinked my eyes and exhaled slowly, trying to shake it off. "Get it together," I muttered under my breath. It was probably nothing. Just a dream I couldn't remember properly. That happens sometimes. Still... I tried to snap out of it, and my feelings didn't leave. I gave a sharp knock on the door. "Hanna, I swear to God if you make me late again, I'm leaving without you." "Hanna, I swear to god, if you make me late again, I'm leaving without you." "I'm coming, I'm coming, chill," Hanna stumbled out of our dorm room with one boot on and her hair half done. "You're so dramatic first thing in the morning." "We have orientation in twenty minutes, and you're still getting dressed." "Orientation is just people telling us things we already read online; relax." "Some of us actually care about making a good first impression." "And some of us slept through our alarm," she finally got her second boot on and grabbed her bag, "Okay, I'm ready, let's go." We headed out, and the campus was already packed. Students everywhere, some looking just as lost as I felt, others walking around like they'd been here for years. I didn't know exactly what I expected college to feel like, but walking through it right now, it felt real in a way I wasn't fully ready for. "Okay, this place is actually gorgeous," Hanna said, turning her head in every direction. "Right? I told you." "You did not tell me; you just kept saying we needed to get here early." "Same thing." She rolled her eyes, and we kept walking, following the signs toward the main hall. We found seats near the middle, not close enough to the front to look desperate, not far enough back to look like we didn't care. Hanna spent the first five minutes scanning the room. "What are you doing?" I whispered. "Looking for cute boys, obviously." "We literally just got here." "And? Time waits for nobody, Aria." I shook my head, but I was smiling because that was just Hanna, always and forever. She'd been my best friend since we were eight, and she had been exactly like this the entire time. There was nobody else on earth I'd rather be sitting next to right now, in this big unfamiliar hall, starting this whole terrifying new chapter. The orientation started, and honestly, Hanna was right; it was mostly stuff we'd already read online. I was taking notes anyway because that's just who I am. The air shifted slightly when he sat down on an empty seat right next to me and bumped my arm hard enough that my pen scraped straight across my notebook. "Seriously?" I said before I could even think about it. He didn't look at me. "It wasn't intentional." "An apology would still be nice." He turned then, and I got my first proper look at him. Sharp jaw, silver-grey eyes, the kind of face that made it very clear he already knew exactly how he looked. "My apologies," he said, in a tone that had zero apology anywhere in it. "Wow," I said, "super convincing." Something moved across his expression, not quite a smile, not quite annoyance, somewhere right in between. "Alexei," he said, like that was supposed to land somewhere. "Good for you," I said and turned back to my notebook. Hanna was in my ear barely two seconds later. "Oh my god, do you know who that is?" "Someone with terrible manners apparently." "People don't mess with him, Aria. That's Prince Alexei, like actual royalty; his family basically runs half the country; everyone on this campus knows who he is." I glanced over at him. He was staring straight ahead now, jaw tight, like the conversation had already bored him completely. "Good for him," I said, and meant it more this time. Hanna grabbed my arm under the table. "You cannot just say 'good for him' to a prince." "I just did." "Aria." "Hanna." She stared at me with that look she always gave me when she couldn't decide if she was impressed or terrified. I turned back to my notes. The orientation wrapped up about forty minutes later, and people started filing out in groups, loud conversations filling up the hall. Hanna was already on her feet, straightening her jacket. "Okay, first things first," she said, "we need to find the cafeteria because I didn't eat breakfast and I'm about two minutes from being unpleasant." "You're already unpleasant." "I'm delightful, and you know it; come on." We joined the crowd moving toward the exit, and I was just starting to feel like I knew where I was going when I heard him again, right behind me. "You're in my way." I stopped and turned around slowly. Alexei was standing there with two other guys behind him, both of them built like they'd never missed a gym session in their lives. He wasn't looking at me like I was a person; he was looking at me like I was a minor inconvenience standing between him and wherever he wanted to be. "There's a whole hallway," I said. "Go around." "You stopped in the middle of it." "For two seconds." "That's two seconds too long." I stared at him. He stared back. Neither of us moved. "Aria," Hanna said quietly behind me, her voice doing that thing where she was trying to communicate an entire paragraph in one word. I ignored her. "You know," I said, "for someone who apparently has everyone on this campus falling over themselves, you have a really interesting way of introducing yourself to people." Something flickered in his eyes, quick, gone just as fast. "I'm not introducing myself," he said, "I'm asking you to move." "And I'm telling you to go around." One of the guys behind him shifted, like he was getting ready to say something, but Alexei held a hand up without looking back, and the guy went still immediately. That part was interesting. I filed it away. "You're new here," Alexei said, looking at me differently now, not like I was an inconvenience anymore, more like I was something he hadn't seen before and hadn't decided what to do with yet. "Everyone here is new," I said, "it's the first day." "You know what I mean." "I really don't." He took one step closer and lowered his voice just slightly, not threatening, just direct. "You should be careful about the energy you put out on this campus. Not everyone here is as patient as I am." I almost laughed, "patient?" You've been rude to me twice in the last hour." "And yet here you are still talking to me." I opened my mouth, closed it, and opened it again. He watched me do all of that with an expression that was almost, almost a smile. "Move," he said simply, then walked around me without waiting for an answer, his two friends following right behind him, the crowd parting for all three of them like it was automatic. Hanna appeared at my shoulder the second they were gone, grabbing my arm with both hands. "Okay, what was that?" "Nothing," I said, watching him disappear into the crowd. "That was not nothing, Aria; that was very much something. He was looking at you like..." "Like what?" She paused, thinking about it. "Like he was trying to figure out what you are." I turned away and kept walking. "Good for him," I said. That's when I caught it. My own reflection in the glass door at the end of the hallway. Just for a second, less than a second, something is wrong with it. Not the angle, not the light. My eyes. They weren't the color they were supposed to be. I stopped walking. The reflection stared back at me, normal now, completely normal, my face, my eyes, exactly as they always were. I blinked. Nothing. I must be more tired than I thought. "Aria?" Hanna was looking at me. "Coming," I said, and followed her; for a second my eyes weren't mine.

ARIA POV

Hanna found the cafeteria like she had a built-in sensor for food, walking through the doors and immediately brightening up. "Okay, this is actually nice," she said, looking around. "Can we just get food? You said you were two minutes from being unpleasant." "I said that four minutes ago, so technically I'm already there; let's go." We grabbed trays and joined the line. The cafeteria was loud and full, every table already forming its own little ecosystem. I could already see how this place was going to work, who sat where, who looked at whom, all of it establishing itself on day one like nobody could help it. We got our food, and I was scanning for somewhere to sit when Hanna grabbed my arm. "There's two seats over there by the window," she said. "Where?" "By the window, come on before someone takes them." We headed over, and I had just put my tray down when a voice came from behind me. The noise around us didn't disappear completely but went down quite a bit. Lower. People were listening without looking like they were actually listening. A few heads turned, just enough to notice her presence. "Those are taken." Hanna's fingers tightened around her tray. I felt it more than I saw it. The small shift and sudden silence. Like I suddenly understood something I didn't I turned around. The girl standing there was beautiful in that very specific way that came with a lot of money and a lot of time. Perfectly put together, not a single thing out of place, looking at me and Hanna like we had walked into her house uninvited. "There's nobody sitting here," I said. "I just said they're taken." "I heard you; I'm just pointing out that there are no actual people in these actual seats." The girl's eyes sharpened. "Do you know who I am?" "Should I?" One of the girls behind her made a small sound, somewhere between a laugh and a gasp. The beautiful girl didn't find it funny. "I'm Celeste Varon," a name that clearly meant something here, she said. like that settled everything. Not to me but to everyone else. I could feel it in the way the table behind her went quiet. She continues. "My father is the king's chief advisor; I've been coming to events at the royal palace since I was six years old; I have been on this campus longer than you have been in this city; and those seats are taken because I say they are." I looked at the empty seats. I looked back at her. "Cool origin story," I said, "but I still don't see anyone sitting here." Hanna made a very small noise beside me that she quickly covered with a cough. Celeste took one slow step forward. "You think you're funny." "I think I'm hungry and my food is getting cold, so if you're not sitting here, I'd really appreciate it if you let me eat." "You have no idea how this campus works." "It's the first day," I said. "Nobody does." "I do," she said simply, "and girls like you, you come here thinking it's a fresh start, thinking nobody knows you, thinking you can just walk in and be whatever you want, and then you figure out very quickly that there's an order to things here and you're at the bottom of it." I pulled my chair out and sat down. "Okay," I said, picking up my fork. Celeste blinked, like she genuinely hadn't expected that. "Excuse me?" "I said okay," I looked up at her. "You've said your thing; I've heard it. I'm going to eat my food now." "You're really not going to move." "I'm really not." There was a pause. Not long. But long enough that I felt like I had just crossed a line I couldn't see. The girl to Celeste's left, tall with dark hair and a look on her face like she smelled something bad, stepped forward. "Celeste, she's not worth it; let's just go." "She's sitting in my spot, Lena." "Then let her sit there," Lena said, already losing interest. "There are other seats." Celeste looked at me for a long moment, the kind of look that was supposed to make people uncomfortable. I picked up my glass and took a sip and waited. "You're going to regret this," Celeste said quietly. There was no scene or voice raised. That was what made it worse. It didn't sound like a threat to me. It sounded like a fact. "Maybe," I said, "but I'll regret it on a full stomach." Hanna choked on her water. Celeste's jaw tightened; she looked at me one more time, then turned and walked away, her girls falling into step behind her without a word. Hanna waited exactly three seconds before she turned to me with both hands flat on the table. "What is wrong with you?" she whispered. "That is Celeste Varon; her father literally advises the king. Aria... she doesn't just talk." People actually listen to her." "She was going to do that anyway," I said. "Girls like that don't need a reason; if I had moved, she would have found something else." "You don't know that." "I do know that." Hanna stared at me, then picked up her fork. "Okay, but if she makes our first semester a nightmare, I'm blaming you." "Fair." We ate in peace for about ten minutes, which was nice while it lasted. "She's staring at you," Hanna said without looking up. "I know." "She's been staring at you since she sat down." "I know." "And you're just going to sit there." "I'm eating, Hanna." "I'm just saying, she looks like she's planning something." "Let her plan," I said. "I'm not going to spend my first day at college scared of a girl who's upset about a chair." Hanna was quiet for a second, then said, "You know what, you're right." "I usually am." "Don't push it." I smiled and reached for my glass again, and that's when I noticed him across the cafeteria. Alexei, sitting at the biggest table in the room like it had always belonged to him, his two friends from earlier on either side of him. Celeste was making her way toward him now, sliding into the seat beside him, her hand going to his arm immediately. Of course. She leaned in and said something to him, her eyes cutting across the room to me as she did. Alexei looked up. We made eye contact for exactly two seconds. Something shifted in his expression. I knew he wasn't interested or annoyed. Recognition. Gone before I could be sure it was ever there. His expression didn't change, but he looked away first. Hanna followed my gaze, and her eyes went wide. "Oh no." "What?" "She's his girlfriend, Aria; Celeste is Alexei's girlfriend." I turned back to my food. "Good for them," I said. "Why do you keep saying that?" "Well..." I shrugged. That's when I felt it. The specific, crawling certainty of being watched. Not by Celeste, whose stare I'd already catalogued and dismissed. Something else. Someone else. I turned my head slowly toward the far side of the cafeteria. There was a man standing near the exit. Not a student. Older, dark coat, completely still in the way that people only manage when they're deliberately trying to be. He wasn't looking at the room. He was looking at me. Not like a stranger, like he already knew me. Like he had been waiting. And his expression was the strangest thing I had ever seen on a stranger's face. Not threatening. Not curious. Relieved. Like he had been looking for something for a very long time and had just found it. "Hanna," I said. "Hmm?" "That man by the exit." I kept my voice even. "Do you see him?" Hanna turned and frowned. "What man?" I looked back. The exit was empty. Too empty. Like he had never been there at all. The space where he'd been standing was just a wall, just air, like no one had ever been there at all. "Nothing," I said. "Never mind." But I didn't pick up my fork again. And I didn't stop looking at that empty doorway for the rest of the meal.

ARIA POV

Three weeks into the semester and I had somehow managed to escape Celeste and her girls. No confrontations, no hallway run-ins, nothing. I was starting to think maybe she'd decided I wasn't worth the energy. Then Professor Mercer walked in and handed out the pairing sheet for the term project, and just like that, my luck ran out completely. I stared at my name next to Alexei's for a good ten seconds. A strange, brief pull settled low in my chest. Not fear or annoyance, something else. I ignored it immediately. Wondering if my eyes were playing a prank on me or the universe. "This is a joke; it has to be," I said out loud. "I assure you it isn't," Professor Mercer said without looking up. I looked across the room. Alexei was already looking at me, his gaze held for a half second longer than it should have. Like he was trying to place something. Like I wasn't entirely unfamiliar with that same flat expression he always had, like the world perpetually owed him something. He held eye contact for exactly one second, then turned back to his phone like I was already boring him. Fantastic. After class I caught up to him in the hallway. "So when do you want to meet to start on this?" I said. "I'll handle it." I stopped walking. "Excuse me?" "The project," he said, not slowing down at all, "I'll handle it and put your name on it." "That's not how partnerships work." "It's how this one will be." "No," I stepped around him and stood in his path, and he actually stopped, looking down at me with those sharp grey eyes, "it really isn't." I don't need you to carry me; I pull my own weight, so figure out a time that works for you and let me know." "You're serious right now." "Completely." There was something different in his tone, not dismissal. That was new. He looked at me for a moment, that same look he always gave me, like he was trying to find the angle. "Tomorrow," he said, "library, five o'clock." "Perfect," I stepped aside. "Don't be late." "I'm never late." "First time for everything." I walked away. Behind me I heard something that could have been a quiet laugh, but when I glanced back he was already gone. Hanna was waiting around the corner, practically bouncing. "Okay, I heard all of that, and I need you to explain to me how you just talk to him like that." "Like what?" "Like he's nobody." "He is nobody, Hanna; he's just a boy with a title." "A title and a father with more power than our entire hometown combined." "Good for his father," I said, and she grabbed my arm. "Aria." "I'm not going to shrink every time he's in the room; that's not who I am. If I let him steamroll this project from day one, he'll do it the whole six weeks." She looked at me for a long second, "You know Celeste is going to lose her mind when she finds out you're partnered with him." I hadn't thought about that. "That's her problem," I said. Hanna did not look convinced. The next day I got to the library at four fifty-five, sat down, spread my notes out, and started organizing. Five o'clock came and went. Five oh five. Five ten. I was pulling out my phone to send him something sharp when he walked in at five twelve looking like he had nowhere else to be and hadn't checked a clock once in his life. "You said you're never late," I said. "I said I'm never late to things that matter," he dropped into the seat across from me, shrugging his jacket off, "project-starting meetings are a formality." "So your word only counts when you personally decide something is worth it, noted." "Are you going to be like this the whole six weeks?" "Are you going to show up twelve minutes late the whole six weeks?" He looked at my notes spread across the table, then back at me, something shifting in his expression. "You actually prepared," he said. His eyes lingered on me for a second. Not impressed. Assessing. Like he was recalculating something. "I always prepare." He didn't respond to that, just reached into his bag and pulled out his own folder. I glanced at it. It wasn't empty either; he'd done work, actual work, outlines, and some research already printed out. I hadn't expected that. I didn't say so. We worked for two hours. Thirty words between us that weren't strictly about the project; twenty of those were disagreements. "That angle is too broad," he said, pointing at my outline. "It's not broad; it gives us room to develop the argument." "It gives us room to ramble; narrow it down." "Narrowing it down this early boxes us in." "Narrowing it down this early keeps us focused." "Those are not the same thing." "They are in this case." I looked at his reasoning on the page. I didn't like that it made some sense. "Fine," I said, "but we keep my secondary point as a fallback." "Fine." We went back to working in silence. At the end, when we were packing up, he closed his folder and just sat there for a second, not reaching for his bag yet. "What?" I said, not looking up. "Nothing." "You're just sitting there." "I'm allowed to sit." I zipped my bag and looked at him. "Say whatever you're thinking so we can both go home." He looked at me in that measuring way he had. "You're difficult." There was no irritation in it. If anything, it sounded like a conclusion he hadn't expected to reach. "You're insufferable," I said, standing up, "so we're even." "I didn't say it was a bad thing." "I didn't ask." I pushed my chair in and picked up my bag. He still hadn't moved, just watching me with that expression I couldn't ever fully read. "Same time Thursday," he said. "I'll be here at five," I said, "actually at five." "I'll keep that in mind." "You do that." I walked out first and didn't look back, which I was proud of because something about the way he'd said it, not a bad thing, was sitting in the back of my head in a way I didn't particularly appreciate. I pushed it out before I hit the door. He was still insufferable. That hadn't changed. I pushed through the library door into the evening air and stopped. It lasted less than a second. A sky that wasn't the sky. Red, deep and wrong, the color of something burning, and below it a sound, not quite a sound, more like the memory of one: metal, screaming and something falling that couldn't be stopped. And then running. Arms holding something. Something small and warm and alive that had to stay alive. It felt real, too real, but I don't understand it. Not like a memory. More like something breaking from somewhere I couldn't reach. Movement. Urgency. The overwhelming need to protect something... someone. And fear, but not mine. But close enough that I felt it was. Like if I stopped moving for a second, something terrible would happen. Then nothing. The silence that followed was worse. Everything went back to normal like it never happened. Just the normal dark sky, the lights along the path, and two students walking past me with a takeaway bag, laughing about something. I stood very still for a moment. It wasn't a memory. I knew that. I'd never been anywhere like that, never seen a sky that color, never run from anything. It wasn't a thought either. It was more like something that had been pressed behind my eyes for a long time had shifted, just slightly, and let a crack of light through. I started walking. By the time I reached the dorm I had almost convinced myself it was nothing but tiredness. But something in me knew it wasn't. That night I didn't sleep well, and when I did, I dreamed of red.