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CALLUM

A dora moves like she’s been training for years. And that’s the damn problem.

She stands in the center of the clearing where I first trained Kendall—shoulders squared, gaze locked, tension humming through her like a blade pulled halfway from the sheath.

I circle her slow, watching every twitch of muscle. Every time she reacts to the shift in my breath or the subtle scrape of my boot in the dirt.

She’s not just fast.

She’s anticipating .

“Again,” I say, low and sharp.

She lunges.

I dodge, barely. Not because I can’t keep up—but because I’m not here to win. I’m here to learn .

She should be stumbling through this. Hesitating. Hell, even Kendall, for all her power, had to fight for control in those early days.

But Adora?

Adora’s body already knows how to fight. And that’s what scares the shit out of me.

We break apart. She rolls her shoulder and grins like it’s a game she’s already winning.

“Was that a smile?” I ask. “Did I actually see teeth?”

“Don’t get used to it,” she says. “You’re still slow.”

I raise a brow. “Careful. I bite.”

“Yeah,” she mutters. “So I’ve heard.”

She’s testing me. Poking at a version of the past she thinks she remembers. But I’m not playing that game. Not today.

I nod toward the walls. “Cool off. Take ten.”

She doesn’t argue. Just stalks off, stretching her neck, fingers still twitching like lightning wants out of her veins.

And I just watch.

She’s too coordinated. Too instinctive. Her senses are tuned to frequencies most new shifts can’t hear for months, if ever .

And the worst part?

She’s not even struggling.

That’s not just shifter. That’s blood. And I know whose. Because the way she moves—the control, the bite, the timing— I’ve seen it before. In him .

Mathis. My father.

I exhale hard, leaning on the heel of my palm against a scratched wall and staring down at the claw marks scarred into the cement. Not hers. Not mine. Old.

I remember the fight fifteen years ago. Mathis came back to the Hollow like a hurricane—wilder than usual, half-shifted, bleeding, eyes blazing. Muttering about betrayal, about a woman who left without a trace and took what was his .

“She ran. Took the girl with her,” he’d growled to one of the elders. “I should’ve marked them both.”

I hadn’t understood then.

But now?

Now it fucking clicks.

He wasn’t ranting about a mate he lost. He was talking about Adora’s mother . And Adora. She’s his.

I feel it in my gut, in the way my wolf stirs like it’s recognizing a sibling. Not fated— kin . Blood of the same line. And that means Adora’s not just some random trigger. She’s shifter royalty . And no one knows, except maybe Mathis. And he’s been hiding it.

I clench my jaw. The session ends shortly after, and Adora vanishes with a quick nod and a promise to be back tomorrow.

No hugs. No trust. Just grit. Which means now’s the time.

I don’t knock when I walk into the Hollow’s war room.

The door creaks, dust trembling in its frame, and Mathis is already pacing—his gait precise, like each step is weighted in ritual. He always paces when he’s pissed or thinking. Or both. Tonight? Definitely both.

The shadows catch hard on the edges of him. Tall , broad-shouldered, that wolf-cut profile like it was carved from flint , every feature sharp enough to wound. His hazel eyes , same as mine, glint with that ever-present gleam of restrained dominance. That shifter stillness that says I’ve survived things you can’t even spell.

But there’s something else tonight. A crack in the armor. I catch it in the slope of his shoulders, the tightness in his jaw.

He turns toward me, voice already bristling. “What?”

“I need to talk.”

He doesn’t stop pacing. “Make it quick.”

I don’t.

Instead, I shut the door behind me and plant myself square in his path. I stand tall—not like a son, but like a threat. Equal footing. Something I never tried until now.

“I trained a new shifter today.”

Mathis raises a brow. “Okay?”

“She’s strong,” I say. “Sharp. Feral control needs work, but her instincts? Damn near perfect.”

“Then good. We need more like her.”

I wait. I watch him. And then, just loud enough to break the floor beneath us: “She’s yours.”

Mathis freezes mid-stride.

His body doesn’t sway. Doesn’t tremble. Just stops. Like a statue. Like he’s holding himself in place with sheer force of will.

“You’re wrong,” he says, but it’s too smooth. Too fast.

“Don’t lie to me.”

“I said you’re wrong.”

“I felt it,” I snap, stepping closer. “The way she reads movement. The way she breaks patterns. Her pulse syncs with mine like pack. That’s not just training. That’s blood.”

He doesn’t move, but something in his throat works once, hard. A flicker of emotion. Barely.

“She’s got your eyes,” I say quieter. “Same storm behind the hazel. Same way she doesn’t blink when most people flinch.”

Still, he says nothing.

“Her name’s Adora,” I add. “Did you know that?”

Silence.

Mathis exhales like the breath costs him something. He turns his head, just a little, so I can’t read his face fully.

“She was never supposed to end up here.”

“But she did.”

“She was hidden for a reason.”

“Because you couldn’t keep it in your pants?” I bite out.

His jaw clenches so tight I hear the crack of his teeth. “Because if they knew what she was, she’d never be safe. Not from the wolves. Not from PEACE. Not from me. ”

That lands heavy. And worse, honest.

I push, quieter now. “Does she know?”

Mathis finally turns to face me again. And gods, he looks older than I’ve ever seen him. Not in the lines around his mouth, or the few silver strands in his dark hair. But in his regret . It hangs off him like a soaked cloak.

“No,” he says. “Her mother swore never to tell. She made it clear I was to have nothing to do with her. She came here once—when she was still pregnant. Stood right in that doorway and told me to stay out of her life.”

I blink. “She what ?”

“She said I would not ruin her marriage. That she would raise the child as Edmund’s. And if I said a word, she’d see to it that I never saw either of them again.”

I stagger a step back, stunned. Not because it’s hard to believe—I heard the mother’s always been a mystery—but because of the way he says it . Like he’s never said it aloud before. Like the words still cut on their way out.

“She robbed me of her,” he says, low now. “Of my daughter.”

I stare at him. This man who raised me with iron discipline, who rarely flinched in battle, looks like he’s standing in the ruins of something he thought he buried decades ago.

Mathis Wulfson is steel. Fire-forged. Hardened by law, war, and power.

But right now?

He’s just a father who lost something.

“Did you ever try?” I ask, softer now. “After that?”

His throat works again. “I wanted to. But what good would it have done? She was safer without my name. Without me. ”

“But now she’s here. Awake. Changed.”

He nods, eyes rimmed in shadow. “And already spiraling.”

“Then don’t you think she deserves to know why?”

Silence.

Again.

And it says everything.

I clench my fists. “You keep telling me to think bigger. To see beyond myself. But you—you left her in the dark. You let her suffer.”

He steps forward suddenly, shoulders squared. “I left her alive. That was the deal. It wasn’t perfect, but it kept her safe. ”

“No,” I snap. “It kept you safe. From the responsibility. From having a daughter who was born from chaos.”

His nostrils flare. “You think I haven’t paid for that choice every day since? You think I didn’t watch the news for a name, for a sign, for a hint that she was alive and thriving?”

He exhales hard, looking away again. His voice drops. “Now she’s here. And I don’t even know if I should tell her or protect her from the truth.”

I pause. Let it sit.

“You don’t get to have both.”

I walk out before the silence swallows me whole.

And behind me, I swear I hear him whisper, almost too quiet to catch?—

“Neither did she.”

I walk out before I say something I can’t take back.

Because I believe him. And I don’t .

Adora’s a fuse already lit. And if anyone finds out what she really is—who she really comes from, or even if she finds out what’s been held from her?

She won’t be the only one that burns.