Chapter 7
Tess
I woke slowly, wrapped in warmth and the steady rhythm of Mason's heartbeat beneath my cheek.
"Good morning." His voice was rough with sleep, vibrating through his chest where my hand rested.
I tilted my head back to look at him, blinking slowly. He was already watching me, dark eyes soft in a way that caught my breath. My tank top had ridden up sometime in the night, and his thumb traced lazy circles against the bare skin of my hip, just above the waistband of my shorts.
His other hand had drifted up while we slept.
His fingers rested against my left shoulder—over the mark.
Not tracing it, not asking anything of it.
Just there. The mate mark hummed faintly under his touch, the bond settling between us.
I'd stopped noticing it the way I'd stopped noticing my own heartbeat—it was just part of being in his arms now.
"Morning," I managed, my voice coming out scratchy.
This. This was what I'd needed after everything.
After the trial, the accusations, after my world had tilted sideways and refused to right itself.
Last night, Mason had shown up at my door without a word, took one look at my face, and pulled me into his arms. What followed had been grounding.
Physical. The kind of intimate comfort that left me boneless and finally able to sleep without my thoughts eating me alive.
I pressed closer, letting myself have this moment. Just a little longer.
"We did it," I said quietly. "We're actually Riders now."
Mason's chest expanded with a deep breath. "Yeah." His arm tightened around me. "We are."
I traced the edge of his collarbone, following the line of an old scar. "You can protect Kali properly now. No one can take that from you."
His eyes softened, and my heart ached. He'd fought so hard for this. Not for glory or recognition, but for the authority to keep his sister safe. To never be powerless again.
"And you found your place," he said. "Where you belong."
Where I belong. The words settled into my chest. Clicked into place. The Library. The Guild. This strange, complicated family I'd stumbled into. For the first time in my life, I wasn't fighting to prove I deserved to exist in a space. I just... did.
"We just have to finish the semester," I said. "That's it. We're so close."
Mason made a low sound of agreement, his fingers threading through my hair. The motion was soothing, the touch that said I'm here without needing words.
Which, of course, made me think about the one person who wasn't here.
"Kane's the reason you're free." The words slipped out before I could stop them. "He got you and Kali out of that place."
Mason's hand stilled in my hair. Just for a moment. Then he resumed the gentle motion.
"I know."
"That's what makes this so—" I struggled for the right word. "It's not just that he hurt me. It's that he was yours first. Your friend. The person who saved you."
Mason pulled me closer, his arm a solid band across my back. "He was. And what he did at that trial..." He exhaled slowly. "I don't understand it. I don't know how to make it fit with the person I thought he was."
I pressed my forehead against his shoulder, breathing him in. "The things he said. In front of everyone." My voice came out smaller than I wanted. "Like I was nothing. Like everything we'd been through together was just—convenient."
His hand cupped the back of my head. "You're not nothing."
"I know." I did know. Mostly. "But it still..."
"Hurts," he finished quietly.
"Yeah."
We lay there in silence for a moment. His thumb traced the nape of my neck, and I let myself sink into the comfort of it.
"I'm not waiting for him," I said finally. The decision hardened as I spoke it aloud. "I'm not going to sit around hoping he apologizes or explains or fixes this. I'm moving forward. Training. The team. The work. That's what matters now."
Mason was quiet for a long moment. When I looked up, his expression was conflicted.
"Okay," he said. "Then that's what we do."
"You don't have to choose," I added quickly. "I know it's messy. I know what he did for you—"
"Tess." He shifted, rolling us so he was propped above me, one hand braced beside my head. His gaze was steady. "I'm here. With you. Whatever else happens, that doesn't change."
My throat tightened. "Mason..."
"We're in this together." He lowered his head, pressing his forehead to mine. "You and me."
When he kissed me, it was soft at first.
But the mate bond had other ideas.
The heat started in my chest, spreading outward—that golden thread between us pulling taut, demanding more. I gasped against his mouth, and he swallowed the sound, deepening the kiss until I couldn't think, couldn't breathe, couldn't do anything but arch into him and—
His hands. His mouth. The weight of him pressing me into the mattress.
Everything else could wait.
Later that afternoon, I knocked on Anya's door with my heart in my throat and a speech rehearsed in my head. Something about how bonding wasn't everything, how her magic was extraordinary, how the dragons didn't define her worth—
The door opened, and every word evaporated.
Anya stood there looking... fine. More than fine. Calm. Grounded. Her dark hair fell in loose waves over her shoulders, and her violet eyes held none of the devastation I'd braced myself to meet.
"Tess." She stepped aside. "I was wondering when you'd come."
Her room was exactly what I should have expected—dark fabrics, protective charms hanging from the ceiling, candles that flickered with something other than ordinary flame.
She moved to a small table where a kettle already sat warming, pouring tea into two cups without asking if I wanted any.
"I—" I started, then stopped. My prepared speech felt ridiculous now. "I thought you'd be..."
"Devastated?" She handed me a cup. The ceramic was warm against my palms. "Sit."
I sat on the edge of her bed, feeling off-balance. "Bonding is what everyone came here for."
"It's one thing I came here for." Anya settled into a chair across from me, tucking her legs beneath her.
"I came to prove that necromancy has value beyond fear.
That my magic isn't something to be hidden or ashamed of.
" She sipped her tea. "The Training Partner Initiative means I stay.
I continue my work. I'm at peace with the path I'm on. "
I stared at her. "You're serious."
"Did you expect me to weep into your shoulder?"
"Maybe a little," I admitted.
Amusement flickered across her face. "I won't pretend it didn't sting. Watching the dragons choose, knowing none of them would look at me." She set her cup down. "But I've spent my whole life being the one people look away from. This isn't new."
"Anya—"
"Don't." Her voice sharpened, just slightly. "Don't shrink your win to spare my feelings. You did something extraordinary in that arena. The dragons chose you. All of them. Don't you dare apologize for that."
My throat tightened. The impulse to deflect rose automatically—to say it wasn't that big a deal, that I'd just gotten lucky, that anyone could have—
I'd been doing that my whole life. Making myself smaller. Less threatening. Less visible. Hoping that if I took up less space, people wouldn't have a reason to hurt me.
And here was Anya, who had every reason to resent me, refusing to let me hide.
"I was afraid you'd resent me," I said quietly.
"I know." Her expression softened. "I don't."
We sat in silence for a moment, the candles throwing shadows across the walls. Then Anya leaned forward, her eyes narrowing.
"What I do resent is Kane. And the fact that you'll have to see him every single day now."
The name landed.
My chest clenched. I'd been so focused on not waiting for an apology that would never come, that I hadn't let myself think about the practical reality. Training sessions. Guild meetings. Passing him in hallways.
"Mason said something similar," I managed. "But that's his own thing to wrestle with. Mason's trying to reconcile that his best friend is the person who stood beside Silvius and watched me get dismissed like I was nothing."
"Mason has his own history with Kane," Anya said, her voice sharp. "His own loyalty. But you don't owe Kane the same grace. What he did—standing there silent while his father tried to humiliate you—that was a choice. And you get to be angry about it."
I looked down at my tea. "I am angry."
"Good."
"But I'm also—" I stopped. Tried again. "I don't want to give him that power. To let what he did define how I show up. I'm not going to spend every training session wondering if he regrets it, or hoping he'll explain, or—"
"Or waiting for him to become the person you thought he was," Anya finished.
"Yeah."
The door burst open.
Pippa swept in carrying a bag of snacks that looked like it weighed more than she did, her red curls bouncing with every step. "I knew you'd be here! Anya, I brought those honey cakes you pretend you don't like, and Tess, I have chocolate because obviously—"
She stopped mid-step, reading the room. "Oh. We're having a Serious Conversation. About Kane?"
"We were," Anya said dryly.
"Perfect." Pippa dumped the bag on Anya's bed and flopped down beside me. "Because I've been thinking."
"Dangerous," Anya murmured.
Pippa ignored her, grabbing a honey cake. "The dragons didn't just take your side, Tess. They made a statement. All of them. Together."
I blinked at the sudden shift. My brain was still half-stuck on Kane, on the reality of seeing him tomorrow and the day after and the day after that. But Pippa's words pulled me into something bigger.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"I mean dragons don't do that." Pippa bit into the cake with aggressive enthusiasm. "They don't make political moves. But what happened in that arena? That was coordinated. Deliberate."
Anya's expression shifted, thoughtful now. "A warning."
"To Silvius," Pippa agreed. "To the Council. To anyone who thought they could control the bonding process."
The weight of it settled over me.
They'd done more than support me. They'd rejected Silvius's authority. Publicly. In front of the entire Guild, the Omnium representatives, every faction leader who'd come to witness the Final Trial.
That wasn't just a bonding. That was a declaration.
My chest tightened. This wasn't just about proving I belonged here anymore. This was about what the dragons had decided I represented—and what that meant for the people who'd spent centuries maintaining control.
The room felt different now. I set my tea down, my pulse quickening.
But it was also terrifying.
"This is bigger than Guild politics," I said slowly.
"Much bigger," Anya agreed.
"Which makes the Training Partner Initiative even more suspicious." Pippa pulled her knees up, wrapping her arms around them. "Silvius loses control of the bonding ceremony, and suddenly there's a new program placing unbonded applicants across Guild operations? Hours later?"
"It could be genuine," I said, though I didn't believe it. "A way to keep talented people who didn't bond."
Pippa gave me a look. "With Selena and Valen participating? Tess. Come on."
"Surveillance," Anya said flatly. "At best. Or just a desperate attempt to keep the Council donors happy by not sending their kids home empty-handed."
"Either way, we're being watched." Pippa's voice lost its usual brightness. "Lord Beaumont's been circling the Guild for years. He's Lucien Voss's right hand—you know, the vampire representative on the Omnium? Beaumont does the dirty work. Voss keeps his hands clean."
Beaumont. The name clicked into place—the vampire who'd stood behind Silvius during my trial, watching the proceedings with those pitch-black eyes. Patriarch of the Beaumont line.
"Wait," I said. "Valen's last name is Beaumont."
Pippa pointed at me. "Grandson. So having him on your team? That's not a coincidence."
I wanted to argue. To believe that the Training Partner Initiative was exactly what it claimed to be. But the timing was too perfect. The participants too pointed.
"So what's the play?" I asked. "What are they actually trying to accomplish?"
No one answered.
"We'll know more Monday," Anya finally said.