Claimed by Alpha and Beta: The Silent Wolf

9: The Assessment

RAYE POV

The next morning, I stood outside the training hall again.

My fingers tightened around the strap of my bag until the fabric bit into my palm. For a long moment I wondered if I should just turn around and walk away before anyone saw me standing there like an i***t for the second day running.

Yesterday, I'd stood in this exact spot for twenty minutes before a single person remembered I existed. Today felt different. Not better, necessarily. Just different, in a way that made my stomach twist with a dread I couldn't quite name.

I pushed the door open anyway.

The training hall was already crowded, students moving between combat platforms while instructors barked commands that echoed off the high ceiling. I kept my head down immediately, some old instinct kicking in. Maybe if I stayed quiet enough, small enough, nobody would bother noticing me at all.

"Raye Hart?"

I stopped dead.

A supervisor stood near the registration desk, eyes fixed on the tablet in his hands. "Over here."

My stomach tightened uncomfortably. So they'd remembered me today. Wonderful.

I walked toward him, forcing my shoulders back even though every part of me wanted to shrink. He checked the screen without looking up. "Combat assessment. Beginner division."

I blinked. Beginner? Something in me wanted to protest — I'd survived plenty on my own before Mooncrest ever knew my name — but then I remembered I had never officially trained anywhere. Maybe the label was fair. Maybe it wasn't, but arguing wouldn't change it.

"Your partner is waiting," the supervisor said, already pointing toward the nearest platform, done with me before I'd finished processing.

I followed his finger and found a tall boy standing there, arms crossed, radiating annoyance so plainly I could feel it from ten feet away. When I approached, he looked me up and down with obvious skepticism.

"You're Raye?"

I nodded.

He sighed like I'd personally ruined his morning. "Great."

I frowned at him. He noticed and uncrossed his arms just enough to gesture vaguely. "What?"

I shook my head, not trusting myself to say anything civil.

"Whatever," he muttered. "Let's just finish this."

I stepped onto the platform, pulse ticking up despite my best efforts to stay calm. The instructor approached, voice flat and bored. "Basic assessment. No advanced techniques. No intentional injury."

The boy smirked. "Easy enough."

I glanced at him sideways, something about his expression settling uncomfortably in my chest. It wasn't just that he was rude. It was the way he looked at me, like I was already a problem he'd been assigned to solve, a burden dropped onto his morning without his consent.

The instructor raised a hand. "Begin."

The boy moved first, fast, faster than I expected from someone that annoyed. I barely stepped aside before his fist passed close enough to my shoulder that I felt the air move. My eyes went wide.

He attacked again immediately. I blocked, and the impact traveled straight up through my arm, hard enough that I stumbled back a full step. A few students had already gathered near the platform edge, watching.

Someone laughed. "She's terrible."

My face burned instantly, humiliation curdling into something sharper in my chest.

The boy came at me a third time, and this time, this time something in me moved before I consciously decided anything. I turned. His fist sailed past where my head had been a heartbeat earlier, and my hand shot out and caught his wrist mid-motion.

For one long second, neither of us moved. I stared at his wrist in my grip, half-shocked at myself. He stared at me like I'd grown a second head.

Then I released him. He kept staring. I stared back, refusing to look away first even though every instinct told me to.

The instructor's eyebrows lifted, interest flickering across his otherwise bored expression. "Again."

The boy's smirk had vanished entirely. He attacked more carefully this time, no longer treating me like an easy formality to get through. I blocked. Stepped back. Blocked again. I wasn't winning, not by any measure, but I wasn't losing either, and that alone felt like something enormous.

My body seemed to know where his attacks were going a half-second before they landed, some instinct I couldn't explain and didn't fully trust. I didn't understand it. I just reacted, over and over, until the instructor finally lowered his hand.

"Enough."

The boy stepped back, breathing hard, sweat beading at his temple. I wasn't even winded. That seemed to unsettle him more than the assessment itself, I watched something shift in how he looked at me. Not kindness, exactly. Just a different kind of attention.

The instructor checked his tablet, frowning slightly. "Raye Hart..." He paused, looking up at me properly for the first time. "You've had combat training before."

I shook my head.

His eyebrows rose. "None at all?"

I shook my head again, firmer this time.

He studied me for a long moment, something calculating behind his eyes. "Interesting."

I lowered my gaze immediately. I hated that word. Interesting usually meant people were about to start asking questions I didn't have good answers for.

The supervisor walked over, glancing at the results on the tablet, expression unreadable. "Assessment complete." He frowned slightly at whatever he saw there. "You'll be assigned to the afternoon training group."

I nodded. That was it — no congratulations, no humiliation, just another student being sorted into a category. For some reason, that plain, uneventful outcome felt like a victory I hadn't dared hope for.

I stepped off the platform, and that's when I heard a familiar, entirely too-amused voice.

"Well, look at that."

I turned. Kael stood near the entrance, grinning like he'd just won a bet with himself. "Silent Wolf actually has claws."

I rolled my eyes, unable to help myself.

He walked closer, clearly delighted. "I knew it."

I pointed toward the door, silently ordering him away.

He laughed. "Your gestures are getting more aggressive, you know that?"

I pointed again, harder this time. He leaned in, mock-wounded. "Are you trying to tell me you missed me?"

I stared at him flatly, refusing to dignify that with a response.

He placed a hand dramatically over his heart. "I'm touched."

I almost smiled. Almost.

Then I noticed several students turning to look at us, whispers rippling outward through the crowd like water disturbed by a stone.

"That's her."

"The girl Cassian personally invited?"

"She was supposed to be assessed yesterday."

"Why is everyone suddenly making room for her?"

My smile disappeared instantly, replaced by a familiar, cold weight settling into my chest.

Kael noticed the shift immediately, his own expression sobering. "Don't listen to them," he said, quieter now. "They're just bored. People here get bored easily and start manufacturing drama out of nothing."

I shrugged, like it didn't matter. But I knew that wasn't the whole truth. Something had genuinely changed. Yesterday, nobody had cared enough to notice I existed at all. Today, everyone seemed to be noticing, all at once, and I wasn't at all sure which version of invisible I preferred.