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ᴛʜᴇ ᴡɪɴᴛᴇʀ ʜᴜɴᴛꜱᴍᴀɴ

ꜱᴜᴍᴍᴀʀʏ › you were never meant to survive. hidden for years in a quiet village at the edge of the northern woods, you grow up believing you are ordinary—until the queen who destroyed your kingdom learns the truth. your scent carries old magic. your blood can command loyalty. and there is a prophecy that says you will be the end of her reign.

ᴘᴀɪʀɪɴɢ › alpha!hunter!bucky x omega!princess!reader ᴄᴏɴᴛᴇɴᴛ ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢꜱ › 18+ MDNI, alternate universe - werewolf au, a/b/o dynamics, loosely inspired by 2012 film snow white and the huntsman, depictions of blood & violence, mentions of war/war trauma, lowk kidnapping at first, mind control, sorcery & blood magic, semi enemies to lovers, semi slow burn, forced proximity, beefy bucky, bucky is only referred to as james, true loves kiss, flirting & light banter, fated mates, eventual fluff, nesting, marking/biting, smut, p in v, virginity loss (not really mentioned tho), unprotected sex, pheromones/scent kink?, breeding, talk of pregnancy, happily ever after, not beta read we die like men. ᴡᴏʀᴅ ᴄᴏᴜɴᴛ › 22.4k

ᴀᴜᴛʜᴏʀꜱ ɴᴏᴛᴇ › junie of house jonesin actually posting a fic??? is this a prank cut the cameras... on some real shit this fic took a lot out of my but im glad i finished it, i think this is my new baby... ALSO i had to wiggle worm my way around the 1000 block limit so if some paragraphs seem super long thats why im sorry i hate it but im not breaking this up into two parts LOL id rather die. as always thank you for reading and bearing with me through all my bs <3

Once upon a time,

Beneath the boughs where shadows creep, The lost-born heir in silence she sleeps. An omega child with ancient breath, Will rise again from hidden death.

Her scent will stir both fang and flame, And every pack will know her name. The wolves will bow, the ravens sing, For blood remembers its true king.

The crown once stolen, stained in red, Will crack beneath the sorceress queen’s dark tread. Her gilded halls will turn to dust, Her throne undone by greed and lust.

For when the moon burns silver bright, The hidden rose will claim her right. Old kingdoms broken, torn apart, Will mend beneath her beating heart.

You'll always remember how much your mother loved the gardens most in winter.

She said it was the only season that told the truth, that spring was too eager, summer too full of itself. Autumn too beautiful in the way beautiful things often are right before they die. But winter was honest, winter stripped everything bare.

Winter in the northern kingdom settled so heavily that even the castle seemed quieter beneath it. Snow covered the gardens in soft white drifts as frost climbed the windows in delicate patterns. The world beyond the walls looked pale and sleeping, wrapped in cold and stillness.

She stood in the snow with a fur cloak wrapped around her shoulders and her gloved hands tucked beneath her sleeves, walking slowly through the sleeping garden while servants followed several steps behind.

Your father watched her from the stone archway always with that look in his eyes, their color bright despite the clouded dim sky, like the world had become something softer the moment she stepped into it. At the center of the garden, tangled among frost-bitten vines, a single rose had bloomed.

Bright red against the snow.

Your mother stopped. The petals looked impossibly alive beneath the gray winter sky, soft and crimson and stubborn. She reached for it without thinking an the thorn pricked her finger. A sharp little breath left her as she pulled her hand back leaving three drops of blood to fall onto the snow.

You would always be told that was the moment everything began.

By the next winter, you were born. You grew up in warmth, but not because the kingdom was gentle, it wasn't. Winters were harsh in the north and the people were proud and loud and quick to fight. But you were loved.

You knew that even before you knew the words for it.

You knew it in the way your mother tucked blankets around you herself instead of leaving it to servants. In the way your father carried you through the halls when you were too sleepy to walk. In the way the castle dogs followed you everywhere, tails wagging wildly whenever you laughed.

You knew it in the gardens.

You spent most of your early childhood there.

Among roses and ivy and lavender bushes, with dirt beneath your nails and flower petals tangled in your hair. The gardeners adored you because nothing ever died around you. Flowers bloomed brighter where you stepped, wilted things straightened when you touched them.

The older servants would exchange glances when they thought no one was looking.

Magic, they whispered. The prophecy fufilled in flesh.

Your mother only smiled when she heard them.

"You were born from winter and roses," she would tell you while brushing your hair before bed. "Of course the world listens when you speak to it."

You grew up with nine springs of love. Nine summers of warm woven winds that howled against your windows, nine autumns of falling leaves that crunched under your boots. The morning of the winter solstice, your birthday, was the last day of peace.

By the time the sun had crested over the horizon, the sky turned black.

You remember standing at the nursery window in your nightgown, one hand still clutching the red ribbon your mother had tied into your braid the night before, watching smoke rise in the distance beyond the mountains. At first, no one understood what they were seeing, then the bells began. Servants rushed through the halls. Guards flooded the courtyards below in steel and furs. Somewhere deep in the castle, someone shouted for the king.

Your mother swept into your room moments later, pale-faced and breathless. She pulled a heavy cloak around your shoulders with shaking hands.

"What's happening?" you asked.

She cupped your face.

"I need you to be very brave for me."

You still remembered the way her fingers trembled as she took you down to the tunnels for safety, and the sound of the army reaching the outer gates. Glass soldiers, they said. Black and gleaming and terrible, moving like shadows over the snow. They poured through the lower villages first, leaving smoke and blood behind them. By the time they reached the castle, the world outside the walls was burning.

Your father rode out to meet them. You remember the roar of the gates opening, the thunder of horses, the smell of smoke drifting through the windows. Hours later, he returned.

Victorious, they said.

But not alone. There was a woman with him. Beautiful in the sort of way storms were beautiful, dangerous and eerie. Dark hair spilling down her back, pale skin untouched by cold, a white gown that looked too clean amidst all the blood and ash. She stood beside your father like she had always belonged there and your father looked at her as if the entire world had narrowed to only her.

Your mother knew immediately, could see something that most could not, could feel the sorcery that lingered around her in the air. You remember the look on her face when she saw the woman step into the ashen dimmed light. The woman called herself a queen from the southern kingdoms. Claimed her lands had been destroyed by the same army that had attacked yours. Claimed she had nowhere left to go.

Your father believed her and by dusk she was sitting beside him at dinner.

By nightfall, he had agreed to help her retaliate against the army that had crushed her kingdom. There was something glassy in his eyes, something smooth and too sinister to name. Your mother tried to stop it, tried to snap him out of the dark green glow that glossed over his eyes.

Everything moved too fast after that.

You remember waking to shouting somewhere beyond your chambers, doors slamming, footsteps running down stone halls. Then silence, heavy and wrong, lingering in the halls. Your nurse came for you past midnight. She wrapped you in blankets and carried you through dark servant passages beneath the castle, one hand pressed over your mouth to keep you quiet.

"Where's my mother?" you kept asking.

She never answered, only held you tighter as you ran. The castle sounded different when the moon lit the night sky, stars shining down. You could hear screaming above you, the crash of glass, the sharp clang of steel against steel. Somewhere, a man was begging for mercy.

Then you reached the hidden passage behind the kitchens and saw blood smeared across the stone floor. Your nurse stopped so suddenly you nearly fell from her arms. There your mother lay, glass shatters of a sword scattered around her. Your mind, as young as it was could still fill in the blanks for you. She ran. She fought. She died. You remember the pale blue of her dress first, then the blood, so much blood. Her eyes were closed, her dark hair spread around her like spilled ink. One of her hands still stretched toward the doorway you stood in, as though she had been trying to reach you.

Your nurse pulled you against her chest before you could see more, but it was too late. You saw enough.

You do not remember much after that, only pieces. Running through smoke-filled hallways, the castle burning, a loyal guard shoving a sword into your nurse's hands. The sound of the new sorceress queen's voice echoed through the halls, calm and cold and terrible.

"Find the girl!"

You made it as far as the stables to people waiting for you there. Men and women loyal to your mother, already bloodied from fighting. One of them lifted you onto a horse while another tied a cloak around your shoulders. Your nurse climbed up behind you. She was crying. You had never seen her cry before, it pricked hot tears at your waterline. As the horse started forward, she pressed her lips to your temple.

"You must listen to me," she whispered. "You cannot go back. Do you understand? You cannot ever let her find you."

You were crying too hard to answer. Soon the forest blurred in front of you as the horse raced through the snow. Behind you, the castle disappeared beneath smoke.

"Your mother knew," your nurse said, voice shaking. "She knew what you were. What you would become. She thought you would have more time."

You turned around toward her.

"What am I?"

She looked at you with tears streaming down her face.

"There is a prophecy," she whispered. "About the daughter born from winter and roses. About the omega princess who will rise again and—"

An arrow cut through the air with a silent hiss, cutting through the tip of your ear and buried itself in her throat. You screamed, your throat catching on a sound you'd never heard yourself make before, a sound that felt farm from human. Pain bloomed at your ear as hot blood began to trickle down, though you couldn't feel it. You couldn't feel anything. Her body jerked backward, blood spilling down the front of her dress and the horse reared you both off.

You hit the ground hard and for a moment, the world became nothing but snow and pain and the taste of blood in your mouth. When your head cleared you looked up to see a figure stood at the edge of the trees, tall and dressed all in black and still as the wind. A boy, not much older than a teenager with dark hair and a bow still raised in his hands. There was blood splattered across his cheek. And around his neck, something black glinted beneath the collar of his coat. He stared at you for one long moment, then someone shouted his name from deeper in the trees. He looked away. Only for a second.

But when he looked back, you were already running.

You ran until your legs gave out. Then you walked. Then you hid. And after a while, you learned how to disappear.

At first, it was easy enough. You were small. Young. Easy to overlook in the chaos left behind by the evil queen's rise to power. Villages burned every week, families were scattered, children lost their parents and never found them again. You just became one more frightened face among hundreds.

You stopped telling people your real name. Stopped saying where you came from. When people asked, you lied, you said your parents had died in a fever, said you had come from some village too far south for anyone to question. You said you were looking for work, for family, for anything.

Sometimes people believed you. Sometimes they didn't. But no one looked too closely at a ragged little girl with dirty hands and hollow cheeks. You learned quickly which villages were safe, which roads to avoid. Which people might offer you soup and which might sell you for coin if you looked at them too long. You learned how to sleep in haylofts and abandoned sheds. How to wrap your feet in cloth when your shoes wore through. How to steal apples without being caught and how to keep walking even when your stomach hurt so badly it felt like something inside you was eating itself.

The years blurred together after that. Summer heat. Winter cold. Autumn breeze. Faces you forgot almost as soon as you left them behind. You grew taller, hair darkened, eyes wider and alert. Your scent changed with age, becoming softer and deeper all at once. Richer in a way you did not understand but knew enough to hide.

People noticed you more as you got older. Alphas especially. You learned to keep your head down, to avoid looking anyone in the eye for too long, to never stay anywhere longer than a few weeks. But loneliness has a way of making people reckless.

You were fifteen the first time you reached the village at the edge of the northern woods. It was small and quiet. Tucked so deeply between the trees and mountains that it almost felt hidden from the rest of the world. You told yourself you would only stay for the night. Maybe two. Long enough to rest your feet and warm your hands and steal enough food to survive the next stretch of road.

You had not eaten in almost two days when you saw the bread. Fresh from the oven, still steaming in a basket outside the bakery window. You remember standing there in the cold, staring at it, at the golden crust, at the curls of steam rising into the winter air. Your stomach hurt so badly you thought you might cry.

You looked around once, no one was there, so you reached for it. Your fingers had barely closed around the bread roll before a voice snapped behind you.

"And what exactly do you think you're doing?"

You jumped so badly you nearly dropped it. An older woman stood in the bakery doorway, arms crossed tightly over her chest. She was broad-shouldered and flour-dusted, with silver threaded through dark hair and the kind of face that looked permanently unimpressed by everything around her.

You immediately shoved the bread back into the basket.

"I-I'm sorry."

"Sorry?" she repeated sharply. "You steal from me and your answer is sorry?"

Your face burned.

"I'm sorry," you said again, more quickly this time. "I didn't mean—I mean, I did mean to, but I wouldn't have if I had money and—"

"That is usually how stealing works."

You swallowed hard, your hands twisted together in front of you. Then, before you could think too hard about it, you dropped to your knees in the snow and bowed your head all the way to the ground. The movement was pure instinct, something buried so deep inside you that it happened before you could stop it. Your scent betrays you. It had been soft before, something steady and almost forgettable in its gentleness. But now it twists, curling into the air around you shifting into something like burnt sugar, bitter at the edges, like something left too long on the flame. Cinnamon, once warm, now biting—spiced too sharply, clinging instead of comforting.

It thickens with your fear, wraps around you, gives you away.

"I'm sorry." Your voice was muffled by the ground but it was shaking still. It was met with silence, only the brief wind through the bare trees could be heard. Slowly, you lifted your head. The woman's expression had changed, only slightly, but enough. Because now she was not looking at you like a thief. She was looking at you like she had just found something she was not supposed to.

You scrambled back to your feet immediately.

"I can go," you said too quickly. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean—"

"How old are you?"

You blinked.

"What?"

"How old are you?" she repeated.

You hesitated.

"Fifteen."

She studied you for another long moment. Your torn cloak. Your worn shoes. The way you were trying not to shake in the cold. Then she sighed heavily through her nose.

"Get inside."

You froze.

"What?"

"You stole from me," she said, already turning back toward the bakery. "Which means you owe me. You're going to work it off."

You stared at her.

"You mean... work here?"

"If you want somewhere warm to sleep tonight."

You followed her inside before she could change her mind.

The bakery was small. Warm in the way only bakeries could be. Everything smelled like flour and cinnamon and rising dough. There was a fire crackling in the back room and blankets folded neatly in one corner beside an old rocking chair. You nearly cried from relief the moment the heat touched your skin.

The woman shoved an apron into your hands.

"You can start by cleaning."

You worked until your hands ached. Sweeping floors, washing trays, carrying sacks of flour twice your size from the storage room. By the end of the night, your hair was dusted white and your arms trembled from exhaustion. The woman handed you a bowl of stew and half a loaf of bread. You ate it so quickly you barely remembered to breathe. She watched you the entire time, not suspiciously just with a careful eye, like she was looking for something that was already there and had hidden itself beneath the surface.

Later, after the bakery had closed and you had nearly fallen asleep sitting upright in your chair, she brought you a blanket.

"You can sleep by the fire."

You looked up at her.

"Thank you."

She grunted and you stayed the night. Then another. Then another after that.

You learned how to knead dough and braid loaves and wake before sunrise to light the ovens. The woman—Helena, she eventually told you to call her—scolded you constantly and fed you even more constantly. The bakery became something steady, something safe. And for the first time in years, you stopped running. Helena knew who you were almost immediately, not because of your face. Faces changed, time changed people. But scents did not lie. You smelled like old magic and winter roses and royal blood.

She never said it out loud.

Not for a long time.

But sometimes you would catch her watching you when she thought you were not looking. Especially when flowers bloomed too early in the garden out back. Or when birds gathered along the bakery roof in impossible numbers. Or when the old pack markings near the woods warmed beneath your hands.

She knew.

And because she knew, she kept you hidden for as long as she could, but nothing good lasts forever.

The village sat at the edge of the northern woods like it had been forgotten there.

Small and crooked and quiet, with smoke curling from chimneys in soft gray ribbons and fences half-swallowed by ivy, it tucked itself beneath the mountains as though trying not to be noticed. In winter, snow gathered thick on the rooftops and the whole place looked like something painted onto old parchment. In spring, wildflowers pushed through the frost in stubborn little bursts of color, and the river thawed enough to carry birdsong through the trees.

You stayed there almost ten years. Long enough for the bakery to become home. Long enough to stop jumping every time someone knocked at the door. Long enough for the ache in your chest to soften into something you could live around.

Helena never asked too many questions after that first winter. Not about where you had come from. Not about the nightmares that woke you crying or the strange way you looked over your shoulder whenever horses rode through town.

She simply made room for you.

At first, you slept by the fire with old quilts tucked around your shoulders and flour still dusting your hands from the day's work. Later, when you were older and taller and no longer looked half-starved all the time, Helena cleared out the little storage room above the bakery and let you make it your own.

It was small. A narrow bed beneath the window, a wooden dresser with one crooked leg, shelves lined with dried flowers and herbs hanging from the ceiling beams. It was the first room that had ever really belonged to you. Still, there were things you could never fully forget. A heavy fur cloak wrapped around you while someone ran through the snow, the sound of horses, the glint of torchlight between the trees. A woman's voice telling you over and over not to cry. You remembered cold fingers around yours and a lullaby you had never heard sung anywhere in the village, soft and low and old enough to sound like it belonged to another world entirely.

Sometimes, in dreams, you could feel it. An arrow flying through the air, the wind being knocked from your lungs as you hit the ground, a pair of pale eyes watching you from a distance. Helena never liked when you spoke of those memories. She would go quiet after, her mouth pulled thin as thread while she kneaded bread too hard or mended shirts by the fire with shaking hands.

"You were sick as a child," she always said. "Dreams feel real when you're sick."

So eventually, you stopped asking and Helena filled your mind with other things instead.

Small things. Somewhat strange things.

She taught you which herbs to hang above your bed when your heats started getting stronger as you got older. Which roots to boil into tea when your scent felt too rich, too noticeable. She taught you how to braid rosemary and cedar into your hair before going into crowded markets so strangers would smell the herbs before they smelled you.

"Never let people know too much about you," she would say while crushing dried leaves between her fingers. "People fear what they don't understand."

She taught you how to listen to the earth. How the woods grew quieter before a storm. How the birds disappeared when strangers entered the forest. How the roots beneath your feet seemed to pull you away from danger before your mind even understood it was there.

"The land will warn you if you pay attention," Helena told you once while the two of you gathered herbs at the edge of the woods. "The earth remembers things people don't."

You thought she was only being strange but over time, you realized she was right.

Animals trusted you in ways they did not trust anyone else. Birds settled on your windowsill in winter and stayed long after the seed was gone. Stray cats followed you home through the market, deer wandered close enough in the woods for you to touch the velvet of their noses.

Even the wolves never frightened you.

You saw them sometimes between the trees at dusk. Great hulking things with silver eyes reflecting the last of the daylight. They watched you quietly, never crossing the line where the woods met the village, waiting as if they knew you.

Then there were the flowers. You tried not to think too hard about that part but it was difficult not to when half the village had seen it happen. You would wake sad and find the flowers outside your window bent low toward the earth, their petals browned at the edges as though touched by frost. Other days, when you laughed hard enough to make your stomach ache, little white blossoms pushed up through cracks in the ground by evening.

Once, after Helena surprised you with a cake on your seventeenth birthday, flowers bloomed all the way down the path behind you. Neither of you spoke about it, but later that night, you found Helena sitting alone at the kitchen table long after the bakery had closed, staring into the fire with tears in her eyes.

The village talked anyway. The older villagers made signs against bad luck when you passed. Mothers pulled their children a little closer, the pack alphas lowered their heads around you without seeming to realize they were doing it.

And every so often, when they thought you couldn't hear, someone would whisper. Royal blood. Forest-born. Cursed. Blessed.

Helena always pretended not to notice. But sometimes, late at night when the fire had burned low and rain tapped softly against the bakery windows, she would tell you stories. Stories about the old kingdoms, about the northern prince whose land had burned beneath black magic and snow. About the lost princess hidden somewhere beyond the mountains.

"The stories say they'll find each other one day," Helena said once while the two of you braided herbs together by candlelight. "The prince and princess of the north."

You smiled faintly.

"And then what?"

Her hands stilled for only a moment.

"Then the evil queen falls," she said quietly. "And the land remembers how to heal again."

You laughed softly, thinking it was only a story.

Helena did not laugh with you.

Far beyond the village, beyond the trees and snow and mountains, the evil queen listened.

Not with her ears.

With the kind of attention that had kept her alive when kingdoms burned and men twice her size tried to break her. With the kind of patience that let whispers travel for months, years, until they finally reached her. An omega in the north. A girl with a scent that lingered too long in the air. Flowers blooming out of season. Animals gathering where they should not. The queen sat very still on her throne as the reports were read aloud. She had spent years erasing the old world. Every banner burned, every bloodline hunted, every child who looked too much like someone important dragged from hiding before they could grow into something dangerous.

She knew what it meant when something survived anyway, when stories refused to die. And this one had followed her for years. Soft at first, easy to ignore and subdue with the promise of fire and ash. Then louder. Then impossible to silence.

For when the moon burns silver bright, the hidden rose will claim her right. Old kingdoms broken, torn apart, will mend beneath her beating heart.

The queen had heard it whispered in ruined halls, in the mouths of dying women, in the quiet defiance of rebels who thought prophecy made them untouchable. She had killed every one of them and still, the words remained. She wanted to believe you were only useful once dead. A body buried beneath snow, a name erased cleanly enough that no one would dare speak it again. Another loose thread cut before it could unravel the careful order she had built.

But the north had always been stubborn, and so had its magic. The women in her court had warned her of that long ago. Ancient seers from kingdoms of old draped in silk and bone, their fingers heavy with rings, their eyes clouded but never blind. They had stood beside her throne since the beginning, whispering truths she did not always care to hear.

This time, they brought her proof.

A scrap of cloth, worn thin and stolen from a village no one had reason to watch. Still carrying the faintest trace of your scent. A broken necklace, dulled with age, its metal etched with a crest no one living dared claim. A dried flower that should not have existed at all—blooming in winter, found growing where nothing else would take root.

The oldest of them took it in her hands and held it over a bowl of dark water, then the petals bled. Red seeping into black. The room fell silent as the seer stepped back for the queen. The water rippled and warped, splashing up against the edges before falling still. The surface changed and went still as stone, morphing into the color of steel, like a mirror. Two guards dragged the cloth from it at her command, the fabric whispering against stone as it fell away.

For a moment, nothing.

Then the glass shivered. Not visibly, not quite, but something beneath it shifted, like breath beneath skin. The queen rose, each step echoed as she descended from her throne, the sound sharp against the quiet, until she stood before it—close enough that her reflection should have met her.

It didn’t.

Her voice cut through the room, cold and measured.

“Speak.”

The surface of the mirror rippled. Not outward, but inward, as though something behind it leaned closer to listen.

“An omega breathes beyond your reach.”

The queen’s jaw tightened.

“I know that much,” she said. “I asked for truth—not riddles.”

A pause.

“A line once buried has taken root again.”

The air shifted. Behind her, one of the seers made a broken sound in her throat, like she wished she hadn’t heard it. The queen’s eyes flickered just for a second, something older wrinkling across her face before smoothing into her young self again.

“Where?” she demanded.

The mirror did not answer her question.

“The north remembers her.”

The words sank into the stone like rot.

“The forests bend. The wild listens. What was scattered begins to gather.”

The queen’s hand lifted, pressing flat against the glass.

“And can she be killed?”

“Not yet.”

The queen’s eyes darkened, she then leaned closer to the mirror, her voice dropping, sharpening.

“What does she become?”

The glass rippled again, deeper this time. And when it answered, it did not sound like one voice—but many.

“A call.”

The torches flickered.

“A claim.”

The room felt smaller.

“The return of what you tried to end.”

The queen’s reflection fractured just slightly, her face splitting along faint, unseen lines before pulling itself back together. For a moment she said nothing, then her hand dropped from the glass. And when she turned, whatever uncertainty had dared to surface was already gone, buried beneath something colder. Harder.

“Then we do not wait,” she said. Her voice carried, sharp as steel. “We do not allow her heart to race. We make sure it stops before it ever learns how.”

Behind her, the mirror went still again, but the cold it left behind did not fade. The queen turned toward the shadows gathered at the edge of the throne room. Her lips curved slowly because at last, after all these years, the shadow at her back had stepped into the light.

"Bring me my huntsman."

He stepped into the room without a sound. Most people never noticed how large he was at first.

They noticed his eyes instead. Steel blue glinting beneath candlelight holding something close to a fury they've never known, silver scars flecked across his jaw and neck worn with years of violence. They noticed the coldness of him too. The way he stood too still. The way his face gave nothing away.

But the frightening thing about him had never been his size.

It was the emptiness. The sense that whatever part of him had once been human had long since been hollowed out. He wore black leathers darkened by snow and old blood, a fur mantle thrown over broad shoulders, his hair longer than most soldiers allowed, brushing against the edge of his jaw. A jagged scar cut across his face like a crack through stone.

Around his neck, hidden beneath his shirt, rested the talisman. A shard of obsidian wrapped in silver with talons stuck into his skin. The queen's leash.

Once, long ago, before the wars and blood and iron, he had been something else. A prince of the northern kingdom. An alpha born beneath snowfall and pine trees and towering white mountains. A boy with sisters who laughed too loud and a mother who braided charms into his hair before battle practice and a father who called him stubborn with too much pride in his voice.

But that kingdom had burned, his family had died screaming and the queen had found him in the ruins before the wolves could. Young enough to break, old enough to remember just enough for it to hurt. So she took his name first. Then his home. Then every soft thing left inside him until all that remained was the huntsman.

He remembered almost nothing now.

Only flashes of a woman's lullaby, snow crunching beneath boots, the smell of cedar smoke. Sometimes he woke with blood on his hands and grief clawing at the inside of his chest so violently he thought he might die from it. But he never knew why. The talisman made sure of that. When the queen spoke, he obeyed, when she ordered, he carried it out. He had hunted rebels through forests and dragged princes from hidden sanctuaries. He had slaughtered entire packs who refused to kneel. Mothers frightened their children with stories about him.

The queen's beast. The wolf with the fury of the old gods. The huntsman who never lost his prey.

He dropped to one knee before the throne. The queen descended the steps slowly, her dark gown whispering against stone.

"There is a girl in the northern woods."

The queen reached beneath his shirt and wrapped her fingers around the talisman resting against his chest and instantly, his jaw locked. Pain shot through him sharp and immediate, burning through bone and blood alike.

"You will find her," the queen said softly. "You will bring her back. Alive."

His breathing grew heavier. He could feel the magic taking hold already, sliding through his veins like chains.

The queen leaned closer. "Do not let her speak to you too long. Do not let her scent confuse you. Do not forget what you are. Who you belong to."

His eyes lowered. "Yes, my queen."

Far north, beyond the mountains, you sat beside the old stone at the edge of the woods with a basket in your lap and flower stems between your fingers. The wind shifted. The birds went quiet. The woods fall silent so quickly it feels wrong. Then the dogs in the village start barking, your hands still around the basket in your lap. Helena is hanging linens on the line when she looks up toward the trees and goes pale. You have never seen fear move across someone's face so quickly.

"Go," she says, and you just stare at her. "Go now."

The basket slips from your hands when you hear the tremble in her voice. Apples spill through the grass. "What is it?"

But she is already grabbing your shoulders, her fingers digging in hard enough to hurt.

"They found you. Go."

For one terrible second, everything inside you goes still, not because you understand what is happening. But because some deep, hidden part of you always knew this day would come.

You run before you can think about it. Through the back garden first. Past the rows of lavender and rosemary, past the fence your hands helped mend every spring. The hem of your dress catches on the gate latch hard enough to tear, but you keep going.

Behind you, voices rise through the village of men shouting, horses trampling against the cobbled stone. You hear your name once, then again echoing through the trees and you run faster until the woods swallow you whole.

Branches scrape your arms and face as you stumble deeper between the trees, lungs burning, heart pounding so hard you can taste blood at the back of your throat. Snow still lingers in patches beneath the pines, soaking through your shoes.

You don't know where you are going, only away. You make it farther than anyone expects. Farther than you expect. Miles, maybe. Long enough for the village to disappear behind you entirely. Long enough for your breathing to turn ragged and your legs to shake beneath you.

You think—stupidly, desperately—that maybe you've escaped.

Then you hear it.

A horse somewhere behind you. Steady hooves against the soft ground as though whoever rides it already knows you cannot get away. You break into another run yet your foot catches on a root. You hit the ground hard. Something like lightning strikes through your leg and you curl within yourself, biting into your lip to conceal an agonizing scream. Pain shoots through your bones, sharp enough to make hot tears spring to your eyes. Before you can scramble back up, a shadow falls across you.

You look up and there he is.

The huntsman.

He looks worse than the stories. Larger somehow. Broader. The fur over his shoulders is dusted with snow, his dark hair tangled from the wind, jaw shadowed from days without shaving. There is blood on one of his gloves you know is not his.

His face is hard in a way that makes him look carved from winter itself. There is no triumph in him, no cruelty. No satisfaction, only the emptiness that comes with having done this too many times to feel anything at all. That would almost be easier to bear. There is simply... nothing.

Your whole body goes cold because you know him. Not truly or personally, but everyone knows him. The queen's beast. The wolf with the dull eyes and deadly snare. The huntsman who drags people back to the capital in chains and leaves with less than he arrived with.

You push yourself backward through the dirt, leg limp below you.

"Please," you whisper.

He steps closer. You can see the scar across his face now. The line of exhaustion beneath his eyes. The way he moves like something permanently braced for violence.

"Please don't." Panic claws up your throat so fast it makes you dizzy.

He says nothing. His gaze drifts over you once. Torn dress. Mud-stained hands. Your bruised and already swelling leg. The scrape bleeding along your cheek. Then he reaches down, grabs your wrist, and hauls you to your feet.

You cry out at the roughness of it. "Wait—please, please, I didn't do anything—"

A rope appears in his hand, you try to scramble away but your leg can't bear any more weight than a feather and the moment you move his hands dig into your wrists so hard you fear he may snap them.

"Please." He binds your wrists without a word. "No, please—"

Your breath catches when he knots the other end to his belt. Like an animal. You hate yourself for the tears that rise so quickly.

"Please," you say again, voice shaking now. "I can pay you. I can—I don't have much but there are coins hidden beneath the floorboards in the cottage and my necklace and—"

Nothing, he just turns and starts walking. You nearly stumble because of how suddenly the rope jerks taut and cry at the pain that spreads up your leg with every step. He leads you back through the woods to where a small group of soldiers waits with horses.

They stare when they see you, you lower your head instantly. The huntsman unties the rope from his hand and secures it instead to the saddle of his horse. Then he climbs up and you stare at him in disbelief.

"You can't expect me to walk."

He looks down at you. Eyes cold and blank.

"You can walk."

Then he clicks his tongue to the horse and starts forward and you nearly fall over, forcing yourself upright and walking as to not be subjected to the beratment of being dragged behind the horse.

For three days, you limp after him through the woods and over frozen roads, your wrists tied, your ankle growing worse with every mile. You try not to cry though it spills its way over the surface, once or twice, when no one is looking. At night, after the soldiers sleep, you curl on your side and hold your breath against the pain throbbing all the way up your leg. Your ankle swells so badly you can barely fit your shoe back on by morning.

The huntsman never comments on it. He never slows. Never looks back. Only keeps moving, horse plodding steadily onward while you stumble after him through snow and mud and stone.

By the end of third day, your body gives out. You barely make it over a rocky incline before your injured ankle buckles completely beneath you and you hit the ground hard. The rope jerks taut and you can't stop the cry that tears from your throat this time.

One of the soldiers groans. "For fuck's sake."

You stay where you fell, hands pressed into the dirt, chest heaving with tears burning hot behind your eyes. You are so tired. So tired of hurting.

The huntsman's horse stops and for a moment, you think he will force you back to your feet. You anticipate it and slowly push up and your palms.

Instead, there is his voice.

"Make camp."

A few of the soldiers complain, but none of them argue. You don't look at him while they set up camp around you. You don't trust yourself to. As soon as the rope around your wrists is loosened enough to give you a little room, you limp away from the others toward the base of a tree.

You sink down into the roots with shaking hands and pull up the torn hem of your dress. Your ankle is awful, swollen and angry and purple around the edges, even the lightest of touches make you wince under your breath. You know you can't go on like this. You stare at it for a long moment before grabbing two fallen branches from the ground beside you.

You remember seeing the healer in the village do this once so you try to copy her. You break one stick trying to make it fit but the other slips from your hands. You hiss through your teeth and blink hard against the tears suddenly threatening again.

Then a shadow falls over you.

You look up to see the huntsman stands there holding a strip of cloth in one hand and you freeze. Without a word, he crouches in front of you. His hands are rough when he takes your ankle, but not careless.

You suck in a breath at the pain.

"I know," he says flatly.

It is the first thing you hear from him besides curt commands to stop crying or keep up. His voice is low. Rusted from disuse. You hate how relieved you are just to hear it.

You watch his hands as he works.

Large hands. Blood-stained and earth crusted hands. Steady hands.

He places the branches carefully along either side of your ankle before tying them in place with the cloth. Firm enough to keep it from moving, gentle enough that the pressure starts easing the pain almost immediately.

You blink down at it, the relief is so sudden it almost makes you dizzy.

"There," he says.

You look up at him.

"Thank you."

His expression hardens immediately.

"I only did it because you were slowing us down."

Still, you smile faintly.

"Thank you anyway."

Something strange crosses his face then, not quite softness, just a flicker of something unsettled. The slate grey of his eyes lightens into something almost blue. Like he does not know what to do with kindness when it is aimed at him. Instead he reaches for the water skin at his belt and holds it out to you.

You stare at it for a second before taking it carefully from his hand.

"Thank you," you say again, quieter this time.

He looks away before you can see whatever is in his eyes this time, then he stands and walks back toward the fire without another word.

Your fear is not yet washed away, despite his moment of brief kindess. You can walk much better, faster and for longer but every step that doesn't ache in your body aches in your heart. Wondering what lies in store for you at the end of this road. You don't admit it outloud, but deep down you know if the huntsman were here, for you, there's a finality to this that cannot be outrun.

It would see pointless to expect anything more, but you beg anyway. You tell him you will disappear if he lets you go. That you will run so far no one will ever find you again. You promise him money you don't have, horses you don't own, land you can't give, anything he wants. Anything any normal hunter would want.

"I don't want anything," he says once.

It hurts more than the rope burning at your wrists. At night, when he ties the rope around his own wrist before sleeping, you lie awake staring at the fire between you as your captor lays on the other side. You've been traveling with him for near a week now and don't know anything past his blank stare and occasional grunt.

He never sleeps deeply, you've notice that quickly. Every snapped branch, every gust of wind through the trees, every distant howl makes his eyes open instantly. Always alert, always waiting. He doesn't touch you more than he has to, doesn't look at you much either. Sometimes you think you see something in those slate grey eyes, something more. Something…

Maybe you're a fool. Maybe marching your way towards death has made you unreasonably optimistic. Maybe hope is just another thing that refuses to die in you, no matter how many times the world tries to beat it out.

Because something is there.

You see it in the way his gaze lingers a second too long before snapping away. In the way his hand tightens on the rope some nights like he’s reminding himself what you are to him. The way every now and then, you'll feel his gaze on you. But the moment you go to look he's turned away, hand brushing at his chest. There is something about him, and whatever it is, its begun to change.

Days into the journey, the herbs in your hair are begin to fail, they begin to wither.

Helena had always braided them carefully. Rosemary, cedar, crushed petals that dulled the sweetness of your scent, kept it quiet, kept it yours. You’d redone them yourself before you the night of your capture, hands shaking but practiced.

At first, you think it’s just the cold crisping their edges. Then you catch the smell. Faint rushes of a flowing river, warm bursts of lavender, and lingering drying linen. It's been so long since you'd known your natural unmasked scent, it almost felt right but you knew it was wrong the second it floated into the air.

You freeze mid-step. The huntsman doesn’t, making the rope jerk and forces you forward again. But it’s there now. You can’t ignore it, your scent bleeding through stronger than it should be, stronger than it’s ever been. You try to fix the braids that night, fingers clumsy as you twist dried stems back into your hair only for them to crumble in your hands. Dead and useless.

You don’t say anything but it's only a matter of time before someone notices.

Of course they do. The soldiers had been distant before. Rough, but uninterested, you were just cargo. Something to deliver, something to avoid, even. Now, their eyes linger. Too long. You feel it before you understand it. The way conversations quiet when you pass. The way their heads tilt slightly, like something instinctive is pulling at them. The way one of them steps just a little too close when handing you food, you shrink back and he smiles but it doesn’t reach his eyes.

By the next day, it’s worse.

You keep your head down and thread your fingers over the rope to keep close. To him. But even that doesn’t stop it. Their voices change around you, dropping into something lower.

"Didn’t think she’d smell like that."

"Queen didn’t say she was that kind of omega."

"Bet she’d be real sweet if she just—"

You don’t hear the rest, you don’t need to.

That night, you try to stay closer to the fire. Closer to him. Your skin shudders at the thought of finding comfort in the huntsman. But when presented with the alternative, being at the subjection to the soldiers… your mind makes the choice for you.

But he moves away from the group again like he always does, setting camp just far enough to be separate, not far enough to raise suspicion. You still follow because you have no choice, because the rope says you do. But most of all, because part of you is starting to understand he is the only thing standing between you and something worse.

You wake sometime in the dark, not because of a sound, the forest is eeriely quiet around you. Your heart jolts you awake because something feels wrong. The rope is slack, cut at the far end [and your stomach drops. You push yourself up, panic already clawing its way into your throat and that’s when you hear it.

Voices echoing too close. You turn to see two of the soldiers stand just beyond the trees, watching you. Your breath catches when they crush a twig in their stride.

"Easy," one of them says, stepping forward. "We just wanna talk."

You scramble backward on instinct, your injured ankle screaming in protest.

"I don’t want to talk."

They don’t stop.

"You smell good," the other one says, voice low, almost dazed. "Didn’t notice it before. Guess you were hiding it."

Your back hits the trunk of a tree, nowhere left to go. "Please," you whisper.

They step closer, hushing you softly and sickly. "Just let us—"

The cut end of the rope snaps taut, both men freeze and so do you. There’s a shift in the air. Heavy. It's not like the first time you saw the huntsman arrive, this time is sharper, dangerous in a way you haven't seen before. Coiled tight on the verge of snapping. You don’t see him through the tress but you can feel him. The huntsman steps between you and them like something pulled from shadow, silent and still.

His eyes flick between them once. "Back away."

One of the soldiers scoffs, trying to shake off whatever hold your scent has over him.

"She’s just an omega—"

He doesn’t get to finish. The huntsman moves. It’s fast and violent yet controlled. The soldier stumbles back, breath knocked from his lungs, a knife suddenly pressed just beneath his jaw before he can react.

The other one goes completely still.

"You forget your place," the huntsman says.

His voice is quiet, it's almost worse than shouting. The blade presses just enough to draw a thin line of blood.

"She’s the queen’s." A beat. "Not yours."

The words feel like a brand, ownership over you from a woman you've never met. It beads up nervous sweat at the base of your spine.

But the men understand. You can see it in their faces, fear replaces whatever had been there before and they slowly back off with their hands raised.

The moment stretches until they disappear into the trees back to their side of camp.

Only then does the huntsman move. He steps away from you like nothing happened. Like you weren’t just cornered, like he didn’t just almost kill someone for touching what belongs to the queen. Your hands are shaking, still bound together with the loose end of rope brushing your thighs.

"Thank you," you whisper.

He doesn’t look at you.

"Sleep."

You try. Laying your shaking frame against the moss covered ground, and shutting your eyes but you don’t sleep. Not really. And neither does he.

The next morning, everything changes.

There are no arguments, no explanations. He cuts the rope from your wrists, freeing them from their binds, mounts his horse then grabs your arm and pulls you up behind him before you can protest.

The soldiers shout.

"What are you doing?"

He doesn’t answer. Just turns the horse toward the mountains.

"We’ll lose time if you—"

"Find another way on your own," he says flatly.

Then he’s gone and he's taking you with him. Away from them, away from the road and into the cold, winding paths of the mountains where fewer people travel and fewer eyes can follow. You don’t understand it. The path narrows quickly, the ground uneven and steep, branches clawing at your sleeves as the horse pushes forward into terrain no caravan would willingly take. You almost slip but instinct takes over before thought and your arms come up around his waist.

You freeze the moment you realize what you’ve done.

Your hands press against his chest where his coat parts slightly, fingers curling into rough fabric and worn leather. You expect him to jerk away. To snap at you. To shove you back or tell you to keep your distance like he always does.

He doesn’t. He says nothing, he doesn’t even look back. But you feel it, the way his body goes still beneath your touch. Not tense, just aware, like the stillness you hold in your breath when waiting for a moment to pass. You should pull away but you don’t. Because something strange happens when you hold onto him. Something you can’t explain, you can feel his heartbeat steady and strong right beneath your palm. And it does something to him. Or maybe to you. The huntsman, the thing people whisper about in dark corners, the queen’s weapon, the man who dragged you from the woods without a second thought, feels… different like this.

Less distant. Less carved from something cold and unreachable. More… human. The rhythm of his heart grounds him into something that exists beyond fear, something warm beneath all the sharp edges, something that breathes and bleeds. Your grip tightens without meaning to. The horse shifts beneath you as it climbs higher into the mountains, the air growing thinner, colder and you don’t let go. Behind you, the world you knew disappears, ahead of you, only snow and stone and silence and between it all the steady beat beneath your hands.

The huntsman doesn’t speak. But something inside him twists. He can feel it where your hands press against him. Where your warmth seeps through layers he had long stopped noticing. It crawls beneath his skin, unfamiliar and unwelcome and… warm. He hasn’t felt that in a long time, not like this, not without pain tied to it. His jaw tightens with his eyes fixed forward. He says nothing. But he doesn’t make you let go either.

The mountains do not forgive weakness.

You learn that quickly.

The paths are narrower than anything you’ve ever walked. Jagged stone beneath the horse’s hooves, steep drops that vanish into white fog if you look too long. The air is thinner here, colder in a way that settles into your bones and refuses to leave.

He does not slow, of course he doesn’t, but he adjusts.

You notice that too. He chooses paths with more cover. Keeps to ridgelines where fewer of the already few travelers pass. Stops before nightfall instead of pushing through it like he did with the others.

You don’t comment on it. You’ve learned not to. Still, by the second night in the mountains, the cold becomes something else entirely. It doesn't just blow, it bites. Sharp and relentless, slipping through the seams of your clothes, curling into your lungs with every breath. The fire he builds is small, controlled, barely enough to push back the dark.

You sit close anyway. You watch him from across the flames, arms wrapped around yourself, trying to ignore the way your fingers have started to go numb.

“You should drink,” you say quietly, holding out the water skin.

He doesn’t respond, just stares into the fire like he didn’t hear you. You hesitate, then shift closer, the movement slow enough not to startle him, and press it into his hand.

“For your throat,” you add softly. “The air’s dry up here.”

His fingers close around it after a moment reluctantly, like taking something from you costs him more than it should. He drinks from it only once then hands it back without looking at you.

“Thank you,” you say anyway.

Something flickers in his expression and is gone before you can name it.

You lower your gaze—and that’s when you see it. A button from his shirt has come loose. You hadn’t noticed before, not with the layers of fur and leather, but now the fabric has shifted just enough to reveal the hollow at the base of his throat, the line of his sternum disappearing beneath worn cloth.

And there something lies. Something dark. Something wrong. A faint glow pulses beneath his the fabric and against his skin. It's near sublte and easy to miss if you weren’t looking for it, but once you've seen it there's no ignoring it. You don’t day anything, you just watch as it flickers once, then fades again like it was never there at all. You tuck the observation away quietly like everything else. Later, when the fire burns lower and the cold deepens into something unbearable, you move without thinking. You sit beside him instead of across from him, close enough that your shoulder brushes his arm.

He goes still instantly and you feel it. That same awareness from before. That same coiled, uncertain tension.

“You’re going to freeze,” you murmur, voice softer now. “I’m already halfway there.”

No answer, so you shift again, closer still. Until the warmth between you becomes shared instead of separate. It’s a risk, you know it is, but he doesn’t pull away. Doesn’t tell you to move. Doesn’t even look at you. And slowly, almost imperceptibly, the space between you stops feeling like a boundary. The warmth feeling less like a need for survival, and more of… just warmth.

The glow returns on the third night of traveling through the mountains. It was stronger this time, you wake to it. A faint, sickly light cutting through the dark. For a moment, you think it’s the fire, then you realize it’s him. He’s on his knees, breath uneven, one hand braced hard against the ground like he’s holding himself upright through sheer force alone.

The glow pulses beneath his shirt, that same place along his chest.

Your chest tightens.

“Hey—”

He jerks violently at the sound of your voice, like it hurt him, like it burned. His head snaps toward you, eyes wild in a way you’ve never seen before. Not the empty slate grey from the first day you met, something else, something fighting against itself.

“Stay back,” he grits out, but his voice isn’t steady.

You push yourself up anyway, slowly, stepping over to him.

“Is there something wrong,” you whisper.

“No—” His breath shudders. “Go back to sleep.”

The glow pulses again, brighter in the night sky. You see it clearly now, some sort of talisman. Not worn, not held, but bound. Woven into him in a way that makes your stomach twist, six legs of iron dug into his skin making it irremovable. And then you hear it, it wasn't words, none that you could understand at least. But something in the air shifts, like pressure building before a storm. Something unseen pulling at him, tightening, demanding.

His body responds instantly, spine straightening, shoulders locking. His expression empties into that cold, hollow stillness returning all at once like a mask snapping back into place. You start to understand, not fully, but enough. Whatever the huntsman has towards the sorceress queen isn't loyalty. It's control.

“Are you okay?”

The words slip out before you can stop them. You watch as he flinches, as the mask cracks just a little. Your heart stutters with fear and something else, but you move closer. Ignoring the warning in his posture. Ignoring the way his hands clench like he’s trying to hold himself together.

“There must be something I can do,” you say softly. “Just—tell me what you need.”

“Nothing,” he snaps, too sharp. Not out of anger, but of something close to panic, like he’s afraid.

The glow pulses again, stronger and he nearly doubles over, faint whispers and hushed lilts float through the air and you watch him coil against it. Without thinking you reach for him, settling your hand lightly against his arm.

And everything… stops, not completely but enough that the tension in him falters. The invisible pressure loosens just slightly, like whatever holds him didn’t expect resistance and his breath shudders. Eyes flickering back to you aren't empty anymore, the slate grey blurring into a pale blue.

You don’t move your hand. “Just breathe,” you whisper.

He does, slowly, his chest rising and falling with shaky breaths, each one deeper and smoother than the last. And the glowing begins to dim. Not fully gone, but weaker. Like something inside him is slowly rising back to the surface.

After that, things change.

Not all at once, not in ways anyone else would notice but they do, and you notice. You notice the way he finds you without looking. Even when you wander a few steps too far gathering wood or water, his gaze always lands on you first. Like he can track you without trying. Like your presence is something he can feel.

You notice how he positions himself on the road. He lets you have the horse the majority of the time, only riding two up with you to find camp when the sun starts to set and the path loses its visibilty. Even then he's always in front, always between you and what lies ahead. Like a barrier.

The first time wolves appear at the edge of the trees, their eyes catching the firelight, he’s on his feet before you even realize what you’re looking at. They don’t come closer, not with him there, not with the low, warning sound in his chest that doesn’t quite sound human.

You notice the way his scent changes too.

You hadn’t paid attention to it before. Not really. It had just been something sharp. Cold rye bread and dried blood. Now it’s different. Still strong with an air of danger to it, but there's something warmer to it. Cedarwood and rusted iron with the barest hint of something soft. Familiar in a way that settles something restless inside you.

You find yourself leaning toward it without thinking, trusting it, and the strangest part—he lets you. Even when he doesn’t understand why, even when it unsettles him, even when something deep inside him keeps pulling him closer without permission, without reason. Like something has already decided that you belong near him.

The trip back to the northern capitol typically takes a full span, but through the mountain pass adds on another halfweeks worth, amounting out to a full fortnight worth of traveling. And the mountains don’t stay empty forever.

You know it before he does. Or maybe you feel it before he lets himself admit it. The way the air shifts, it's subtle, but wrong. The birds go quiet first. Then the wind seems to pull back, like the world itself is holding its breath. Even the horse grows restless beneath you, ears flicking, muscles tightening with unease.

Your fingers curl instinctively into the fabric at his chest.

“Someone’s here,” you whisper.

He’s already slowing the horse, already listening. Then—movement, too fast to track. Figures break from the trees on either side of the path, boots crushing snow, weapons drawn. Not soldiers. Not the queen’s men, something rougher and hungerier. Bounty hunters.

You don’t even have time to think before he's moving. He shoves you down from the horse just as an arrow slices through the air where your head had been. You hit the ground hard, breath knocked from your lungs, snow burning cold against your skin.

“Stay down,” he snaps and you do, not by choice as your lungs are still trying to reinflate themselves.

Steel sings and you scramble backward, heart pounding, as the world explodes into motion around you. Blades clash. Boots slide across ice. Someone shouts. Someone else laughs. There are too many, you know it immediately. Three. No—four, all alphas. You feel it in the air, in the way their presence presses too close, too sharp, too overwhelming without the herbs to dull it.

One of them looks at you, really looks and smiles.

“There she is.”

Your stomach drops. The huntsman steps between you and him instantly and the fight turns brutal. There is no control in his movements, he fights like a man who has survived too much to hesitate. Fast and efficient, ruthless in a way that makes your chest tighten because you realize, this is what he was made into.

This is what the queen kept him for.

One goes down quickly. Another staggers back with blood spilling down his side, but they don’t retreat, they press harder, desperate and greedy.

You try to stay out of the way, you really do. But one of them breaks past him, too fast for him to catch. A hand grabs your arm, yanks you forward and you scream.

“Got you—”

You flail and try to flee but another hand slams into your chest and shoves you backward. You hit the ground hard, the air punched from your lungs before you can even scream. Snow seeps instantly through your clothes, freezing and suffocating all at once. He’s on you before you can recover. Weight, too much to fight. Your wrists are pinned above your head, his grip iron-tight as he forces you flat into the ground. His knee presses into your thigh, trapping you completely.

“Hold still,” he snarls, breath hot and wrong against your skin.

Panic detonates in your chest.You thrash beneath him, twisting, kicking, anything, but it’s useless. He’s stronger. Bigger. Every movement only seems to tighten his hold.

“Get off—” Your voice breaks. “Get off me!”

He laughs.

“You don’t smell like you want me to—”

Something inside you snaps. Your blood is racing through your veins like fire and ice all at once. Something washes over you, not quite fear, not quite anger. Something mystic that calms you despite the thrashing of your limbs. Your mind goes quiet, only feeling the thud of your heart in your chest as your hand scrambles blindly against the ground, fingers clawing through snow and dirt and frozen leaves, when your nails brush against a stone. You don’t think. You don’t hesitate. You just swing. It connects with a dull crack against the side of his head. He jerks, grip loosening just enough and you don’t wait, you wrench one arm free and shove him hard. He stumbles off you, disoriented, and suddenly you’re the one moving.

You scramble on top of him before he can recover, your breath coming in ragged gasps as you raise the rock again and bring it down. Again. And again. You don’t feel it. Don’t hear anything except the rush of blood in your ears and the echo of his voice and the thrum still clawing its way out of your chest.

You just keep going. Until hands grab you, strong and unyielding.

“Enough.”

The huntsman.

He pulls you back hard, dragging you off the man as your arm fights against him on instinct, still trying to swing, still trying to finish it—

“Enough,” he says again, sharper this time.

Your body locks and the world crashes back in all at once. The cold air, your shaking breath, the blood on your hands. The man beneath you isn’t moving and your hands start to shake violently, the rock slips from your fingers. You don’t recognize yourself for a second. Don’t recognize the feeling still burning in your chest—hot and terrifying and alive.

He doesn’t let go of you right away, his grip stays firm, grounding. And you’re left standing there, frozen, staring at what you’ve done.

You killed him.

You—

“Move!”

The huntsman's voice rips through the moment. You barely have time to react before he’s in front of you again, dragging you back as another attacker lunges forward. It all happens too fast, you don't see it happen until it's too late. A blade. A misstep as he pushes you back. The third hunter drives his sword forward and he takes it. For you.

The sound that leaves you doesn’t feel human.

He doesn’t go down immediately, of course he doesn’t. He rips the blade free with a snarl and finishes it anyway, driving his own knife deep into the man’s chest before he can pull back, then, silence. The last of them collapses into the snow.

And the huntsman drops to one knee, shaking to hold himself up. Your ears are ringing, your hands are shaking yet you still rush towards him.

“Hey—hey—” you stumble toward him, dropping beside him in the snow. “Are you okay—”

There’s blood, too much of it. Soaking through his clothes and staining the snow a murky red that makes your stomach twist.

“We have to move,” he says, voice rough.

“You’re bleeding.”

“I know.”

You shake your head, panic clawing up your throat.

“No—no, you can't, you're hurt—”

“I can. We have to go,” his eyes lift to yours. Still steady. Still him, somehow. “More will come.”

That’s what gets you moving, not fear for yourself. For him.

You don’t remember how you find the cabin.

Only that the forest closes in around you again, thick and quiet and endless, and somehow your feet keep moving even when they shouldn’t. You half-carry him, half-drag, holding his arm over your shoulders as you trudge through the snow with the horse trailing behind, his injury too sensitive for him to ride. His weight is heavy against you, steps uneven, scarlet blood staining the snow behind you in a trail that makes your chest tighten with every glance.

“Stay with me,” you whisper.

“I am.”

“Don’t lie.”

A faint huff of breath… almost a laugh.

“Not lying.”

The cabin appears like something out of a dream. Small and abandoned and barely standing, but enough. It has a door, a roof, four walls to keep the wind out. You get him inside.

The world narrows after that. To fire, blood and him. You don’t think about what you did, you don’t think about the man you killed, you can’t. Not yet. You tear open his shirt with shaking hands, breath catching when you see the wound clearly, deep and ugly and pooling crimson.

Your hands hover for a second, then move. You clean it, stitch it with the minimal catgut he had in his napsack on the horse and wrap it. Everything Helena ever taught you comes back in fragments. Herbs. Pressure. Heat. Don’t let him sleep too long. Don’t let him bleed out. Your hands stop shaking eventually, you don’t notice when, only that they do. By the time the fire burns low, he’s lying on the narrow couch in front of the fire, breathing shallow but steady.

You sit beside him, watching, waiting as hours pass, maybe longer. When he finally wakes, it’s slow and disoriented, staggered breaths as his eyes find you almost immediately.

“You’re still here,” he murmurs.

You let out a breath you didn’t realize you were holding.

“Of course I am.”

Something shifts in his expression, small, but real. You hesitate, then reach for him, gently resting your hand on his arm. He doesn’t flinch. Doesn't pull away or tell you stop. The warmth of his skin under you palm ease a shakeness in you that you hadn't known was stirring. He was still alive, still here with you.

“You took that blade for me,” you say quietly.

His gaze drifts to the ceiling.

“Part of the job.”

“No,” you shake your head. “Not like that. You don't almost bleed out to death for cargo. The evil queens huntsman doesn't purposely risk his life for the job. You saved me. Why?”

Silence stretches between you, his eyes flick between you and the fire. He slowly sits up, your hand right at his back to catch him if he were to slump.

“I wasn’t always… this.” he says after a moment. His face glows in the firelight, showing more of him than you'd ever seen, right down to the slight cleft in his chin.

“James,” he murmurs, his voice quiet and hesitant. “James Barnes.”

The name settles into the space between you like something important, something remembered.

“I was—” He exhales slowly. “I was more than what she made me.”

“I know.”

His eyes flick back to yours, you don’t look away.

“I remember pieces now,” he says, voice quieter. “Not all of it. Just… fragments.”

He closes his eyes briefly.

“Snow. Always snow.” A faint crease forms between his brows. “Wolves. Not like the ones here. Bigger. Smarter.” A pause. “A crest. White… and blue. I can’t—” His jaw tightens. “I can’t see it clearly. She doesn't let me remember.”

Your heart pounds. “Your home,” you whisper.

His eyes open again and something sharper there now.

“Gone.”

“So is mine.”

The words leave you before you can stop them. Silence fills the air as understanding settles in slowly behind it.

“You were there,” he says suddenly. “That day. In the forest.”

His expression shifts, not denial but recognition.

“I was supposed to kill you,” he says.

You blink. “What?”

A beat.

“I could have.”

The memory clicks into place, the angle, the arrow cresting your ear instead.

Your chest tightens. “But you let me go.”

“I disobeyed,” he corrects quietly.

Something in your throat closes. You look at him, really look at him and for the first time, you don’t see the queen’s huntsman. You see what’s left of a man who lost everything. Just like you.

“The queen ruined both of our lives,” you whisper.

His gaze softens, barely but enough.

“Seems like it.”

The fire crackles softly ahead you. The world outside is still cold, still dangerous. But something shifts between you, in the walls of this small broken cabin. He—James, lets you sit closer, lets your hand stay on his arm. Seeing him in this new light changes something in you, he doesn't feel like your captor, and you don't feel like something being taken. For noe, you're just two people left behind by the same ruin, trying to remember how to be something more than what it made you.

The quiet after that night lingers longer than it should. It follows you into the next days as you stay at the cabin to let him heal. Into the way your hands still shake sometimes when you're out collecting firewood. Into the way James watches you now, not like before, not like a task.

Like something he’s trying to understand.

The mountains stretch on around you, cold and endless, but the distance between you begins to shrink in ways neither of you name.

It starts with the cold.

It always does.

Nights are worse at higher elevations. The wind cuts sharper through the thin wood walls, the fire never quite enough. You try to sleep curled in on yourself, arms tight around your body, but it doesn’t stop the shivering. The first time he shifts closer, you think it’s accidental, the second time, you don’t move away. By the third, it becomes something unspoken.

Shared warmth. One blanket instead of two.

You lie on opposite sides at first, careful, deliberate distance between you. But sometime in the night, that space disappears. You wake with your shoulder pressed against his chest, your breath fogging faintly against the fabric of his shirt.

He doesn’t move you, doesn’t say anything, just stays. And you let yourself stay too.

But one night, when sleep won’t come, you sit up and find him already looking at you.

“You should rest,” he says.

“So should you.”

Silence, then, his voice just above a whisper. “I will.”

He doesn’t, you know he won’t. So you shift closer instead, wrapping the blanket tighter around both of you, and lean lightly against his side, carefully of his wounded side.

His body goes still for a moment.

Then slowly he relaxes into it. Your head dips forward before you can stop it, resting briefly against his shoulder, you don’t pull away this time.

And after a long moment—you feel it. His hand, lifting, hovering, then brushing a loose strand of your hair back from your face. The touch is hesitant, like he’s relearning something he forgot how to do. You lean into the touch, pressing your face into his shoulder. You sleep with something close to a smile that night.

The closer you get, the more something else begins to change.

You notice it in the quiet moments.

In the way his jaw tightens less when you speak. In the way his shoulders don’t lock every time you step near him. In the way that strange, unseen pressure, the one that pulls at him, bends him, owns him doesn’t feel quite as strong as it did before.

It’s still there. You see it sometimes in the flicker of that faint glow beneath his shirt, in the moments his expression goes distant, like something is trying to pull him away from himself. But it doesn’t last as long anymore. Not when you’re close, not when your hand finds his arm, not when your voice pulls him back. And he feels it too. Even if he doesn’t say it. Because the closer you are the quieter the commands become, the less they hold, the more he remembers.

And the more he wants.

Not in a way he understands, but it’s there, growing and unavoidable. Like something waking up inside him after a very long sleep.

One night, something almost happens.

You’re sitting across from each other in the cabin, the fire low, the world quiet around you. No danger or urgency. Just stillness. You've checked and rebanaged his wound twice already, the list of things to do dwindling by the second. You say something, a soft half joke, something small, and he actually huffs out a breath that might almost be a laugh.

It surprises both of you.

You smile and he stares at you like he’s never seen that before, like he’s trying to memorize it. The firelight catches in his eyes. Your breath slows and so does his. The space between you feels different. Closer, too close. You don’t realize you’ve leaned in until it’s already happening and he doesn’t stop you.

For just a second it feels like everything else disappears. The queen, the road, the past. All of it, gone. Just this, just him and you and the warmth from each other.

Then something in him snaps back to reality. That same invisible force, that same pull. His body tenses sharply, like something inside him yanked him back all at once. His expression shutters, breath hitching as the moment fractures between you and he pulls away. You feel the absence immediately, like something warm just vanished and silence settles in its place. He turns away from you, running a hand through his hair like he’s trying to shake something loose. You don’t reach for him this time, but you feel it. That shift, that crack in whatever holds him.

Because it didn’t stop on its own. It fought. And for the first time it almost lost.

Morning comes too quiet, something wrong lingering in the air. The snow is untouched, no wind, no birds just a stillness that presses too close against your skin. James is already awake when you stir. Sitting at the edge of the bed, shoulders tense beneath his shirt, gaze fixed on nothing. The bandages at his side are cleaner now, the worst of the damage healed, but you can tell—he’s listening.

“We should go,” he says.

You push yourself up slowly, blanket slipping from your shoulders. “Already?”

He nods once.

“Too exposed here.”

Something in his tone settles it so you don’t argue. You pack quickly. What little you have is easy enough to gather—herbs, cloth, the last of the dried food. Your fingers brush his once when you pass him the water skin, he doesn’t pull away, just looks at you for a second longer than necessary.

Then stands.

Outside, the cold hits hard. The world is blindingly white, the path nearly erased beneath fresh snow. For a moment, it almost feels peaceful. Like nothing has found you yet. Like maybe—

James goes still beside you and your stomach drops.

“What is it?”

He doesn’t answer, doesn’t move. Then you hear it, the sound of boots, crunching through the snow, erupting the white powder all around you. They come from all sides, the trees, the ridge, the path behind you. Completely surrounded. Not the worn leather boots of bounty hunters. Steel rings and echoes from chain covered horses. Soldiers from the capital. From the queen.

Your breath catches.

“No—”

James moves instantly, pulling you behind him, body shielding yours in a motion that’s become instinct now. But this isn’t like before, there are too many. James stiffens and you see it before he does, that faint glow beneath his shirt. Bright, violent and wrong. You feel the shift in him, watch as his shoulder baldes fight and pull back together, his entire body at war with itself..

“No,” he echoes.

His hand tightens around yours. Then it stops. Not the glow, but him. His body locks, shoulds straightening, spine rigid. That emptiness returns to his eyes all at once, like something has reached inside him and pulled him back into place.

Your heart drops into your stomach.

“James,” you whisper, stepping in front of him, grabbing his arm. “James, look at me—”

His gaze flicks to you for a second, just a second he’s there, fighting it. Then the glow pulses again harder and stronger than ever before and he’s gone. The soldiers don’t even need to move.

“On your knees,” one of them says.

You don’t listen. You reach for him instead, both hands gripping his shirt, your voice breaking.

“James, please—”

His hand comes up and grabs your wrist, not rough but not gentle either, just final.

“Don’t,” he says, his voice is empty, not his.

Your chest caves in.

They take you easily after that. There is no fight, no struggle. Because the one person who would have fought for you is the one holding you still.

The northern capital feels colder than you remember, not in temperature but in something deeper. The walls rise high and black against the sky, sharp and unforgiving, like they were carved to keep hope out rather than enemies. It's hard to believe you once called this place home.

You’re dragged through the gates, through the courtyard, through halls you barely remember but somehow still know. It feels like stepping into a nightmare you once escaped. Only this time there is no one coming to get you out.

They separate you immediately. You fight then, you don’t mean to it just happens.

“No—!” you twist, reaching for him, panic surging all at once. “James—!”

He doesn’t look at you even once. That hurts more than anything and they drag you away, your voice still echoes through the halls long after you can’t see him anymore.

The tower they put you in hasn’t changed, not really. The same narrow windows, the same stone walls. The same silence that presses in until it feels like it’s sitting on your chest. They lock you inside without a word, the door slams and just lke that you're trapped again.

You don’t know how long it takes before she comes, hours, maybe less.

The door opens slowly as she steps inside like she owns the air itself. The queen is just as you remember. Beautiful and terrible, untouched by time in all the ways that matter. Her gaze finds you and she smiles.

“So,” she says softly, voice smooth as silk. “The little ghost finally comes home.”

Your hands curl into fists at your sides. You don’t bow, you don’t speak. You don't give her anything. Her eyes flick over you slowly, taking in every detail, assessing.

“Where is he?” you ask.

You hate how your voice sounds, not strong enough, not steady enough.

Her smile deepens.

“Ah,” she murmurs. “Straight to him.”

You don’t respond, you can only fight the tremble of your lip as she steps closer.

“He’s exactly where he belongs,” she says. “Back at my side.”

Your chest tightens. “That’s not true.”

“No?” Her head tilts. “You think you changed him?”

You swallow hard yet keep quiet, this doesn't go past her.

“Ah, I see now. You thought love would be enough.”

For a moment something sharp flashes in her eyes, then it’s gone, replaced by amusement.

“Sweet girl,” she says softly. “Alphas like him don’t choose love.”

She reaches out and tilts your chin up with cold fingers.

“They choose survival.”

Your stomach twists.

“He remembers me,” she continues. “Remembers what I made him. What he is.”

Your heart pounds relentlessly and you feel warmth spread across your fingertips.

“He’s already obeying me again.”

The words hit harder than anything, your heartbeat falters and you shake your head.

“No.”

But doubt slips in anyway, quiet and poisonous. She sees it and her smile turns sharper.

“You’ll see,” she whispers. “Soon enough.”

Then she steps back, turns and leaves you alone with the echo of her words.

Below the castle, far beneath the stone and silence, James kneels in chains. His head bowed, his hands bound, the glow at his chest burns brighter than it ever has. And somewhere deep inside him, something is still fighting to remember your name.

The first day, you don’t believe her.

The second, you tell yourself you won’t.

By the third, the silence starts to press in.

There are no windows wide enough to see the sky properly, only narrow slits that let in thin, colorless light. No voices beyond the guards who never speak to you. No footsteps except the ones that come and go without pause, without pattern.

No him.

That is the part that unravels you. At first, you hold onto it stubbornly. The way he looked at you in the cabin. The way he said your name. The way his hand had brushed your hair away like it meant something. Like you meant something. You replay it over and over until it starts to feel distant and unreal.

Because the longer you sit in that tower, the quieter everything becomes. Including him. Whatever it is you felt between you doesn’t vanish, but it dims. Like something struggling through layers of stone and distance and magic. You sit on the edge of the bed, fingers curled into the thin blanket, eyes fixed on the door.

Waiting.

For footsteps, for him, for anything. Nothing comes. By the time the queen returns, you are already tired in a way that sleep won’t fix. The door opens slowly, like she has all the time in the world, and she steps inside with that same measured grace.

“You look smaller,” she observes lightly.

You don’t respond. You’ve learned that much, but your silence doesn’t bother her, it never has. She walks the room like she owns it, because she does, fingers brushing along the stone, the furniture, the edges of your cage.

“I gave you time,” she says. “I thought perhaps you would come to your senses on your own.”

Your jaw tightens.

“I don’t need time.”

Her lips curve faintly.

“No,” she agrees. “You need truth.”

You look at her then, because something in her tone has shifted into somethign sharper, more certain.

“What have you done to him?” you ask.

She doesn’t answer immediately. Instead, she moves toward the small table near the window. There is something resting on it, you hadn’t noticed it before. A single apple, red and perfect. Too perfect.

Your stomach twists. The queen picks it up delicately, turning it in her fingers as if admiring her own reflection in its skin.

“Do you know,” she says softly, “how old magic binds itself to blood?”

You don’t answer but she continues anyway.

“It doesn’t need force,” she murmurs. “Not always. Sometimes it only needs… the right vessel.”

She holds the fruit out slightly.

“Someone beautiful. Someone pure. The fairest in all the land.”

Your pulse quickens. “What is it”

Her smile deepens.

“A gift.”

“No.”

The word comes out sharper than you intend and she tilts her head sickly.

“You’re not curious?”

“I’m not stupid.”

A flicker of amusement crosses her face.

“No,” she agrees. “You’re not.”

She steps closer.

“There was a time,” she continues, “when your kind ruled through bonds like yours. Through scent. Through devotion. Through love.” Her voice softens on the last word, like she’s tasting something bitter. “It made you powerful.”

You don’t move.

“But power like that…” Her gaze sharpens. “Was made for so much more, and you squandered on it. But it doesn’t disappear. It only waits for someone smarter to come along and take control of it.”

The apple gleams in her hand.

Your chest tightens. “What does it do?”

Her eyes meet yours and for the first time, there's no pretense in them.

“It ends you,” she says simply.

Your breath stutters.

“No—”

“And when it does,” she finishes, “he will return to me completely.”

The room tilts and you shake your head.

“He won’t.”

“He already is.”

Your throat closes.

“You’re lying.”

She steps closer, close enough that you can’t look anywhere but at her.

“Am I?”

Her voice drops.

“He hasn’t come for you.”

The words make your chest ache.

“He hasn’t broken free.”

Harder.

“He hasn’t chosen you.”

Your hands shake.

“Stop.”

But she doesn’t.

“Alphas like him don’t defy control for long,” she murmurs. “Not when survival is on the line.”

You close your eyes, try to block it out, but the silence of the tower wraps around her words and makes them echo. Louder. And louder.

Until—

“Eat.”

Your eyes snap open and the apple is in front of you. Closer now, too close and your stomach churns.

“No.”

Her expression doesn’t change.

“Eat.”

“I won’t.”

Something shifts then, subtle, but deadly.

“Do you think you have a choice?” she asks softly.

The air tightens and your chest constricts. You try to step back you can’t, your body refuses. Your breath comes faster.

“What—”

“Old blood magic,” she says. “Yours is not the only blood that remembers.”

Your hand lifts but not by your will and your fingers close around the apple. Terror floods your chest.

“No—no, please—”

Your arm moves slow and unstoppable.

“Stop—!”

You try fight it. Every muscle straining, every thought screaming—but it doesn’t matter. The apple touches your lips and the queen watches, smiling.

You bite, it tastes sweet, too sweet. The world tilts immediately and your knees give out. The apple slips from your hand as you collapse, the floor rushing up too fast, you barely feel it before everything goes distant.

Your breath slows and your heartbeat follows. The last thing you see is her standing over you.

Victorious.

Then, nothing.

The palace whispers by nightfall. The lost omega princess is dead. Gone.

Far below, something breaks. James jerks against the chains with a violent force that rattles the stone around him. His breath comes sharp.

“No.”

The word tears out of him, because something is missing. Not fading. Gone.

Your scent is gone. The thread that had been there, quiet but constant, woven into him whether he understood it or not, severed.

His chest heaves.

“No,” he says again, louder this time.

The glow at his sternum flares violently and commands flood in. Obedience and stillness overcome him. He fights it, ignore it, to silence the submission in his head.

“Where is she?” he demands, voice breaking into something wild, something unrecognizable even to himself. No one answers, not even the wind. The chains hold, the walls don’t move but he doesn’t stop, he pulls and strains. Fights like a man trying to claw his way back to something already lost. Your name sits on his tongue but he can’t say it, not fully not through the magic choking it down.

Stil he tries.

Again. And again. And again.

Because even without whatever bond you two had, without your scent, without anything left to guide him something in him knows something is wrong.

And he is too late.

War comes easily to her.

By the time the sun dips behind the black stone towers, the queen has already begun carving the world into something new. Maps stretch across her war table, inked borders slashed through with impatient hands, territories reduced to nothing more than places to be taken.

“There is no one left to oppose me,” she says, calm and certain.

Messengers bow, generals listen. Your name is not spoken.

“Bring me my huntsman.”

The command echoes down into the dark where he is kept. James doesn’t feel the pull the way he used to. It’s there—but distant. Frayed. Like something reaching for him through water instead of iron. Still, it tries. He sits in the dim of the dungeon, head bowed, breath slow, when the door creaks open.

Bootsteps, not from the same guard. Slower steps, familiar in a way he can’t place.

“You hear her, don’t you?” the voice says quietly.

James lifts his head. An older man stands in the doorway, lamplight flickering across a face lined with years and something heavier than age.

“I hear enough,” James mutters.

The man studies him carefully, then steps inside, closing the door behind him.

“They told you she was dead,” he says.

James goes still. The words land like a blade.

“She—”

“She isn’t gone,” the man interrupts gently. “Not in the way they want you to believe.”

Something cracks open in James’s chest.

“What did she do?” he demands.

The man exhales slowly.

“Old blood magic.” His voice lowers. “The kind meant to preserve… or to pause.”

James’s hands curl into fists.

“Where is she?”

“The tower.”

A beat, then the man steps closer.

“There are stories,” he continues, quieter now. “Older than this kingdom. Older than her.”

James doesn’t move.

But he listens.

“Of a northern prince,” the man says, “and an omega princess hidden away by war. Bound not by crown—but by choice.” His gaze sharpens. “Destined to find each other, bound together by the moon goddess herself. Their bond was said to outlast everything. Curses. Kingdoms. Even death.”

James swallows and something deep inside him stirs.

“And you think… that’s us,” he says.

“I think,” the man replies, “this is your chance to prove it is.”

Silence stretches. Then the man reaches for the chains, the metal clicks and falls away.

James stares when the man doesn't make any moves towards him.

“You’re supposed to take me to her.”

The man just shakes his head.

“Go.”

James doesn’t hesitate.

The castle feels different when you’re not being dragged through it. He moves fast, faster than thought. Up corridors. Through shadowed halls. Past guards who don’t see him in time—or don’t see him at all. The tower door stands open as candles flicker inside, the flames still in the air.

His chest tightens before he even crosses the threshold and then he sees you, laid out in white like something already mourned. Flowers surround you, soft and pale, arranged with careful hands. Your hair is spread gently around your shoulders. Your hands folded over your chest as you lay still as stone.

“No…”

The word leaves him broken. He crosses the room in seconds, dropping to his knees beside you, hands hovering like he’s afraid touching you will make it real.

“Hey,” he says, voice unsteady. “Hey—no, this isn’t—”

His throat closes as his hand finally settles over yours, cold and still. It hits him then all at once.

“I’m sorry,” he breathes. The words spill out before he can stop them.

“I should’ve fought harder. I should’ve— I should’ve found a way—”

His forehead presses against your hand.

“I remember now,” he whispers. “Everything.”

Snow-covered courtyards. Wolves in the distance. A crest stitched into winter cloaks. A name spoken with pride.

“And you—you gave that back to me.” His voice shakes. “You made me remember what it felt like to be… human. You saved me even when I was… when I wasn't worth saving.”

Silence answers him, but he keeps going.

“I didn’t say it,” he admits. “I should have. Back in the mountains. Before she took you.”

His thumb brushes your knuckles.

“I love you.”

The words settle into the room like something sacred.

“I love you,” he repeats, quieter now. “You gave me something worth choosing. Something worth fighting for.” His breath falters. “And I would rather die than go back to what I was… than live in a world where you’re not in it.”

He looks at you, still silent, eyes unmoving thinking about what he would give to see the firelight reflect in them one last time.

“I'm sorry,” he whispers.

And then he leans in and presses his lips to yours, soft and careful, sealing his apology in something stronger than words, holding onto the last fragile piece of something he refuses to lose. For a moment, nothing happens, the candles still flicker gently and the tower bricks groan in the wind. Then—you gasp. Air rushes into your lungs all at once, your body jolting as your eyes snap open, hands clutching at his shirt.

“James—”

Your voice is raw and ragged and alive. He freezes as his mind tries to wrap around the miracle in front on him, then you grab his hand and he exhales like the world has been given back to him.

“I’m here,” he breathes. “I’m right here.”

At the same moment, a crack splits the air, sharp and violent that makes him go stiff. The glow at his chest flares once, then shatters. The talisman fractures apart, pieces falling from beneath his shirt and striking the stone floor with a hollow sound that silence follows.

You and James both goes still. Waiting. For her voice, for the pull, for the command that has lived in his bones for years, yet nothing comes. Not even an echo.

His breath catches. The absence is so complete it almost feels loud.

“James?” you whisper, still disoriented, your hand tightening in his. He looks at you and there is nothing in his eyes now but himself, gone is the slate grey that you came to know, in their place is a crystal clear steel blue reflecting the setting sun.

“I can’t hear her,” he says, voice quiet with disbelief.

Your lips part. “Good.”

A breath breaks from him, half laugh, half something else entirely. He leans forward, pressing his forehead to yours, the silence in his head beautifully disorienting with the quiet truth that he is finally, undeniably free.

"We have to go," you whisper, longing to stay in this moment with him but knowing it must end. That all of this must end. You can't wait any longer. There is no time for it, no space left for hesitation or fear or the quiet, careful steps you learned to take just to survive.

This time, you choose to be seen.

The halls blur as you move, hand locked in his, your steps matching his without needing to think about it. The castle feels different now. Not endless or suffocating, but something breakable. Doors slam open as you pass. Servants freeze and guards turn when they see you. Alive. Whispers follow in your wake like sparks catching fire. By the time you reach the throne chamber, the air is already shifting, the doors are thrown open and there she is. Seated on her throne like nothing in the world has changed, like she has already won. Her gaze lifts lazily and then she sees you and she falters for half a second.

“…no,” she breathes, the word is quiet and uncertain. "Impossible."

You step forward, unbroken and her composure snaps back into place like glass reforming.

“Kill her.”

The command is immediate, sharp and absolute. It echoes through the chamber as every guard stills, every breath holds. But James doesn’t move and the silence stretches.

“Kill her,” she repeats, rising from the throne now, something desperate creeping beneath the surface. “That is an order.”

Nothing happens, he doesn’t even look at her. Instead, he steps in front of you and the room shifts. You feel it, the barricade he's made, the choice he shows. Everyone does and the queen’s eyes widen, not in rage this time but in fear.

“No,” she says, quieter now. “No, that’s not—”

Her gaze drops to his chest to where the talisman used to be and her breath catches seeing it gone.

“You—” Her voice sharpens, cracking at the edges. “What did you do?”

James finally looks at her and there is nothing obedient in his expression. “You don’t get to command me anymore.”

The words land like a blade, sending something fractured across her face. You step forward then past him and into the center of the room, into the light.

“Look at her,” you say. Your voice carries, it cuts through the tension like something older than the walls around you. “Look at what she’s done.”

The room is full now. Servants, guards and nobles lingering at the edges, all watching and listening.

“She took this kingdom,” you continue, your gaze fixed on hers. “Not by right. Not by loyalty. By lies. She destroyed entire kingdoms to sit on that throne, she had my mother murdered and poisoned my father,” you say, louder now. “Burned cities to the ground. Took their heirs. Their people. Their lives.”

The queen’s expression twists. “Silence her—” No one moves and you don’t stop.

“She bound men to her will,” you go on, your voice rising. “Turned them into weapons. Into things they were never meant to be.”

Your hand finds his and pulls him slightly forward.

“Ask him.”

All eyes turn. James stands there, no longer the queen’s shadow, not just the northern prince, something else entirely.

“She didn’t rule you,” you say, sweeping your gaze across the room. “She controlled you.”

Soon a guard shifts, another lowers his weapon slightly.

“She made you afraid,” you press. “Afraid to remember who you were before her. Afraid to stand against her.”

Your chest rises and falls with each breath.

“But you remember.” The words soften. “You remember your homes. Your families. The lives you had before this place became something else.”

Silence drapes over the room.

“We can rebuild,” you say. “The kingdoms she broke—we can bring them back. Together. You don’t have to serve her anymore. Stand with me.”

James laces his fingers through yours, holding you tight.

"With us.”

The first weapon drops. It hits the stone with a sharp clang, then another, and another. The sound spreads through the chamber like thunder. The queen steps back.

“No,” she snaps, voice rising, cracking. “No, you will obey me—”

Her hand lifts and black magic surges, wild and in its own air. It lashes out, striking one of the nearest guards and throwing him back. Screams break the silence.

“Kill them!” she shrieks. “All of them—kill her—kill—”

The last of her loyal guards surge forward and James moves. This time, he doesn’t hesitate. He meets them head-on, fast, brutal and precise. But different, no longer is he an empty fighting machine, every movement is chosen, every strike grounded in something real.

You don’t stay back, you just can’t.

You grab the nearest fallen blade and step in beside him. The first guard lunges and you move instinctively, flashes of the fight in the mountains cross through your mind but it's different now, with James by your side. The fight spills out of the throne room, down the halls, through corridors that echo with shouts and crashing steel. The queen retreats desperately. Her magic lashes out wildly, cracking stone, shattering glass, forcing people back as she stumbles toward the courtyard.

“This is mine!” she screams. “This kingdom is mine—I built this—I took this—”

“No,” you say, breathless but unyielding as you follow. “You stole it.”

James takes down the last guard in your path turns and finds you instantly. Together, you push forward, step by step driving her back out into the open into the courtyard where the entire palace can see, where there is nowhere left for her to hide.

Her magic flickers, unstable now.

The courtyard holds its breath. Snow drifts softly from the gray sky, settling over stone still cracked from her magic, over fallen weapons, over the remnants of something that is already ending. She stumbles back as her power flickers violently around her hands, wild and unfocused, striking the ground instead of you, splintering stone instead of bending it.

“This is mine!” she screams again, voice unraveling. “I took this kingdom—I earned it—”

“No,” you say, stepping forward despite the chaos, despite the way the air still hums with danger. “You destroyed it.”

Her gaze snaps to you and several emotions cross her eyes, rage and fear, something desperate and cornered. Behind her, the high window stands open, shattered glass scattered across the floor, the drop beyond it steep and endless, cliffs swallowed by snow and fog. James moves first, he closes the distance between them in seconds, forcing her back another step, his presence unyielding, solid, final. There is nowhere left for her to go as her back nearly touches the broken edge.

“Stay back!” she hisses, power flaring again in her hands but it doesn’t land, doesn’t hold. Whatever she built is failing her now.

You step up beside him and for a moment it's quiet, just the three of you and the gentle winter wind carrying the end of something long and terrible.

“You can stop,” you tell her. “It doesn’t have to end like this.”

Her lips curl.

“Spare me,” she spits.

“I’m offering you a choice,” you say. “Surrender and stand down. Let this end without more blood.”

The courtyard around you listens, every person gathered there, every life she touched. Her eyes flick between you and James and something shifts in her expression.

“You think you’ve won?” she laughs, sharp and broken. “You think this ends with me?”

Her power lashes out again, wild, uncontrolled—and she steps back, just slightly and her heel catches. For a single, fragile second she falters when she realizes there is no one behind her to steady her, no magic left to hold her in place.

She falls.

The drop swallows her instantly, her scream cut short by the wind and the distance below, and then silence. It settles over the courtyard like snowfall. No one moves, no one speaks, wondering if it's finally over. Truly over. You stand there, staring at the empty space she left behind, your breath slow, uneven, your heart still catching up to what just happened. James steps closer, his hand brushing the back of your arm, just letting his presence solidify behind you.

The first person to move is a servant, then another, then a guard, then more. They gather slowly, cautiously, like they’re afraid this might disappear if they move too fast, but it doesn’t. You’re still standing, both of you, not as what she made you, not as what the world feared. But as what you chose to become. Someone kneels. Then another. And another. It spreads through the courtyard, through the people, through the space she once ruled with fear but this is not forced, not commanded. It's given freely. James’s hand finds yours and you hold on tight, knowing that whatever lies ahead of this, you'll do it together.

The days that follow feel unreal.

The castle changes quietly. Windows are opened. Doors unbarred. The heavy, suffocating presence that once clung to every wall begins to lift, replaced by something lighter. Something uncertain, but hopeful. People speak more, laugh, sometimes but mourn, too. Because there is still loss, there always will be but it no longer feels like the end.

The ceremony is held beneath an open sky. Snow still blankets the ground, but the sun breaks through for the first time in what feels like years, light spilling across the courtyard where everything changed. You stand beside him as the crown is placed on your head first.

Light, but heavy with meaning.

“By blood and by right,” the elder declares, voice carrying across the gathered crowd, “we name you, the lost princess of the north, returned and restored.”

Then James steps forward. There's a moment, just a moment where the past flickers across his face. Everything he was, everything he lost, everything he found again. The crown settles onto his head.

“By blood stolen and returned,” the elder continues, “we name you, the true prince of the north, returned and restored.”

A pause.

“Together, you stand as the rightful rulers of the north. Long may you reign!”

The words echo across the crowd, applause deafens any thoughts of doubt and suddenly it all becomes real. Then the crowd bows and James’s hand slips into yours again, the familiar warmth spreading through you. When you glance at him he’s already looking at you, he looks different than the first time you saw him. There's something fuller about him, a pink dusting to his cheeks, the smoothed skin of his used to be chapped lips, his hair swept back into a tight little knot at the nape of his neck.

He looks… handsome, you've never really noticed how much until now.

The palace feels too big now. Not in the way it used to, all looming and suffocating and cold, but in the quiet spaces between things. Rooms that echo a little too much. Hallways that stretch a little too far. You’re still getting used to it, both of you are.

“You’re walking like you’re being hunted,” James mutters from behind you.

You glance back, half-offended, half-amused. “I am not.”

“You are,” he insists, arms crossed as he leans against the doorway, watching you navigate the room like the floor might give out beneath you. “You keep checking the corners.”

You pause because… you had been.

“Well I was kidnapped for a time, tends to put people on edge afterwards,” you shoot back.

A corner of his mouth lifts. “Yeah. Well now you don’t have to be anymore.”

You huff softly and move to the table, eyeing the carefully arranged plates waiting for you both. Everything too neat, too polished.

“This doesn’t even look edible,” you mutter, poking at something that has been sliced into impossibly perfect pieces.

“It’s fruit,” he says.

“It’s ruined fruit.”

He laughs under his breath, pushing off the wall and coming to stand beside you.

“Give it a chance.”

“I miss stealing bread,” you say flatly.

“That’s not something you’re supposed to admit as queen.”

“Well, I preferred it,” you reply, picking up a piece and inspecting it suspiciously. “At least it didn’t look like it had opinions about me.”

James snorts.

“I miss not having to wear this,” he adds, tugging lightly at the collar of his formal shirt like it’s personally offended him.

You glance at him. “Liar.”

His brow lifts.

“You like looking like a prince.”

“I liked not freezing in the mountains with you more.”

“That’s fair.” A beat, then your voice slips into something softer. “I liked that too.”

He looks at you as something quieter settles between the humor and the silence lingers, not uncomfortable, but telling. You turn away first, reaching for the water, trying to ignore the way something in your chest tightens without warning.

“So,” you say, a little too casually. “They said the first group to go back to the sister kingdom leaves in a few days.”

“A week,” he corrects.

You nod too quickly. “A week.”

He watches you, you can feel it. “Yeah.”

You busy your hands with nothing, rearranging the fruit by biggest to smallest.

“They said they'll send someone to oversee things,” you continue. “Organize supplies. Make sure it’s… done properly.”

“They will.”

You swallow. “You don’t have to go.”

It slips out before you can stop it.

“I know,” he says carefully.

“You could send someone else. There are plenty of people—more qualified people—”

“Hey.”

His voice cuts through it gently and you stop to look at him. He’s leaned in closer now, you hadn’t noticed him move.

“What’s going on?” he asks.

You open your mouth, close it, and try again.

“Nothing.”

He doesn’t buy it for a second.

“You’re a terrible liar,” he says.

“I’m not lying.”

“You are,” he counters quietly. “You’re just… not saying it out loud.”

Your chest tightens and you look away, those near cerulean blue eyes impossible to face with the truth.

“That’s not fair.”

“Maybe not,” he says. “But it’s true.”

Silence stretches between you, but he doesn’t push, just waits. And that somehow makes it worse because now you have to say it. You stand from your seat and take a few steps from the table, needing some sort of seperation to manage your dignity should you lose it.

“I don’t want you to go,” you admit finally, the words quieter than you meant them to be. There it is, out in the open. You brace yourself for denial, amusement, rejection. But he doesn’t laugh, doesn’t brush it off.

“Okay,” he says instead.

You blink. “That’s it?”

He shrugs slightly, standing from his seat to walk over. “That’s what you said.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Then what did you mean?”

You hesitate, because now it’s harder, now it’s real.

“It just…” you exhale shakily. “After everything, after the road and the mountains and all of it, it doesn’t feel right… when you’re not there.”

Your voice softens.

“Like something’s missing.” You finally look at him fully again. “And I don’t like it.”

He’s quiet for a moment. “There was something the old servant told me,” he says slowly.

You frown slightly. “What?”

“About the north,” he continues. “Before all this. About… a prince and an omega princess.”

Something flickers in your memory.

“They were meant to find each other,” he says. “No matter what happened. No matter what tried to keep them apart.”

“I’ve heard something like that,” you admit. “Stories. Helena used to tell them sometimes.”

He nods.

“People think that’s us.”

You let out a small, uncertain laugh. “That’s a lot to put on two people.”

“Yeah,” he agrees. “It is.”

He pauses, like the next words are lingering in the air just waiting to be said.

“Some of them say… a true mate bond can break anything.”

Your heart stutters as your feet draw you closer.

“Even magic,” he adds, watching you like he’s still trying to piece it together himself. “Some people say that’s what happened,” he continues. “That a—”

“James.”

He stops as you step even closer, close enough that there’s no space left between you.

“Stop talking,” you murmur.

His brow lifts slightly.

“Oh, I—”

You don’t let him finish, your hands grab at the linen of hist shirt and pull him down and you kiss him. It’s not hesitant or careful, but certain. Like something you’ve been holding back for far too long finally finding its way out. He stills for half a second, then he’s there meeting you, returning it. His hand finds your face, steady and warm, like he’s anchoring himself just as much as you are. When you pull back, your breath is uneven.

Your forehead rests against his.

“I heard you,” you whisper.

His brows knit slightly.

“When?” he asks.

“In the tower,” you say. “Before I woke up.”

“I didn’t know if—”

“I did,” you interrupt softly. “I just didn’t get to answer.”

Your fingers curl into his shirt. “I love you too.” The words settle between you.

“And I don’t want you to leave,” you add, quieter now. “Not yet. Stay with me.”

Something shifts in his expression and he leans in again, pressing another kiss to your lips—slower this time, grounding. When he pulls back, he presses a quick kiss to your forehead.

“Okay,” he says. “I’ll stay.”

He finds you some days later. Not in the throne room, not in the halls where people now bow and watch and whisper. Somewhere quieter, a side corridor that opens out toward the gardens, where the light is softer and the air doesn’t feel so heavy with expectation.

You hear him before you see him. That steady, familiar rhythm of his steps. You turn and when you catch his eye he stops like he hadn’t entirely decided what he was going to say until this exact moment. For a second, neither of you speaks. It’s… different now, not distant but just new.

“Hey,” he says finally.

You tilt your head slightly, studying him.

“Hey.”

He shifts his weight, subtle, but you notice.

“I was thinking,” he starts, then pauses like the words don’t quite line up the way he wants them to. “We’ll probably be… doing a lot of this.” He gestures vaguely—toward the castle, the responsibilities, the everything. “And not a lot of anything else.”

You smile faintly.

“That’s one way to put it.”

“Yeah,” he huffs quietly, rubbing the back of his neck. “So I thought—maybe—”

He stops again and you just watch him through it.

“Would you—” He exhales, then tries again, more straightforward this time. “Would you have dinner with me?”

You blink.

“Dinner?”

“Not—” he shakes his head quickly. “Not like that. Not formal. Not… any of this.” His hand gestures again at the castle around you, like it personally offends him. “Just us.”

Something soft settles in your chest.

“Okay,” you say.

He looks almost surprised you didn’t make it harder.

“Okay?”

“Okay,” you repeat, smiling a little more now.

A breath leaves him—relief, maybe.

“Good,” he says. “Good. Then… meet me in the gardens. At dusk.”

You nod.

“I’ll be there.”

Dusk paints the gardens in gold and blue.

The last of the sunlight stretches long across the grass, catching on the edges of the stone paths and the early bloom of flowers that have started to return. You follow the sound of quiet movement. And then you see it. He’s already there kneeling in the grass, adjusting something with a focus that feels almost out of place for him. It takes you a second to take it all in, it’s not elaborate or overly polished but it's intentional. A blanket spread across the ground—no, several blankets, layered unevenly, some folded over each other, others half-bunched like he couldn’t decide where they were supposed to go. Candles scattered around in small clusters, their light flickering softly against the growing dark.

And food, simple food.

Bread, still slightly warm. Fruit—unsliced this time. Something wrapped in cloth that smells faintly savory. It's not royal and draped in gold, but it's him and it's utterly perfect. He looks up when he hears you and for a second, there’s something almost unsure in his expression, like he’s waiting for you to decide what this is worth.

Your gaze drifts over the blankets again then back to him.

“…you made all this?” you ask.

He shrugs, a little too casual.

“Yeah. Well—some of it. I didn’t exactly bake the bread.”

A small smile tugs at your mouth as you step closer, eyes catching on the pile of blankets again. There are a lot of them, more than necessary. Some mismatched. One folded into itself like it gave up halfway through.

You glance at him.

“James.”

“Yeah?”

“…what is all this?”

He follows your gaze and hesitates.

“I—” He exhales through his nose, rubbing the back of his neck again. “I tried to make a nest.”

You blink.

“A nest?”

“Yeah.” He gives a half-shrug, like he’s trying to play it off before it can matter too much. “I don’t know. I don't remember much from how courting works… only bits of it. Not really. Just—” He gestures vaguely at the blankets. “This is probably wrong.”

You don’t say anything right away.

“I know I’m just an alpha,” he adds, quieter now, almost under his breath. “I don’t know how this is supposed to look I just know that in my offering needs my scent and I—.”

“It’s perfect,” you say softly stopping him as you step closer, close enough that the space between you disappears again, like it always seems to now.

He huffs lightly.

“It’s really not—”

“It is,” you interrupt gently.

“Not because of how it looks,” you continue, softer now. “Because you made it.”

You can see the tension in his shoulders eases, just slightly.

“Besides,” you add, glancing back at the blankets with a small smile, “I think you overdid it.”

He lets out a quiet laugh.

“Yeah. I got that feeling halfway through.”

You step onto the blankets, sinking into them a little as you settle down. It’s warm and soft, his scent crowding you in the best way possible, teakwood and ocean salt, comforting in a way that feels familiar. He watches you for a second like he’s making sure you actually like it, then joins you.

You reach for a piece of bread and break it in half to hand him the other. He takes it without hesitationn and you eat, quietly. No ceremony or royal flare, just this. The candles flicker around you, the sky deepening into night overhead, at some point, your shoulder brushes his. Neither of you moves away.

“You know,” you murmur after a while, “this is better than the dining hall.”

“Yeah?”

“Much.”

He nods.

“Good," he pauses, brushing crumbs from his palm. “I wanted something that felt like before.”

You glance at him.

“It does.”

Another pause, quieter this time, full in a different way. You shift slightly, settling more comfortably into the blankets, into him. The candles flicker lower, their light softer now near fading, shadows stretching across the blankets. Somewhere beyond the gardens, the palace continues on in the distance, voices, footsteps, life, but it feels far away from here.

From this.

You don’t realize you’ve gone quiet until you notice he has too. The conversation fades naturally, like it’s run its course without either of you needing to force it and in its place something else lingers. You glance at him and he’s already looking at you. It’s not sudden, not sharp, just a moment that stretches a little longer than it should. Your breath catches slightly, not from nerves, not really but from the weight of everything that led here. The road. The mountains. The fear. The choosing. All of it sitting quietly between you now, and neither of you looks away. He shifts first slowly, like he’s giving you time to stop him if you want to. You don’t so you meet him halfway. It’s small, the way it happens, subtle and gentle. The space between you closing inch by inch until it isn’t there anymore. His hand finds yours again and your fingers curl into his without thinking.

Then he leans in when your lips meet, it’s soft at first, testing, like both of you are still learning what this is allowed to be now that nothing is forcing it apart. But it doesn’t stay uncertain for long, because you already know each other, know the way the other breathes, the way the other moves, the way everything settles into place when you’re close. It deepens like embers glow hot in a flame, like something finally clicking into alignment. You shift closer without thinking, your shoulder pressing into his, your hand tightening slightly in his as if grounding yourself in the moment. He leans into you in return, steady and warm, like he’s anchoring himself there too. When you finally pull back, it’s only barely. Your foreheads rest together, your breathing a little uneven, your eyes still half-focused on each other.

There’s a quiet there again, but it’s different now like something you didn’t fully realize you were holding onto has finally been set down.

His thumb brushes lightly against your hand.

“You okay?” he murmurs and you nod, a small smile pulling at your lips.

“Yeah," you hum through a smile. “Better than okay.”

He exhales a quiet laugh at that, the tension in him easing in a way you can feel.

“Good,” he says.

The moment lingers, your forehead still rests against his, your breath slowly evening out, the quiet between you no longer uncertain but settled, warm, steady, and real.

And then the light changes, it’s subtle at first. A shift in the shadows. A softening of the dark. You feel it before you see it, both of you do. James’s hand tightens slightly around yours as his gaze lifts, something instinctive pulling his attention upward.

You follow it to see the clouds part without warning. And the moon—full, bright, impossibly clear breaks through the sky. Its light spills over the garden in a way that feels… different. Not just illumination, but presence. It washes over the blankets, the candles, your hands still tangled together, over both of you and everything stills. The air goes quiet in a way that doesn’t feel empty but feels held. Like the world has paused just for this. The garden fades at the edges, not disappearing, just softening, like it’s no longer the center of what matters.

And something else settles in. You can't see it, but you feel it in your bones. Something ancient watching. Your fingers tighten in his without thinking and the connection between you shifts, deepening, opening into something wider than just the moment. You feel it in your chest, in your quickening pulse. In the quiet place inside you that has always known there was something more, even before you understood what it was. Images flicker through your mind, not quite memories, not quite dreams.

A home you’ve never stood in, but somehow recognize, stone walls that feel safe instead of cold. Snow falling outside a window that doesn’t feel like something to survive but something to watch, together.

Laughter, yours and his. Your hand in his, the feeling of belonging, not to a place, not to a crown, but to each other. It moves through you like a quiet truth unfolding. You glance at him and he’s already looking at you and you know he sees it too, feels it, understands it in the same wordless way.

Not just what you are, but what you’ve chosen to be. Something ancient threads through it all, the echo of stories whispered long before either of you were born. The northern prince. The lost omega princess. Fate bonded through destiny.

The presence lingers just long enough for it to settle fully into you with a quiet certainty, a promise without words. Then just as gently as it came it fades, the garden returns, the candles flicker back into focus and the night breathes again as the moon passes over the garden walls. Sound trickles back in—the distant rustle of leaves, the faint crackle of flame.

Nothing looks different but everything feels it, there’s no question left now. James exhales slowly, like he’s just come back from somewhere far away. This time you don’t hesitate, you lean in first and he meets you immediately. The kiss is deeper this time, grounded in something deeper than love, every bit of it anchored in what you just felt, what you now understand. His hand comes up to your jaw, steady and sure, holding you there like something he has no intention of ever losing. You shift closer again, the last of the space between you disappearing completely.

Then, something shifts.

His exhale shudders against your mouth, his grip tightening just enough to make your pulse jump. The kiss deepens, slow but inevitable as his tongue traces your lower lip, and when you gasp, he takes the opportunity to claim more, his other hand sliding around to cradle the back of your neck. The sweetness melts away, replaced by something darker, hungrier. The air between you grows thick, charged with the scent of Alpha and Omega, of need and promise. You can feel the moment his instincts surge forward, his growl vibrates through your chest as his teeth graze your lip, not quite biting, not yet. But the threat of it, the promise of his control slipping, makes your body arch against his without thought as he pulls you into his lap.

His fingers flex against your skin, pulling you impossibly closer until there’s no distinction between where he ends and you begin. The kiss turns messy, consuming, tongues tangling in a rhythm that mimics something far more carnal. Your nails dig into his shoulders, dragging down the fabric of his shirt, needing more. And James answers without hesitation. His palm slides down to your waist, gripping hard enough to near bruise as he tugs you flush against him, letting you feel the hard length of him pressing insistently between your thighs. A whimper escapes you, high and needy, and he swallows it greedily, his free hand fisting in your hair to tilt your head back.

There’s no more gentleness. Only heat. Only want. Only the two of you, lost in the pull of the moon and something deeper, something inevitable.

He groans into your lips as he kisses you harder and deeper like he's trying to devour you whole. The slick heat between your thighs is impossible to ignore, your scent saturating the air, and James growls against your lips, low and possessive.

"You smell so fucking good," he rasps, his voice rough with want. "Like mine."

Your fingers tangle in his hair, pulling the tie loose until his dark strands spill free, silken and soft under your touch. You tug, just enough to make him groan against your mouth, his hips bucking up instinctively beneath you.

His hands are everywhere, rough palms skimming your waist, gripping your hips before sliding up to cup your breasts, thumbs brushing over your peaked nipples through the thin fabric of your dress. The growl that tears from his chest is pure Alpha, possessive and starving. “Fuck, you’re perfect,” he rasps, his voice wrecked. “Knew you’d feel like this—soft, warm n' mine.”

You rock against him, the hard line of his cock pressing into your core through his pants, and the friction is almost too much. A whimper slips from your lips as you grind down, chasing the delicious pressure, but James' hands tighten on your hips, halting you just as pleasure starts to crest. “Not yet,” he growls, though his own breath comes ragged. “Gonna make sure you’re ready for me.”

His free hand slips under your skirt, calloused fingers dragging up the inside of your thigh, his touch is firm but unhurried as his fingers slide beneath the soaked fabric of your panties, his lips brushing against the shell of your ear.

“Let me take care of you, sweetheart,” he murmurs, his voice a velvet rasp that makes your thighs tremble. You nod ferevently, as his fingers glide through your slickness with agonizing slowness, circling your entrance before slipping just the tip inside teasing you, maddeningly.

You whine, arching into his touch, but he hushes you with a kiss, deep and slow. “Easy, omega. I’ve got you.”

When he finally sinks a finger into you, it’s with deliberate tenderness, curling just right to make your breath hitch. His thumb swipes over your clit in gentle circles, coaxing pleasure from you in waves rather than sharp bursts. His lips trail down your jaw to your throat, sucking lightly at the tender skin there, still marking you without claiming yet. “That’s it,” he praises softly. “Let go for me.”

You shatter under his touch with a cry with hardly more effort, your orgasm washing over you like warm honey, slow and syrupy sweet. But before the aftershocks even fade, you’re writhing against him again, hands clutching at his shoulders. “James—please.”

He smiles against your skin, fond but predatory before easing you back onto the soft grass beneath you. His body covers yours completely as he lines himself up at your entrance, his gaze dark but warm. “Gonna be good for me?” he asks softly, brushing a kiss over your forehead. “Gonna let me take care of my queen?”

You nod frantically again, legs wrapping around his hips to pull him closer still. The first push is slow, agonizingly so, his cock stretching you inch by inch until he’s fully seated inside, his forehead pressed to yours. “Fuck,” he groans, voice rough. “You feel like heaven.”

Then he moves, a deep, rolling thrust that punches a gasp from your lungs. His hips snap forward again, harder this time, and your nails dig into his shoulders as pleasure coils tight in your belly. “More,” you beg, “harder—”

He obliges with a growl, fingers tangling in your hair as he drives into you, each stroke hitting that sweet spot inside until you’re sobbing his name. “That’s it,” he rasps against your neck, sucking bruises into your skin, everywhere but where you need it most. “Gonna fill you up every damn day, keep you round with my pups. My perfect queen.”

You’re close again, so close and then his teeth finally sink into your scent gland. The world explodes. Pleasure rips through you like lightning, your body clamping down around him as he spills deep inside, his knot locking you together as he murmurs sweet nothings against your skin, “Mine. Always mine.”

The bond settles between you like a promise, eternal and unbreakable as he licks the mark clean and pulls you tight against his chest. The night hums with satisfaction around you both... but it’s far from over.

Winter comes again, but it no longer feels like something to survive. Snow settles softly over the rebuilt northern kingdom, over stone set back into place by steady hands and quiet hope. The palace breathes differently now—windows open to light, laughter where silence once lived. You find him not in the grand halls but in the nursery, standing by the window with the mountains stretching beyond him, hanging up an hand carve mobile. You pause in the doorway, watching the way he has become both stronger and gentler all at once, how the past is no longer something that owns him.

When he looks up and finds you, something in his expression settles like this, here, is where he was always meant to be.

ʙᴏɴᴜꜱ ᴀᴜᴛʜᴏʀꜱ ɴᴏᴛᴇ › god BLESS the pea in my pod miss aluri buchanan barnes for dealing with me and my crashouts during this and making me laugh regardless. i love guys

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