Elvira POV
The packhouse is a rustic hellhole, all creaking wooden beams and howling wolves that grate on my nerves like claws on stone. My room is the only concession to civilization, opulent silk drapes the colour of midnight frame the tall window, a massive four-poster bed swathed in imported French linens that slide against my skin like a lover’s whisper, a wardrobe bursting with dresses that cling to every curve like they were sewn on. But even here, it’s a gilded cage. The walls press in with suffocating scents of the pack – earth, loyalty and that insufferable wildflower stink that clings to her. The potion sloshing in my false belly keeps up the charade, its acrid bitterness mimicking the faint milky scent of a pup to fool their damned noses. But it’s a fragile illusion, one wrong
