Chapter 11: Ryker's Jealousy
1074 Words
I didn't notice the shift in Ryker's mood until it was already a storm.
It had been a good day, all things considered — Thorne had grudgingly admitted my footwork was "less embarrassing" than the day before, Lila had smuggled me a honey pastry from the kitchens between lessons, and Ash and I had spent another quiet hour in the library, ledgers slowly starting to make sense under his patient guidance. I'd walked back to our room that evening lighter than I'd felt in days.
Ryker was waiting when I arrived, arms crossed, leaning against the bedpost with an expression I'd learned to recognize as trouble.
"You spent the whole afternoon with him again," he said, without preamble.
"With Ash?" I set down the small stack of ledgers Ash had lent me to study further. "He's teaching me pack law. Someone has to, since apparently I'm expected to sign trade agreements without understanding a word of them."
"I could teach you plenty," Ryker said, and there was an edge under the words that had nothing to do with trade agreements.
I studied him for a moment, understanding dawning slow and unwelcome. "You're jealous."
"I'm not jealous." The denial came too fast, too sharp, undercut by the tight set of his jaw.
"Ryker."
"You laugh with him," he said, the words coming out rougher now, like he'd been holding them back all day and finally lost the grip. "Easy. Comfortable. Like breathing. And when you're with me, half the time you still flinch before you remember you don't have to." He pushed off the bedpost, pacing like the room was suddenly too small for whatever was building in his chest. "I've watched you find your footing with him for days now. Trade law. Council politics. Little private jokes over ledgers I don't understand and don't care to." He stopped, turning to face me fully, something raw and unguarded flickering underneath the frustration. "I don't know how to give you that. I don't know how to be patient the way he is. I only know how to want you so badly it feels like drowning."
The admission hung in the air between us, more honest than anything he'd said since the grove. I crossed the room slowly, closing the distance he'd put between us, and reached up to press my palm flat against his chest, right over the frantic drum of his heartbeat.
"I'm not comparing you," I said quietly. "You're not failing some test Ash is passing."
"Aren't I?" His hand came up to cover mine, holding it there against his chest like he needed the anchor. "You flinched away from me the first night. You've never flinched away from him."
"You scared me the first night," I said honestly, because he deserved honesty more than comfort right now. "You were fire and hunger and everything I'd never let myself want, and I didn't know yet that underneath all of that was someone who'd burn the world down to keep me safe rather than to own me." I held his gaze, steady despite the way my pulse still raced under his nearness. "I don't flinch from you anymore, Ryker. Look at me. I'm not flinching now."
Something in his expression cracked open, the frustration giving way to something far more vulnerable underneath. "I watch him teach you patience and strategy," he admitted, voice lower now, quieter, "and all I know how to teach you is how to throw a punch and how to survive a battlefield. What happens when the fighting's over? What use am I to you then?"
"You think that's all you are to me?" I asked, genuinely startled by the depth of doubt buried under all that fire. "Ryker, you were the one who told Thorne I deserved a chance to prove myself instead of dismissing me outright. You're the reason I have training at all instead of being locked away for my own safety like some fragile thing that might break. You don't just teach me how to survive a fight." I stepped closer, until there was barely any space left between us. "You teach me it's allowed to fight back at all. Do you understand how much that matters to someone who spent her whole life being told to make herself smaller?"
He was quiet for a long moment, searching my face like he was looking for the lie in it and couldn't find one.
"I don't want to be the Alpha who only knows how to claim you," he said finally, roughly. "I want to be worth keeping, too. Not just wanted. Worth choosing, the way you're choosing to learn from him."
"You are," I said, and meant it fully, without hesitation. "You already are, Ryker."
He kissed me then — not the bruising, possessive claim of our first nights, but something slower, more searching, like he was asking a question with his mouth instead of demanding an answer. I answered it the only way I knew how, sinking into him, letting my hands slide up into his dark hair, giving him the certainty his pride had been too proud to ask for outright.
When he finally pulled back, forehead resting against mine, some of the storm had gone out of him, replaced by something quieter and more fragile than I'd ever seen him allow himself to be.
"I don't know how to share well," he admitted against my lips. "I've never had to before. Not even with Ash, not really... we split territory, split duties, but never anything that mattered like this."
"You don't have to know how yet," I said softly. "We're all still learning. Even him."
Ash's voice came from the connecting doorway then, quiet, amused, and not remotely surprised by what he'd clearly overheard. "For what it's worth, brother I don't think either of us is failing at this nearly as badly as you seem to believe."
Ryker huffed something that might have been a laugh, might have been embarrassment, and didn't let go of me even as his twin crossed the room to join us.
"I still don't like sharing," Ryker muttered.
"None of us do," Ash said, settling against my other side, his hand finding the small of my back. "We're just choosing to anyway. Every day. That's the whole point."
For the first time since the Moonlight Festival had upended my entire life, I let myself believe that might actually be enough.
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