Awakening The Silver Wolf

so long

Bella pov

I considered lying to Leon but eventually decided against it. No excuse sounded good enough.

"I came to see him." I replied in a small voice.

"Why would you come to see him? You don't have any business sneaking into the Alpha's room." Leon pressed, his voice carrying an edge I hadn't heard from him before.

"Leon." Kiara stepped in, her voice firm. "Bella is still Asher's mate." She reminded him.

Something shifted in Leon's expression at that reminder. His expression did not soften, the opposite happened.

"Is she?" He said quietly.

Kiara frowned. "What is that supposed to mean?"

Leon looked at me directly and I could see the conflict from earlier had been replaced by something else entirely.

"She already rejected him." He said. "She plans to leave this pack the moment it's safe enough." He added.

His voice wasn't cruel but it carried weight. "Do you think it doesn't hurt him every single day to look at his fated mate and know she wants nothing to do with him? After waiting for her for so long?"

The corridor was very long after those words left Leon’s mouth.

He was pissed, Kiara looked awkward and I? I was stabbed hard by the truth in those words. U could not refute a single one.

"Getting close to him now after making your intentions clear." Leon continued. "That's not fair to him Bella."

I had no answer for that or anything to say because he was right.

I had been so consumed by my own pain that I hadn't stopped to think about what my presence here was doing to Asher. Every shared dinner, every walk, every moment I let myself get comfortable.

I was pulling him closer with one hand and pushing him away with the other.

"Leon, that's enough." Kiara said softly, defeat apparent in her voice.

"Is it?" He replied. Then he exhaled and looked away.

“ I'm leaving.” He announced then turned around and walked away.

I stood there in the quiet corridor long after his footsteps faded.

Kiara touched my arm gently.

I shook my head before she could say anything.

"He is right." I said quietly then turned to leave too.

Kiara followed me back to my room without asking if she could. Not like she needed any permission from me.

I didn't tell her not to.

Inside my room, I sat on the edge of the bed and stared at the floor.

Kiara closed the door quietly behind her and sat beside me without a word.

Then she waited, like she knew I would say something.

Leon's words were still sitting in my chest like something heavy that hadn't found its place yet.

Do you think it doesn't hurt him every single day?

"Bella." Kiara said softly after the silence stretched for long.

"He is right." I admitted.

“ Leon is right about everything."

"He shouldn't have said it like that…" Kiara tried to say but I cut her off.

"But he wasn't wrong." I cut in quietly and Kiara went silent.

I pressed my hands flat against my thighs and tried to find the words for something I hadn't said out loud to anyone. Something I had been carrying since before I walked into that river.

"I am afraid." I confessed in a small voice.

Kiara didn't move, she just listened.

"I am afraid of this." I continued.

“ I am afraid of accepting a bond that will eventually hurt me. Of opening my heart again and handing someone the ability to destroy me." I swallowed. "I did that once. I gave everything I had to someone who was supposed to protect me and he used it against me in every way imaginable."

The room was very quiet, just the sound of our breathing echoing in the space.

"Asher is good to me." I said. "He is patient and kind and he says things that make me feel like maybe I deserve to be treated well." My voice dropped. "And I don't know what to do with that. I genuinely don't know how to just receive it without waiting for everything to fall apart."

"Bella…"

"What happens when he gets tired of me?" The words came out before I could stop them. "What happens when he looks at me properly and sees everything that's there? The scars.The broken parts. The wolf that is too weak?The woman who walked into a river because she ran out of reasons to stay." My throat tightened. "What happens when he realizes that I am not someone you love? I am someone you feel sorry for."

My eyes burned but I blinked hard, fighting the tears.

"He is the Alpha King Kiara." I said. "He needs a Luna who can stand beside him and match him.

Asher needs someone strong, someone whole." I pressed my lips together.

“ He doesn't need a weak broken omega who flinches at kindness because she has never been able to trust it."

I could not control myself any longer. The first tear came without warning.

I pressed the back of my hand against my eyes immediately. I was so tired of crying. I had cried enough in those dungeons to last several lifetimes.

But they kept coming anyway, those f*****g treacherous eyes.

Kiara's arms came around me quietly.

She didn't speak or rush to fix anything.

She just wrapped her arms around me and the quiet of the room holding us both.

I cried until the tightness in my chest loosened enough to breathe properly.

Then I sat back and wiped my face with the back of my hand and felt embarrassed and lighter at the same time.

Kiara reached over and tucked a loose piece of hair behind my ear gently.

"Can I say something?" She asked and I nodded.

"Fear is not your enemy." She said. "It makes sense that you are afraid. Anyone who went through what you went through would be." She paused. "But Bella, fear is also a liar. It tells you that you are unlovable when the truth is that nobody has loved you properly yet."

I looked at her.

"You are not weak." She said firmly. "A weak woman does not survive what you survived. A weak woman does not look an Alpha King in the eye and tell him his concerns are an excuse." The corner of her mouth lifted. "You are the strongest person I have met in a long time. You just haven't been shown that enough for it to feel true."

I looked down at my hands.

"And as for scars." She continued. "We all have them, Bella. Every single one of us has scars.

The ones you can see and the ones you can't." She squeezed my hand. "Asher has his own. Trust me."

Something about those words made me look up at her.

"Life is too short to spend it waiting for the right moment to let someone in." She said quietly. "Sometimes you hesitate long enough and the chance is gone. And then you spend the rest of your life wondering what would have happened if you had just been brave for one moment."

The room was very quiet.

I thought about Asher sitting at that desk looking tired.

I thought about the walk. About “when did someone being decent to you become something that needed an explanation.”

About the way he said he would let me go and meant every word.

I exhaled slowly.

"Kiara." I said.

"Mm."

I hesitated before eventually gathering the courage to ask.

"What did you mean earlier? When you said Asher was fading away." I looked at her carefully. "Is he sick?"

Something moved across her face.

She was quiet for longer than was comfortable.

"That is something Asher needs to tell you himself." Kiara replied.

"It is not my story to tell." She met my eyes. "But I will say this much." She paused. "Don't wait too long Bella."

The words landed softly but they carried so much weight.

She stood up, smoothed her dress and looked at me with those blue eyes that somehow always managed to say more than her words did.

"Get some sleep." She said. "Things have a way of looking different in the morning."

She walked to the door.

"Kiara." I called.

She turned.

"Thank you." I said. "For everything."

She smiled. Small and genuine.

"That's what family is for." She said simply and then she was gone.

I sat alone in the quiet room for a long time after that.

“Don't wait too long.”

Those were Kiara’s words.

I laid back against the pillow and stared at the ceiling and let Kiara's words settle into the spaces that fear had been occupying for so long.