ADIRA

The halls of the Lycan Haven are too quiet tonight. The kind of silence that wraps itself around your throat and squeezes slowly. Every step I take echoes like a drumbeat, but I keep walking, clutching the hem of my sleeve so I don’t scream.

Darian shoved me.

That image keeps playing in my head on a violent loop. The way his face twisted in disgust. The way he turned his back like I was nothing. Like I never mattered.

I knock once before pushing open my father’s door.

He looks up from the desk, eyes shadowed with age and wariness pinning against mine. He doesn’t greet me, never...