Claimed by Alpha and Beta: The Silent Wolf

2: Breathe

RAYE'S POV

The crash tore through the classroom before anyone could brace for it, glass shrieking, something heavy slamming against the frame, students jerking upright in a wave of gasps and scraping chairs.

My body reacted before my mind caught up. I dropped beneath the desk, knees hitting stone, heart hammering so violently I could feel it in my teeth.

*Not again. Not that sound. Not—*

"Raye!"

Lila dropped down beside me instantly, her voice slicing through the roaring in my ears. "Hey. It's okay. Look at me."

I couldn't hear her properly. My hands flew to my ears, pressing hard, like I could physically shove the noise back out of my skull. Too loud. Too many bodies. Too much air pressing in on me from every direction at once.

"Raye, look at me. Please."

I forced my eyes toward her, vision swimming. She held my face gently between both hands, steady in a way I desperately needed.

"It's a training drone," she said, slow and clear. "That's all. Just a drone. Nothing's after you."

I blinked, dragging my gaze toward the window. A shattered academy drone lay crumpled against the glass, sparking faintly. Nothing more. No danger. No threat.

My body didn't care what my eyes told it. My breathing stayed ragged, uneven, refusing to cooperate no matter how hard I tried to force it back under control.

Footsteps approached, measured, unhurried, deliberate.

Cassian crouched a few feet away, level with me, his expression carved from careful stillness.

"Everyone stay seated," he said to the room, without turning.

Then his eyes found mine. No pity in them. No fear. Just steady, unshaken focus, like I was the only person in the room worth looking at.

"Raye."

I looked at him, chest heaving.

"Breathe."

One word. Simple. Solid as stone.

I followed the sound of his voice instead of the panic clawing up my throat.

In.

Out.

Again.

Slowly, impossibly, my heartbeat began to unknot itself.

Cassian rose to his feet, and for one absurd second I nearly reached out to stop him, to keep whatever steadiness he'd handed me from walking away with him.

"Professor." Marcus's voice, smug even now, cutting through the settling quiet. "Is she always this helpless?"

The room went dead silent.

Cassian turned. Slowly. The temperature in the room seemed to drop several degrees along with him.

The smirk vanished off Marcus's face like it had never existed.

"Say that again," Cassian said. Quiet. Even quieter than before. Somehow far more dangerous for it.

Marcus swallowed audibly. "I — I was joking."

"Then I'd suggest," Cassian said, voice like a blade wrapped in velvet, "you learn better jokes. Immediately."

Nobody laughed this time. Marcus lowered his head, ears burning red, and said nothing else.

Cassian's gaze returned to me. For one suspended moment, the classroom, the shattered window, the entire world seemed to fall away again, leaving only the two of us and the memory neither of us had ever spoken aloud.

He had saved me once, years ago, when saving me cost him something I never fully understood. And now he'd calmed an entire panic attack without laying a single hand on me, just his voice, steady as a held breath, cutting straight through the noise in my head.

And that terrified me far more than Marcus, or the drone, or the crash, ever could.

Because the more Cassian noticed me, the harder it became to keep pretending I didn't still care. That I hadn't spent years quietly rebuilding a version of myself around the shape he'd left behind.

I lowered my head, fingers trembling beneath the desk.

Class ended in a blur I barely registered. Lila steered me out into the corridor, one hand firm on my elbow like she thought I might bolt.

"You want to talk about it?" she asked, the second we were out of earshot.

I shot her a look.

"Right. Stupid question." She huffed a laugh, but her eyes stayed serious, searching my face for cracks. "You want to write about it, then?"

I hesitated — actually hesitated, notebook halfway out of my bag — before shoving it back in and shaking my head.

"Raye." She stopped walking, forcing me to stop too. "That wasn't nothing back there. You went somewhere. I could see it."

I looked away. "You don't have to tell me everything," she said, softer now, all the teasing drained out of her voice. "But don't pretend it was fine. Not with me."

I swallowed hard, throat tight, and pulled the notebook back out after all.

“It sounded like the night I got bit,” I wrote, hand shaking slightly. “The crash. The glass.”

Lila read it twice. Her jaw tightened, something fierce and protective flashing across her face.

"Okay," she said quietly. "Okay. Thank you for telling me."

I nodded, throat burning, and closed the notebook before I could write anything else, before I could write his name.

We rounded the corner toward the courtyard, and I nearly walked straight into him.

Cassian stood there, arms crossed, clearly waiting.

Lila froze beside me. "Uh. I just remembered I have somewhere to be. Anywhere. Immediately." She practically evaporated down the hallway, throwing me an entirely unsubtle grin over her shoulder as she went.

Traitor.

I turned back to Cassian, pulse hammering all over again for entirely different reasons than the drone.

"You handled that well," he said. "Considering."

I shrugged, noncommittal, refusing to let him see how much the compliment landed.

"You don't have to pretend with me, Raye."

My eyes snapped up at that. Something hot and defensive flared in my chest, and before I could stop myself, I pulled the notebook out and scrawled hard enough to nearly tear the page.

*You don't get to say that. You left.*

He read it. Something flickered across his face — guilt, maybe, or something closer to regret — before it smoothed back into careful control.

"I had reasons."

I wrote faster this time, anger loosening something in me that fear usually kept locked down tight.

“Everyone always has reasons. I still ended up alone.”

His jaw tightened. For a long moment he said nothing, and I almost turned to walk away, almost let the silence be the last word, the way it always was.

Then he spoke, low and rough, like the words cost him something.

"I never stopped watching out for you. Even when I couldn't be here."

I stared at him, chest aching, notebook forgotten in my hand.

"That invitation," he said. "The one that got you into Mooncrest. That was me."

My breath caught. "I know it made things harder for you," he continued. "The Omega registration, the whispers, all of it. I didn't think it through. I just knew I wanted you somewhere I could—"

He stopped himself, jaw working, like he'd nearly said something he hadn't meant to.

"Somewhere you could what?" I mouthed the words silently, lips shaping them even though no sound came, daring him to finish the sentence.

His eyes dropped to my mouth, then back up to my eyes, something unreadable and intense burning behind his composed expression.

"Somewhere I could keep an eye on you," he said finally. "Properly, this time."

The courtyard around us seemed to hold its breath.

I didn't know whether to be furious that he'd rearranged my entire life without asking, or something far more dangerous and warm that I refused to name.

Before I could decide which, a voice rang out across the courtyard, sharp and delighted and entirely unwelcome.

"Well, well. Professor Cassian and the silent wolf. Isn't this cozy."

We both turned. Marcus stood at the courtyard entrance, flanked by two Born Wolves I didn't recognize, smirk firmly back in place, and behind him, unmistakably, stood someone wearing the Dean's crest.

Cassian's expression shuttered instantly, professional and distant, the warmth from seconds ago gone like it had never existed.

But it was too late.

The Dean's eyes moved between us, sharp and assessing, and I felt the ground shift beneath me all over again, the way it had the moment the window shattered, except this time, there was no training drone to blame.

This time, the danger was real.