The gravel bit into my palms. Cold seeped through the white silk where my knees pressed stone. The bond-site on my neck had gone from ice to nothing—a void where something living used to be.
I stayed down for three seconds. Long enough to feel the biological fact of what had just happened. Long enough to register that Dax was still standing there, ten feet away, witness to everything, saying nothing.
Then I pushed myself up.
My legs shook. I locked them. I didn't brush the dirt off my dress. I just stood there, facing Colson, and let the silence stretch.
He looked at me the way you'd look at a problem that had finally solved itself. Relief. That's what I saw in his face. Not regret. Not even discomfort. Just the smooth, unburdened expression of a man who'd made a decision and felt lighter for it.
Behind him, Holland's hand rested on the doorframe. Her fingers were pale against the wood. She didn't smile, but something in her posture read like victory.
I opened my mouth. No words came. What was there to say? *Please take it back?* *You're making a mistake?* I'd spent six years saying those things in a hundred different ways—with pastel dresses and wolfsbane tea and the careful erasure of everything sharp in me. It hadn't worked.
So I said nothing.
I turned. I walked.
Behind me, gravel crunched—Colson's boots shifting, maybe turning back toward Holland's door. I didn't look. I just kept moving, one foot in front of the other, the white silk train dragging through the dirt.
The wolfsbane haze in my head was receding. I could feel it pulling back like a tide, leaving something raw and furious in its wake. A voice. Faint. Barely a whisper.
*"Finally. Now burn the tea."*
I stumbled. Caught myself. Kept walking.
Seraphine. My wolf. The one I'd caged for six years. She was awake.
---
The pack house was empty when I got back. Everyone was still at the ceremony grounds or pretending they had somewhere else to be. I was grateful for that. I didn't want witnesses.
I walked straight to the bedroom—*his* bedroom—and stood in the doorway for a long moment, looking at the space I'd lived in for six years. The bed we'd shared. The closet full of clothes I'd chosen because they made me look softer. The vanity where I'd practiced smiling in the mirror until it looked natural.
It all felt like someone else's life.
I moved to the closet first. Pulled open the doors. Rows of pastel dresses stared back at me—lavender, blush, cream, pale yellow. Fabrics that whispered when I moved. Colors that made me look gentle.
I grabbed the first one. Tore it.
The fabric ripped easier than I expected. I pulled another off the hanger. Tore that one too. Then another. And another. My hands moved fast, mechanical, pulling and ripping until there was a pile of shredded silk and cotton at my feet.
Beneath my skin, something vibrated. Not pain. Something deeper. A fracture in a wall I'd spent years building.
I left the closet and went to the nightstand. The wolfsbane tea tin sat there, exactly where I'd left it that morning. I picked it up. Carried it to the fireplace. Set it on the hearth.
Then I went back for the rest.
There were six tins total. I'd kept a supply in the bedroom, the bathroom, the kitchen downstairs. I gathered all of them, lined them up on the hearth, and opened the first one.
The dried leaves inside smelled bitter and medicinal. I'd brewed this tea every day for six years. Sometimes twice a day when Seraphine got too loud. I'd told myself it was temporary. Just until my wolf settled. Just until Colson felt secure enough to mark me.
I dumped the first tin into the fireplace. Struck a match. Dropped it.
The leaves caught fast. Smoke rose—thick, chemical, wrong. It smelled like burning plastic and something organic underneath. I opened the second tin. Dumped it. Watched it burn.
By the fourth tin, my hands were shaking.
By the sixth, something cracked.
It felt like a bone breaking beneath my ribs. A sharp, clean snap that echoed through my chest. I gasped. Dropped the empty tin. It clattered against the stone.
And then I heard her.
*"Six years."*
The voice was raw. Furious. Grief-soaked.
*"You caged me for six years."*
I sank to my knees in front of the fireplace. The smoke from the burning wolfsbane made my eyes water. Or maybe that was something else.
"I know," I whispered.
*"You chose him over me. Every day. Every cup of that poison. You chose him."*
"I know."
*"And he left you anyway."*
I pressed my palms against the stone hearth. The heat from the fire stung my skin. "I know."
Seraphine went quiet. Not the suppressed, wolfsbane-muffled quiet I was used to. Something different. Waiting.
I looked at the pile of torn dresses behind me. The empty tea tins. The smoke still rising from the fireplace.
"I'm done," I said. My voice cracked. "I'm done performing."
*"Good."* A pause. Then, softer: *"Now get us out of here."*
I stood. My legs were steadier now. I walked to the dresser, pulled out jeans and a dark sweater—clothes I hadn't worn in years. Changed out of the ceremony whites and left them in a heap on the floor.
I didn't pack. Didn't take anything that belonged to the performance. Just my phone, my keys, and the leather jacket I'd shoved to the back of the closet three years ago.
The sky outside was still dark. Pre-dawn. The pack house was silent.
I walked out the front door and didn't look back.
