Wildborn

Paths

The link opened easily, soft as breath.

Riona’s mind link response was immediate. You can speak freely, darling. Ivy’s a friend.

Bri’s gaze flicked toward the older woman. Ivy’s hands moved smoothly, stirring another pot without looking up.

A friend? Bri asked silently. Since when?

Riona’s reply came with faint laughter. Since before you were even a thought in your mother’s eye. Ivy and I are of the same order, though I’ve let the title sleep for some years. And more than that really.

Order?

We are Aethercallers, Brielle. Hollowbinders, yes, but of a particular branch. We interpret what others only sense. The veil whispers, and we answer.

Bri’s hands stilled. The spoon clinked against the bowl. “Aethercallers,” she said aloud. “Mystics and… spiritual intermediaries?”

Ivy’s smile was faint but approving. “I was wondering when I’d have to stop eavesdropping. You’ve been studying your classifications, I see.”

Bri blinked. “Eavesdropping?”

Ivy tilted her head toward the bowl Bri had been stirring. “You and your grandma have been having quite the conversation. Hard not to listen when it’s happening three feet away.”

Bri’s eyes widened. Eira… can she hear us?

Ivy’s smile deepened just slightly. “Yes,” she added gently, “I can hear that too.”

Heat crept up Bri’s neck. “That feels… mildly invasive.”

“Only when invited,” Ivy said easily. “Wildborn minds don’t exactly whisper.”

Bri froze. “Wildborn—”

Riona gave a soft, amused hum from her chair. “Careful, Ivy.”

Ivy only lifted a shoulder. “What? She already knows she isn’t ordinary. She should know we aren't ordinary”

Bri looked between them. “You two talk like this is all perfectly normal.”

“For us,” Riona said lightly, “it is.”

Ivy leaned back against the workbench, her amber eyes warm. “Your grandmother and I have been Kindred for a very long time.”

Riona’s smile softened, something ancient flickering behind it. “Long enough that arguing over who is older stopped being productive centuries ago.”

Ivy snorted. “You’re still older.”

Bri stared at them both. “I feel like I just stepped into the middle of a story no one bothered to explain.”

Riona’s gaze softened. “You did.”

"Well, I only know what Sera mentioned about you being an Aethercaller the first time I came here, and even that was brief. Is it… secret?”

Riona’s mouth curved in a faint smile. “Not secret. Selective. They’re watching you, child. Weighing who and what you are before deciding what to tell you.”

“Why?”

“Because potential makes people nervous,” Ivy said softly.

“Perhaps,” Riona said evenly, “it’s time you heard it plain.”

Ivy gestured with her spoon, marking each point with rhythmic precision. “Five primary Paths derive from the Lumen Praxis. Each draws different strengths from the bond between wolf and spirit.”

“The Lunarch Path,” Riona began, “trains leaders, tacticians, and strategists. Alphas, Lunas, and Betas, those who command through presence and vision. They shape the pack’s future, for better or worse.”

“Governance and charisma,” Ivy added. “But also burden. The weight of every decision.”

"And Lunarch Path's take chosen mates from among other Lunarch students."

Bri nodded slowly. She could assume who some of the Lunarch students were; Sera, Soriah, the Alpha's son. She wasn’t one of them.

“The Veilguard,” Riona continued, “are our defenders. Warriors, Gammas, Deltas. The shield wall of the pack. They stand between the world and what would undo it.”

Bri pictured Delta Vincenzo's advanced group and Gamma Matteo's son, Galen, disciplined, lethal, fierce.

“Then come the Hollowbinders,” Ivy said, eyes glinting. “Healers, lorekeepers, nurturers. We mend what others break, but we also remember what must never be forgotten. Among us, some hear more than the physical, those are the Aethercallers.”

Riona chuckled softly. “Ivy is this pack's only Aethercaller. The only one in over 100 years."

"How old are you?" Bri asked.

"A lady never reveals her age," Ivy sassed.

Bri smiled despite herself.

“The fourth,” Ivy continued, “is the Umbral Stride, the unseen. Scouts, spies, shadow-walkers. They keep our secrets safe and uncover those of our enemies. They’re independence given form.”

Bri thought briefly of some of her advanced combat peers, and their uncanny ability to vanish between shadows during training.

“And last,” Riona said, her voice softening, “the Hearthbound Path. Omegas. The quiet ones. Craftsmen, cooks, builders, those who hold the world together while everyone else chases glory. They feed and mend and remind us what we fight for.”

Ivy’s eyes softened. “Never underestimate the Hearthbound. Their steadiness is worth more than twice the political power plays.”

Bri let the information settle. “And the Lumen Praxis decides where we belong?”

“The Lumen answers resonance, not preference,” Riona explained. “It calls what matches your nature. The choice is never yours.”

Bri looked down at the half-finished infusion mixture on the table. “What if I’m chosen wrong?”

Riona’s eyes softened. “The Lumen Praxis never errs, though it often confuses. You may not like its reflection, but it will always show truth.”

Ivy leaned forward slightly, her voice quieter still. “The ones marked highest, five to ten percent of every cohort, are called the Moonmarked. The trials bend for them. Elders whisper their names afterward. They say such wolves shift the very air around them.”

Bri swallowed hard. “And what happens to them?”

“They bear the weight of legacy,” Riona said. “a designation that carries both prestige and pressure. The Moonmarked are seen as future leaders and protectors sometimes outside of pack hierarchy. These students often carry bloodlines of the old families.

Then Riona’s expression turned unreadable. “Well sometimes they do. Sometimes it’s something older.”

The fire crackled between them.

Bri's thoughts turned back to the man beneath the fig tree. Of how he’d said her name like he’d spoken it a thousand times before.

"My Stormborn Sentinel,” he’d called her.

She shivered.

Ivy noticed. “You’re pale. Something troubling you?”

Bri hesitated, then decided truth was safer than silence. “Well, what I started to tell Grandma. I’ve been having… dreams. One dream really. Of a man I don’t recognize. He calls me Brielle, says strange things, like he called me his child, and his Stormborn Sentinel.”

The reaction was immediate. Ivy froze. Riona’s hand tightened on the armrest of the chair she was sitting in.

“Describe him,” Ivy said quietly.

“Golden skin, dark curls, clothes like something from centuries ago. His eyes felt… old.”

Riona exhaled, slow and deliberate. “Ivy?”

Bri frowned. “What? Who is he?”

Riona’s expression softened into something between reverence and worry. “The name you heard, ‘the Stormborn Sentinel’ isn’t new. It belongs to an ancient wolf. A name lost to time."

“For now?” Ivy interrupted. “You study. You train. You let the Praxis reveal what it will. And you tell only your Grandma and I if you have any more dreams.”

By the time the lesson ended, dusk had deepened into indigo. The fire burned low, painting the cabin in amber light. Ivy pressed a small jar of salve into Bri’s hand, a blend she’d helped make that day.

“For your hands,” she said. “And your thoughts, if they sting too much.”

Riona chuckled softly. “Poetic as ever.”

Bri managed a smile. “Thank you, both of you.”

Outside, the air had turned cool. She started down the path alone, her boots crunching softly against gravel. The path to the packhouse stretched before her, silvered by moonlight. She pulled her sweater tighter as she walked, her thoughts restless.

Sera hadn’t said what Luna Isabella needed. Grandma hadn’t explained what seemed like a deep connection to Ivy, and to this pack. Ivy and Riona had spoken of Paths and prophecy like things already written.

And soon, the Lumen Praxis would choose for her.

Bri looked up at the sliver of moon through the trees and wondered, not what she wanted to become, but what the world had already decided she was.

The night offered no answer, only silence.