FAYE
By the time I stepped out of the library, my thoughts were tangled beyond comfort.
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The quiet I’d left behind clung to me… thick with dust, ink, and ancient cruelty. Anna’s theory moved through my mind in slow, deliberate circles.
Memory severance.
Ritual exile.
A wolf cut away from himself so completely that he would never find his way home.
It sounded barbaric.
It sounded deliberate.
And worst of all… it sounded possible.
I walked down the stone steps toward the parking area, barely noticing the late afternoon sun stretching
across the pavement. Roman’s face kept rising in my thoughts… the way he looked at the world as if it were something he had been dropped into without instruction.
Empty.
If someone had truly done that to him-
I cut the thought short.
I reached my car, unlocked it, and slipped inside. The door shut with a soft thud, sealing me into a smaller,
quieter world. I reached into my bag for my phone.
The screen lit up.
Three missed calls.
Alexander.
A faint smile touched my lips. I pressed his name and lifted the phone to my ear.
He answered before the second ring.
“Where did you go?”
No greeting. Just that low, steady voice.
“I stepped out,” I replied, leaning back into the seat.
“You didn’t say anything,” he said.
“You were in a meeting. I didn’t want to bother you.”
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A pause. I could almost feel his expression through the silence.
“Where exactly are you?” he asked.
“The library.”
He went quiet for half a second.
“The library,” he repeated.
“Yes.”
“For what?” he asked dryly.
I smiled faintly. “I went to see Anna.”
Silence.
“Anna,” he said slowly.
“Yes.”
“And Anna is…”
I let out a soft laugh. “You’re impossible.”
“I’m busy.”
“Cole’s mate, Alexander.”
A sharp breath came through the line.
“Oh.”
“Yes. Oh.”
“Do not repeat this to Cole,” he said immediately. “I don’t have the energy for that conversation.”
I laughed. “You don’t even remember her name.”
“That is not an issue.”
“It is exactly an issue.”
He muttered something under his breath that I chose not to comment on.
For a moment, there was only the quiet hum of the line between us. Familiar. Steady.
Then it shifted.
Subtle, but unmistakable.
“What is it?” I asked.
A brief pause. “It’s about Roman,” he said.
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The ease drained from me instantly.
“What happened to Roman?”
“He’s fine,” he said. “His wolf awakened.”
The words landed… and everything inside me stilled.
Awakened.
I stared straight ahead at the windshield, not really seeing it.
That wasn’t what I had expected.
That wasn’t what I had just spent hours considering.
“You’re sure?” I asked quietly.
“I wouldn’t say it if I wasn’t.”
My grip tightened around the steering wheel.
“How do you know?”
“You should come see for yourself,” Alexander said.
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When I reached Roman’s door, I didn’t hesitate.
I knocked once and stepped inside.
The difference struck me before my eyes even settled on him.
It wasn’t visual.
It was instinctive.., a presence.
His wolf.
The air in the room felt charged… not aggressively, not dangerously… but undeniably different. The emptiness I had sensed around him before was gone. In its place was something steady. Something
breathing beneath the surface.
Alexander hadn’t been mistaken.
Roman was sitting on the edge of the bed, upright, shoulders squared. When he looked up and saw me, something in his expression shifted… relief, perhaps. Or simply recognition of the one constant he had
managed to anchor himself to.
“You’re back,” he said.
His voice was calm. Composed. But there was weight under it.
“I said I would,” I replied, stepping further into the room.
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As I moved closer, the sensation strengthened.
There it was.
His wolf brushed against my senses…
Roman’s eyes narrowed slightly as I approached.
“You feel that too,” I said quietly.
His jaw tightened just a fraction.
“I don’t know what I feel,” he answered honestly.
Confused in the way a man is when something inside his own body no longer follows rules he
understands.
I let my gaze drop to where his injuries had been.
He noticed and raised his shirt for me to see.
Gone.
The skin was whole, smooth.
A breath left me slowly.
“That’s…” I stopped myself. “You’re not in pain.”
“No.”
He flexed his hand once, watching the movement like it belonged to someone else.
“It was real,” he said evenly. “The injury.”
“Yes.”
“And now it’s not.”
He lifted his eyes to mine.
“Explain that.”
It was a demand for clarity.
I held his gaze.
“I can’t. Not fully.”
His expression hardened slightly.
“Did you do something to me?”
“No.”
A pause.
t
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Chapter 317
“The injection,” he said.
“Wolfsbane.”
He waited for me to continue.
“It doesn’t heal a wolf,” I said gently. “It weakens. It suppresses… It’s different for humans, though. It caused that fever because you’re a wolf, Roman.”
He absorbed that quietly.
“So it wasn’t that.”
“No.”
Silence stretched between us.
He looked down at his hands again, then back at me.
“You and Mr. Alexander,” he said carefully, “keep using a word.”
I didn’t interrupt.
“Wolf.”
He held my gaze.
“He said everyone here is one,” Roman said.
“Yes.”
His expression didn’t shift dramatically.
But something tightened in his eyes.
“Even you?”
“Yes.”
He stood slowly, probably just needing to feel his own balance.
He took one step, then another.
Testing.
“I don’t understand being anything other than… human,” he said.
“You are human,” I replied softly. “And more.”
His gaze sharpened slightly.
“More how?”
I stepped closer, careful not to crowd him.
“You have a wolf,” I said gently. “It’s part of you. Always has been.”
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A long silence followed.
I saw the quiet war behind his eyes.
“That’s not possible,” he said at last.
“It is.”
“In what world?” he asked.
“This one.”
He exhaled through his nose slowly, like he was grounding himself against something destabilizing.
“If this is some kind of metaphor,” he said carefully, “I’d appreciate clarity.”
“It isn’t a metaphor.”
He held my gaze for a long moment.
Waiting.
Searching my face for any crack, any hint of mockery.
He found none.
“So,” he said quietly, “you’re telling me I’m… what exactly?”
“A werewolf.”
He looked away briefly, running a hand through his hair.
“My injuries disappeared,” he murmured. “I feel… different.”
His eyes lifted back to mine.
“And the explanation is that I have a wolf inside me.”
“Yes.”
Silence again.
“If I’m supposed to be this,” he said, “why do I feel like I’m standing outside my own life?”
“Because your mind hasn’t caught up yet,” I said softly. “Your body and your wolf are ahead of it.”
He was quiet for several seconds.
Then:
“And I’m meant to just stay in this room while I ‘adjust‘ to being something out of nowhere?”
There was no sarcasm in his tone.
I allowed myself a small smile.
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“I’ll speak to Alexander,” I said.
His eyes flicked toward me. “About what?”
“Loosening the restrictions.”
He studied me carefully.
“You’d do that?”
“Yes.”
A pause.
“Why?”
“Because confinement won’t help you accept this.”
That seemed to settle something in him.
He exhaled slowly.
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“This feels like a dream,” he admitted quietly. “Like I’ll wake up somewhere else and none of this will exist.
“I understand that feeling.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
He held my gaze again.
“You don’t have to worry or think too far ahead,” I told him. “Stay. Learn. Let things settle. When you’re
steady enough to choose your next step, you’ll know. For now, one day at a time.”
He inclined his head slightly.
“Thank you,” he said.
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