Moonlight spilled across the courtyard stones, and at its edge stood the dire wolf. His fur shimmered white tipped with silver and streaked in faint blue, a beast of winter and shadow both. Golden eyes fixed on me from beneath the fringe of night.

Halven was alive. Safe. The fear that had haunted me for months, that I had lost him forever, finally loosened its grip. The relief came sharp, so fierce it almost hurt. Once, my heart had belonged to him, my first love, and I had given him up because my Moon Fae blood demanded it. That choice had never stopped aching. When the entities had claimed him, I had cursed myself a hundred times, convinced it was my fault for letting him go.

But tonight, he walked again, steadied by the friends I had fought beside to bring him home. He had Lo now. She held his hand, his heart, his future. And I was glad for him. Truly glad. Whatever we had shared belonged to the past.

Because my future stood before me.

Neir.

New but old, familiar as breath, yet only now fully mine. The other half of my soul. My soul half. I had lived for years believing I was whole, yet his presence proved I had been incomplete all along. With him, the world seemed sharper, steadier, as if everything inside me had finally clicked into its rightful place. Where Halven had been a love I could never keep, Neir was a love I was allowed. Moon Fae blood bound us both. Permission and destiny wove together.

Love was no longer forbidden. It was possible.

As I left the foyer and crossed the space to him, the wolf bowed his head. The solemnity of it twisted something in my chest, a vow of devotion bound into one quiet motion. Then he turned, powerful limbs carrying him toward the faculty wing, and without hesitation, I followed.

Confusion tugged at me, thinking he would take me back to the bridge, but the wolf’s stride never faltered. He climbed the inner stair that curled into one of the towers. The air pressed colder as we rose, night thick through arrow-slit windows.

Each step carried the same question: when would he change back? His body had burned with so much magic earlier. Maybe he lacked the strength to shift again. Maybe this was who he would remain for a while. The thought sank deep, heavy with doubt, yet still I followed the sway of his tail, the sure set of his paws.

At the landing he stopped before a heavy oak door. He nudged the steel handle with his nose and looked back at me. His gaze urged without words.

My hand wrapped around the chilled metal, and the door groaned open. We stepped together into a chamber shrouded in white sheets and stillness. I closed the door when Neir began to shift.

Light bent around him as his body reformed, bones reshaping with the slow inevitability of tide. Fur melted away, silver-gold light tracing his limbs until a man stood in the wolf’s place. Neir’s hair fell loose over his shoulders, dark and glinting, his skin luminous against the dimness. Naked, unashamed, as if the magic of the change itself had left no room for modesty.

Silence pooled in the chamber, broken only by his steady breathing, and my own heart hammering hard in the hollow space.

“Welcome to my chambers,” he said.

I barely dragged my eyes from his nakedness to take in the room, revealed in moonlight from the balcony. Sheets draped across the furniture, ghosting over chairs and shelves, a thin veil over a life never lived. Dust dulled the edges of what might once have been fine things. A bedframe pressed against the far wall but no mattress lay upon it, only a bare wooden slat hidden beneath linen. The chamber carried silence as if it had waited for someone to claim it and no one ever had.

My gaze traced the emptiness, the absence more telling than any presence. The chamber carried him, the same way the snow carried silence.

“You have quarters here.” My voice rose small in the hollow room. “Have you ever used them?”

He leaned back against the oak door, hair unbound from his shift into human form, chest bare, arms crossed as if the room meant nothing to him. “These were mine when I first came here. I do not sleep in them, and I’ve never lived here.”

A blaring truth pressed at my ribs until words pushed out of me. “You’re leaving again, aren’t you?”

He did not look away, no lie in his stance. “I am a guardian of magic. My place is nowhere.”

The hollowness of the chamber crept into me, empty shelves echoing inside my chest. The burn behind my eyes stung, traitorous.

He crossed the room, each step closing the silence until his hand framed my jaw. Warmth spread through the touch, firm, steady, grounding. “Come with me, Little Moon.”

Breath caught against the thought. Leave with him. Wander without walls or classrooms, without rules. I had never allowed the idea inside before. What life could I carve with the sliver of magic that belonged to me? Could I survive out there? Outside of Nythral?

Yet standing in that barren chamber, the thought of staying without him hollowed me deeper than the empty shelves around us. My lips parted, but he shook his head, thumb brushing my cheek before he kissed me. When he pulled back, we were both short on breath.

A plea shone in his golden eyes which turned into something like resolution. “Stay here. Finish your schooling. Learn what you can about your magic. I will return for you. When you graduate, I will take you with me. We will travel the world. You will see more magic than you ever imagined possible.”

The words lifted me and pressed me down all at once. Time apart stretched long and bleak, yet beyond that lay a horizon I had never considered. A life outside Nythral, a life on the road at his side, a life where adventure met me at every turn. With him, survival might not be survival at all but wonder.

“I never thought about life beyond this valley,” I whispered against his hand. “I am not even sure I could live it. My magic is small. My reach is nothing compared to others. But with you… it feels like an adventure. And I want that adventure.”

His gaze fixed on mine, silver shadows threading his golden irises.

“Then let the adventure begin tonight.” His hand slipped from my jaw, fingers lacing with mine. An earnest expression set on his face. “I love you, Rielle. I’ve never loved another like this, and I never will again. Let me claim you and make you mine.”

My heart raced with his words. At the beginning of this semester, I carried a broken heart, never believing I’d find love again so quickly. “I love you, too, Neir. But I don’t know what you mean by claiming me.”

“If I claim you, no other will touch you, and I will touch no other. It is something werewolves do. When we find our mate, there is no other for us for the rest our days.”

I liked that idea, because as crazy as it sounded, I only wanted Neir. So I nodded.

“Little Moon,” he said, something like awe in his voice. His thumb swept across my cheek. “I will ensure my claiming will hurt very little.”

My brows rose, a flicker of doubt, but his golden eyes held only devotion. Whatever fear lingered in me ebbed beneath that look.

He chuckled at my concern. “Come, let me show you what else our Moon magic can do.”

He drew me across the chamber and out onto the balcony. Wintermere opened before us, moonlight spreading silver over the frozen lake. I leaned against the balustrade, the cold stone grounding me while the glitter of ice carried me away.

Pressure brushed my shoulders. I tipped back into it only to meet empty air. My breath caught, confusion stirring until unseen hands guided me, turning me until my back pressed to the railing. Neir stood several steps away, unmoving, his chest rising steady, his eyes fixed on me with a golden fire that made my skin prickle. His hands remained at his sides.

“What’s happening,” I whispered, my voice trembling.

“You know so little of what your magic can do.” His words carried steady, his gaze never wavering.

“I do not have much to do anything with it.”

His head tilted, shadows making his hair darker. “You need none of it tonight. Not for what I want to do to you.”