Irina’s POV

I let go of her wrist.

Just—dropped it. Like she’d burned me.

For a second I didn’t do anything. Didn’t breathe. Didn’t move. Just stood there in the middle of that overgrown garden with the roses behind me and the sound of that bird still going somewhere in the bushes, completely indifferent to the fact that my entire chest had just caved in.

"What did you say?"

My voice came out wrong. Too small. Too thin.

Katerina—the woman who used to be Katerina, who had shorter hair and different eyes and a coat that hid whatever she was hiding—looked at me steadily.

"You heard me."

"No." I shook my head. "No, say it again. Say it again because I don’t think I—"

"Father is coming." She said it carefully. Like she was speaking to someone very young. Someone who needed simple words. "He’s already been in contact. He filed a formal request. It was approved." She pressed her lips together. "They’re coming here."

My legs didn’t feel real.

"They can’t." The words came out before I thought about them. "They can’t just—he’s the alpha king. Nobody comes into his palace without—"

"It’s already been arranged."

I stared at her.

"The formal visit," she said. "Maxim has to present himself as the new alpha of Iron Thorn. Father goes as his beta. Pack protocol." Something moved behind her eyes. Something she wasn’t letting into her voice. "It’s standard procedure."

Standard procedure.

I laughed.

It came out short and sharp and completely wrong. Not funny. Nothing about this was funny. But the sound left my mouth anyway and Katerina’s expression flickered and I pressed the back of my hand against my mouth to stop whatever else was trying to come up.

Maxim.

*Maxim* was coming here.

"He’s going to—" I couldn’t finish the sentence. Tried again. "He’s going to walk into this palace and—what? What happens then? What’s the plan, Katerina? Did you think about that? Did any of you think about what happens when Maxim walks in here and—"

"Stop." Her voice went sharp. "Stop. You’re spiraling."

"I’m *spiraling?*" The word came out loud. Too loud. She flinched slightly and I lowered my voice with effort that cost me something. "You just told me the man who spent a year making my life hell is going to be standing in this building in what, days? Weeks? And you’re telling me to stop spiraling?"

"I’m telling you to think."

"I *am* thinking." My hands were shaking. I pressed them against my thighs. "I’m thinking that you reached out to Father. You actually—you contacted him. You told him where I was."

She didn’t deny it.

Something cold moved through my chest.

"Why?" The word came out cracked in the middle. "Why would you do that? After everything. After all of it. Why would you—"

"Because you don’t belong here." Her voice came back hard. Certain. Like she’d rehearsed this. Like she’d had this argument with herself a hundred times and knew exactly where she stood. "Look at this place. Look at *him.* You were dragged here against your will and marked in public and you’ve been trying to survive ever since. That’s not a life, Irina. That’s just a different cage."

"You don’t know him."

"I know enough."

"You don’t." The words came out fierce in a way I didn’t plan. "You’ve been hiding in a gray coat and a different name for over a year. You don’t know anything about what’s happened in the last three weeks."

She looked at me.

That careful, controlled look.

"Did he ask you?" she said quietly. "Before he marked you. Did he sit down and explain what was going to happen and ask if you were okay with it?"

I didn’t answer.

"Did he ask you before any of it?" She took a step forward. "Or did he just—take? Because that’s what alphas do. That’s what they’ve always done. They take and they call it protection and they expect you to be grateful."

My throat felt tight.

"He’s different," I said. And then hated myself for saying it, because that was the most embarrassing thing I’d ever said out loud, the most predictable thing, the thing I’d promised myself I would never be stupid enough to think.

But it was out there now.

Katerina’s expression did something complicated.

My stomach turned over.

"That doesn’t matter right now," I said. "What matters is that Maxim is coming here. With Father. And you reached out to them and invited this and now I have to—" I stopped. My head felt like it was full of static. "What am I supposed to do? What am I supposed to do when they show up?"

"You go home."

The words landed like something dropped from a height.

"Home." I repeated it back. "You want me to go back to Iron Thorn."

"I want you to be somewhere safe. Away from—"

"That’s not safe." My voice cracked on it and I didn’t care. "Do you understand that? Do you actually understand what that pack house was like after you left? After you disappeared and Maxim needed somewhere to put everything he was feeling and I was the only one left standing there?"

Katerina went still.

"A year," I said. "I’ve told you. A year. And not once—not a single time—did Father step in. Not once did he look at what was happening and decide I was worth more than keeping his head down." My hands were shaking again. I could feel it all the way up my arms. "You want me to go back to that. You reached out and arranged it and you’re standing here telling me it’s safe."

She looked at the ground.

For the first time, the controlled surface cracked a little.

Just a little.

"It’ll be different," she said. "Maxim’s alpha now. He has responsibilities. He can’t just—"

"He absolutely can."

"—with an alpha king’s claimed mate, he wouldn’t dare—"

"*Claimed.*" I latched onto the word. "You just used that word. His claimed mate. So you know. You know what I am to Nicolas now. And you’re still saying I should go."

Her jaw tightened.

"Because that claim doesn’t mean what you think it means," she said. "It doesn’t make you safe. It makes you a political asset. It makes you a piece on a board. You’re the alpha king’s mate and that is a target on your back, not a shield in front of you." She looked up. Her eyes were fierce. "Every enemy he has is going to want to use you. Every family that hates him is going to see you as leverage. And when something goes wrong—when some situation comes up where letting you go is easier than keeping you—what do you think happens?"

I didn’t answer.

"He’ll let you go," she said. Flat. Certain. "Because you’re convenient right now, and when you stop being convenient, you’re gone. That’s how this works. I’ve watched it for three years. That’s how it always works."

"He’s different." I said it again. Hated myself again. Meant it again.

Katerina’s expression collapsed into something that looked almost like pity.

I hated that more.

"He’s not," she said. Soft. Careful. Like breaking something small and trying not to make a mess. "I know you want him to be. I know what it feels like when you’re in it—I know how the mate bond makes everything feel certain, makes everything feel like *yes, this one, this is different.* But he’s not different. He’s just more powerful." She reached out. Her hand hovered near my arm and then settled there, light, like she wasn’t sure if she was allowed. "Come home. Let Father take you out of here. Start over somewhere. Somewhere quiet. Somewhere *yours.*"

My throat closed.

All the things I’d wanted to say to her. All the things I’d kept swallowed down for a year, for longer than a year, words I’d rehearsed in the dark when there was nothing else to do but rehearse.

I didn’t say any of them.

I looked at her hand on my arm.

"He already agreed," I said. My voice came out flat. Empty. "Nicolas. He already approved the visit."

"Yes."

"He knew." Something moved through my chest. Cold and slow. "He knew they were coming and he didn’t tell me."

Katerina didn’t say anything.

"He knew Maxim was coming. He knew Father was coming." I was working it out as I said it. Like pushing through fog. "He had to know what that meant. What it would mean for me to have to—" I pressed my mouth closed. Swallowed. "He knew and he didn’t say a word."

"He approved it," Katerina said quietly. "That’s what I’m telling you. He could have refused. He’s the alpha king. He could have said no, told Father to stay in his territory, kept the whole thing from ever reaching you." She held my gaze. "He didn’t."

The bird had gone quiet.

The garden was very, very still.

I thought about breakfast. His voice, easy and certain: *I’m going to take their heads and hang them from the city walls.*

I thought about the dark. His arm around my waist. His breath at the back of my neck.

I thought about this morning. The warm spot in the sheets where he’d been.

I thought about the vial in my pocket.

"You need to understand something," Katerina said. Her voice had gone low. Urgent in a way she usually kept buried. "You’ve been here three weeks. You’ve been trying to read him. Trying to figure out if he’s safe. Trying to find the version of this that makes sense." She squeezed my arm, barely. "But he already made a decision about you. Without asking. Without telling you. He let them come."

I stared at the ground.

Didn’t say anything.

Couldn’t.

"He’s not going to fight for you," she said. Soft. Careful. Like she knew how much it was going to cost me to hear it. Like she was sorry about that, at least. "He’s the alpha king. He has forty-two families to manage and a war on the eastern border and a thousand political calculations that matter more than one omega who ended up in his palace by accident." Her voice dropped to barely a sound. "He’s going to let them take you, Irina."

The roses moved. Just slightly. A breeze I hadn’t felt until now.

"He’s already decided," she said.

And then, the final thing. The quiet, certain, devastating thing.

"The alpha king won’t protect you."