The Alpha's Forgotten Flame

Sara p.o.v "You are not seriously thinking of going back there." Mara's voice was sharp enough to cut glass. I did not look up from the letter in my hands. I have read it four times already. The words had not changed. By order of the High Council of Silverstone Territory, Strategist Seraphina Ash is hereby assigned to lead the Pack Restructuring Initiative at Silverstone Pack, effective on the 14th of next month. Duration: six weeks. Six weeks. I put the letter on the counter and reached for my coffee. My hands were steady. I was proud of that. "It is an assignment," I said. "I do not get to say no." "You could ask for a transfer. Tell Dorian..." "Dorian does not know where I am from." She stared at me. "You have worked for the man for two years and he does not know that you are from Silverstone?” "I left Silverstone. That is not the same as being from there." She opened her mouth. Then little feet came stumbling down the hallway and we both turned. Eli appeared in the doorway wearing one sock, his shirt twisted sideways, and an expression of deep personal grievance. "The blanket fell," he announced. I picked him up without a word. He was warm and solid and he pressed his face into my neck and the tight thing in my chest slowly loosened. His eyes, catching the morning light, were the colour of storm clouds. Silver-grey. Mara looked at him and said nothing. She did not have to. I had four weeks to prepare. I spent the first two telling myself it would be fine. By the third, I had a plan built on one rule: he cannot know who I am. Not until I finished the work, filed the report, and put two hundred miles between me and Silverstone again. My name was Seraphina Ash. Before that I was Sera Calloway, the omega girl, the one Alpha Caden Vale had looked at on the night of the Blood Moon and then looked away from so fast it left marks. Nobody in Silverstone knew what Sera Calloway looked like now. I had cut my hair . I carried myself differently. I had learned, somewhere between eighteen and twenty-one, how to walk into a room and make people think I belonged there. I was not the girl who had dropped to her knees while Caden Vale said the words that ended us. I was never going to be her again. The morning I left, Eli sat on my suitcase. I crouched in front of him and fixed his collar. "I'm going to work for a while," I said. "How long?" "Six weeks." He thought about this. "Will you call?" " I will, every night." He patted my cheek once. Then he pressed his forehead to mine, the old wolf greeting, the one nobody taught him. He just knew. My throat tightened hard. I held his face for one extra second. Then I stood and walked to the door before he could see that my expression has change. Mara was on the porch. She squeezed my hand. "You are not that girl anymore," she said. "You are allowed to walk in there knowing that." I nodded. Got in the car. Drove north. Silverstone rose out of the tree line two hours later. I had forgotten how big it was. Stone buildings, long paths through dark pines, the great hall at the centre with high windows that caught the afternoon light like a warning. The air pressed against my skin the moment I crossed the territory line, thick, old and watchful. My wolf stirred. Not now, I told her. She kept quiet, barely. I parked in the visitor bay, killed the engine, and sat still for a moment. In, Do the work, Six weeks, Out. I told myself. I reached for the door handle. And then the front doors of the great hall opened and he walked out. I had told myself I was prepared. I had been wrong. Caden Vale was twenty-six now and he looked it. Broader than I remembered. Dark hair, grey eyes, and the way he moved, like the ground made room for him, like the air shifted when he passed through it. He was frowning at something on a tablet, talking to the man beside him. He had not seen me. My hands were steady, but my heart was not. He glanced up. Our eyes met across the car park. Nothing, no recognition. He looked at me the way a busy man looks at a stranger, brief, neutral, already moving on. I exhaled slowly. Then the man beside him said something and Caden paused. Tilted his head. Something about that pause made the back of my neck prickle. He looked back at me. His brows pulled together. Just slightly. The way they do when something does not fit, when your brain catches something your eyes cannot yet explain. My wolf went completely still. "Strategist Ash?" A woman appeared at my elbow with a clipboard and a professional smile. "Welcome to Silverstone. I am Lena, Alpha Vale's assistant. If you'll follow me..." "Of course." I matched her tone. Easy and calm. I did not look back toward the steps. But I felt it. His gaze following me all the way through the door. My room was on the second floor of the east wing. Clean, quiet with a window overlooking the pine trees. I set my bag on the bed and stood still for a moment. My wolf was pacing. She had been since the car park, since him she saw him. I washed my face and looked at myself in the mirror. Brown skin. Amber eyes. The gold stud in my left ear that Eli had called shiny just last week. I looked like someone who had their life together. I needed to keep looking like that. I pulled out my phone and typed to Mara: I'm in. He didn't recognise me. Her reply came fast: Good. You must keep it that way. I set the phone face down on the dresser. Five weeks and six days. I could do this. Then my phone buzzed again. Not Mara this time. An unknown number. Local area code. The message was three words. I remember you