CHAPTER 6
1054 Words
Ariana’s POV
The moment Adrian said the word mate, the world didn’t explode the way it had before.
There was no sharp c***k in my chest. No tearing pain. No public humiliation dressed up as destiny. Instead, there was a strange stillness, like the calm that comes after a storm has already passed and left its damage behind.
I stood there, rooted to the ground, my heart pounding as if it were trying to decide whether to run or stay.
Leah’s voice reached me faintly, asking if I was okay. Ethan hovered close, protective as always. But my attention was fixed on Adrian—on the way he stood a few steps away from me, not crowding my space, not reaching out, not demanding anything from me.
That alone told me he was different.
When I nodded to Leah and gently pulled my hand from hers, I could feel her hesitation, her worry. I understood it. She had watched me crumble once already. But I also knew I couldn’t avoid this moment. Fate had placed it in front of me, and running would only leave it unfinished.
Adrian led me away from the gathering without touching me, without even glancing back to see if I was following. He trusted that I would come on my own, and that trust felt heavier than any command.
We stopped near the edge of the pack, where the noise dulled, and the lantern light faded into moonlit shadows. The trees stood tall around us, witnesses that would not gossip or judge.
For a long moment, neither of us spoke.
I could feel the bond—gentle but present, like a thread humming quietly between us. It wasn’t frantic or demanding. It didn’t claw at my chest the way the first one had. Instead, it waited.
Adrian was the one who broke the silence, his voice calm and steady.
He told me he wasn’t rejecting me.
The words settled slowly, carefully, as if he had chosen them with intention rather than impulse.
He said he could feel the bond clearly, that he had no doubt about what it meant or who I was to him. But he also said something no one had ever said to me before in relation to fate—that a bond did not erase choice, and that connection mattered just as much as destiny.
I listened without interrupting, my arms wrapped loosely around myself.
He explained that accepting the bond fully—publicly, formally—was not something he wanted to do blindly. Not because he doubted me, but because he respected me. He wanted to know who I was, beyond the pull, beyond the title fate tried to assign us, beyond the expectations that came with being an Alpha’s mate.
He wanted time.
Time to talk.
Time to understand.
Time to build something real instead of claiming something fragile.
There was no dismissal in his tone. No disgust. No fear of how it might look.
Just certainty.
And that frightened me more than rejection ever had.
I told him the truth—that I was afraid. That bonds no longer felt sacred to me, only dangerous. That the first one had taught me how easily something meant to protect could be turned into a weapon.
I admitted that I didn’t know if I could trust fate again, or my own heart.
Adrian listened without interruption. He didn’t rush to reassure me or promise things he couldn’t prove. He simply stood there, letting my words exist between us.
When he spoke again, it was only to say that he understood why I would hesitate. That if the roles were reversed, he would do the same.
He told me that accepting the bond didn’t mean surrendering myself to it. That he would not pressure me, would not parade me, would not use the bond to claim authority over me or anyone else.
He wasn’t asking me to be his Luna.
Not yet.
He was asking me to be Ariana—or Aria, as the world knew me here.
The simplicity of that nearly undid me.
I realized then how tense my body had been, how tight I’d been bracing for impact that never came. My shoulders slowly relaxed, my breathing evening out as the weight I hadn’t known I was carrying finally loosened.
The bond pulsed softly in response, not stronger, not weaker—just… patient.
I asked him what would happen next.
He said nothing needed to happen immediately. That when visiting packs gathered, everyone expected spectacle and dominance and declarations—but he wasn’t interested in any of that. If we were going to stand beside each other one day, it would be because we chose to, not because the Moon Goddess cornered us into it.
He would remain here for the duration of the gathering. We would speak when we could, walk when we wanted, and stop whenever I felt overwhelmed.
No expectations.
No labels.
No pressure.
I searched his face for deception, for the subtle signs of arrogance I had learned to recognize so well in Silvercrest. I found none. There was strength there, yes—but it was quiet, controlled, and rooted in restraint rather than dominance.
It reminded me painfully of my father’s words on the night before I left home.
Strength is not always loud.
When I finally agreed—when I told Adrian I was willing to try, slowly—I felt something shift inside me.
Not joy.
Not relief.
Something steadier.
Hope, maybe. Cautious and fragile, but real.
We walked back toward the gathering side by side, still not touching. Wolves turned to look, murmurs rising like a distant tide. I could already feel the curiosity sharpening, the speculation forming.
For once, it didn’t matter.
Because nothing had been claimed.
Nothing had been taken.
Something had simply been acknowledged.
As we stepped back into the light, I realized that fate had given me another chance—not to be chosen, but to choose.
And this time, I would not rush.
I would not bend.
I would not disappear into someone else’s expectations.
Whatever this bond became, it would grow from trust—or it would not grow at all.
And for the first time since my rejection, that truth didn’t scare me.
It empowered me.
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