Chapter 4
1099 Words
By noon I’d almost convinced myself they’d leave us alone for a day.
Stupid.
Three firm knocks. No pause.
My father opened the door. The scent of pine and storm rolled in before Cassian stepped over the threshold.
“Corin. Mara.” He gave my parents a brief nod, then looked at me. “Rhea. We need to talk.”
My mother’s mouth flattened. “In front of her family.”
Cassian hesitated, then inclined his head. “Here is fine.”
He didn’t come in full Alpha armor. No cloak, no escort. Just dark clothes and that contained pressure that made our little kitchen feel two sizes too small.
We sat at the table: Cassian at one side, me opposite, my parents bracketing me. Lysa planted herself in the doorway, arms folded, pretending she wasn’t obviously eavesdropping.
For a few heartbeats, no one said anything. The tick of the old clock was suddenly deafening.
“I thought Thorne said everything that needed saying this morning,” I said at last.
Cassian’s jaw flexed. “Thorne said what he wanted. I haven’t.”
My father snorted. “Took you long enough.”
“Dad,” I muttered.
Cassian folded his hands on the table. Long fingers, scar across one knuckle. “You’ve been classified as Hollow,” he said, not bothering to soften the word. “That label isn’t…ideal. But it buys us time.”
“For what?” I asked. “For the Council to sharpen their knives?”
“For us to understand what you are before they decide for us,” he said.
My stomach twisted. “According to Thorne, I’m empty.”
“I don’t think you are.” His gaze held mine. Gray, steady. Too intent. “You felt the Call. You felt your wolf. You described a barrier. That matters.”
“It didn’t matter enough to stop you from stamping Hollow on me,” I shot back.
He flinched, just for a second. My mother’s fingers tightened around her mug.
“You think I enjoyed that?” Cassian asked quietly. “If I’d pretended last night was nothing, Thorne would have gone around me to the Council. They’d have called you unstable, hidden. They send hunters for that, Rhea. Chains. Cells.”
Lysa bristled. “So she should be grateful you picked the nicer cage?”
“Lysa,” my father warned.
I swallowed. “What exactly does this…nicer cage look like?”
Cassian didn’t look away. “You stay with your family. You keep your home. You can work in the infirmary, help in the village. But no primary patrols. No ritual participation. You stay off the stone. And you don’t leave Nightwind territory without clearance.”
Every word was another little cut.
“So I get to be useful,” I said slowly, “as long as it’s nowhere people might have to trust me with teeth.”
He winced. Didn’t deny it.
“And the Council?” my mother asked, voice very calm. That was how I knew she was furious.
“I’ll report that we have a misaligned wolf under supervision,” Cassian said. “No sign of aggression. No loss of control. Contained risk.”
“Contained,” my father repeated. “Like she’s a leak.”
“It’s better than them deciding you’re a weapon we’re hiding,” Cassian said, eyes back on me. “Or a mistake that needs correcting.”
By “correcting” he meant “dragged away and never seen again.” Stories of that sort tended to be whispered, but everyone had heard them.
“And Sera?” I asked. “She looked at me like I’m her new favorite puzzle.”
“She’ll want to run some tests,” he said. “Energy readings. Old diagnostic rites. Nothing invasive without your consent.” His mouth flattened. “I’ll make sure of that.”
“You’ll make sure,” my father said. “And who makes sure of you?”
Cassian’s gaze flicked to him, then back to me. “You can say no,” he said. “To Sera. To me. I won’t force you onto a stone again.”
I barked out a humorless laugh. “You already let it happen once.”
He didn’t argue. “I should’ve stopped the ritual sooner,” he said instead. “I felt the resistance in the Call. I thought…” He shook his head. “Doesn’t matter what I thought. I was wrong.”
The admission threw me more than any excuse would have.
“I’m not asking you to apologize,” I said, voice rough. “I’m asking what happens when the Council decides even your carefully contained Hollow is too much.”
“We’re not there yet,” he said.
“But it’s coming.” I held his gaze. “You know it.”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. “Maybe. Maybe not. But the more we know before that day, the more leverage we have.”
“Leverage,” I repeated. “You mean me.”
Silence.
He didn’t say yes. He didn’t need to.
Lysa’s hand closed around mine under the table. My mother’s shoulders were tight. My father looked like he wanted to punch something.
“You can hate the word,” Cassian said finally, quietly. “I do too. But right now, Hollow with a roof and a family is better than ‘anomaly, status unknown’ on a Council docket.”
I stared at him. At the man who had let me stand alone in a sea of bowed wolves, who had not stopped Darius when he cut our bond in front of everyone.
He looked tired. Not sorry. Not cruel. Just…caught.
“I’ll talk to Sera,” I said at last. The words tasted like rust. “No promises beyond that.”
Some of the tension bled from his shoulders. “That’s enough for now.”
He pushed back his chair and stood. At the doorway, he paused, glancing back at me.
“For what it’s worth,” Cassian said, voice low, “I don’t believe Luna got it wrong with you.”
I huffed out a breath. “Feels like She did.”
“Sometimes,” he said, “it’s the stories we built around Her that are wrong.”
He left us in the quiet kitchen with cooling tea and a single, bitter fact: my world had shrunk to the size of this village—and every eye in it now watched to see what the Hollow girl would do next.
- Writer
