Page 13

THIRTEEN

SOL

A s Sol guided Helena back through the forest, his arm possessively encircling her waist, he savored the lingering scent of their lovemaking. Water droplets still clung to her long red hair, catching the sunlight filtering through the canopy, and her skin seemed to glow with a newfound radiance.

“I should really call Tyanna and the others,” Helena said abruptly, breaking the comfortable silence between them. “They must be worried sick about me. And I need to speak with Victor about the restaurant.”

The name sent a jolt through Sol’s system. His jaw clenched involuntarily, and his wolf stirred, bristling with territorial rage. He’d hoped—foolishly, perhaps—that their connection in the grotto would have pushed thoughts of her human life away, at least temporarily.

“Victor.” The name tasted bitter on his tongue. “You mean the snake who tried to steal you from me?”

Helena stopped walking, her hazel eyes widening. “What? Victor is my new boss. He just bought my restaurant.”

Sol’s nostrils flared. Of course, Victor would insert himself into her life that way—the cunning bastard had been planning this from the start.

“He’s dangerous, Helena. Far more than you realize.” Sol’s voice dropped to a low rumble. “There’s a reason he was exiled from our pack.”

“Wait—Victor is a wolf too?” Helena pressed her fingers to her temples. “This is... this is just too much. I need to call my coworkers. They’re like family to me. I need to know they’re okay, and I need to figure out what’s happening with my job.”

Sol’s wolf reared up inside him, demanding he assert his claim. The very idea of Helena returning to that restaurant—to Victor—sent a red haze across his vision.

“You won’t be returning to work,” he stated, the authority of centuries as alpha resonating in his voice. “Your place is here now, with me, with our pack. You’re the Luna.”

Helena’s jaw dropped, her expression transforming from confusion to indignation. “Excuse me? I never agreed to stay here permanently. I agreed to learn about my powers, not abandon my entire life!”

Sol felt a stab of genuine shock. In his hundreds of years, he’d never imagined his Luna would question her place by his side. It was fate, destiny—the natural order. Yet here she stood, her striking red hair seeming to spark with defiance, challenging him.

He opened his mouth to assert his will, to remind her of what it meant to be Luna, but something stopped him. A flicker of heat shimmered around her fingers—subtle, but unmistakable. Her emotions were stirring her newfound powers. His wolf urged him to dominate, to bend her to his will, but the man in him recognized the danger.

An uncontrolled flare-up here could set the entire forest ablaze.

Sol took a deep breath, reining in his alpha instincts with effort that made his muscles tense. He watched as Helena’s chest rose and fell with quickened breaths. How could he expect her to understand pack law and tradition in just one day when she had spent her entire life as a human, unaware of their world?

The heat emanating from her intensified, and Sol recognized he needed to tread carefully—not just for the forest’s sake, but for the fragile bond forming between them.

Sol gritted his teeth, fighting the impulse to simply throw Helena over his shoulder and carry her back to the castle. But centuries of leadership had taught him that sometimes strength meant restraint.

“Helena.” He kept his voice steady, though a muscle twitched in his jaw. “You don’t understand the danger you’re in. Victor isn’t just some investor who bought your restaurant. He’s a rogue shifter—exiled from our pack years ago for attempting to seize power by force.”

Her eyes narrowed, and he felt a wave of heat pulse from her skin. Through their growing mate bond, Sol sensed her confusion, her fear, and beneath it all, a stubborn determination that both infuriated and impressed him.

“It’s not just Victor,” he continued. “Word will spread about you. A human Luna with fire powers who’s not properly claimed? Every power-hungry creature will come hunting for you. They’ll try to capture you, use you, and drain your power until there’s nothing left.”

“And you think locking me away in your castle is the solution?” Helena crossed her arms, her eyes flashing. “I’ve taken care of myself for thirty years. I don’t need some alpha male swooping in to run my life.”

He inhaled sharply. His wolf bristled at her defiance, but Sol forced himself to remain calm. “This isn’t about controlling you. It’s about protecting what’s mine.”

“What’s yours ?” Her voice rose, and Sol detected the air around them growing warmer. “I am not a possession, Sol. We’ve known each other for a day. One day! Yes, we had sex—amazing sex—but that doesn’t mean I’m ready to abandon my entire life for you.”

Sol stepped closer, his eyes intense as he stared down at her. “Can you honestly tell me you feel nothing? That what happened between us meant nothing to you?”

Through their bond, he felt her heart rate accelerate, felt the surge of desire that belied her words even before she spoke them.

“It was just sex,” she said flatly.

Lie. The bond between them hummed with the deception. Sol’s nostrils flared as he detected both the falsehood and the dangerous spike in her emotional state. The scent of smoke tinged the air, though no flames had appeared yet.

“You’re lying.” He moved closer still, overwhelming her personal space. “I can feel it, Helena. The bond between us doesn’t lie, even when you do.”

Her pulse jumped—he could see it throbbing at the base of her throat, that delicate spot he’d kissed just an hour ago in the grotto. The memory sent heat coursing through his body.

“Fine. Maybe I felt something,” she admitted, her voice dropping to almost a whisper. “But that doesn’t change anything. You can’t just expect me to abandon my human life overnight because we have some mystical connection. My friends, my career—that’s real to me. This—“ she gestured between them, “—is still fantasy.”

Sol reached for her, his fingers grazing her cheek. “Your friends could visit. Your cooking—the pack would be blessed by your skills. Nothing says you must abandon what you love.”

He sensed her wavering, felt the flicker of longing through their bond. But just as quickly, it was replaced by a surge of frustration.

“You don’t get it,” she snapped, stepping back from his touch. “It’s not about what I’d be giving up. It’s about choice. My choice. You just announced that I won’t be returning to work like you have the final say in my decisions.”

The air around Helena shimmered, heat distorting the space between them. Sol felt alarm rising in his chest. Her emotions were feeding her power, bringing her dangerously close to igniting the forest around them.

“Helena,” he commanded, his voice low but firm, “you need to calm down.”

“Don’t tell me to calm down!” she shot back, her hair seeming to float slightly as the heated air rose around her. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about! You think you can just order me around because you’re some alpha wolf prince!”

Sol clenched his fists, fighting his own nature. Every instinct screamed at him to assert control and to dominate this situation. Sol felt his wolf clawing mercilessly inside, desperate to break free. The primal creature had been patient—too patient—and now demanded action. A growl built in his throat, low and dangerous.

“You don’t understand what you’re risking,” he snapped, his voice taking on the commanding resonance that made lesser wolves cower. “Victor will hunt you down the moment you leave these grounds. He won’t be alone. There are others who would capture a Luna for her powers.”

Helena backed away, but Sol closed the distance in a single stride, towering over her.

“You’ll be taken, used, and discarded like trash when they’ve drained every ounce of power from your body. Is that what you want?” His voice rose with each word, centuries of authority pouring into his tone. “All because you’re too stubborn to accept what’s right in front of you?”

His wolf was practically snarling, pushing against the confines of his human form. Sol’s green eyes flashed with an inner glow as he gripped Helena’s shoulders.

“You’re running from me and your feelings because you’re scared. Scared of the connection between us, and scared of how powerful it is.” The accusation came out as a thunderous declaration. “Stop lying to yourself, Helena. Your human life is over. This is who you are now—the Luna of the Sunflare pack. My Luna.”

The moment the words escaped his lips, Sol knew he had made a catastrophic mistake. Shit. The rational part of his brain—the part that had led a pack for centuries—screamed at him to back down and to apologize, but his wolf was too far forward now and too dominant.

He watched Helena’s face transform, her shock giving way to raw fury. The temperature around them spiked dramatically. Her hazel eyes brightened until they glowed like molten gold, and her red hair seemed to float in the superheated air around her face.

“How DARE you?” Helena’s voice trembled with rage. “You don’t tell me who I am or what I feel!”

Sol sensed the imminent danger building—felt it through their bond and saw it in the shimmering air—but arrogance kept him rooted in place. Centuries as alpha had taught him many things, but backing down wasn’t among them.

“I’m just trying to protect you,” he insisted, his voice harsh with frustration and fear for her safety.

“I never asked for your protection!”

Her fury exploded outward in a sudden whoosh of flames that shot directly at him. Sol barely had time to register the blinding orange heat before it engulfed him.

Heat ripped through his body, but beneath it was something more startling—a connection to the flames themselves. They were Helena’s essence, her power, and through their bond, he sensed a path to control them.

Acting on pure instinct, Sol reached out with his mind, connecting to the fire through their mate bond. The flames hesitated, wavering around him as if confused by this new intrusion. Sol felt a strange intimacy as he manipulated Helena’s fire, a connection deeper than physical touch. The flames that should have consumed him instead responded to his will, twisting into an elegant vortex. His wolf prowled with satisfaction inside him—this was proof of their bond, undeniable even to her stubborn human mind.

With a mental push, he redirected their energy, swirling them away from his body and into a controlled spiral between them. The fire formed a perfect cyclone, dancing between them without touching either one.

He watched her expression transition from fury to astonishment, savoring the moment her anger gave way to wonder. Those hazel eyes, now reflecting the dancing orange light, were wide with disbelief.

“That’s not possible,” she whispered. “How are you?—“

“I told you, you and I are connected,” Sol said, his voice gentler now as he maintained focus on the flames. “Your fire recognizes me as yours.”

The fireball rotated slowly, casting flickering shadows across Helena’s face. Sol shaped it further with his mind, condensing it into a perfect sphere that hovered at eye level between them.

“You could have killed anyone else with that outburst,” he said, not as an accusation but a statement of fact. “But not me. Never me.”

Fear crept into Helena’s expression, her earlier anger dissolving as she fully comprehended what she had done. “I could have hurt you,” she whispered, her voice cracking slightly.

“You need to learn more control,” Sol replied, his tone softening despite his wolf’s persistent urging to assert dominance. “Take this fire back, Helena. Put it out.”

She shook her head, backing away slightly. “I don’t know how.”

Sol stepped closer, the fireball moving with him. “Yes, you do. The power is yours. You created it, you can end it.”

Helena’s gaze shifted nervously between Sol and the flames. Her hands trembled at her sides. “I can’t?—“

“You can,” Sol insisted. “And you will.”

Her chin lifted defiantly, that spirit that had first drawn his wolf surging back. “Don’t order me around, Sol. I’m not one of your pack members.”

Sol flashed her a predatory smile. “No, you’re not. You’re my Luna—something far more powerful.”

He moved the fireball closer to her, watching her flinch slightly. “I’ll make you a deal,” he said, the negotiations feeling foreign on his tongue. As alpha, he had rarely needed to bargain. “Put out this fire, and I’ll let you call your friend—Tyanna, was it?”

Hope brightened Helena’s features. “You promise?”

“An alpha’s word is binding,” Sol replied with solemn certainty. “I never break my promises.”

Helena took a deep breath, her shoulders relaxing slightly. She reached toward the fireball, her slender fingers extended but stopping short of touching the flames.

“Focus on your connection to it,” Sol instructed. “Feel the heat as part of you, not separate from you.”

Her brow furrowed in concentration, and Sol felt a peculiar tug through their bond as if she were drawing energy back into herself. The fireball wobbled, shrinking slightly.

“That’s it,” he encouraged, his voice low and intimate. “Take back what’s yours.”

Sol watched transfixed as Helena closed her eyes. The fireball quivered, then rapidly contracted until it was no larger than an apple. With a final inward gesture of her hand, the flames winked out completely, leaving only a wisp of smoke that curled up between them.

“I did it,” she whispered, opening her eyes to look at him with newfound confidence.

Pride swelled in Sol’s chest—pride not just in her accomplishment but in her fieriness, her refusal to back down even when faced with his alpha nature. His wolf recognized this as a worthy quality in their Luna, even if the man occasionally found it maddening.

“You’re a quick study,” Sol acknowledged, closing the remaining distance between them to cup her face in his hands. “That’s good. You’ll need to be.”