CHAPTER SEVEN
1236 Words
Amara’s POV
The collar is warm when they fasten it around my throat and it settles against my skin with a soft, final click. The obsidian surface pulses once, just once, it feels like a living thing registering its place, but it goes still. In that moment, I brace for pain, for resistance, I expect the Silver Flame to lash out, to scream its refusal through my veins.
Instead, everything inside me quiets, the magic doesn’t vanish. It only holds its breath.
After placing it, the guards step back immediately, their hands retreating as if they expected me to burn them for the touch.
The weight of the collar is negligible, but the air changes the moment it locks into place. The vast hall, vaulted and carved from black stone threaded with faintly glowing sigils, feels smaller; it feels pressurised.
Alpha Elior watches from his throne.
He doesn’t lean forward, doesn’t bare teeth or posture or revel in the moment. He sits like a man accustomed to obedience without performance, one elbow resting against the arm of the chair, fingers steepled beneath his chin with a sense of ownership without urgency.
“You’re quiet,” he observes.
I lift my chin slowly and the collar hums, not in warning or in restraint.
“I’m listening,” I say.
One corner of his mouth curves upward. “Good. Wolves who listen live longer.”
The guards withdraw closing the doors shut behind them with a sound that echoes too deeply, vibrating somewhere beneath my ribs.
We are alone now, predator and prize.
“Tell me,” Elior says, rising at last. “What do you think this is?”
“A cage,” I answer immediately.
“Incorrect.”
He approaches, steps unhurried, boots striking stone with precise restraint. He stops just outside my reach. Close enough that I can feel him, not scent or heat, but pressure, he has the kind of presence that shapes a room without moving in it.
“This,” he says, gesturing vaguely to the hall, the collar, himself, “is an opportunity.”
I let out a short laugh. Sharp. Empty. “That’s what men say when they want obedience dressed up as mercy.”
Interest shifts behind his eyes.
“You were exiled,” he says calmly. “Hunted, shackled and sold.” His gaze drops briefly to my wrists, where the faint ghosts of iron still linger. “And yet you stand here without bowing, that makes you rare.”
“I don’t need your approval.”
“No,” he agrees. “You need protection.”
The word lands softly.
“I survived without it.”
“Barely.”
Silence stretches between us.
Beyond these walls, I can feel the territory breathing, wolves moving, guards rotating, lives unfolding in quiet order. No chaos or rebellion. Everything held in place by a steady, unseen hand.
“What do you want from me?” I ask.
Elior doesn’t answer right away. He circles me slowly, not crowding, not touching, but letting the space speak for him.
“I want what you are becoming,” he says at last. “And I want to ensure that power does not destroy you.”
“You don’t protect power,” I say, turning to keep him in my sight. “You contain it.”
“Same thing,” he replies mildly. “Depending on who benefits.”
It is at this point that I realised what this Alpha wants with me.
“You want a Luna.”
“Yes.”
The word is unadorned.
“And not just any Luna,” he continues. “A broken one would be easy. A loyal one would be useful.” His gaze sharpens. “But you would be formidable.”
My wolf bristles.
Do not trust him.
“I already had a mate,” I say.
“And he cast you out,” Elior counters smoothly. “Publicly.”
The bond stirs faintly at the words.
“Be my mate,” Elior says quietly, “and no one will ever collar you again.”
My fingers curl at my sides.
“And this?” I ask, lifting a hand to brush the obsidian ring at my throat.
His smile is slow. “A precaution.”
...
That night he gave me a chamber to sleep.
The room is carved high into the eastern wing, overlooking the valley below, its windows are without bars, the bed is layered in dark linens and a bathing chamber fed by heated springs.
Luxury offered like a leash woven from silk.
The collar remains. It doesn’t tighten when I test it, doesn’t punish or threaten. It simply exists, quiet, watchful and a reminder that my freedom is conditional, my power measured.
I pace until exhaustion drag me to the edge of the bed.
Somewhere beyond these walls, Kael breathes.
The thought arrives uninvited.
The bond flickers faintly, not reaching nor severed, just suspended, like a bridge swallowed by fog.
He will come, my wolf murmurs.
“No” I whisper. “No.”
…
Elior returns in the morning.
No summons. No announcement.
He’s already there when I wake, standing near the window as though he belongs in the space, as though it has always been his.
“Have you decided?” he asks.
I study him more carefully now, his stillness, the discipline, the way the territory bends subtly around his presence.
“You’re patient,” I say.
“I don’t require haste,” he replies. “You have nowhere else to go.”
I step closer, stopping just short of him. “If I agree… what happens to the collar?”
“It stays,” he says without hesitation. “Until trust is earned.”
“And my powers?”
“Trained, regulated. Used.”
“Used for what?”
“For stability,” he says. “Influence and survival.”
“For you.”
“For my territory,” he corrects. “Which would be yours as well.”
The offer hangs between us, gilded, dangerous.
“And if I refuse?”
“You remain under my protection,” he says evenly. “As a guest.”
I wait.
“And a guest,” he continues, “does not leave without permission.”
The cage reveals itself fully then.
Not one slamming shut but closing politely.
“I won’t be forced,” I say.
“No,” Elior agrees. “You won’t need to be.”
He steps back, giving me space again, an illusion of choice, carefully preserved.
“Think,” he says, “about the world beyond these walls. About how long a hunted Luna survives alone.”
At the door, he pauses.
“And Amara?” he adds softly. “When you decide… I will be here.”
The door closes.
I stand alone, collar warm against my throat, power humming beneath my skin.
This is a new cage, feels stronger than iron and kinder than chains.
Built not to break me but to convince me I belong inside it. I press my fingers to the crescent scar on my palm and let the Silver Flame stir.
If I must remain here, I will learn its weaknesses.
If I must wear this collar, I will understand its rules.
And when the time comes, this cage will learn what it means to hold a monster.
- Writer
