Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Coaxing Pip out of the ventilation shaft took the better part of an hour.
Baylin had shifted back to human form almost immediately after she began searching for her companion.
The transformation was faster in reverse—his body seemed to know that the beast had served its purpose and was willing to retreat—but Pip didn’t care about the nuances of Vultor physiology.
All the little glider knew was that something large and terrifying had appeared in its safe space, and now it wanted nothing to do with any of them.
“Come on, Pip,” she called, reaching into the grate with a handful of dried fruit. “It’s me. You know me. Baylin isn’t going to hurt you, I promise.”
An angry chittering echoed from somewhere in the ductwork.
“He’s my friend now. Like you’re my friend. And friends don’t eat each other, remember? We talked about this when you tried to bite the plants in the greenhouse.”
More chittering. Slightly less angry.
He watched from across the room, keeping his distance. He’d put his pants back on and was doing his best to appear non-threatening. It wasn’t easy. Even in male form, he was large and scarred and probably still smelled like a predator.
“Come on,” she coaxed. “I have your favorite. The purple berries from the top shelf. The ones I’m not supposed to give you because they make you hyper.”
A small silver-gray head poked out of the grate. Luminous eyes fixed on the offered fruit, then flickered to him, then back to the fruit.
“That’s it. Just a little closer.”
The glider inched forward. Its whiskers twitched as it sniffed the berries.
“Good boy. See? Everything’s fine. Nothing to be scared of.”
Pip snatched the fruit and retreated into the duct immediately.
“Progress,” she said cheerfully. “He’ll come out eventually. He always does.”
She stood and brushed off her hands, apparently unconcerned by her companion’s continued retreat.
He admired her optimism even as he felt a twinge of guilt.
He shouldn’t have transformed. He shouldn’t have let himself lose control, even briefly.
Now the little creature that had been her only companion for years was cowering in the walls, traumatized by something he had done.
“Stop that,” she said.
He blinked. “Stop what?”
“Looking guilty.” She crossed the room towards him, bare feet silent on the stone floor.
“Pip will be fine. He got over the time I accidentally dropped a pot on his tail. He got over the time Ari activated the emergency lights and scared him so badly he didn’t come out for three days. He’ll get over this.”
“I shouldn’t have—”
“You should have.” She stopped in front of him, tilting her head back to meet his eyes. “I asked you to show me. You did. I don’t regret it, and neither should you.”
“My beast—”
“Is part of you. And I want to know all of you, remember?” She reached up and touched the scar on his face, her fingers gentle. “The male parts and the beast parts. The controlled parts and the wild parts. Everything.”
Something that had been wound tight for years suddenly loosened its grip.
He’d spent so long believing he had to hide what he was.
Believing that he had to suppress it and keep it leashed so that others wouldn’t be afraid.
Even his pack had valued his strength but feared his intensity.
His former alpha had used him as an enforcer precisely because his beast was more savage than most. And after Rykan left, after everything fell apart. ..
He’d been alone. For a long time. Because he’d convinced himself that alone was safer. That letting anyone close was a risk he couldn’t afford.
Now this strange, wonderful, impossible female was standing in front of him, asking to know him completely, and he didn’t know what to do with that.
“It’s late,” he said finally. His voice came out rough. “You should sleep.”
“Stay with me.”
“Liora—”
“Please.” She took his hand, her small fingers wrapping around his much larger ones. “I don’t want to be alone tonight. Not after everything that’s happened. Not when I finally have someone who—” She stopped, swallowing. “Please, Baylin. Just stay.”
He should have said no. His beast was still too close to the surface. His control was still too fragile. And every moment he spent with her made it harder to imagine walking away.
But she was looking at him with those wide blue eyes—trusting, hopeful, achingly vulnerable despite her bravery—and he found he couldn’t refuse her anything.
“All right,” he said. “I’ll stay.”
They settled onto the bed together, and for a while, neither of them spoke.
She curled against his side like she’d been doing it her whole life—one arm draped across his chest, her head resting in the hollow of his shoulder.
He kept his arm wrapped around her, overwhelmingly conscious of every place their bodies touched.
Of her warmth. Her softness. The trust implicit in the way she relaxed against him.
“I never thought I would have this,” she murmured eventually.
“Have what?”
“Someone to hold me.” Her fingers traced idle patterns on his chest. “In my books, there are always scenes like this. Two people together, just... being close. I used to wonder what it felt like. I used to lie in this bed alone and imagine there was someone beside me.”
His arm tightened around her involuntarily. The thought of her lying here night after night, year after year, with nothing but imaginary companions for comfort... it made his chest ache.
“You’re not alone anymore,” he said.
“No.” She smiled against his skin. “I’m not.”
Silence fell again. Outside the windows, the jungle hummed with nocturnal life—the calls of night birds, the rustle of creatures moving through the canopy, the distant roar of something large enough to command the darkness. Inside the tower, everything was still.
Her breathing gradually slowed and deepened. Her body grew heavy against his as sleep claimed her. But he remained awake, staring at the ceiling, his mind churning with thoughts he couldn’t silence.
His beast was quiet now, satisfied by Liora’s closeness. But it wasn’t gone. It was waiting. Watching. And every time he looked at her, every time he felt her warmth against him, it whispered the same word.
Mate.
He didn’t know what to do with that.
Vultor took mates for life. The bond, once formed, was unbreakable—a connection that went beyond love, beyond choice, into something instinctive and eternal.
His parents had been bonded. Rykan’s parents had been bonded, before the alpha’s first mate died and he’d made the political marriage that produced Rykan’s half-brother.
The bond was sacred, and once it took hold, there was no escaping it.
His beast believed Liora was his mate.
He wasn’t sure what he believed. He’d known her for a day.
Less than a day. Long enough to learn her smile, her curiosity, and her fierce determination to understand everything around her.
Long enough to feel the pull between them—the attraction that had sparked the moment he’d looked up and seen her standing on that balcony.
But a day wasn’t enough to build a life on. A day wasn’t enough to promise forever.
And yet...
He looked down at her sleeping face. At the way her lashes fanned across her cheeks, dark against pale skin. At the scatter of freckles across her nose. At the slight curve of her lips, as if she was dreaming about something pleasant.
He thought about how she’d touched his beast without fear. How she’d called him beautiful. How she’d asked him to show her everything, to hide nothing, to let her see the parts of himself he’d always believed were too much.
Maybe a day could be enough. Maybe time wasn’t the point. Maybe some connections transcended chronology, existing outside the normal rules of how relationships were supposed to develop.
Or maybe he was just a lonely fool, grasping at the first person to show him kindness in years.
Either way, it didn’t change what he knew he had to do. He had to help her escape this tower. Had to give her the freedom she’d been denied her entire life. Whatever happened after that—whether she still wanted him once she’d seen the world beyond these walls—that was her choice to make.
He wouldn’t take it from her.
His thoughts drifted backwards, as they often did in the quiet hours. Back to the pack. Back to Rykan. Back to everything he’d left behind.
Baylin, I need you to stay.
Rykan’s voice echoed in his memory, as clear as if they were standing together again on that mountain ridge, the pack’s territory spreading out below them.
The pack needs someone steady. Someone they can trust. With me gone, Lysara will...
Rykan hadn’t finished that sentence. He hadn’t needed to. They’d both known what Lysara was capable of. What she’d already done.
So he had stayed. He’d watched his best friend walk away—exiled by his own stepmother, betrayed by the female who should have been his mate—and he’d stayed behind to pick up the pieces.
For a while, it had worked. The pack had needed him.
The younger warriors looked up to him, the elders trusted him, and even Lysara had been forced to acknowledge his value.
He’d been the glue holding everything together after Rykan’s departure, the steady presence that kept the pack from splintering into factions.
But Lysara was patient. And she was cunning. And she had plans that didn’t include a loyal enforcer who remembered what the pack used to be.
It started small. Little requests that pushed the boundaries of what he considered honorable. Collecting debts from families who couldn’t pay. Intimidating rivals who hadn’t actually done anything wrong. Enforcing rules that seemed designed more to benefit Lysara than to protect the pack.
He’d resisted. Questioned. Pushed back.
And then came the day she’d ordered him to kill an innocent man.
A trader from outside the territory who had stumbled across something Lysara didn’t want anyone to know.
The man had done nothing wrong. Had simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time.
And Lysara had looked at Baylin with those cold, calculating eyes and told him to make the problem disappear.
He’d refused.
The fallout had been swift and brutal. Suddenly the pack he’d sacrificed everything for turned against him.
Suddenly the warriors he’d trained and fought beside were looking at him like an enemy.
Suddenly staying meant becoming something he couldn’t live with.
There were those who supported him, but they were too few and too scared of Lysara to speak in his defense.
So he’d left.
Like Rykan before him, he’d walked away from everything he’d ever known. He’d spent the years since then wandering. Trying to find a new purpose, a new home, a reason to keep moving forward.
He’d told himself it was the right choice. The honorable choice. That walking away rather than letting Lysara use him against innocent people was the only option his conscience could accept.
But late at night, when the darkness pressed in and there was no one to hear, the guilt still whispered.
You abandoned them. The young ones. The families. The people who needed you to stay and fight.
You left them to her.
You could have done more.
He should have found another way. He should have challenged Lysara directly. He should have rallied the pack against her, exposed her schemes, fought for the home and people that mattered instead of just... leaving.
But he’d been tired. So tired. Tired of fighting battles that never ended, of holding together something that kept trying to fall apart, of being strong for everyone else when he had nothing left for himself.
So he’d run. And the pack he’d sworn to protect had been left to Lysara’s tender mercies.
He didn’t know what had happened to them since.
He didn’t know if the young warriors he’d trained were still alive, if the families he’d protected were still safe, or if anything remained of the place that had once been home.
He’d deliberately avoided any news, any contact, anything that might make the guilt worse.
It was cowardice. He knew that. But some wounds were too deep to probe, some failures too complete to face.
Liora stirred against him, murmuring something in her sleep. He tightened his arm around her, anchoring himself to the present.
This was different. This was a chance to do something right. To help someone who needed him, to free a prisoner who deserved to see the world, to be the protector he’d always wanted to be instead of the weapon others had tried to make him.
He wouldn’t fail her the way he’d failed his pack.
Whatever it took, whatever the cost, he would find a way to give Liora her freedom.
His beast rumbled in agreement.
Protect mate. Keep mate safe. Always.
He closed his eyes and let sleep finally claim him, his arms wrapped around the female who had somehow, impossibly, become the center of his fractured world. Just before he drifted off, Pip hopped up on the bed and settled against the curve of his neck.