Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Everyone in the Hallow gathered on this, the holiest night of the year—the Blood Moon.

Lanterns swayed from tree branches, casting amber light across the packed earth. The scent of woodsmoke and spiced honeycakes curled through the air, mingling with the faint musk of wolf fur and sage.

Children chased each other around firepits, their laughter rising like sparks into the velvet sky, while elders murmured greetings and clasped hands, their shawls catching the moonlight in threadbare embroidery.

Closer to the altar, the crowd stilled. There was reverence in the hush, a quiet anticipation that crackled just beneath the surface. The altar had been washed clean and strewn with wild herbs and bone-colored blossoms. Silver bowls smoked with incense—juniper and myrrh—and the flames burned with a faint blue tinge, reflecting the glow of the rising moon.

Their parents stood farther back, leaning against worn stones and ancient trees, eyes fixed not on the ritual but on their children—watching the cycle repeat as it had in their youth.

Their people were no longer ruled by the phases of the moon, not in the way they once had been.
But still, the wolf's pull lingered in the blood of the strongest, running hot beneath their skin.
And the legends remained the foundation of everything they were.

One young girl, no more than four, sat cross-legged beside her older sister for her very first Moon Ceremony. She clutched a sticky half-moon cake in both hands, her fingers dusted with sugar and ash. Her face glowed with excitement and crumbs. Her wide eyes followed the flickering torches, then landed on the priestess as the courtyard quieted.

The woman seemed impossibly old. A younger priestess supported her as she walked, her bare feet silent on the stone path.  Her silver hair spilled down her back like water, and though her skin was creased with centuries, there was something luminous in her presence—

As if a god had once whispered her name and never stopped listening.

And then, the priestess began to speak.

⸻

"Before the world had shape, it had breath.
And before the breath, it had silence.
And from that silence, She opened Her eyes.

She was Elentha, the First Flame.
Before the world of alpha or omega,
She was bound nor wild—only becoming.
Her breath stirred the void, and from it, time began.

From her ribs she carved the Eldermade, the first gods:
Of stone and sky, of light and law, of hunger and harvest.
They rose singing, building the bones of the world.
But Elentha wept—for even in creation, She was alone.

So She took the silver thread of Her soul and split it three ways—
Not to rule, but to love.
And from that thread came Caelion, Vireth, and Selathi.

Caelion, the Flame That Stands.
The first-born, king of the gods, and the first of the Alphas.
He rose from stone as the sun kissed it—his hands calloused from holding sky.
He was strength without cruelty, protection without pride.
He built mountains to cradle light and gave his fire to all who lacked warmth.

Selathi, the Moonwell.
The youngest of the three, but fairest. The Omega born.
She was born beneath a still lake—her first breath rippling the stars.
She was healing and hope, gentle power wrapped in silence.
She spoke to seeds and wombs and ancient bones.
She sang life into being and called it sacred.
Caelion saw Selathi and bowed—not to worship, but to walk beside her.

Between the two stood always Vireth, the Ash-Sister.
Born not of breath, but of a scream. Neither Alpha nor Omega.
She came from shadow and ember—memories no longer welcome.
Her gift was memory. Her curse was longing.
She did not sing. She howled.
But she, too, loved.

For a time, the three were whole.
Selathi planted.
Caelion guarded.
Vireth burned back the rot.

They danced across the world, weaving time into stars, and stars into stories.
They were sisters.
They were bound.
They were balance.

But love does not always come in equal measure.

The Fracture was bound to come.

Vireth loved them both—Selathi for her light, Caelion for his stillness.
She whispered to them in dreams, danced too long in their fires.
But when Selathi and Caelion joined as one—
When moon and sun kissed at the eclipse—
The world tilted.

Vireth shattered, alone.

She tore herself from the dance.
Ripped her heart from her chest and cast it into the void.
From her grief, the Devourers were born—gods of shadow, decay, unmaking.

She became Ash-Sister.
Not evil. Not forgotten. But divided.

The world cracked, and the Age of Blood and Ruin began.
Storms rose. Oceans drowned the land.
The plants Selathi had sown shriveled in fire.
Caelion fought to protect the innocent.
Selathi wept rivers, trying to heal what burned.

But Vireth would not return.
Not unless she was chosen.
Not unless she was seen.

They speak of the Prophecy of Three:
When the moon forgets her name,
And the sun breaks his blade,
And the ash learns to bleed once more—
Then the world shall begin again.

Some say the gods died.
Others say they walk the earth still, wearing mortal skin,
Reliving their story again and again,
Until one of them chooses love over ruin.
Until the dance is whole again."

⸻

The little girl sat spellbound, her mooncake forgotten in her lap, eyes wide and shining with wonder.
She didn't notice how the shadows had lengthened, or how the air had cooled with the priestess's final word.

Above them, the Blood Moon had risen in full—
a great red eye hanging in the sky, watching.
It cast a ruddy glow over the altar, the crowd, the girl's upturned face.
The flames danced lower. The hush deepened.

She was too young to understand the weight of the tale,
too small to know prophecy when it brushed against her skin.
But the moon knew.
And it would remember her.

For long after the songs had faded,
after the priestess stepped away and the feast began,
the Blood Moon lingered—full and heavy—
marking not just the turning of the season,
but the quiet beginning of something far more ancient.

It would rise again for her.
It would shape her days and call her dreams.
It would rule her life.

And she, in time, would change the world.

Chapter Text

Twenty-four years later…

The last of the raiders scattered into the woods, their war cries swallowed by the morning wind.

Smoke still clung to the edges of the valley, rising from burned carts and trampled grass. Blood soaked into the thawing earth. Steve wiped his blade on the hem of a torn banner, then sheathed it with a slow exhale, hanging his shield across his back. Spring always brought them—hungry men, half-mad with frostbite and desperation, testing the borders like the wolves they were.

Sam rode up beside him, his falcon on his arm. Nightwing’s wings folded tight against his body as he perched, sharp-eyed and still.

“No more movement east,” Sam said, breath short but steady. “The last of them dropped their weapons and bolted.”

Bucky approached from the ridge, helmet tucked under one arm. “The village is clear. Civilians shaken, but alive.”

Steve nodded, scanning the wreckage one last time. The wind was shifting. Too warm for this early in the season.

He barely had time to register the scent of the rider before the hooves thundered into view.

A crown-marked courier raced down the slope, his cloak streaming behind him like spilled ink. His horse nearly collapsed as he slid from the saddle, dust and panic in his wake.

“Captain—no, my lord—” He bowed low. Too low. Too long. Steve’s stomach turned cold.

“Get up,” he said. “What happened?”

The rider’s hand trembled as he held out the sealed parchment. Steve knew the wax before he saw the crest—dark blue, stamped with a flame-ringed crown.

Joseph.

He broke the seal without ceremony. His eyes scanned the lines once.
Then again, slower.

The wind stilled.

“He’s dead,” Steve said quietly. “My father’s dead.”

A silence rippled through the valley. Even the wounded stopped groaning.
Bucky’s jaw tightened. Sam stepped closer.

“What do you need?” Bucky asked.

Steve didn’t answer at first. His gaze lifted to the men behind him—their battered armor, the blood on their faces.
One by one, they dropped to a knee.

Not in fear.
Not in victory.

In allegiance.

He took a step back, shaking his head.

“No,” he said, voice hoarse. “Don’t bow. Not to me.”

But they already had.

Sam was the last to lower his gaze, fist pressed over his heart. “Long live the king,” he murmured.

Steve turned back to the letter. His hands curled around the parchment, still warm from the courier’s grip. One more line waited at the bottom, written in the clean, practiced hand of the Crown Secretary:

By decree of the Royal Council, the Choosing will begin by the next full moon. The realm must not wait.

You must choose, my king.

Steve stared at those words until they blurred.

A crown.
A throne.
A stranger’s future laid across his shoulders.

And somewhere far to the north,
the moon was already rising.

______

The scent of bloodroot and milk clung to Grace’s hands.

She had washed twice, but the delivery had been long—the second twin breech. It lingered in her nails, the creases of her palms, the soft folds of her sleeves. Beside her, Lydia stumbled a little on the front step, her dark hair half-tamed, the sleeves of her healer’s smock rolled to the elbows.

“Forty-eight hours,” Lydia mumbled. “We were in there for two whole days.”

Grace passed her a waterskin. “They’re all breathing. That’s what counts.”

Lydia drank gratefully and leaned against the fence, watching the twin newborn pups stir inside the cottage. Their mother slept curled around them, skin slick with sweat and amniotic sheen. The sun was just cresting over the trees—soft and golden, like a blessing.

For a breath, there was peace.

Then Matthew burst through the trees, nearly tripping over the stone path.

“Grace! Gracie!” he shouted, waving one arm, the other clutching a rolled parchment. “The Elders—Elder Tamsin’s calling for you. They sent for all council-bound.”

Grace turned sharply. “What happened?”

He skidded to a stop, eyes wide. “The king is dead.”

The world seemed to narrow.

Lydia’s waterskin hit the dirt with a dull thud. She reached instinctively for Grace’s hand, like they already knew what was coming.

“They said it came by royal courier—same crest as the old missives. Elder Mirin read it aloud. They’ve already begun Choosing summons. You’re expected.”

Grace didn’t speak. She looked past him, up the slope where the ceremonial fire pit stood cold and black. The moon had barely faded from the night. Her body still felt pulled thin by it—like her skin remembered something her mind hadn’t caught up to yet.

She glanced at Lydia. “Can you stay with the mother?”

Lydia nodded, dazed. “Go. Matthew, my love—go with her. Please.”

⸻

The Council’s circle had already gathered by the time Grace arrived—seven stones arranged around the ceremonial ash bowl, their faces half-shadowed by the rising sun.

Her mother, Elder Sarah, was already speaking quietly to Mirin. Tamsin stood straight-backed, arms folded, while Corvin scowled in the corner, pacing like a caged dog. Nicola stood behind him, awkward and alert, her eye narrowing as she spotted Grace.

Cassia sat at the edge of the clearing, fingers curled into her skirts, pale with worry.

When Grace stepped into the ring, they all turned.

Elder Tamsin’s voice was the first to break the silence.

“The king is dead,” she said. “And by royal decree, the Choosing will begin by the next full moon.”

Corvin muttered, “Of course it will,” too low to be called a challenge—but loud enough to mean one.

Elder Sarah stepped forward, her voice gentle but iron-edged. “You were summoned, Cassia and Grace, because you are both unmated omegas of age.”

Grace’s jaw clenched. She glanced toward Nicola, trying to understand why she was here. “I know.”

Cassia whimpered. “I don’t want to go.”

“You won’t get a choice,” Corvin snapped. “You are of age, omega, and unmated. That brands you as clearly as any crest.”

“They should have every right to decline,” Mirin interjected calmly.

“One won’t,” Tamsin said—not unkindly. “Because we have to send someone. You all know what’s at stake.”

Grace stood silent in the center of them all, the air thick with incense and expectation.

The king was dead.
The Choosing had begun.
And the blood in her veins had started to stir.

The circle fell quiet again.

Then Corvin laughed—dry, sharp, ugly.

“Of course the council would leap at prophecy. Never mind the other candidates. Never mind that the kingdom burns at the edges and the Choosing has become a spectacle.”

“Would you rather we send no one?” Tamsin snapped. “And have our village disowned—banished?”

“We should send someone ready. Willing.” He gestured to the tall young woman behind him. “Nicola may not meet every qualification on parchment, but she’s strong, trained in court custom, respected by three provinces, and wants the role.”

“She isn’t omega,” Sarah said evenly. “You know the candidate must be omega.”

“That tradition is dead, and you know it,” Corvin barked. “The Choosing was never meant to be a bride auction. It’s political theater to soothe a fractured realm, and Grace—” he turned to her, “—isn’t suited for it. She’s a healer. Untrained in court affairs. Look at her. She’s covered in blood as we speak.”

Grace didn’t flinch. She met his eyes.

“I came from a birth. Can you say the same?”

“Then you’re needed here. You are our next healer,” Corvin countered. “Unless you plan to disappear—like your sister?”

The air thickened.

“Enough,” Tamsin growled.

Elder Mirin raised a hand, voice quiet. “We must acknowledge what she is. The prophecy speaks of a moon-born Omega. A child of ash and light. Grace was born under the Blood Moon, and she returned beneath it. She is bathed in the blood of the people—by saving them.”

“Prophecy isn’t a crown,” Corvin snapped. “It’s a myth for those too afraid to rule without ghosts behind them.”

At the edge of the circle, Cassia’s voice broke in softly.

“I… I qualify too. I can go, I guess.”

All eyes turned.

She shrank, but didn’t look away. “I’m seventeen. I’m omega. I meet the requirements.”

“You’re a child,” Sarah said gently.

“And Grace is too old,” Nicola fired back. “At twenty-eight, she’s an old maid. What king would want her?” She paused, then added, sharper: “Besides—her sister was the beautiful one. Grace? The irony of your name.”

The silence that followed was heavier than any argument.

Grace stepped forward, jaw tight.

“Yes. My sister was the beautiful one. But Hope is dead. And at thirty, if she were still unmated, would that not make her an old maid too?”

Sarah inhaled softly. The others stilled.

“She was supposed to go,” Grace said. Her voice didn’t rise, but it carried weight. “She trained for it. Studied. Prepared. Everyone knew. She had the look, the bond, the heart.”

She looked at no one.

“And then she was gone.”

Another breath. She turned to Corvin—not in challenge, but in resignation.

“I didn’t study to rule. I studied to serve. To heal. To protect this place and its people.”

“But you are going,” Tamsin said quietly.

Grace nodded. “I am.”

Corvin scoffed. “Just like that?”

“No,” she said. “Not just like that.”

She looked around the circle—at Sarah’s pain, at Cassia’s trembling hands, at Mirin’s watchfulness and Tamsin’s fire.

“I was born under the Blood Moon. My sister was supposed to be our Chosen. But fate chose differently. And I’ve known since the moment the moon turned red again that it would fall to me.”

She looked toward the northern sky, where the smoke of distant torches curled upward.

“I will go. Because it’s my duty. Because our people deserve a voice. And because if I don’t… someone worse will stand in my place.” She pointedly looked at Nicola.

There was no more argument. They knew she was right.
They felt it on the wind, and in the long shadows of morning.

______

They rode in silence for most of the first day.

Steve kept to the front, reins loose in his hands, the wind tugging at his cloak. Behind him, the escort formation moved like a whisper through the trees—Sam on his right, Bucky to his left, the rest spread in a loose, reverent formation. Even the horses seemed to understand the shift.

The missive hadn’t lied: the council had already moved.

When they reached the halfway mark, a second courier was waiting—breathless and pale, with new orders sealed in deep red wax.

All arrangements are in place.
You will be crowned immediately upon arrival.

Steve folded the parchment without reading it twice.

⸻

By the time the spires of the capital breached the horizon, twilight had fallen.

Torches lined the road to the southern gate, flickering in rigid symmetry. The banners had already been changed.

His father’s crest—a sun-ringed mountain, bold and unyielding—was gone.

In its place flew the new sigil:
a silver star ringed by three concentric circles—each etched in the colors of the Old Gods.

The inner ring burned gold, for Caelion—the Flame That Stands.
The second shimmered silver, like moonlight on water—for Selathi, the Moonwell.
The outermost ring glowed a deep ash-blue, nearly black—for Vireth, the Ash-Sister.

A crest that matched the old shield he still carried.
A symbol of protection and prophecy.
And now, a crown.

He didn’t remember approving it.

But he did like it.

As they passed beneath the gate, people knelt. Some cried. Some just watched.

He thought of his mother. Of his brothers in arms.
Of the girl in the orchard he’d kissed once at seventeen—before duty took her name away.

But mostly, he thought of his father—cold and quiet on the pyre now, his voice gone, but his legacy still everywhere.

⸻

The Great Hall was full by the time he arrived.
The old priest waited at the head of the chamber, dressed in ceremonial white, his palms stained with ash and wine. The council stood beside him, silent and composed.

Steve didn’t break stride.
He walked between them like a man approaching trial.

When he reached the steps of the dais, he paused—just once.
Eyes on the empty throne his father had held for four decades.
Then, he knelt.

The priest spoke the old words.
Sam and Bucky flanked him in silence.
Steve answered with a low voice, steady despite the storm in his chest.

The crown was lighter than he expected.

But the weight came after.

“Stand, Stephen of House Brooklyn.
By blood, by will, by vow,
You are king.”

He rose to his feet.

The room bowed.

But he didn’t feel powerful.

He felt alone.

Chapter Text

The trees blurred into shadows, the path worn from years of use but suddenly unfamiliar. The moon hung low, dull and red-gold near the horizon. The edges of her hands were still stained with birth, and her chest ached with something she didn’t have the language for—not grief, not fear.

Weight.

Just as she reached the porch of their cabin, the floorboards creaked behind her.

“You always walk too fast when you’re angry,” her mother said softly as she jogged to catch up.

Grace turned.

Sarah stood just outside the tree line, wrapped in a shawl that had once belonged to Grace’s grandmother, her braid half-loose. Her expression was unreadable—one of those healer masks made of stillness and long years.

“I’m not angry, Mom,” Grace said.

Sarah raised a brow. “Then you’re terrified, my darling. Which is fair.”

Grace said nothing.

They stepped into the cabin together. Grace lit a beeswax candle without thinking, the warm scent of honey and smoke rising to meet her. Her movements were automatic—set the kettle, fingered the jars of dried herbs, stirred the banked coals in the hearth until the embers breathed red again. The rituals of the Hallow clung to her like second skin.

But it was already slipping. All of it.

“I have to leave in two days,” she said finally.

Sarah nodded. “The moon goddess waits for no one.”

Grace laughed, but it cracked at the edges. “You think she’ll wait for me to pack a second dress?”

“Only if it’s got armor stitched into the bodice.”

Grace snorted. “They’ll be expecting silk.”

“They’ll be expecting a naïve pup,” Sarah corrected. “Pretty, soft. Scared enough to obey, but clever enough to impress. What they’ll get is a wolf with a spine full of bone and a mouth full of questions. They will get my daughter.”

She moved to the hearth, the floor creaking faintly as she poured the water into waiting mugs. Steam rose in delicate spirals, carrying the sharp scent of nettle and lemon balm.

“You’ll be surrounded by snakes in bejeweled dresses, cunning and cruel,” she said. “Fluffy peacocks with no brains but big colorful distractions. Court girls with titles they didn’t earn and fathers who paid for their lineage in blood and favors. Nicola is a pup compared to what waits at the capital.”

Grace sat slowly. “What if I don’t know how to do this?”

“You do,” Sarah said. “You just don’t want to. That’s not the same thing.”

The candlelight flickered between them. Grace reached for her tea with both hands, the mug warm against her palms, but she didn’t drink. For a long while, neither spoke.

Then Grace whispered, “I thought it would be Hope.”

Sarah closed her eyes.

“I know.”

“She wanted it so badly. She trained for it. She would’ve ruled like fire—hot and fast and beautiful. And they would’ve loved her for it.”

“She would’ve burned herself out too fast,” Sarah said gently. “You… you’re made of something that lasts. Stronger. Tempered.”

Grace finally sipped the tea. It was bitter. Familiar.

“Can I sleep with you tonight?” she said, voice smaller than she meant it to be.

Sarah smiled faintly. “I was going to, whether you asked or not. One of the Chosen or the future queen of the realm, you will always be my pup.”

They curled up in Sarah’s bed by the window, the old quilt worn soft and smelling faintly of lavender and cedar. Grace lay with her head tucked under her mother’s chin, her braid trailing down her back. The candle burned low.

Outside, the moon drifted through the branches.

And inside the little cabin, for a little while longer, Grace was still only a daughter.

_____

The sun broke low and soft over the ridge, the trees silvered in early mist.

Grace woke with a crick in her neck and her mother’s arm draped protectively across her waist. For a moment, she lay still—watching the morning light filter through the window lattice, striping the worn floorboards with gold. It was a quiet thing, waking in her childhood bed. Familiar. Fleeting.

She slipped out gently, so as not to wake Sarah, and laced her boots in silence.

She didn’t take the main path. Her feet found the old back trail to the birthing cottage by instinct—winding between tree roots and over damp moss, her fingers trailing through dew-heavy branches. The scent of rosemary and wet bark clung to her clothes.

She reached the small home just as the birds began to stir. Smoke curled from the chimney in lazy spirals. Inside, the mother lay dozing, one cub curled against her chest, the other nestled in the crook of her arm. Grace stepped in without a sound and crouched by the hearth, checking the broth, the poultice, the bloodroot paste.

Everything was as it should be.

She exhaled slowly.

A voice behind her, soft as the fire’s crackle:
“You should be sleeping.”

Grace turned.

Lydia stood in the doorway, hair tousled, cloak crooked at her shoulders, eyes already brimming.

“I couldn’t,” Grace said simply.

They stood a moment, saying nothing.

Then Lydia moved forward and wrapped her in a fierce, breathless hug—bone-tight and trembling. Grace held her as steady as she could.

“I don’t want you to go,” Lydia whispered. “I know you have to, I know you will. But I—gods, Gracie—I’m scared.”

“I am too,” Grace said. “But I need you here. I need you to stay.”

Lydia pulled back just enough to look at her. “I’ll stay.”

Grace nodded, then reached into her satchel and drew out a bundle of folded cloth and a worn leather ledger.

“This is everything,” she said. “My notes. My remedies. Fever guides, birthing herbs, even the ash-burn salve. If I don’t come back—”

“Don’t say that.”

“—you’ll be the one they turn to.”

Lydia clutched the bundle like a blessing. “You’ll come back.”

Grace smiled, though her throat burned. “If I can.”

“I’ll keep everything safe,” Lydia promised. “Even Cassia.”

That name made them both turn.

Cassia stood just inside the doorway, half in shadow. Her eyes were wide, her lips pressed tight. Grace braced for a sharp word—but instead, the girl blinked quickly and stepped forward.

“I came to help,” she said. “I figured… someone should.”

Grace studied her, then nodded. “Thank you.”

Together, they checked the bedding, the mother’s pulse, the cubs’ breathing. Cassia worked in silence. Grace noticed the way her hands shook when she reached for the linen, how she kept glancing at Grace like she wanted to speak.

When they finished, Grace turned to her.

“Cassia,” she said gently. “You’re strong. And kind. And brave enough to admit when you’re scared. That’s more than most queens could say.”

Cassia’s mouth wobbled. “I was awful yesterday.”

“You were seventeen,” Grace said. “That’s allowed.”

And finally, Cassia hugged her.

Lydia wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and muttered, “This is going to be awful.”

Grace nodded. “Yes. But it might also be worth it.”

⸻

She didn’t go home right away.

Instead, she followed the long stone path down to the edge of the Hallow, where the orchard thinned and the glen opened into the orphan’s yard. A low fence ringed the property, and the paint on the gate was peeling again—Grace made a mental note to remind Matthew to fix it before she left.

Before she could even knock, the door burst open.

“GRACE!”

Two blurs—one silver-haired, one red—crashed into her legs in a tangle of laughter and limbs.

“Did you bring treats?”
“Can we braid your hair?”
“Can we cut your hair?”
“Are you bleeding again?”

Grace laughed, kneeling to catch them both. Rain, the redhead, was missing another tooth. Ryanna had tied yellow ribbons in her curls and one around her wrist like a bracelet.

“No sweets today,” Grace said, smoothing back their wild hair. “But I came to talk.”

They froze.

“Are you sick?” Rain blinked up at her, terror in her eyes.

Grace shook her head, voice soft. “No. Nothing like that. I promise.”

She saw the panic in Rain’s face and felt it echo in her own chest.

A year ago, she’d held that same child through fever and blood-soaked sheets, whispering lullabies while the plague took half the valley—including Rain and Ryanna’s parents. She had stayed long after the others left, refusing to give up. And when the worst had passed, it was Grace who’d carried them—half-starved and orphaned—into the Hallow’s fold.

They didn’t remember all of it.

But they remembered her.

“Is someone else sick?” Ryanna asked.

“No. I just… I have to leave for a while.”

The twins exchanged a look.

“Where?”

“To the capital. It’s far.”

“Are you coming back?”

Grace didn’t answer right away. She pulled them into her lap and held them tight.

“I want to. I’ll try with everything I have,” she said. “But I don’t know how long I’ll be gone. And I needed to make sure you were safe.”

“Who’s gonna braid our hair?” Ryanna whispered.

Grace kissed her brow. “Lydia will. And Matthew, too—though he’s terrible at it.”

Rain’s eyes widened. “Lydia’s staying with us?”

“Every day. And soon…” She hesitated, then smiled. “They’ll be your family. All official.”

Gasps.

“You knew?!” Ryanna demanded. “And didn’t tell us?!”

Grace laughed through tears. “I’m telling you now, aren’t I? But keep it secret—they want to tell you themselves.”

They clung to her like ivy, arms and hearts tangled.

She wasn’t their mother. But she had loved them like one.

And that would have to be enough.

“I’ll write,” she promised. “Even if I can’t sign my name. Lydia will help me send letters. But you have to write back, or I’ll send Matt to tickle your feet at night.”

Rain giggled. Ryanna sniffled.

“Swear on the moon?”

Grace touched her finger to Ryanna’s chest. “On the moon and all the stars.”

The light had shifted—sharper now, gilding the path with gold, but brittle at the edges like the snap of frost. Grace tucked a small yellow ribbon into her pocket, a parting gift, and turned for home.

She didn’t get far.

A voice broke the quiet like a thorn slicing skin.

“Well, if it isn’t our Chosen One.”

Grace stopped with a frustrated sigh.

Nicola stood just off the main path, arms crossed, posture casual in that calculated way that always felt too deliberate to be anything but a performance. She was dressed in soft leathers and court-trained smugness. Elias hovered just behind her, shoulders cocked like a blade waiting for use, mouth twitching like he was trying to swallow a sneer and failing.

Grace didn’t move. “Nicola. Elias.”

“You must be thrilled,” Nicola said sweetly. “Your little prophecy finally coming true. Born under a blood moon, praised in every circle, beloved by Elders… you must feel untouchable.”

“I feel exhausted,” Grace replied evenly, shoulders square but pulse thudding against her throat. “And I have things to do before I have to leave.”

Elias stepped forward. “Going to say goodbye to every mongrel pup before you leave? How noble.”

Grace’s jaw tightened. “They’re children.”

“And you’re still pretending to be something you’re not,” Nicola said, tilting her head. “You’re not ready for the court. You’re not elegant. You’re not diplomatic. You’re not even particularly well-trained. You’re just… the one with the most convenient birthdate.”

“Convenient?” Grace echoed. “I watched my sister die under the weight of that moon. I was buried under every expectation of what she should have been. Don’t talk to me about convenience.”

Nicola blinked, caught off guard—but not for long.

Elias leaned in slightly. “You’ll be eaten alive at court.”

Grace’s gaze was ice now. “Then I’ll let them choke on the bones.”

She stepped past them without another word, her boots crunching against gravel with every steady step.

Nicola called after her, voice syruped with disdain, “Better pack more than herbs and rags, Grace. You’re not going to a healing circle. You’re going into war.”

Grace didn’t turn around.
But her silence was louder than anything she could have said.
Even the birds seemed to hold their breath.

⸻

By the time Grace returned to the cabin, the sun was dipping behind the western ridge. Shadows stretched long across the clearing, and the air carried that sweet, sharp edge of evening.

She expected silence. Maybe a quiet moment to breathe, or to finish packing alone.

Instead, she opened the door to chaos.

Lydia was perched on the table, sorting bundles of herbs with stained fingers and a pencil stuck behind her ear. Sarah knelt by the hearth, brushing out the hem of one of Grace’s travel dresses, her braid pinned in a crown. The cabin smelled like sage and soap—and something sweet, maybe honeycake.

Grace blinked. “What—?”

“Sit,” Lydia ordered, without looking up. “You’re late.”

“I was—”

“Sit.”

Grace obeyed, half-laughing, half-stunned.

Lydia held up a deep blue bundle and shook it out with a bit of flair. “Ta-da. Your capital debut.”

It was the most beautiful dress Grace had ever seen. Simple linen, but finely made—structured bodice, long sleeves, and delicate hand-stitched flowers at the hem and neckline. Midnight blue, so rich it looked like ink in the candlelight.

“I didn’t think we had anything like this in the village,” Grace murmured.

“We don’t,” Sarah said, smiling faintly. “We had Matt rush to get it from the pass. Lydia’s not marrying an idiot—he has good taste. It might not be court silk, but it’s dignified. And it’s you.”

Lydia handed her a small satchel next. “Medicines. Wound balm, fever tonic, ginger lozenges, two packs of moon-leaf, and something that might stop a nobleman’s boasting—if thrown hard enough.”

“And this,” Sarah said softly, holding out a modest wooden box.

Inside: her mother’s few jewels. A garnet ring. A brooch shaped like a star. A pair of tiny crescent-moon earrings Grace hadn’t seen in years.

“For ceremony,” Sarah said, her voice just barely steady.

Lydia added one final item—a journal, bound in rough leather, a strip of blue ribbon tied to the spine.

“In case you forget who you are,” she said, quieter now. “Write it down. Hold onto it.”

Grace reached out, then paused. “You did all this today?”

“We’ve been ready,” Sarah said gently. “We just prayed we wouldn’t need to be.”

Lydia pointed to the corner, where a tidy stack of mended dresses and polished boots waited. A pair of soft leather slippers peeked out beneath the pile.

“Even your wedding shoes, Mom?” Grace whispered.

“You can’t stomp into court like a stable girl,” Sarah said. “But you can walk in like the woman you’ve become.”

Before Grace could reply, a knock sounded at the door.

Lydia opened it, revealing a young boy—barely twelve—out of breath, with reins clutched in his hands.

“Elder Mirin sent this,” he panted. “Said she’s too old to ride herself, but it’s time someone gave you a proper mount.”

Outside waited a weathered, sturdy mare with a coat the color of tarnished silver and the gentlest eyes Grace had ever seen.

Tears pricked behind her eyes.

“What’s her name?” she asked.

“Dawn,” the boy replied. “Said she’s a bit slow, but steady. And always finds her way home.”

Grace laughed, the sound cracking through her chest like sunlight after a storm.

She turned back to the cabin—to the carefully folded dresses, the food parcel from Maeve, the polished boots, the ribbon still tucked in her pocket. Every piece of her life had been gathered into a single offering. Not riches. Not armor.

But love.

“I’m not ready,” she whispered.

Sarah stepped forward and pressed her hands to Grace’s cheeks. “You never will be. That’s how you know it matters.”

Grace didn’t need to ask. They knew what she needed.

Once the fire was banked and the cabin dimmed, Sarah slid into the narrow bed by the window. Lydia hesitated only a moment before curling up on the other side, arms folded beneath her head.

Grace lay between them.

No one spoke.

Sarah’s breath was slow and steady, rising and falling in time with the wind outside. Lydia’s fingers twitched occasionally, like she was still counting herbs in her sleep. The room smelled of cedar smoke, mended cloth, and lavender salve.

Grace stared at the ceiling.

She didn’t sleep.

She didn’t cry.

She just lay there—still and silent—her shoulder pressed to her mother’s, Lydia’s foot tucked against hers beneath the covers. The two people who had kept her anchored all her life. The ones who had patched her back together every time the world tried to unravel her.

The bed was too small. The night too short.

But for now, it was enough.

Outside, the waning moon rose toward fullness.

And inside the little cabin, Grace listened to the rhythm of home, committing it to memory.

Just in case.

Chapter Text

The Hallow was still asleep when Grace rose.

The moon had dipped low, the sun not yet broken over the trees. But inside the little cabin, all three women were already moving. The hearth crackled gently, chasing the chill from the floorboards. A kettle steamed, and the scent of frying herbs and morning cakes wrapped through the room like a blessing.

Lydia stood at the counter, hair in a quick braid, flipping bannock in a cast iron pan. Sarah was slicing dried fruit into a bowl of steaming oats, her hands steady, her expression unreadable.

Grace stood in the doorway, her hair damp from the basin, a towel slung around her shoulders.

“You’re both ridiculous,” she said quietly.

“Eat first, cry later,” Lydia replied without turning.

Sarah gave a quiet hum of agreement. “And if you try to leave on an empty stomach, I will send a hawk after you with hard-boiled eggs and shame.”

Grace smiled despite herself. She retreated into the back room, slipping into her travel clothes: fitted leather leggings, soft tunic, and her worn boots—freshly oiled and quiet on the floorboards. She pulled part of her hair back into a long braid, weaving a strip of blue cloth through the strands like a warding charm. Her pack sat on the bed, half-full.

She paused beside it and ran her hand over the flap.

One last time.

She tucked in her journal. The star brooch. The moon-leaf. The yellow ribbon. Hope’s old floral shawl.

When she emerged, fully dressed, the table had been set—bannock stacked on a plate, honey and smoked butter nearby, sliced fruit and boiled greens in clay bowls. Three mugs steamed, and one place at the table had been left open for her, its chair turned slightly outward.

Sarah looked up. “Sit, pup.”

Grace did.

They didn’t speak much as they ate, and they didn’t have to. Every bite was a goodbye. Every glance a prayer.

The sun finally crested the trees as they finished.

They all knew today, she would leave.

Grace finished her tea slowly, letting the warmth settle low in her chest. When the last dish had been washed and dried, Lydia pressed a wrapped parcel into her arms—more food from Maeve, tucked with care—and Sarah tied a leather cloak lined with wool around her shoulders with hands that lingered just a moment too long.

Outside, the mare waited patiently, reins looped over the post.

Dawn.

She looked up at Grace with soft, knowing eyes, and Grace pressed her forehead to the horse’s for a heartbeat before saddling her. The bags were light—just enough to travel, just enough to return. Lydia tightened the straps, double-checked the satchels, then gave the mare a gentle pat.

“All set,” she said.

And then… it was time.

The three women stood in the clearing, morning light just beginning to filter through the trees. Grace mounted slowly, boots settling into the stirrups with a finality that caught somewhere between her ribs.

Sarah stepped forward and laid a hand on her leg. “Ride steady. Speak carefully. Trust your instincts.”

Lydia blinked fast, then held up a wrapped cloth. “One last thing. For when the road feels long.”

Inside: a tiny carved fox and a flat, smooth stone painted with the Hallow tree.

Grace swallowed. “Thank you. I love you both, and I’ll see you soon. I promise.”

Then she nudged Dawn forward—and began the ride through town.

She expected silence. Maybe a few curious glances. A half-hearted wave.

Instead, the road was full.

The entire village had turned out.

They lined the path in twos and threes—elders with walking sticks, children clutching wildflowers, apprentices still in their ash-smeared tunics. Some waved. Some wept. Some simply watched in silence, expressions unreadable.

There were those with tears in their eyes… and those with barely hidden smirks. But even the skeptics had come. Even the ones who had muttered behind their hands for years.

She was their Chosen now.

A blacksmith’s apprentice stepped forward and handed her a pouch of nails and horseshoes. “For the journey,” he said, cheeks red. “Never hurts to have a few.”

An herbwife offered a sprig of hawthorn and a small blade. “Protection,” she murmured.

A girl she didn’t recognize pressed a dried braid of rosemary into Grace’s palm. “You helped my mother last winter.”

Some gave her coins. A few of the Elders pressed jewels into her hands—tokens to ensure she could represent them properly when she reached the capital.

The road felt endless. Grace nodded, murmured thanks, accepted trinkets and food and notes and folded cloth. Every face was a thread in the tapestry of her life—and now they were here to stitch her into something larger.

She reached the edge of the village with her chest aching and her satchels a little fuller.

There, in the middle of the road, stood the old priestess.

The Woven One.

She didn’t speak. She didn’t move. Just stood, veiled and motionless, blocking Grace’s path.

Grace slowed, then dismounted with care. She approached warily.

“Priestess?” she asked.

The woman nodded once and turned, walking toward the spiritual house without a word.

Grace hesitated. Then she tied Dawn to the fence and followed.

She had never been inside the spirit house before.

It was dark. The air was thick with incense and age. Shelves lined the walls, crowded with jars—some filled with herbs she recognized, others with things she couldn’t name. Roots and resins. Bones and blackened petals. The whole place felt wrong somehow, or just too much. Heavy. Unsettling.

And still, the old woman said nothing.

Until she did.

The Woven One turned.

And spoke.

“Child of Hallow,” she said, voice low and layered—like wind through trees, like the hush between thunderclaps. “Born under a blood moon. Sister to fire and heir to silence.”

Grace froze.

No one had spoken of Hope that way. Not in years.

The priestess stepped forward, raising her hands. Her fingers brushed Grace’s brow, then her lips, then her heart—each touch sparking something beneath her skin, like embers catching light.

“You walk the path alone—but you are never alone. The mothers walk behind you. The stars chart your bloodline. The wolves know your name.”

Then her hand dropped lower—resting flat over Grace’s abdomen.

And the air changed.

A low pressure rolled through the chamber, thick and pulsing like a heartbeat beneath the stone. Grace swayed, catching herself against the altar. Her vision blurred at the edges—just for a moment—but in that sliver of distortion, she saw flashes:

A child’s cry.
A crown of twisted light.
A cradle, empty and burning.

She blinked hard.

The priestess’s hand was still there—firm, unmoving, over her womb.

“And your womb will carry more than blood. It will carry the turning of the age.”

A sharp cramp twisted through Grace’s belly—deep, ancient, not of this world. She gasped, knees trembling. Nausea coiled in her throat like smoke. It wasn’t pain, not exactly.

It was knowing.

Too much. Too fast.

Her powers flared, unbidden—just a flicker beneath her ribs, like something ancient rising to meet the words.

Three shall rise.
One to rule. One to break. One to return.

From your body, a kingdom will bloom.
And from your sorrow, a future will take root.

The silence that followed was absolute.

Grace’s hands were shaking. Her breath came short and shallow.

Then the priestess pulled a jar of ochre dust from the altar, dipped her fingers, and anointed Grace’s forehead, her chest, her palms.

“Blessed be your journey. Blessed be your name. Blessed be your womb, and all that it may bear.”

As the dust touched her skin, a heat bloomed in her chest—then low in her belly, a weight that settled like stone and refused to lift. Grace pressed her lips together, but her fingers trembled. Something ancient had been stirred.

And it wasn’t done with her yet.

When the Woven One stepped back, her veil fell again.

She said no more.

And Grace, pale and shaking, stepped back out into the morning.

She mounted Dawn with unsteady hands, swallowing the bile in her throat.

Behind her, the Woven One stood unmoving.

Before her, the forest opened.

And with a single breath, Grace began to ride.

Chapter Text

The forest opened before her, wide and golden beneath the early light.

She nudged Dawn forward, barely aware of it.

Her hands were still unsteady on the reins, her breath shallow. The Woven One’s words echoed beneath her ribs like a second heartbeat—one that didn’t belong to her. Every part of her felt stretched thin, like skin pulled too tight over too much knowing.

She blinked hard, trying to clear her vision.

The dust on her palms had turned tacky with sweat. The pendant at her throat pulsed warm, as though it too remembered. Her belly felt weighted, thick with something unseen that refused to lift.

She was halfway to panicking when she saw the figure at the edge of the trees.

A man on horseback waited just where the path dipped into shadow again.

Sunlight caught the dull sheen of his chestplate. A sword hung at his side, worn but well-kept, and his horse stood saddled and ready. As she approached, he lifted a hand in a lazy wave—like they were just meeting for an afternoon ride.

Grace pulled Dawn to a halt, frowning. “Matt?”

He grinned. “Morning, princess.”

“What… what are you doing here?”

He tilted his head. “Keeping a promise to Lydia. And keeping my favorite ‘sister’ alive long enough to get crowned—or rejected. Whichever comes first.”

“You’re coming with me?”

“To the capital? Yes. To your wedding? Absolutely not. I’m riding back the moment I deliver you.” He smirked. “Lydia would kill me if I missed ours.”

A laugh escaped her—shaky but real. “She would.”

Matt looked her over more carefully, his smile dimming. “You look pale. You okay? What did that old bat do to you?”

“I’m fine,” she lied. “Just… blessed by a terrifying ancient priestess in a bone-scented cave, that’s all.”

Matt raised a brow. “Ah. A normal morning, then.”

She gave him a weak smile.

“You really don’t have to—”

“I do,” he cut in, gentle but firm. “You’re an unbonded omega, Grace. You shouldn’t be traveling alone. Not through the borderlands. Not with a crown possibly hanging over your head and strangers watching every road.”

Grace snapped her jaw shut. Hard to argue when he put it like that.

He clicked his tongue and nudged his horse forward. “Besides,” he added lightly, “if you do become queen, I want the stories. And the first piece of gossip.”

Grace exhaled slowly and guided Dawn into step beside him.

The road was quiet. The wind was cool. And for the first time that morning, Grace didn’t feel entirely alone.

She also didn’t speak for the first hour.

The road beneath Dawn’s hooves was soft with loam, muffled by layers of pine needles and fallen leaves. Mist clung low to the ground, veiling the world in pale silver. Everything felt suspended—like even the birds were holding their breath.

Matt rode just ahead, silent save for the occasional jingle of tack. His gelding, a lean gray with a jagged scar along one flank, moved like water—fluid, efficient, alert. Grace had seen Matt in armor before, but never like this: every motion was deliberate, coiled with quiet readiness. A soldier’s stillness.

But the vision still clung to her skin.

Her belly felt swollen with something she couldn’t name. Her fingertips buzzed faintly—residue of power, of prophecy, of something half-awake inside her.

“I’m not going to ask,” Matt said eventually, voice low and even. “But you look like you saw the inside of the world and didn’t like what it showed you.”

Grace didn’t answer right away.

Then, softly: “She touched me, Matt. And I saw… I don’t know what I saw.”

He nodded once, like that was enough. Like he knew what it meant to carry something alone.

“The Woven One’s words get under the skin,” he murmured. “That’s why she doesn’t use them often. I know she’s a conduit to the goddesses or whatever—but she’s terrifying.”

They rode on.

By late afternoon, they stopped beside a narrow stream—clear and cold, singing softly over rounded stone. Dawn drank deeply. Matt unsaddled both horses while Grace knelt at the water’s edge, splashing her face and cupping the chill against her cheeks. She filled their flasks with shaking hands.

That night, they built a small fire between two trees. Its glow flickered weakly against the trunks, barely pushing back the dark.

Grace ate in silence—chewing dried bread and strips of smoked meat that tasted like ash in her mouth.

Matt didn’t press. He didn’t ask about the vision or her silence. He just handed her a blanket and told her to rest.

She started to argue.

But then he looked at her—really looked. Not like her childhood friend, but like the soldier he’d become. His expression was calm, immovable, quietly commanding.

So she didn’t argue. She just lay down on her bedroll and curled toward the fire.

She didn’t remember falling asleep.

But sometime after midnight, she jolted upright—sweat slicking her brow, a cry caught in her throat.

Matt was already there.

“You’re safe,” he said, his hand firm and steady on her shoulder. “I’ve got you. You’re here.”

Grace stared into the dark woods, eyes wide and unfocused. “The cradle was on fire—flames licking up the carved edges, devouring the blankets,” she whispered.

Matt didn’t ask for more.

He just stayed beside her, breathing steady, until her heartbeat slowed again. Until her fingers stopped trembling.

Somewhere far off, a single wolf howled—long and low, a sound like sorrow carrying across the trees.

The next morning broke too bright.

Grace blinked into the light, eyes aching, head pounding. Her stomach twisted as she packed up camp, the cloying scent of damp leaves and last night’s ash making bile rise in her throat. She said nothing.

Matt noticed anyway.

“Still sick?”

Grace nodded. “It’ll pass. Just nerves.”

They rode in silence for a while—just the shuffle of hooves and the distant caw of morning birds. The path narrowed, climbing into fog-laced foothills. Ferns grew thick and high, brushing their boots. The air shifted—cooler, wilder, edged with stone.

By midday, the road twisted through a narrow, rocky pass. Matt raised a hand.

“Quiet,” he said, voice low.

Grace slowed Dawn, pulse spiking.

Then—movement.

Two figures stepped into view just ahead. Not villagers. Not travelers. The wrong kind of stillness clung to them. One had a blade strapped across his chest. The other smiled too quickly.

“Traveling far?” the taller one asked.

Grace said nothing.

Matt’s voice cut clean through the air. “Far enough that you don’t want to slow us down.”

The man’s smile widened. “Pretty little omega like that—bet she’s sweet when she begs. And such a Small guard. Bit of a risk, don’t you think?”

Before Grace could flinch, Matt dismounted in one smooth motion. His sword cleared its sheath with a sound like finality.

The men hesitated.

Grace stayed frozen—but her body hummed. Power thrummed beneath her skin, the same heat that had bloomed in the spirit house now flickering again—unfocused, unwanted, alive.

Matt stepped forward, calm and cold. “I’d rethink your odds.”

The shorter man swore under his breath and stepped back. The taller one lingered a moment longer, then spat at the ground.

“Whore. We don’t need her.”

And then they were gone—swallowed by the trees.

Matt didn’t move until the silence held steady.

Then he turned, face grim. “Bandits don’t normally come this far north.”

Grace slid from her saddle, her legs unsteady as she glanced toward the trees. “Something’s shifting.”

“Yeah,” he muttered. “And we’re not even halfway there.”

They camped early that night in a thicket of birch and thistle. Matt set a perimeter with quiet precision. Grace built the fire with shaking hands.

Later, she sat staring into the flames as they curled skyward.

“They could’ve taken me,” she said softly.

“They didn’t.”

“I don’t mean today,” she added. “I mean in general. If I didn’t have you. If Lydia hadn’t—”

Matt shook his head. “An unbonded omega traveling alone, especially in spring, when the raiders move north?” His voice was low, but firm. “Lydia was right. It isn’t safe.”

Grace pressed a hand to her abdomen. It still felt too full. Too heavy. A prophecy waiting to wake.

“Doesn’t feel safe either,” she whispered.

Matt glanced at her—something flickering in his eyes. Not just concern. Something older.

But he didn’t press.

And Grace was grateful for it, as she lay down next to him that night.

They found him just after dawn on the third day.

If Grace had to guess, the bandits found him first.

A man—no, a boy—slumped against a tree, cloak torn, face bloodied. His leg was bent at an unnatural angle, and the dirt around him was rust-colored with half-dried blood. At first glance, he looked dead.

Grace was off her horse before Matt could stop her.

“Careful,” he warned, hand already on the hilt of his blade. “Could be bait.”

“It’s not,” she said, already kneeling. “Look at the wound. He’s been here since yesterday—maybe longer.”

She tore into her pack, fingers already seeking moon-leaf, feverroot, clean bandages. Power stirred low and steady, like it had been waiting for purpose. She pushed it down, focused on her hands.

“Bandits?” Matt asked, crouching beside them.

Grace nodded. “Likely. Or wolves. Doesn’t matter. He’s septic.”

“We’ll lose half the day.”

“Then we lose half the day,” she snapped.

Matt didn’t argue. He knew that was a fight he wouldn’t win.

She worked quickly, but not carelessly. Splinted the leg. Cleaned the cuts. Packed the worst with woundwort and ash-honey. The boy moaned once but didn’t wake. His fever burned high—dangerously so—but his pulse was steady.

“He’s young,” she murmured. “Younger than he looks. Maybe sixteen. Seventeen, tops. He’s just a kid, Matt. We can’t leave him.”

Matt lifted the boy onto his own saddle, tying him into place so he wouldn’t fall. Then he took the reins and walked beside Dawn while Grace rode, one eye always on the unconscious rider behind her.

It was slow going.

The gelding didn’t like the stranger.

The sun crawled overhead—too hot. Too still.

Around midday, Grace felt it again. That subtle pressure behind her eyes. Not quite nausea. Not quite power.

Just… knowing.

They were being watched.

She tightened her grip on the reins.

They reached a shallow glade before nightfall—tucked into the woods, soft with moss and shaded by ash trees. Matt built a fire. Grace checked the boy’s wounds again. The fever had broken—barely—but some color had returned to his cheeks.

As the boy slept, Matt handed her a mug of bitterleaf tea.

“You could’ve left him,” he said. “Anyone else would’ve.”

Grace shook her head. “Then anyone else shouldn’t be Chosen.”

Matt didn’t speak for a moment.

Then, quietly: “It’s going to cost you.”

She met his eyes across the fire. “I almost feel like it already has.”

He nodded once and took first watch.

Grace sat beside the flames, the boy’s shallow breathing steady behind her. She sipped her tea and stared into the embers until the sky turned dark.

The sky had turned strange by midday of day four.

That sickly green-yellow color that meant only one thing: a storm was coming. A bad one, if Grace was interpreting the winds correctly.

Clouds moved fast overhead, wind snapping through the trees with the scent of rain and lightning. She kept her hood up, eyes narrowed against the gusts. Behind her, the injured boy rode tethered to Matt’s horse—still half-conscious, but healing.

They were making good time again.

Until they weren’t.

A lone rider appeared just past a bend in the trail.

He wasn’t dressed like a trader or a traveler. His horse was too well-fed, his boots too clean. A dark cloak hung over reinforced leathers, and his posture—loose, but alert—put Matt instantly on edge.

Grace pulled Dawn to a halt. Her hand tightened around the reins.

“Afternoon,” the man called, voice smooth and pleasant. “Didn’t mean to startle.”

Matt didn’t lower his hand from his blade. “Strange place for a ride.”

“Strange time for it,” the man agreed. “Storm’s coming in behind me. Thought I’d get ahead of it. Mind if I ride with you until the fork?”

Grace didn’t answer right away.

Not because she sensed danger. But because the air changed the moment she looked at him.

Something ancient stirred low in her chest. Her stomach flipped. Her vision rippled—not from fear, but recognition. The pressure in her belly eased for the first time in days.

But that wasn’t possible.

She blinked.

And in that breath of distortion, the man shimmered—not visibly, not physically, but to her.

Crowned in gold light.

Hands dripping with blood not his own.

Behind him: a throne of antlers. A shadowed wolf. A child with fire in its eyes.

Grace swayed in the saddle.

“Grace?” Matt’s voice was sharp. His hand reached for her.

“I’m fine,” she murmured. “Just… tired.”

But her knuckles had gone white.

The stranger tilted his head, eyes narrowing slightly. “You alright, miss?”

“She’s fine,” Matt said flatly.

“I’m fine,” she echoed, a little too fast.

The man lifted his hands in easy surrender. “Didn’t mean to intrude.”

But he rode with them anyway.

For hours, they traveled in uneasy silence—three horses and one barely conscious passenger. The man asked no questions. Offered no stories. But Grace could feel him watching.

Not with hunger. Not with threat.

With knowing.

When the fork in the road appeared—one trail leading toward the capital, the other curling toward the southern wilds—the man reined in his horse.

“Safe travels,” he said.

Then, to Grace alone: “And good luck in your journey.”

A slight nod. Almost a bow.

Then he was gone, swallowed by the trees and the rising wind.

Grace didn’t breathe until his silhouette vanished.

And the moment he did, the heaviness in her belly returned—like gravity had snapped back into place.

Matt was staring at her. “You’re sure you’re alright?”

Grace laid a hand low across her abdomen.

“No,” she whispered. “But I think we just met someone important.”

They reached the village by midmorning the next day after riding through the night in hope of outpacing the storm, but managed only barely.

It was little more than a handful of stone cottages nestled against the base of the hills, but smoke curling from the chimneys meant warmth—and help.

Matt rode ahead to speak with the elder. Grace stayed behind to ensure the injured traveler was received properly: clean bandages, fresh broth, a soft place to recover. When the healer started to protest, Grace pressed two coins into her palm and closed her fingers around them.

“Thank you,” she said quietly. “He wouldn’t have made it without you.”

The healer blinked. “We should be thanking you, my lady.”

Grace’s stomach turned at the title. But she didn’t correct it.

They left the village under a sky that was no longer just dark, but angry—thick with the weight of a storm ready to break.

Thunder rumbled across the distant ridge.

“We won’t beat it,” Matt muttered, scanning the horizon. “Not on this trail.”

Grace squinted through the rising wind. “There’s a cave ahead. I think. West side of the pass. We found it on that mapping run three years ago—remember?”

Matt shot her a look. “Yeah. I remember. Let’s move.”

The first cold drops hit just as they found it.

The cave wasn’t large, but it was dry and deep enough to shield them. A small fire could be built near the entrance, tucked back from the wind. Matt led the horses inside and unbuckled their tack with quick, practiced hands. Grace pulled off her damp cloak, shaking it out with chattering teeth.

The storm struck in full within minutes—lightning tearing across the sky like the world was cracking open, rain hammering the earth so violently it made the trees moan.

Inside, it was quiet.

Matt lit a small fire. They shared what was left of the food Maeve had packed—dried meat, crumbly cheese, rough travel bread. Grace sat cross-legged, shawl wrapped tight around her shoulders, but she couldn’t stop shivering.

Not from the cold.

From something else.

Visions flickered at the edge of her mind:
A child in her arms.
Blood on snow.
A crown at her feet—then stolen by hands cloaked in shadow.

Matt looked up from his meal. “Talk to me.”

Grace blinked, startled.

He raised an eyebrow. “You haven’t said ten words since that fork in the road. What happened with that traveler yesterday?”

She hesitated. Then: “I saw something. In him. I think.”

Matt didn’t scoff. Didn’t push. Just waited.

“I don’t know if it was magic or fate or madness,” she whispered. “But I saw a crown. Blood. A child. I think it was mine.”

Matt’s jaw tightened. “Prophecy?”

“Maybe. Or warning.”

Thunder rolled again—louder this time, closer. Grace closed her eyes.

Matt shifted closer. Without a word, he handed her his blanket. She took it, wrapping it around her legs, then scooted closer to him and leaned her head on his shoulder like she used to when they were kids.

For a long moment, there was only the firelight and the sound of the storm.

Then Matt kissed the top of her head and said, softly, “You won’t be alone, you know. Not ever. Even when it feels like it… we’re still there. All of us. Right here.” He tapped her chest, just over her heart.

Grace squeezed her eyes shut.

“I know,” she said quietly. “I just don’t know if it’ll be enough.”

Outside, the rain poured on.

Inside, they waited.

Tomorrow would be Day Six.

And the next day—the capital.

The storm had passed by dawn.

The forest was rinsed of the earlier violence—wet earth, crushed pine, petrichor rising in soft curls from the mossy ground. Grace woke to the rhythm of water dripping from the lip of the cave, the steady breath of Dawn beside her, and the warmth of Matt’s cloak still draped over her legs.

They broke camp in silence, their movements easy with routine. The sky was pale and cloud-dappled, the worst of the storm swept eastward. The road ahead gleamed damply, rutted with tracks but welcoming.

By midday, they were riding through fields edged with wildflowers, the forest slowly thinning as the terrain opened up. The air was cool, the sun veiled just enough to make the journey pleasant.

No threats. No injuries. No visions.

Just motion.

Grace rode with her shoulders loose for the first time in days, hands light on the reins. Dawn’s pace was smooth beneath her, steady as always.

Matt whistled something low and off-key beside her, and when she looked over, he grinned.

“You’re awful,” she said.

He kept whistling—louder now, completely off tempo.

Grace rolled her eyes and tossed a small pinecone at his chest. He caught it with mock seriousness. “Weaponizing forest debris? How unladylike.”

“I’m practicing for court,” she replied dryly.

They shared a soft laugh.

Later, they rode in easy silence. Grace watched sunlight flash through the trees, dapple over her hands. She thought of her mother. Of Lydia. Of the girls in the orphanage and the babies born in the birth house.

Of Hope.

She thought about the weight the Woven One had placed on her—on her body, her bloodline, her future.

But for now, the wind was gentle. The air was cool. And nothing ached except the saddle beneath her.

That night, they made camp near a winding stream, not far from the rise that overlooked the capital. The water sang nearby, and the leaves overhead whispered instead of roared.

Grace curled her fingers around her cloak, watching the fire flicker low. “Tomorrow.”

Matt nodded. “Tomorrow.”

She didn’t ask if he was nervous. He didn’t ask if she was ready.

They just sat with the quiet between them—a final stretch of peace before the city swallowed them whole.

Chapter Text

The stream wound gently past their camp, its surface catching the early light like strands of silver thread. Mist clung to the rocks and pooled in the hollows of the mossy bank. Birds stirred in the trees, their song quiet, reverent.

Grace crouched beside the firepit, hands working in automatic rhythm as she rolled up the blankets and tucked the last of their food into her satchel. Matt emerged from the trees with a yawn and a stretch, his tunic rumpled and armor loosened.

“Stream’s clear,” he said, raking a hand through his hair. “Cold as the goddesses’ breath, but it’ll do.”

Grace didn’t look up. “Go ahead. I’ll follow in a bit. I have… more to prep before I’m ready.”

Matt paused, then smiled faintly. “Right. Because we’re not ten anymore.”

She did look at him then. “Exactly. Although, technically, the answer should be that I’ve seen more of you than Lydia has, since our mothers used to bathe us together. But we both know that’s not the case anymore, is it?”

He gave a smirk and a small, mock bow, grabbing his towel and soap pouch. “Try not to disappear into a vision while I’m gone. I don’t want to come back to a prophecy floating downriver—Lydia would kill me.”

Grace rolled her eyes but didn’t answer.

Once he was gone, she finally let herself pause.

Her fingers hovered over the edge of her pack. Her stomach still felt heavy, but her chest… lighter, somehow. The storm had passed. The capital was only hours away.

And between here and there—only rolling hills and water.

She stood slowly, pulling out what she needed to become who she was expected to be.

When Matt called that he was out of the water and changing in the trees, she made her way toward the stream. Her hands shook slightly as she stepped onto the narrow path and down toward the running water, like she was about to wash away her past.

The trees closed behind her.

And ahead, the water waited.

Matt was right—it was cold. But that was expected this time of year, the flowers only just beginning to bloom along the riverbank as she submerged herself. She gasped when she surfaced, the shock of the water making her scrub quickly. Her body. Her hair. The last of the blood under her nails.

The last of who she had been.

She stood slowly, wrapped herself in a towel, and stepped out of the water. A branch snapped nearby. The sensation of being watched crept across her skin.

Then, just as suddenly—it was gone.

She looked around, finding nothing.

So she dressed.

Not in a tunic.

But in the dress.

The one Matt had bought under Lydia’s and Sarah’s instructions, handed over with teary eyes.
The ink-blue linen dress Maeve had insisted on hemming by hand—before they even showed it to her.
The one Grace had refused to look at.

Until now.

She unfolded it carefully, smoothing the fabric between her fingers. She was grateful they’d thought about the corset ties in the front, the ease of getting it on by herself.

She combed through her curls, braiding the top section and threading a blue ribbon through as she went. But when she looked at her reflection in the water, it felt too simple. So she twisted the braid into a crown around her head, leaving the rest to curl freely on her shoulders.

Then she opened her small wooden box—hand-painted, cracked at the corners.
Inside: a stub of kohl, a sliver of beeswax balm, and the faintest trace of perfume on a faded cloth.

She used the mirror to line her eyes, to darken her lashes. Dabbed a bit of perfume at her throat.
Along the bank, she spotted a patch of early berries and mixed them with her balm, giving her lips a hint of color.

Her skin, kissed by sun and weather, held a golden undertone. Freckles danced across her cheeks, giving her a softness that often made people think she was younger than she was.
But with the extra touches, the reflection in the water didn’t look like a girl anymore.

She looked like a woman. Proud. Pretty. Her stormy grey eyes seemed to glow in the sunlight.

At the bottom of the bundle, wrapped in a linen scrap, were her mother’s wedding slippers—worn at the heels, still dusted with rose ash.
Probably a bit out of style.
But they fit. And they were still nicer than her boots.

She opened the last box—the one with the jewelry.

Grace sat on the mossy bank and stared down at it for a long moment.

Across the stream, something rustled again.
She froze.

Then—just a squirrel. Darting up the trees.
She exhaled and shook her head. Nerves, she told herself.
But that heavy feeling in her belly was gone again.
Maybe she really was losing her mind.

She looked back at the box.

She’d told Matt she needed more time because she had to prep.

But the truth was simpler.

She had to become someone else.

Someone who looked like she belonged in a hall of thrones.
Someone who could sit in a circle of nobles and not be laughed out of it.
Someone who could wear this dress and not feel like an orphan girl in borrowed silk.

She was no one’s princess. Not really.

But today—she had to look the part.

She reached into the box, sliding on her mother’s ring. Hooked in the earrings. One of the village women had given her a comb, and she tucked it into the back of her braid.
Nothing matched.
But it was what she had. And she would make it work.

When she was finished, she didn’t recognize the girl staring back from the water’s edge.

She didn’t look like Grace of the Hollow.
She didn’t even look like Grace the Woven One.

She looked like a stranger.
Like a lady.
Like one of the Chosen.

She gathered her things.

Then—crack.

Something large crashed through the brush on the far bank. Much louder this time.

Grace froze, her breath catching.

She scanned the trees, but whatever it was had already vanished.

Still, the hairs on her arms stayed raised.

She tightened the towel around her shoulders and walked back to camp.

Back to Matt.
Back to the road.
Back to whatever came next.

When she stepped into the clearing and saw Matt, he didn’t smile.
Didn’t laugh.
Didn’t speak at all.

He just stared.

And for once—Grace didn’t flinch.

He had stopped cold, his eyes sweeping over her from the hem of the blue dress to the kohl lining her eyes.
His mouth opened. Then closed. Then opened again.

“Wow,” he said finally. “You’re… terrifying. You actually look like a woman. Not my quasi-little sister.”

Grace arched a brow. “Terrifying?”

He nodded solemnly. “Absolutely. Like a noble lady who might poison my wine if I insult her embroidery.”

She rolled her eyes, but smiled despite herself. “You’re an idiot.”

“And yet,” he said, grabbing his saddle, “I’m the idiot escorting a goddess through the front gates.”

They mounted up in silence, nerves crawling through her body with every step Dawn took.

The road sloped gently down through a break in the trees, and the scent of hearth smoke drifted faintly on the wind. In the distance, a ridge curved up like a protective hand, cradling the land beyond it—where the capital waited.

Matt cleared his throat. “Listen. Before we get there…”

Grace turned slightly in the saddle, brows raised.

He didn’t look at her. Just kept his eyes on the trail.

“I trained here,” he said. “For three months. Ten years ago now. Just after I was first sworn in.”

Her stomach tightened. “I remember. I don’t think I ever heard Lydia whine as much as she did when you were gone.”

He shrugged. “I wasn’t ready to be what she needed yet. But that’s not the point.”
He hesitated. Then: “Look. The capital—it’s not like the rest of the kingdom. It’s older. Sharper. Everything moves faster. People speak in circles and smile with knives.”

“Sounds lovely,” Grace muttered.

Matt’s mouth twitched. “It’s not all bad. The market’s beautiful. The food’s good. And if you know where to look, the people still remember the old gods. The real ones.”

Grace fell quiet.

Ahead, the trees thinned.

Matt’s voice dropped. “The minute we pass through those gates, you’re no longer a traveler. Or a healer. Or even a girl from the borderlands. You’re one of the Chosen. Every person you meet will already think they know who you are.”

She didn’t answer.

He looked at her then, gaze steady. “So show them who you are.
Not who they expect.
Who I know you are.”

Grace nodded once.

And together, they rode toward the city.

Toward the future.

Toward the crown.

It was only a few hours later when the city gates loomed ahead—tall stone, weather-worn but still proud, flanked by guards in crested silver and blue.

Grace kept her chin high, her hands steady on the reins.

Matt leaned closer in the saddle. “Deep breath,” he murmured. “And don’t look at the guards. They’re trained to spot nerves.”

“I’m not nervous.”

“Liar.”

The gates opened slowly, with a groan of iron.

And then they were inside.

The capital unfolded around them like a map unrolled: narrow streets veined with cobbled alleys, bright flags hanging from iron balconies, shopkeepers calling out wares beneath striped canopies. The scent of fresh bread mingled with smoke and horses and salt.

Grace tried not to gape.
She failed.

Matt smirked. “Alright. Quick tour while we ride.”

He gestured right with his chin. “Healer’s Row is down there—don’t go unless you need something, and bring coin if you do. Which I know you will, so go to the apothecary at the corner with the red shutters. That’s the good one.”

He pointed left. “Market Square—pickpockets everywhere, but the best spices you’ll ever find. The baker on the south side makes honey tarts Lydia would stab me to bring home. I’m stopping to get some as part of her wedding gift.”

She smiled faintly.

He nodded toward a narrower lane just off the main road. “That’s the place to avoid after sunset. Not dangerous, just… full of interest. If you’re into perfume, propositions, and diseases you can’t wash off.”

Grace wrinkled her nose. “Duly noted.”

They passed a small fountain, a boy chasing a dog through the spray. A woman sold pressed flowers from a cart beside a pair of tired-looking guards. Laundry fluttered overhead, strung between windows like pennants of ordinary life.

Matt kept narrating—street names, good inns, where the best smith worked, which alley had the fastest exit routes.

It helped.
The knowing.

Until it didn’t.

Because the road began to widen.
The crowd thinned.
And the castle rose ahead.

Grace felt it before she saw it—an invisible pressure curling in her chest. The gates were wrought iron and gilt, carved with ancient sigils that pulsed faintly in the sun. Beyond them: the sprawl of stone and slate, turrets climbing into cloud.

Her heart kicked hard.

Matt slowed his horse. Grace did the same.

Neither spoke.

Because this was it.
The end of the road.
Of shared fires and pinecone wars and whispered confessions in the dark.

She turned to him, throat tight, as they both dismounted.

Matt met her eyes. “You’ve got this.”

Her jaw trembled. “What if I don’t?”

He leaned in, pressing his forehead to hers, gently. “Then you come home. But I think… I think you’re about to show them all exactly who you are.”

Grace nodded.
Once.
Then again, blinking back tears as he pulled her close in a tight hug, kissing the top of her head.

“No matter what—I am proud of you, Gracie. We all are. If you don’t make the cut, if they don’t give you an escort—send for me. I will bring you home. Promise me.”

“I love you, Matty.” She sniffled, trying not to cry. “And I promise.”

He lifted her back onto her saddle, giving her hand one last squeeze as he passed her the reins.

Then she squared her shoulders and lifted her chin, and rode forward—toward the gates, toward her future, toward the crown.

Matt didn’t follow.

He just mounted his horse at the edge of the path, just beyond the reach of the castle’s shadow. His hands rested lightly on the reins, but his eyes never left her.

He watched as Grace approached the outer gate—posture steady, dress straight, hair caught neatly beneath her cloak. She looked every bit the lady her village had hoped she’d become.

Until the guards bristled.

He saw it in their body language—a shift of weight, a skeptical glance. One of them stepped forward, blocking her path with his halberd lowered just enough to be insulting.

Matt straightened in the saddle.

He saw Grace say something—heard the edge in her voice even from here. The guards didn’t move. Another muttered something that made the first one smirk.

Matt’s hand moved toward the hilt of his sword.

But Grace didn’t flinch.

She reached into her pack and pulled free a sealed parchment—the missive from the village elder, stamped with wax and sigil. Then another: the letter from the Borderlands Council. Her credentials. Her proof.

The guards read them.

Slowly.
Grudgingly.
The halberd lifted.

She led Dawn forward with a quiet dignity Matt doubted many queens could muster.

Just before she passed beneath the archway, she turned.

Her eyes found him across the distance—clear and bright, full of more weight than any girl should have had to carry.

She didn’t wave.

Didn’t smile.

Just looked.

Like it was goodbye.

And then she was gone.

The gates closed behind her with a deep, echoing thud.

Matt let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. The wind shifted through the trees. Somewhere behind him, a crow called once—and then fell silent.

The road ahead was empty.

Matt turned his horse toward home.

His future was waiting for him there.

Chapter Text

The council chamber stank of polished wood, burnt oil, and old men clinging to relevance.

Steve sat at the head of the table, only half-listening as Baron Zemo droned on about tradition and ceremonial structure and the sanctity of Choosing Season—like it wasn’t just a gilded cattle market for noble daughters and ambitious houses.

He resisted the urge to grind his teeth. Barely.

He’d been on the road for nearly a month. His father’s body had barely cooled before the missives were sent, and by the time he arrived in the capital, half the Chosen were already waiting—embroidered, perfumed, and eager. Just in time for his coronation.

It was bullshit.

He shouldn’t have to marry just because tradition demanded it. Because some archaic system insisted the crown required not just a ruler—but an omega. A match. An heir.

Zemo was still talking. Something about bloodlines and the Spring Trials.

Steve’s jaw twitched. His fingers tapped once against the carved arm of his chair.

He was about to interrupt—about to tell them all exactly what they could do with their ancestral obligations—when something shifted.

The wolf woke.

Restless. Reverent. Like it had waited lifetimes for this.

It surged to the surface like it had caught a scent on the wind. Not a threat. Not danger. Not fear.

Something older.

Something soft. Sacred. Familiar.

Something his.

Steve went still. Every instinct honed by years of silence, of discipline, of pretending—flared awake in a single breath.

His omega was out there.

She had just come into power.

And he felt it.

He didn’t know how. Didn’t know where. But she was real.
Awakened. Blessed. Woven.

And the bond—long dormant—had just struck like a match behind his ribs.

Zemo kept talking.

But Steve was already elsewhere.

Not physically. Not yet. But his mind had left the room.

The Choosing had begun.

But it would not go as they expected.

Not now.

Not with her in play.

Not if he had anything to say about it.

He kept his spine straight. Kept his hands still. Kept his breathing even.

Zemo continued. Others joined in—House this, Dowry that, alliances and sacred rites. They spoke of omegas like trophies. Bloodlines like livestock.

Steve didn’t hear a word of it.

He felt the wolf pacing under his skin. Felt his senses sharpen. His pulse slow. The ancient part of him straining toward something real.

She was out there.

His omega.

And the bond—the one he thought he’d never feel—had finally stirred.

He clenched his jaw and waited.

Waited until the final parchment was passed.

Waited until the High Steward rang the old brass bell to signal adjournment.

Then Steve stood.

No royal speech. No diplomatic close.

Just this:

“I have one week before the Choosing begins. I’m taking it.”

A few nobles looked up, startled. Zemo raised an eyebrow.

Steve kept his tone cool. Controlled.

“I’ll be back for the opening ceremony. Lord Wilson will hold council in my place. Don’t summon me unless the city’s on fire.”

And before anyone could object—before Zemo could launch another monologue, or Lady Thorne could flash that sugar-sweet smirk—

He was already gone.

Boots echoing down the corridor.

⸻

Bucky and Sam caught up before Steve reached the end of the hall.

“Steve!” Sam called. “Hey—what the hell just happened in there?”

Bucky fell into stride beside him, brow drawn. “Did you finally snap, or was that something else?”

Steve didn’t slow down. His cloak swept the stone behind him, boots striking with purpose. He didn’t have time.

“She’s out there,” he said, voice low but electric.

Bucky blinked. “Who?”

“My omega,” Steve said. “I felt her. She just came into power. The bond lit up like fire and she’s—” He broke off, chest heaving with the weight of it. “She’s real. And she’s not in that godsdamned council chamber.”

Sam exhaled like he’d been punched. “Holy shit. You’re serious.”

“I’ve never been more.”

“You sure it wasn’t a false stir?” Bucky asked, but gently. “A phantom flare? You’ve waited a long time, Stevie.”

Steve looked at him then, eyes sharp and clear and burning with something older than grief.

“I know the difference,” he said.

That was all it took.

Bucky nodded once, sharp and sure. “Then we’re leaving. Now.”

Sam rubbed both hands over his face. “You’re both insane.”

“Probably,” Bucky muttered.

“But I’ll hold the fort,” Sam added, cutting across his own protest. “You’ve got six days. After that, I start making excuses.”

“Thank you,” Steve said, pausing just long enough to clasp his shoulder. “I’ll be back before the ceremony.”

Sam’s reply was gruff but fond. “Yeah, yeah. Go fetch your damn destiny, Cap.”

They were out of the palace by sundown.

Out of the gates by moonrise.

And the moment they crossed the city perimeter—

Everything shifted.

The world tilted sideways, like it had been waiting.

The air snapped clean. The trees sharpened. The wind carried something raw and pulsing and ancient.

Steve stumbled once.

Then he let go.

The wolf surged forward—not a violent transformation, but a surrender. A yielding. A welcome home.

Magic threaded through him like breath, warming his veins, sharpening every sense. His spine flexed as the wolf took lead—not tearing through skin but weaving through muscle and instinct, letting the beast run ahead with his body still intact.

His boots hit the dirt, hard.

His cloak fluttered once, then fell behind.

He was faster than wind, eyes blazing gold.

Beside him, Bucky exhaled sharply.

And shifted.

His bones reshaped, fluid and brutal.

His form compressed, then stretched—tendon to fur, breath to growl. Where a man had stood, a massive wolf now ran. Broad-shouldered, deep gray with streaks of black along the ridge of his back.

And his front left leg gleamed.

Vibranium.

Not metal bolted onto flesh, but a seamless blend—magic-forged, rune-etched, and deadly.

The Winter Wolf had come.

Not a myth.

Not anymore.

They didn’t speak.

They didn’t need to.

The bond pulled like a beacon, low and pulsing and impossible to ignore.

She was out there.

And they were coming.

⸻

They ran all through the night, under a sky choked with stars.

The wind tore past them, cold and wild, but Steve barely felt it. Not with the bond humming raw against his ribs. Not with the echo of her presence thrumming in his chest like a second heartbeat.

She was awake.

Not just awake—but startled. Afraid.

It hit him all at once.

A jagged pulse of energy—fear, grief, something primal—ripped through the tether between them. His lungs seized. His footing faltered.

She had woken from a nightmare.

Or worse—into one.

Steve howled.

Long and low, the sound bursting from his chest before he could stop it.
A call laced with instinct and warning.
Need and fury.
Recognition and ache.

Where are you?

Somewhere beyond the hills, she answered.

Not with sound. Not with a voice.
But with a flicker in the bond.
A quiet press against his senses.
A tremor of startled power, soothed just enough to tell him—

She was still breathing.

Not safe. Not quite. But alive. Enduring.

She hadn’t seen him. He hadn’t reached her.

But he felt her.

And she—whatever state she was in—had felt him back.

The connection steadied. Just a little.

Like a hand on the spine. A whisper in the blood.

Not near enough to touch.

But enough to know she was holding on.

And he would find her.

Even if the world burned on the way.

⸻

He tracked her until dawn.

Her scent was faint—new, not fully awakened—but his wolf followed the threads like starlight caught on branches.

She moved through the forest with quiet purpose. Not alone.

A man walked beside her.

A beta.

Not a threat. Not even uneasy. Just alert. Protective. Familiar.

Steve didn’t growl. Didn’t bare teeth. Just watched.

Tracked.

His instincts pulled tight until he caught a clearer glimpse—and recognized him.

Matt.

Royal Guard. Born in the Healer’s Hollow, if Steve remembered right. Loyal to the bone. One of the few men Steve had ever trusted with stories from the old ways.

He’d die before letting harm come to her.

That made it easier.

Not easy.

But easier.

Still, Steve didn’t stray too far.

Couldn’t.

Every time the distance grew too wide, it hurt—like something inside his ribs was unraveling. A bone-deep ache that twisted with each step away.

And he could feel it in her too.

Even if she didn’t understand it yet.

Whenever he drew near again—just a wolf in the shadows—her body responded.

He saw it once from the cover of trees.

She paused mid-step, brow furrowed like she’d forgotten something. Then her hand moved—soft, absent—across her lower belly.

There was no change in her posture. No outward sign of awareness.

But her touch lingered.

Tender. Curious. Knowing.

Like something in her had stirred.

Like some part of her knew.

Her omega was awakening.

And it knew it’s mate was near.
____
The bandits made their move around midday.

Steve and Bucky had sensed them long before—clumsy movements, breath patterns wrong for prey animals, the sour stench of fear and opportunism laced through the wind.

They didn’t intervene.

Not immediately at least.

Steve stayed low along the ridge, eyes trained on the narrow pass below. He wanted to see how she moved. How she responded. How the world reacted to her now.

The path twisted between outcroppings of rock and bramble. Grace and Matt moved cautiously, too exposed in the open corridor.

Matt felt it first—his posture tightening, his hand drifting near the hilt of his blade. He threw a hand up in signal, body angling just enough to nudge Grace’s horse behind him as the first bandit stepped from the shadows.

Two emerged in the open.

Three more in the brush. Maybe four.

Steve’s jaw clenched.

Then came the words.

“Pretty little omega like that—bet she’s sweet when she begs.”

The wolf rose instantly.

But he didn’t move. Not yet.

Matt was faster than the insult. Steel drawn. Posture wide. Voice low and steady as he warned them once.

And then—

Grace ignited.

Not in flame, not in light—but in presence. Power shimmered at her fingertips, raw and half-formed, crackling through the air like static before a storm. The scent of magic bloomed around her—undeniable. Inborn. And she didn’t even know.

One of the men faltered.

They might have been outnumbered.

But not outclassed.

Matt stepped forward, blade arcing just enough to force them back. Grace stayed behind him, still radiating energy she didn’t she didn’t realize she was controlling.

The bandits hesitated.

Then turned.

Retreating, spitting curses.

One of them hissed over his shoulder, “Whore.”

That was the last mistake he ever made.

Steve moved.

No roar. No sound. Just motion—precise and brutal.

The shift took him mid-leap—muscles stretching, paws landing silent on damp earth. He cut through the trees like smoke, targeting the flank.

He wasn’t aiming for the loudest one.

He was aiming for the one sneaking behind the ridge. The one circling toward Grace’s exposed side. The one thinking no one had noticed.

Claws sank into flesh.

Teeth locked around bone.

It was over before the man could scream.

Bucky flanked the others—just as silent. Just as fast.

No cries. No warnings. Just chaos buried in silence.

The forest swallowed the violence whole.

By the time Matt turned to check the shadows again, the bandits were already gone—scattered or dead.

He didn’t question it.

He simply sheathed his blade and muttered something low to Grace. She exhaled slowly, her power ebbing, shoulders tense but steady.

They kept walking.

But before she moved, she paused.

Fingers brushed across her stomach—light, uncertain.

Her brow furrowed. She glanced toward the trees.

Steve froze where he crouched, half-shrouded in undergrowth, the taste of blood still on his tongue.

Her gaze passed over him—but didn’t linger.

She hadn’t seen him.

Not fully.

But something in her knew.

He could feel it in the bond—a soft flutter, like a whisper behind the ribs. An instinctual question not yet formed.

He stayed still.

Watched her go.

And when the path was clear again, he turned to Bucky.

The other wolf stood silent nearby, coat streaked with dust, his vibranium leg catching faint light.

No words passed between them.

They vanished back into the trees—ghosts with teeth.

___
They followed her for the remainder of the day until just after sunset when they set up camp.

A thicket of birch and thistle, smoke rising soft and steady against the darkening sky. The scent hit first—cinders, dried herbs, something sweet beneath it. And her.

Steve crouched low behind a moss-covered log, breath tight in his chest.

She was close. So close he could hear the crackle of her fire. The rhythm of her breath. Her voice—low, uncertain—carried on the breeze.

“They could’ve taken me,” she murmured.

Steve flinched.

“They didn’t,” came the reply. A man’s voice. Calm, grounded. Protective.

Steve’s wolf snarled low in his gut.

He shifted forward, silent as shadow, just enough to glimpse her through the undergrowth. She sat curled near the fire, arms wrapped around her knees. Her hair was loose. Her eyes too tired for someone so powerful.

His omega.

She didn’t know.

Not yet.

She pressed a hand to her abdomen—slow, uncertain. As if she was afraid of what she might find there.

“Doesn’t feel safe either,” she whispered.

Steve’s hands clenched into the earth. The bond ached like a bruise.

Beside her, the man—Matt—watched her with a strange mix of worry and reverence. His body was relaxed, but his senses weren’t. Steve could see it. Smell it.

Matt knew something was off.

The wolf in him was stirring.

Steve dropped lower into the brush, pulse heavy in his throat.

They hadn’t been spotted.

But they were known.

Bucky crouched beside him, wolf-form barely visible in the shadows. His breath was even, but his muscles were coiled tight.

Not yet, Steve thought.

They couldn’t rush in—not like this. She was unsteady. Raw. Her magic still new and humming with uncertainty.

But gods—he wanted to go to her. Kneel at her feet. Press his forehead to her belly and promise she would never be alone again.

Instead, he waited.

Watched.

Listened.

Until the fire burned low and she lay down beside the man, curled into herself.

The wolf inside Steve snarled again.

But the man in him held still.

Tomorrow.

⸻

They found the boy just after dawn.

Steve smelled the blood before they crested the ridge. Feral. Metallic. Wrong.

He and Bucky paused, crouched in the cover of tangled pine. Below, a figure slumped at the base of a tree—limp, broken, forgotten. Barely more than a kid. The copper scent of sepsis hung thick in the air.

Steve’s gut twisted.

He could feel her before he saw her.

Grace slid from her horse with barely a sound, movements swift and certain. Matt called after her—protective, wary—but she didn’t pause. She was already kneeling, fingers unfastening her satchel, voice low and calm and focused.

“She’s going to help him,” Steve whispered.

Bucky shifted beside him in the brush, wolf-form tense.

“She shouldn’t,” he replied.

“She will,” Steve said. “She already has.”

Grace worked in silence, hands practiced and sure. Steve couldn’t look away. Not from the way she mixed feverroot without measuring, or the way her power hummed in the air—low and steady, like a song only he could hear.

She pressed her hand to the boy’s chest. Magic stirred beneath her skin.

The wolf inside Steve howled.

She was healing a stranger.

Giving her strength to someone who couldn’t repay it.

He gritted his teeth. The bond ached like a pulled muscle—longing, warning, need.

“She’s going to cost herself,” Bucky murmured.

“I know,” Steve whispered.

And yet he didn’t move.

Couldn’t.

She was radiant in her mercy.

And he was already hers.

They trailed behind as she and Matt continued—slower now, with the boy tied into Matt’s saddle. The gelding didn’t like it. Kept shifting, snorting, uneasy.

Smart animal. It knew they weren’t alone.

So did she.

Steve saw it in the stiff line of her shoulders. The way her fingers tightened on the reins. The way her gaze drifted toward the woods even when she tried not to look.

She felt them.

Not clearly. Not yet.

But enough.

By the time they reached the glade, the sun had dropped low behind the trees, turning everything gold and gray. Bucky stayed to the north, running the perimeter. Steve kept to the shadow of the ash grove, close enough to hear the crackle of their fire.

Grace checked the boy’s wounds again. Her touch was gentle. Intent. She murmured something Steve couldn’t hear, but her energy had softened.

The fever was breaking.

Steve let out a slow breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.

Matt handed her tea. She curled around it, palms cradling the mug like a hearthstone.

“You could’ve left him,” Matt said.

Steve froze, body taut.

She didn’t.

“Then anyone else shouldn’t be Chosen,” she replied.

Steve’s heart cracked open.

There. That.

That was why he had felt her in his soul before he ever laid eyes on her.

She was power.

She was grace.

She was his.

And he was going to earn her.

No matter how long it took.

He slipped further into the shadows, the scent of bitterleaf and moss clinging to the edge of his memory.

The fire burned low.

She stared into it, quiet and steady, as if she already knew she was being seen.

_____

The sun hadn’t quite broken through the clouds, but the scent of rain was already in the air.

Steve crouched at the edge of a rocky outcropping, watching as Grace packed up camp. She moved slower than the day before—tired, cautious. Her hands trembled slightly as she tied down the saddle bags.

Matt was watching her. The boy slept fitfully, tethered to the other horse. Bucky lingered just out of range, half-shifted—wolf eyes, human form, quiet as smoke.

“She didn’t sleep much,” Bucky said softly, stepping up beside Steve. “Neither did he.”

Steve didn’t respond right away. He was watching the way Grace’s fingers hovered over her abdomen before she caught herself and moved on.

“She’s unraveling,” Steve murmured. “Still trying to hold everything together.”

“You going to keep hiding behind tree branches forever?” Bucky asked, arms crossed. “You look like a half-feral stalker.”

Steve exhaled. “There’s a villa about a mile and a half east. Royal property. Still in use, if the reports were right.”

“You’re going to it,” Bucky said flatly.

Steve nodded. “If I’m going to show myself… I can’t look like I’ve been crawling through the woods for four days.”

“She won’t care.”

“I will.”

Bucky eyed him. “You’re serious.”

“I’m going to ride out and intercept them at the fork. Clean. Armed. In control.”

“And if she recognizes you?”

“She won’t. Not fully. Not yet. But I need her to feel it. I need her to see me and not know why she can’t breathe.”

Bucky gave him a long, low look. “You’re a damn romantic, Rogers.”

“I’m not going to claim her,” Steve said, adjusting the strap across his chest. “Not yet. But I’m not hiding anymore.”

“You’re ditching me. Let me guess I’m staying with her,” Bucky warned.

“That’s why I’m telling you.”

Steve stood, finally turning from the sight of her. “Don’t let them out of your sight.”

Bucky tilted his head, expression softening for just a moment. “You really think this is it?”

Steve nodded. “I know it is.”

Bucky let out a breath. “Go. I’ve got them.”

Steve pressed a hand to his friend’s shoulder—a quiet thank you—and then melted into the trees, already angling east.

______

By the time Steve had cleaned, changed and had the horse saddled the sky had soured.

The kind of green-yellow haze that made animals bolt and mothers pray. The wind moved too fast. The trees bent too low. Steve tasted copper in the air. Lightning was coming. Big. Wild. The kind that didn’t care who it broke.

He’d scouted ahead early that morning, following the bond like a taut string through the woods. It pulled sharper now. Clearer. She was close—so close he could feel the rhythm of her breath beneath his skin.

And then he heard the horses.

Three. Two awake. One tethered.

He slowed his mount just before the bend.

And then he saw her.

Grace.

Sitting tall but worn, hood up against the wind, a streak of hair blown loose across her cheek. She pulled her horse to a stop with practiced calm, but her shoulders stiffened the moment she laid eyes on him.

Their eyes met.

The bond hummed.

A lightning strike in his chest—swift and scorching and holy.

Her hand tightened around the reins.

Steve kept his posture loose. Nonthreatening. Cloak drawn. Leathers clean.

“Afternoon,” he called, voice smooth despite the roar in his blood. “Didn’t mean to startle.”

The man beside her—had his hand on his blade. Good instincts.

“Strange place for a ride,” he challenged.

Steve nodded once. “Strange time for it. Storm’s coming in behind me. Thought I’d get ahead of it. Mind if I ride with you until the fork?”

He kept his gaze steady—but not locked.

It was agony.

She was staring at him like she was seeing something through him. Like her body recognized him before her mind could catch up.

And gods help him, he felt it too.

Not just the bond. But something deeper. Prophetic. Her aura was flaring at the edges, magic cracking like static around her frame.

Then it hit.

A pulse of power. A shimmer behind her eyes.

She saw something.

Not him exactly—but something woven through him.

She swayed.

Steve’s heart stopped.

“Grace?” Matt’s voice was sharp.

“I’m fine,” she said. Too fast. Too thin.

Steve tilted his head slightly. Forced only mild concern into his voice. “You alright, miss?”

Matt cut him off. “She’s fine.”

She echoed it like a reflex. “I’m fine.”

But her knuckles were white.

Steve raised his hands in apology. “Didn’t mean to intrude.”

But then he stayed.

He rode beside them in silence, every breath a war between stay and speak.

He didn’t ask questions.

Didn’t reach for her.

Didn’t tell her that he’d dreamed of her voice since the day the bond flared awake.

Instead, he let her feel it.

Not fully.

Just enough.

When the fork finally came—one road curling toward the capital, the other south—he reined in.

“Safe travels,” he said.

Then, just for her:

“And good luck in your journey.”

He bowed his head. Slight. Deep enough to mean something.

Then turned his horse and rode into the trees.

The storm cracked open behind him.

He didn’t look back.

But he felt it.

The moment the pressure returned. The weight in her core. The ache.

She had felt him.

She just didn’t know what to call it yet.

Not yet.

But soon.

They reached the village by midmorning.

Steve circled wide through the trees, staying downwind, soaked to the bone and silent as stone. Bucky had rejoined him briefly at sunrise before falling back again—scouting a southern route, watching for threats, giving Steve space he hadn’t asked for but clearly needed.

They’d ridden hard through the night, but the storm still hunted them.

He watched from the ridge as Grace dismounted, cloak snapping in the wind. She didn’t rest. Didn’t seek shelter. She went straight to the boy—checking his bandages, smoothing his fevered hair, speaking in that low, steady voice she used when she thought no one was listening.

Steve was always listening.

He followed them again when they left—riding straight into the jaws of the storm.

By the time she found the cave, Steve was drenched and half-feral with restraint. The sky had cracked open above them. Lightning streaked like a blade across the hills. The rain fell sideways, sharp and cold.

But inside the cave, it was still.

Steve didn’t enter.

He curled beneath the thick branches of an overgrown pine just outside, body low to the ground, watching through the downpour with amber eyes.

He saw her shake out her cloak. Saw Matt tend the horses, build the fire. Saw her sit and try to eat—but she barely touched the food.

She was shivering.

Not from the cold.

He felt the shift in her—magic rising, memory flickering.

She’s seeing something, he thought. Something true.

Her voice was soft, almost lost to the rain, but Steve heard it.

“I saw something. In him. I think.”

He went still.

“A crown. Blood. A child. I think it was mine.”

The air punched out of his lungs.

He lowered his head, closing his eyes against the ache.

She saw the child.

She saw the crown.

And yet she didn’t know it was him.

Not yet.

He opened his eyes again. Watched as Matt handed her a blanket. Watched her lean against him like she’d done it a thousand times.

Steve didn’t move.

Didn’t growl. Didn’t shift.

Just watched.

Watched and burned.

Matt kissed her head. Whispered something Steve couldn’t fully hear—but Grace’s answer came clear:

“I just don’t know if it’ll be enough.”

He could almost feel her weight against his chest. Hear her heartbeat. Taste the truth of her scent without wind or rain between them.

But he didn’t move.

Didn’t breach the cave.

Didn’t claim what wasn’t his to claim.

Not yet.

Instead, he lay in the mud and the dark, letting the storm soak through his coat, his skin, his soul.

Because she didn’t need a stranger in the night.

She needed a king who could outwait the storm.

A mate who could burn without touching.

A wolf who knew the difference between hunger and honor.

The rain beat down like war drums.

And still—he watched.

Every breath he took was a vow:

Soon.

Soon.

The storm had passed by dawn.

The forest gleamed with quiet aftermath—wet earth, broken branches, silvered leaves still trembling from the night’s fury. Steve padded silently through the underbrush, paws sinking into soft moss. Petrichor curled thick in the air, mingling with the faintest trace of smoke.

She had slept.

Not deeply, not long. But enough to soften the lines around her mouth.

He’d watched her stir awake to the sound of dripping water and the low sigh of her horse beside her. Watched her fingers curl around Matt’s cloak before she even opened her eyes.

They moved with practiced ease—packing, brushing down the horses, folding damp wool and tightening saddles. Grace never rushed, but never lingered either. Her hands were steady again.

By the time they rode out, the wind had calmed. The storm had swept east.

And Steve followed, no longer hiding his trail.

He kept his distance. Close enough to watch. Far enough not to be noticed.

They passed through open fields by midday—wildflowers at the edges, tree shadows striping the grass. The air smelled clean. New. The kind of day that could almost make a man forget war, prophecy, and obligation.

She rode with her shoulders loose for the first time in days.

It nearly broke him.

No visions. No injuries. Just motion. Just sunlight on her skin and laughter in her voice.

Matt whistled something terrible. She laughed—actually laughed—and tossed a pinecone at him. Steve’s wolf ears twitched at the sound. It was so normal. So human.

So far from the weight she carried.

He watched her eyes go soft later, turned toward the sky. Watched her thumb brush the saddle horn like she was holding a memory in her palm.

He wondered what—or who—she was thinking about.

Her mother, maybe. Her fallen. Her future.

Him?

He’d give anything to know.

But he wasn’t part of her thoughts yet.

He was still just a shadow on the wind.

That night, they camped beside a winding stream.

Steve lay curled in the bracken on the ridge above, camouflaged by dusk and the slope of the land. He watched her fingers twist into her cloak. Watched her stare into the fire, lips barely parted like she was about to ask something—but didn’t.

“Tomorrow,” she said.

Matt nodded. “Tomorrow.”

Steve swallowed hard.

The capital waited just beyond the rise.

So did duty. So did legacy. So did everything he’d spent years trying to avoid—until she made him want to walk straight into it and tear it down if it meant earning her trust.

He didn’t move.

Didn’t close the gap.

Didn’t speak.

He just watched.

Listened.

And waited.

One more night.

And then—

The Choosing.

But not in the way they planned.

The stream wound gently past their camp, catching the first light like strands of silver thread. Mist rose in soft curls from the moss and pooled in the hollowed banks. Birds stirred in the trees, singing as if they, too, understood this day would not be ordinary.

Steve waited in the brush beyond the far bank, paws sunk deep into wet earth, breath still as stone.

Grace crouched beside the firepit, rolling blankets with careful precision, movements practiced and quiet. No visions today. No fear. But something in her was pulling taut.

She was preparing.

He felt it like a shift in gravity.

Matt emerged with a yawn, muttered something about the cold, and disappeared toward the water. Grace lingered. Then rose, slowly. Her fingers hovered over her satchel like it held something sacred.

Steve watched her walk toward the stream—alone.

She stepped into the shallows like a rite.

And when she submerged—shoulders vanishing beneath the current, curls dark with river water—Steve felt the moment break.

She was washing something away.

He crouched lower in the brush, heat thrumming through his limbs.

He should look away.

He didn’t.

Not out of lust—never that—but reverence.

She scrubbed herself raw. Hair, arms, the faint trace of blood beneath her nails. He’d seen warriors do the same before battle. But this? This wasn’t just cleansing.

It was a burial.

She emerged wrapped in a towel, shivering, alone.

Steve’s breath caught when she opened the bundle.

The dress.

Ink-blue linen. Soft and regal. But simple. She held it like it might turn to ash in her hands.

And then she put it on.

Piece by piece, she constructed herself.

The braid. The ribbon. The mirror. Her mother’s slippers. A smear of crushed berries to her lips. Kohl to her eyes.

She was still Grace.

But the Grace he’d first found in the forest—the one covered in dirt and sweat, sharp-tongued and golden-eyed—was fading with every layer.

He grieved it even as he adored her.

She sat on the moss and stared at the box. Jewelry. Trinkets. Nothing matched. But she wore it all with the kind of quiet grace no court could teach.

Steve’s wolf heart ached.

He didn’t know how to breathe through it.

And when she finally looked into the water—

When she didn’t recognize her own reflection—

Neither did he.

Not because she wasn’t hers anymore.

But because she was becoming something else.

Something she didn’t want to be.

He took a step forward.

A branch cracked beneath his paw—too loud.

She froze.

Looked up.

Looked straight toward him.

His pulse hammered in his ears.

But a squirrel darted up a tree, saving him. She shook her head and muttered something to herself—nerves, probably.

She wrapped the towel tighter and turned back toward camp.

Back to Matt.

Back to the road.

Back to the palace that would ask her to play a part.

Steve stayed where he was, muscles locked.

He could still taste the storm from two nights ago. Could still hear her voice saying I just don’t know if it’ll be enough.

And now, as she vanished between the trees in her borrowed armor and orphaned linen—

He wasn’t sure it would be either.

But he would be there.

He would see her through it.

Even if she never knew he had followed her through every mile of this road.

Even if she never knew that the wild had already claimed her.

The road had begun to widen by the time he stepped out of the corridor and onto the high stone terrace, tucked just above the outer gate.

From this vantage, he could see everything: the split in the trees, the curve of the road, the gilded iron gates with their ancient sigils still faintly pulsing in the morning light.

The crowd had already begun to gather beyond the second wall. Nobles. Advisors. Curious onlookers. All of them waiting for the procession of the Chosen.

But Steve wasn’t watching the road for them.

He didn’t need fanfare.

He felt her long before she appeared.

The bond thrummed like a struck chord.

And then—

She crested the final rise.

Ink-blue linen.

Braided hair.

Chin lifted like she belonged here—and couldn’t quite believe it.

Steve went still.

She didn’t see him. Not tucked into shadow, not above the gate.

But he saw her.

And gods help him, he wanted to run to her.

To open the gates himself. To walk down the stairs and help her down from that horse and tell her she didn’t need to prove a damn thing to anyone.

But he didn’t move.

He stayed where he was.

Watched as Matt dismounted beside her, saw the moment they leaned close—foreheads pressed, hands trembling between them.

Steve’s jaw tightened.

Not out of jealousy.

But because this was her goodbye.

The end of the road that had held her steady. The last touch of something safe.

She blinked hard and nodded. Twice. Let him lift her onto her horse like a child preparing for war.

And then she turned toward the gates.

Alone.

Steve’s hands curled at his sides as the guards shifted.

He saw the moment they stiffened—the subtle lowering of the halberd. The narrowed eyes. The arrogant slant of a smirk.

She was too small.

Too quiet.

Too new.

They thought she didn’t belong.

Steve took one step forward.

He didn’t need to call down. Didn’t need to speak.

Because she already had it handled.

Grace pulled the letters from her satchel with calm, deliberate hands. Held them steady despite the cold, despite the weight.

Credentials.

Authority.

Proof.

The guards read them—slowly, reluctantly.

But they moved.

The halberd lifted.

And she walked through like a storm in silk.

Unshaken. Unapologetic.

He exhaled only when she passed under the archway.

Just before the shadow swallowed her, she turned.

She didn’t look at the guards.

She didn’t look at the crowd.

She looked back.

Across the distance.

Steve’s breath caught.

She wasn’t looking at him—not really. She was looking toward Matt, toward the forest, toward everything she had just left behind.

But for one aching moment, her eyes passed over the stone terrace where he stood, hidden in the carved shadows of the high corridor.

And something in the bond pulled.

Not recognition. Not yet.

But something ancient.

Something real.

Then she was gone.

The gates closed behind her with a slow, echoing thud.

The sound traveled down his spine like a final note of a song that wasn’t his.

Steve let out a breath.

Straightened his shoulders.

And turned toward the Hall.

Because she was inside now.

And the Choosing had begun.

Chapter Text

The palace was colder than she expected.

Not in temperature—but in welcome.

No one greeted her.

No stewards with scrolls. No pages offering guidance. No hushed voices murmuring Ah, one of the Chosen. Just guards who barely looked twice and a few staff who nodded absently before moving on.

She might as well have been invisible.

Grace adjusted her pack over one shoulder, keeping her spine straight as she stepped deeper into the wide entry corridor. The stone beneath her boots was smooth with centuries of footsteps—chill against her soles, echoing each step like a judgment. Columns lined the walls like sentries. Grand. Impersonal. The air smelled faintly of oil and old ash.

In her finest dress—blue linen, carefully mended—she looked more like a servant than a suitor.

The other women were easy to spot.

They swept through the courtyard like painted queens—draped in silks and scented powders, trailing maids and trunks and airs of entitlement. Grace counted no less than three carriages being unloaded for one girl. Another had lace on her horse blanket.

No one looked her way.

And that suited her just fine.

Mostly.

She needed to find the stables. And figure out where she was supposed to sleep. And preferably not get trampled by whichever duchess decided she owned the flagstones.

Dawn huffed beside her, tossing her head, and Grace reached to calm her with one hand.

“I know,” she murmured. “We’ll find it. Just give me a second to—”

She turned the corner—too fast, too distracted—and slammed into someone.

Tall. Solid. Warm.

Her breath caught as her fingers curled instinctively in the rough weave of a cloak not meant for ceremony but for storms.

She stumbled back, startled, eyes flying up—

And the world stopped.

Him.

The quiet traveler from the road. The one who rode beside her for half a morning and said almost nothing. The one who felt too still. Too aware. The one who vanished with barely a word.

He was broader than she remembered. Closer. His jaw was rough with stubble. His hair tousled by wind, not ceremony. And his eyes—

Deep, storm blue.

She stared, caught.

And in that breath, he blinked—slowly—and his gaze swept across her face like a tide. The scent of river and fire still clung to her skin. Something in him stirred.

And for the first time, he noticed her eyes.

Grey. Not pale. Not weak. Silvered, storm-soaked grey. Like clouds right before lightning strikes.

The bond didn’t snap into place. Not yet.

But it thrummed.

Low and deep, under thought, under bone. A pulse neither of them named.

Neither moved.

She didn’t speak.

He didn’t breathe.

And then—

A cough.

Low. Meaningful. Exasperated.

Steve didn’t look away, but his mouth twitched—barely.

“Grace,” he said, voice low and even. “You made it.”

Her brows pulled in slightly. “You remember my name?”

“Hard to forget.”

Behind him, a man stepped into view—dark hair, sharper eyes, mouth already curled in amusement.

“If you two are done having a moment,” Bucky muttered, “maybe we can tell her where the hell she’s supposed to go.”

Grace blinked, finally pulling back a fraction.

“Wait… who—” she looked between them. “Who are you?”

Steve smiled, just enough to make something warm crawl up her spine.

“I’m someone who’s very glad you’re here.”

He shifted first, one hand reaching gently for Dawn’s reins.

“I’ll take her to the stables,” he said. “She’ll be well looked after. They’re just around the corner—she won’t be far.”

His voice was steady. Reassuring.

Grace hesitated, one hand still resting on the mare’s flank.

“Are… are you sure?”

He nodded, gaze flicking briefly to her fingers before meeting her eyes again.

“I promise. She’ll be brushed, fed, watered. A stall of her own.”

There was something about the way he said it that made her believe him.

Slowly, she stepped back.

Behind her, the other man—Bucky—lifted her satchel from her shoulder like it weighed nothing. Then her second bag. Then the third.

All at once.

Grace blinked at him.

“I could’ve—”

“I know,” he said, not unkindly. “But I’ve got it.”

He started walking, not waiting for her to argue.

She looked from him to the quiet stranger now leading her horse away, and thought—not for the first time—

…maybe it really is that easy for people like them.

⸻

Bucky led her through the main corridor, his steps easy despite the weight slung over his back.

“Name’s Bucky, by the way,” he said as they walked. “I’m… around. If you need anything.”

Grace glanced at him. “That’s vague.”

He grinned. “Intentionally.”

He nodded toward an arched doorway. “Dining’s through there. Formal meals only. Otherwise, you’ll find the kitchens open late.”

Another hall. “Training grounds out that way—open to everyone, even the Chosen. Especially the ones who want to survive court.”

She half-smiled at that.

They passed a series of drawing rooms, open courtyards, and stone staircases wound like ribbon. And every hallway—every single one—was full of women. Draped in brocade, feathered hairpins, painted lips. Laughing too loudly. Watching everything.

They preened like peacocks Prepared to perform on a moments notice,

Grace glanced down at her own dress—blue linen, damp at the hem, creased from the ride. Not barely jewel especially nothing like the gaudy jewels they wore.

Bucky caught the look.

“Don’t worry,” he said lightly. “There are other options waiting in your room. You can wear whatever makes you feel comfortable.”

Her throat tightened a little, but she didn’t answer. But in her head she thought that she was comfortable before she got here.

They turned into a smaller hall—quieter, older, lined with tapestries instead of mirrors.

“Most of the Chosen are staying near the main court,” Bucky said, pausing in front of a carved door. “But Ste—” he caught himself, cleared his throat lightly— “the court thought you might like a little more peace.”

Grace blinked. “So I’m not being… exiled?”

He snorted. “Not unless you consider quiet halls and thicker walls a curse. You’re not the only one down here—just the newest. Everyone on this floor earned a bit of breathing room.”

Something in his tone—wry, but kind—eased the tight coil in her chest. He wasn’t mocking her. He meant it.

He opened the door and stepped aside.

“This is yours.”

The door swung open with a soft creak.

Grace stepped inside.

And stopped.

It wasn’t lavish in the gaudy, gilded way she’d expected.
It was… intentional.

The fire had already been lit, casting warm light across polished floors and deep green tapestries embroidered with silver thread. A velvet-upholstered chair stood beside the hearth, and thick rugs cushioned every step. The walls were stone, yes—but softened with rich textures, carved wood accents, and a quiet stillness that made the space feel settled.

Safe.

The bed was enormous—larger than any she’d ever seen—piled high with furs and fine linens. Not just a guest’s bed. A sovereign’s.

A writing desk, stocked with ink and parchment, faced a window that overlooked the east gardens. Books lined a low shelf nearby—bound in leather and cloth, their spines worn by use, not show.

Against the far wall stood a wardrobe carved with winding symbols she didn’t recognize—ancient and watchful.

This wasn’t a spare room.
It wasn’t even just a Chosen’s room.

This was a room meant for a royalty.

Bucky stepped in behind her and gestured to a second door, half-hidden behind a velvet curtain.

“Bath’s through there. Hot water’s already drawn.”

She turned to him, eyes wide, voice quiet.

“Why is this room empty?”

Bucky smiled, setting her bags down with careful ease.

“It’s obviously not.”

He nodded toward the rope near the bed.

“If you need anything, pull that. Someone will come.”

He paused at the door, glancing over his shoulder before stepping into the hall.

“Dinner’s at seven. That’s when the ceremony starts.”

Her breath caught. “Already?”

“Yep. Moves fast,” he said, and then his voice softened just slightly. “I’ll send someone to help you get ready in a couple hours.”

And then— He looked at her. Really looked.

Like he saw something in her she didn’t know existed.

“Try to relax. Soak in the tub, read a book, take a nap. This is all going to be okay. Grace. I promise.”

And then he was gone.

Grace stood there for a long moment, holding the cup between both hands.

The tea was warm.

The room smelled of fire… and something else.

Leather. Pine. The faintest trace of something warm and clean—like sun-warmed linen and woodsmoke after rain. Familiar, though she couldn’t place it. Not exactly.

It smelled like comfort.

Like the feeling she’d had, just for a second, when she hit the traveler in the hall and the world tilted on its axis.

She didn’t understand it. But she didn’t question it either.

She sank into the chair by the hearth, exhaling slowly as her shoulders finally uncoiled.

And for the first time in days…
She let herself sit.
She let herself breathe.

She was warm.
She was alone.
And somehow—she wasn’t afraid.

Evidently, Grace moved slowly through the room, her fingers grazing every surface like they might vanish if she blinked too hard. The velvet of the chair. The smooth grain of the carved desk. The fur throw still warm from the fire’s reach.

The scent of the room clung to her skin—woodsmoke, clean linen, and something richer beneath it. Leather, maybe. Or the memory of sunlit forests after rain. She didn’t know why it felt familiar.

But it did.

The fire crackled behind her. The heavy door stayed closed. The quiet stretched.

She wasn’t used to silence feeling like a gift.

To the right of the bed—half-tucked behind a tapestry—she found another door. She pushed it open carefully and froze.

A sitting room.

Not a shared space. Not a hall with benches and strangers.

A real sitting room—just hers.

A velvet sofa curved toward the hearth. A tray of fruit and warm bread rested on a low table. There was a writing desk, another set of books, and by the window, a cushioned alcove wide enough to curl up in, draped with soft blankets and facing the garden.

It wasn’t what she’d expected.

She’d imagined a cot and stone walls. A basin and a curtain. Maybe a bench if she was lucky.

But this?

This was the kind of room someone would live in.
Not pass through.
Not borrow.
Live.

⸻

She crossed back to the other side of the main room and opened the bathroom door.

It was like something out of a dream.

Stone floors, warm beneath her bare feet. Shelves lined with folded towels and vials of amber oils. And the tub—gods, the tub.

Carved from smooth slate, deep enough to disappear into. Steam drifted in slow curls, catching the light.

But what made her stop—what made her step closer with a hand half-raised to her lips—was the thin copper lever tucked just beside it.

She reached for it, tentative.

Turned.

And gasped.

Water poured out—hot. Steady. Controlled.

Not a cistern. Not a carried bucket. Not boiled in a pot and cooled on stone.

Running water. In a room. On command.

She laughed—once, breathless and astonished—and leaned down to test the heat.

Perfect.

⸻

By the time she returned to the main room, her hair was damp and loose, her skin flushed from warmth and lavender oil. She wore one of the soft linen gowns folded neatly in the wardrobe, and carried her old clothes in a tidy bundle like they might shatter if she dropped them.

She crossed the room slowly—then all at once darted to the velvet chair and dropped her things onto the cushion with a muffled squeak of excitement.

Then: she spun. A full circle. A wild, stunned twirl like a child in a market square.

And then she caught herself—froze mid-step.

Because it was too nice.

The fire. The bed. The steam-soft air. The scent of lavender and cedar and something unplaceably warm.

It was too much.
Too quiet.
Too perfect.
Too good.

Her stomach flipped. Her chest tightened with it.

But the room didn’t vanish. The floor didn’t fall away.

No one burst in to tell her there’d been a mistake.

So—very slowly—she moved toward the bed and sat on the edge.

Then eased herself down.

Then finally, with a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding, she let go.

The mattress caught her like a sigh. The pillows welcomed her weight. The blanket curled around her like it knew her shape.

She closed her eyes.

And for the first time since leaving the Hollow—

She felt safe.
Held.

Even if she didn’t know by whom.
Even if she wasn’t ready to believe what the voice in her chest was whispering.

Not yet.
____

The sun dipped low beyond the palace walls, casting long golden streaks across the stone floor where Steve stood—arms folded, unmoving—staring out the narrow tower window.

He hadn’t moved in nearly an hour.

Below, the courtyards bustled with motion and pageantry. Carriages jostled. Staff scurried. Nobles fluttered through the palace grounds in silks and satin, loud and lacquered like overfed birds.

The Choosing was already in motion—even if the formal ceremony was still hours away.

But none of it mattered.

Not compared to her.

He could still feel the bond—low and steady, humming just beneath his ribs.
Not a flare. Not a pull.
Just presence.

Warm. Real. Close.

“You’re going to break the railing if you keep gripping it like that,” Bucky said behind him, dry.

Steve didn’t turn. “She made it inside?”

“I walked her to the door myself,” Bucky replied. “Room’s perfect. Bath was hot. She hasn’t bolted.”

Steve’s shoulders loosened a fraction.

“And Natasha will go to her in a few hours. Help her dress. Answer questions. Keep the other vultures away.”

Now Steve turned—slowly.

“You trust her with Nat?”

Bucky’s mouth tugged into a half-smirk. “You know I’d trust her with the world.
Much less your queen.”

He let the words hang in the air for a beat.

“She’ll be protected, Steve. Taken care of. She has support. And so do you, Stevie.”

Steve exhaled, rough and quiet, and ran a hand over his jaw.

“She doesn’t even know who I am.”

“She’ll figure it out,” Bucky said, stepping closer.

“And when she does…”
He shrugged, like it was the simplest truth in the world.
“She’ll choose you anyway.”