Elara's POV
"He was the Alpha of the Black Stone Pack," Samuel said. Quietly.
"You knew," Victoria said, matter-of-fact.
"I knew of him. The Chosen bond, the illness." He paused. "He was respected."
"He was wonderful," Victoria said. Her voice was steady. She wasn't sad about it anymore, just stating a fact.
"He developed wolf-mania at forty-three. The latent gene is more common than anyone talks about publicly. Some never trigger it. Kyle was not that lucky."
She folded her hands on the table. "When I left the Black Stone Pack after he died, I didn't speak about any of it. I didn't want the Luna history following me into laboratories. I wanted to get there on my own terms."
She looked at me.
"Which is why," she said, "when I found a young researcher doing extraordinary work under
