The Wolf Without a Voice' and the Three Who Claimed Her

Double Lives

RAFE

"I'm going for my meditation walk."

I stood in the doorway of Father's study, my notepad in hand with the excuse already written out. It was the same excuse I'd used every week for the past year, and Father barely looked up from his paperwork anymore.

"Be back before dawn," he said, which was what he always said. Then he added quietly, "Give her my regards."

I nodded and slipped out into the night.

The lie had become so practiced that no one questioned it anymore. Young Rafe Sterling took midnight walks for meditation and exercise. It was odd, sure, but then again, the mute adopted heir was already considered odd by most of the pack. What was one more eccentricity?

Vivienne thought I was seeking attention. "More of his dramatic episodes," she'd said to Father once, not bothering to lower her voice. "Wandering around at night like some tragic figure. You indulge him too much."

Father had simply replied that meditation was good for a young wolf's development and left it at that.

If only they knew where I was really going. What I was really doing.

I made my way through the now-familiar route to the school on the outskirts. One year of weekly visits had taught me every shortcut, every shadow to hide in, every patrol route the pack guards took. I could make the journey in half the time it had taken that first night.

When I reached the school, I climbed the tree outside the third-floor classroom window like always. But this time, I didn't need to peek through the glass. Mina was already there waiting for me, sitting on the windowsill with it propped open.

She smiled when she saw me, and my chest felt warm. Over the past year, I'd learned to read every expression on her face. This smile meant she was happy to see me but also exhausted from another long day of work.

I climbed through the window and immediately pulled the bag off my shoulder. Inside were the supplies I brought every week: food stolen from the Sterling kitchens, medicine from Father's private stock, clean bandages, and tonight, a new book I thought she'd like.

Mina's eyes lit up when she saw the book. She'd taught herself to read years ago with the woman who'd raised her, but she'd never had access to books like the ones in the Sterling library. Every week I brought her a new one, and every week she'd have it finished by our next meeting.

She was brilliant. Scary brilliant. And no one except me and Father knew it because she spent her days scrubbing floors and being invisible.

MINA

Rafe climbed through the window and I felt that familiar warmth spread through my chest. The same warmth I felt every week when he arrived. The feeling of being whole again, even if just for a few hours.

He pulled out his bag and started unpacking supplies like always. Food first—fresh bread, cheese, dried meat, an apple. My stomach growled just looking at it. The headmaster's "one meal a day" was usually stale bread and watery soup. Rafe's weekly deliveries were the only reason I wasn't wasting away.

Then medicine and bandages. I'd had another run-in with the headmaster three days ago when I'd accidentally knocked over a bucket of dirty water. The bruises on my ribs were still tender, but the salve Rafe brought always helped them heal faster.

And finally, a book. I took it reverently and read the title: "Advanced Pack Histories and Bloodline Magic." My eyes went wide. This was from the restricted section of whatever library he had access to.

I grabbed our shared notepad—we'd gone through three of them this year—and wrote quickly.

Won't someone notice this is missing?

Rafe shook his head and wrote back.

Father knows I'm taking books for you. He thinks it's good that you're learning. He says if you're as smart as I think you are, you deserve an education even if you can't get one the normal way.

I felt tears prick my eyes like I did every time Rafe mentioned his father. Lord Daemon had never met me, but he'd been helping me for a year now through Rafe. The medicine, the books, even the advice Rafe sometimes passed along about how to avoid the headmaster's worst moods.

Someday I wanted to thank him properly. Assuming I ever got out of this school.

How was your week? I wrote, changing the subject.

Rafe made a face and started writing.

Boring. Tutors and etiquette lessons and Vivienne criticizing everything I do. She told the pack Alpha's wife that I'm an embarrassment to the Sterling name because I can't speak at formal dinners.

My hands clenched into fists. I'd never met Vivienne, but I hated her. She was cruel to Rafe in subtle ways that he tried to pretend didn't hurt, but I could feel his pain through our connection. It had grown stronger over the past year—that thread between us that let us sense each other's emotions.

She's wrong, I wrote fiercely. You're not an embarrassment. You're amazing.

Rafe's cheeks turned slightly pink and he ducked his head, but I saw him smile.

RAFE

Over the past year, our weekly meetings had fallen into a comfortable routine. First we'd catch up on our separate lives through the notepad. Then we'd share whatever we'd written during the week—thoughts, observations, questions we couldn't ask anyone else.

Then came my favorite part. The training.

"Show me what you learned this week," I wrote to Mina.

Her face lit up and she stood, moving to the center of the classroom. She began the strange movements she'd been doing instinctively since she was small. Fluid, graceful motions that looked almost like a dance but felt like something more.

Something powerful.

I'd asked Father about it once, describing the movements in writing. His face had gone pale.

"Those are the f*******n arts," he'd written back. "The Oracle's combat techniques. No one's practiced them in fifty years. How does she know them?"

I'd had no answer. Mina just... knew. Like the knowledge was buried in her bones, waiting to surface.

And now she was teaching them to me.

I stood and mirrored her movements, trying to copy the way she shifted her weight, the precision of each gesture. It was harder than it looked. Every movement had to be exact or the energy flow was wrong.

That was another thing we'd discovered. Energy. We could feel it now, especially when we were together. It flowed through us during these exercises, making us stronger, faster, more aware.

Mina corrected my stance, adjusting my arm position with gentle touches. Through our connection, I could feel what she was feeling—the way the energy should move, where it should pool, how it should release.

We practiced for an hour, moving through forms that had no names because no one alive remembered what to call them. Forms that made my muscles burn and my wolf stir restlessly inside me.

When we finished, we were both breathing hard and grinning.

MINA

After training, we'd sit together and write. Sometimes we'd work on developing our own sign language—gestures that meant specific things only we understood. Sometimes we'd pass the notepad back and forth, telling stories or asking questions about the world.

Tonight, Rafe had something important to share. I could tell by the way he was fidgeting.

I had a dream last night, he wrote. About a woman singing. She had dark hair and silver-grey eyes like ours. She was singing a lullaby I've never heard before, but somehow I knew all the words even though I can't speak them.

My hand started shaking as I took the pencil.

I had the same dream. Three nights ago. I've been humming the melody in my head ever since. I remember her face so clearly, like I've known her my whole life.

We stared at each other, and I knew we were both thinking the same thing. This wasn't just a coincidence. These were shared memories surfacing. Memories from before the river, before we were separated.

Memories of our mother.

Do you think she's still alive? Rafe wrote hesitantly.

I thought about the memory we'd shared that first night. The woman putting us in the basket, then turning to face the wolves chasing her. The determination in her face. The acceptance of what was about to happen.

No, I wrote slowly. I think she died protecting us. That's why she had to send us away. She was buying us time.

Rafe's eyes got suspiciously bright. He nodded and wrote:

Someday we'll find out the truth. About who she was. Why we were hunted. Why we can do the things we can do.

Someday, I agreed.

But for now, we had this. Weekly meetings in a classroom where no one would think to look. Stolen hours where we could be ourselves completely. Where I wasn't a servant and he wasn't a noble heir. Where we were just Rafe and Mina, two halves of one soul.

RAFE

As dawn approached, I reluctantly started packing up my supplies. Mina helped, moving efficiently like she did with everything. A year of weekly meetings had taught us how to maximize our time together.

Before I left, I always checked her over for new injuries. Tonight I noticed bruises on her wrists that looked like finger marks.

What happened? I wrote, anger already building.

Headmaster grabbed me when I wasn't moving fast enough, she wrote back. It's fine. They'll fade.

It wasn't fine. Nothing about her situation was fine. But we'd had this argument before, and we both knew there still wasn't a good solution. I was nine years old with no real power. She was nine years old with no legal standing. We couldn't run away together—we'd never survive. And bringing her to the Sterling estate would raise too many questions.

So instead I did what I could. I wrapped her wrists carefully with clean bandages soaked in healing salve. I made sure she had enough food to last the week. I gave her the new book and three more blank notebooks.

And I promised, like I did every week, that I'd be back.

Same time next week, I wrote.

I'll be here, she wrote back with a small smile.

We hugged tightly, and through our connection, I felt everything she wouldn't write. The loneliness when I left. The way she counted down the days until our next meeting. The fear that someday something would happen and I wouldn't be able to come back.

I'll always come back, I thought at her, pushing the feeling through our bond. Always.

She squeezed tighter, and I knew she'd received the message.

Then I climbed out the window and made my way back to my privileged life, while she stayed behind in hers.

But we weren't as far apart as we used to be. Every week, our connection grew stronger. The telepathic whispers became clearer. The shared dreams became more frequent. The sense of each other's emotions became more precise.

We were rebuilding what had been broken eight years ago when that basket split in the river.

And someday, somehow, we'd be together permanently.

MINA

I watched Rafe disappear into the pre-dawn darkness, then carefully hid all the supplies he'd brought in my secret spaces around the school. Food in the loose floorboard. Medicine behind the broken panel. Books in the crawlspace where we'd first hidden together.

Then I got back to work scrubbing floors before the headmaster woke up.

My body was exhausted. My hands were raw. My ribs ached from the bruises.

But my chest felt warm. Full. Complete.

Because I had a brother who loved me. Who brought me food and books and hope. Who was teaching me that I wasn't cursed or broken, just different. Special, even.

And that made everything bearable.