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Chapter Sixteen

G riffin Wild

The morning sun filters through the palace windows, casting long shadows across the marble floors.

I stand at the glass door of the laboratory, watching them work together—Maya and Mathew, her purple-haired assistant from Seattle.

They move in perfect synchrony, anticipating each other’s needs without speaking.

When she holds out her hand, he places a pipette in it.

When he frowns at a sample, she adjusts the microscope settings without being asked.

Two weeks she’s been here, and I’ve never seen her smile—except with him.

It’s a small thing, barely a curve of her lips, but it’s there when he makes some ridiculous joke or pretends to swoon dramatically over a particularly promising test result. Her laughter, rare and precious, floats across the lab, and each time I hear it, something twists painfully in my chest.

“You’re staring again,” Erik says quietly, appearing at my side.

I don’t look away from the scene before me. “I’m observing the progress of our kingdom’s most important scientific endeavor.”

Erik snorts. “You’re observing Maya like a starving man watches a feast.”

“She’s my mate,” I say simply, as if that explains everything. And it does, to me at least.

“A mate who doesn’t want you within ten feet of her,” Erik points out. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed how you circle the lab like a ghost, never entering when she’s there.”

I finally tear my gaze away from Maya to look at my brother. “She needs space.”

“She needs help,” Erik counters, his voice dropping lower. “Have you seen how much weight she’s lost since she arrived? Jerry says she barely eats. The staff report she hasn’t touched her breakfast in days.”

A muscle in my jaw tightens. I’ve noticed.

Of course I’ve noticed. The hollows under her cheekbones grow more pronounced by the day.

The blue of her veins stands out starkly against her pale skin.

But I’ve also seen how she flinches whenever I approach, how her heartbeat accelerates with stress rather than desire.

“I can’t force her to eat,” I say, though the wolf in me howls at the thought of my mate going hungry.

“Maybe not,” Erik concedes. “But you could try. It can’t be worse than watching her fade away in front of us.”

Inside the lab, Mathew leans close to Maya, his hand lingering on her shoulder as he points to something on a computer screen. Her head tilts toward his, their faces mere inches apart. The easy intimacy between them makes my blood boil.

“He’s in love with her,” I growl, unable to keep the possessiveness from my voice.

Erik follows my gaze. “Of course he is. She’s brilliant, beautiful, and broken in ways that make certain men want to fix her.”

“She’s not a project.”

“No, she’s your mate.” Erik sighs. “But she doesn’t remember that, does she? All she remembers is that you pushed her away.”

Before I can respond, Maya looks up, her eyes meeting mine through the glass. For a heartbeat, something flares between us—the connection that never truly died. Then her expression closes off, and she deliberately turns her back to me.

Message received.

“I have work to do,” I mutter, needing an excuse to leave before I do something foolish like break down the laboratory door.

“Griffin...” Erik’s voice stops me. “A word of advice from someone who’s been watching this disaster unfold: don’t wait too long. She’s slipping away, and I don’t just mean from you.”

His words follow me down the corridor, echoing in my mind with each step.

The next morning, I rise before dawn, restless after another night of fitful sleep.

The palace is quiet as I make my way to the kitchens, nodding to the few servants already at work.

I gather ingredients without really thinking, falling into the familiar rhythm of cooking that has always centered me.

Eggs whisked with cream and herbs. Bread sliced and toasted golden brown. Fresh berries arranged carefully on a plate. It’s a simple breakfast, but substantial—the kind that nourishes rather than merely satisfies.

A young kitchen girl watches me with wide eyes, clearly shocked to see her king preparing food himself. I give her a small smile, and she curtsies nervously before scurrying away.

When everything is ready, I place it all on a tray and make my way through the palace and the gardens. I know exactly where to find her. It’s where she goes every morning instead of eating breakfast.

The remains of her mother’s cottage stand in stark silhouette against the morning sky, blackened timbers reaching up like skeletal fingers.

Maya sits on a stone bench nearby, her slender form huddled in a thick sweater despite the mild morning air.

She stares at the ruins, her face expressionless, lost in memories I can’t access.

I approach slowly, careful not to startle her. “Good morning.”

She doesn’t look up. “Go away.”

“I brought breakfast.” I set the tray on the bench beside her, keeping a respectful distance.

“I’m not hungry.”

“You need to eat, Maya.”

Her eyes finally meet mine, and they are dull with exhaustion. “What I need is for you to leave me alone.”

I study her face, noting the changes that worry me more each day. Her scent has changed subtly, a sour note threading through her natural lavender fragrance.

“I can’t do that,” I say quietly.

“Why not?” Her voice lacks its usual fire. “It’s what you’re good at, isn’t it? Leaving me alone?”

The barb strikes true, but I don’t flinch. “I deserve that.”

“You deserve a lot worse.” She turns her attention back to the cottage ruins. “But I don’t have the energy to give it to you.”

I sit down on the bench, careful to leave the tray between us as a buffer. “Can I ask you something?”

“Will you go away if I say no?”

“Probably not.”

A ghost of something—not quite a smile, but close—flickers across her face. “Ask your question, then.”

“Why haven’t you confronted me about the night of the ceremony? About what you heard me say to Erik?”

She’s silent for so long I wonder if she’ll answer at all. When she finally speaks, her voice is flat, devoid of emotion. “There’s nothing to ask. You made yourself clear.”

“Did I?”

“You wanted to humiliate me, and you did.” She shrugs, a small, defeated gesture. “But then, my mother’s death upstaged whatever hurt you wanted to cause me.”

The accusation knocks the breath from my lungs. “Is that how you see me? As someone who would deliberately hurt you? Who would want to humiliate you?”

“I don’t know what to think of you anymore, Griffin.” She looks at me now, truly looks at me for the first time since she got here. “I’m just tired of being forced to live.”

The words are torn from her, raw and honest in a way that pierces straight through all my carefully constructed walls. Now I can see it: the precipice she’s standing on, the yawning darkness beckoning her closer with each passing day.

I’m losing her. Not just as my mate, but entirely. She’s fading before my eyes, slipping away into shadows I can’t pull her back from.

“Let me ask you something else,” I say carefully. “If you loved someone but found out that staying with them would kill them, what would you do?”

Wariness replaces the emptiness in her gaze. “I’d leave.”

“And if you discovered that being mated to me would kill me, what then?”

She stiffens. “I wouldn’t be mated to you.”

“That was my answer, too.” The admission costs me more than she knows. “The prophecy the witch told us in the woods—it wasn’t just meaningless words. She said you would die if we completed our bond. That I would be the cause of your death.”

Maya stares at me, shock written clearly across her face. “What?”

“I pushed you away to save your life,” I continue, the words spilling out after being held back for so long. “I couldn’t mark you as my mate knowing it might kill you. So, I made a choice—your life over our bond.”

She shakes her head slowly, processing this new information. “If that were the case, you could have talked to me. But you didn’t.”

“No, I didn’t,” I admit. “I thought I was protecting you.”

“You clearly didn’t see me as an equal,” she says, hurt and anger finally breaking through her apathy. “Someone worthy of making her own choices.”

“I was wrong,” I acknowledge. “I thought I was saving you, but I lost you anyway.”

She looks away, back to the ruins of the place she once called home. “You should have told me.”

“I know that now.”

A silence stretches between us, less tense than before but still fragile.

“Maya,” I begin, but she shakes her head.

“Don’t,” she says quietly. “I don’t even know what to think about what you just said. Just go. Please.”

There is no hint of rudeness in her tone.

I’ve given her something to think about, so I decide to leave. As I reach the pathway back to the palace, I pause, my enhanced hearing catching the soft sounds of her eating. It’s something. A small victory in a war I’m terrified of losing.

I make a mental note to speak with Jerry about the change in her scent. Something is wrong beyond the obvious emotional distress, and I won’t lose her to an illness we could have prevented.

The midday sun beats down on the palace training grounds as Erik and I circle each other, wooden practice swords held at the ready.

We’ve been at this for over an hour, sweat soaking through our training clothes, muscles burning pleasantly with exertion.

It’s been too long since we’ve sparred like this—like brothers rather than king and commander.

We may be shifters, but there are certain situations in which shifting isn’t an option. We need to be able to use weapons as well.

Erik lunges forward, his blade whipping toward my ribs. I parry the blow, countering with a strike of my own that he barely manages to block.

“Your mind’s not on the fight,” he observes, stepping back to create distance between us.

“My mind hasn’t been on much of anything lately,” I admit, lowering my sword slightly.