6. Stellan
STELLAN
The beast is changing.
I've lived with the morveth for fifteen years, learned its rhythms and triggers and the particular way it hums beneath my thoughts like distant thunder.
I know what it feels like when it's hungry for violence, when it's straining against my control, when it's waiting just beneath the surface for something to crack.
I know the beast the way you know an old enemy who shares your skin.
But I don't know this.
Esmerelda is sitting beside me in the hallway near my post, her shoulder almost touching mine, close enough that I can smell her perfume and feel the warmth radiating from her body.
She's telling me about a case from work, something about a family she helped reunite after years of separation, her voice soft and animated as she describes the moment the mother saw her children again.
It's the kind of story she tells when she wants to remind herself why she does what she does, and I've learned to recognize the particular cadence of it, the way she lights up when she talks about people finding their way back to each other.
The beast should be restless with her this close.
Every instinct I've developed over fifteen years says proximity is danger, that letting anyone this near is an invitation to disaster.
But instead of straining, the beast is settled.
Instead of hungry, it's content. It lies quiet in my chest, watching her through my eyes, and when another brother walks past and his gaze lingers on her a moment too long, it growls.
Not at her. For her.
The realization makes my hands shake. I count to seven, grounding myself, and Esmerelda notices because she notices everything.
"You're doing it again," she says, pausing her story. "The counting."
"Sorry."
"Don't be sorry. I'm just curious." She tilts her head, studying me with those warm brown eyes. "Why seven? You told me once that seven is your favorite number, but you said you didn't know why."
I lied. The words surface in my mind, unbidden and undeniable.
I lied because the truth is too heavy, too personal, too much to share with someone I barely knew.
But I know Esmerelda now, or I'm starting to.
Six days of conversations, of coffee and patience and the slow, careful process of being seen. She's earned more than my lies.
"I didn't tell you the truth," I say, and my voice comes out rougher than I intend.
She doesn't flinch, doesn't pull away. Just waits, patient as always, giving me space to find the words.
"My sister died on the seventh of March." The sentence feels like a stone in my throat, heavy and painful. "Fifteen years ago. She was sixteen. I count to seven when I need to remember her."
The silence that follows is different from the silences we usually share.
This one is heavier, loaded with the weight of what I've just given her.
I watch her face, looking for the pity I've learned to expect, the discomfort that comes when people don't know what to say to grief that's this old and this raw.
Instead, I see something else. Understanding. Compassion. A grief that matches my own, not for Mira specifically, but for the loss itself, for the years of counting and remembering and trying to hold onto someone who's been gone for so long.
"Stellan," she says, and my name in her mouth sounds like something sacred.
"I'm not good at this." The words spill out before I can stop them. "Talking. Being known. I've spent so long keeping everyone at a distance that I don't know how to do anything else."
"You're doing fine."
"I'm terrified."
She doesn't ask what I'm afraid of. Maybe she already knows. Instead, she reaches out and puts her hand on my arm, just like she did days ago, that same light touch that shouldn't mean anything and means everything.
"You don't have to be good at it," she says quietly. "You just have to want to try."
"You make me want to." The confession comes out before I can swallow it back, and I feel my face heat with something that might be embarrassment.
"I don't understand it. I've spent fifteen years building walls, and you walk through them like they're nothing.
You see me counting and asking why. You bring me coffee and food and conversation like it's the most natural thing in the world, like I'm someone worth taking care of. "
"You are."
"I'm not?—"
"Stellan." Her voice is firm, gentle. "You are."
The beast stirs in my chest, and for one terrifying moment I think this is it, this is where the control breaks, where I ruin everything by reaching for her the way I've wanted to reach for days.
But the stirring isn't rage. It isn't hunger.
It's something else entirely, something that feels almost like contentment, like the beast is settling more deeply into quiet because she's here, because she's close, because she's looking at me like I'm worth seeing.
She smiles, and the beast purrs.
I didn't know it could do that. I didn't know I had anything inside me that could make that sound.
"I should go," she says after a moment, squeezing my arm before releasing it. "The others will wonder where I am."
"Same time tomorrow?"
The question comes out before I can stop it, needy and hopeful in a way that makes me want to count to seven hundred. But Esmerelda just smiles wider, and something warm blooms in my chest.
"Same time tomorrow," she agrees.
I watch her walk back toward the common room, her copper-streaked hair catching the light, and I feel like something fundamental has shifted inside me.
For fifteen years, I've been convinced that the beast is all I am.
That the violence inside me defines me, limits me, makes me unworthy of connection.
But Esmerelda doesn't look at me and see a monster.
She looks at me and sees a man who counts to seven to remember his sister.
Maybe that's what I am, too. Maybe I've always been both.
Marcus finds me an hour later.
The kid appears out of nowhere, that ridiculous grin on his face, and drops onto the floor beside my post like we're old friends sharing a quiet moment.
I should tell him to get back to his rotation.
I should maintain the distance that's kept everyone safe from me for fifteen years.
Instead, I just look at him, this twenty-three-year-old sunshine in a club full of storm clouds, and I feel something dangerously close to affection.
"Heard you're actually talking to someone," he says. "Historic."
"Don't you have a post?"
"Rotation ended. Wanted to check on the big guy." He leans back against the wall, stretching out his legs. "She's good for you. The whole club can see it."
"There's nothing to see."
"Sure there isn't." Marcus's grin widens. "You've been lighter the last few days, you know that? Less brooding. Almost approachable. I overheard Elias say you were 'practically pleasant' this morning, and I thought Barrett was going to have a stroke."
I don't have a response to that. The idea that my brothers have noticed the change in me, that they're talking about it, makes something uncomfortable twist in my chest.
"It's a good thing," Marcus continues, reading my silence correctly.
"You've been alone for too long. We've all seen it, even if none of us were brave enough to do anything about it.
" He pauses, something more serious flickering behind his amber eyes.
"When you pull your head out of your ass and actually claim her, invite me to the party. "
"You're optimistic."
"Someone has to be." He bumps his shoulder against my arm, the casual physical contact that he's always offered and I've never known how to receive. "This war isn't going to last forever. When it's over, maybe you can have something good. Maybe you deserve something good."
I think about Kira's warning, about Kieran's blessing, about the beast purring in my chest when Esmerelda smiles. I think about fifteen years of isolation and the slow, terrifying process of letting someone in.
"Maybe," I say, and it sounds almost like hope.
Marcus grins like I've given him a gift. "That's the spirit. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go annoy Roman about something. Keep him on his toes."
He pulls himself to his feet, brushing off his jeans, and I watch him go with something heavy settling in my chest. Marcus has been trying to reach me for two years, cracking jokes at the empty space where my laugh should be, refusing to give up even when I gave him nothing in return.
He's the only one besides Kieran who's consistently treated me like a person instead of a bomb waiting to go off.
"Marcus," I say before he gets too far.
He turns, eyebrows raised.
"Thank you." The words feel inadequate, but they're all I have. "For checking on me. For not giving up."
Something shifts in his expression, surprise giving way to warmth. "That's what brothers do, big guy. Even the scary ones."
He disappears down the hallway, and I count his footsteps until I can't hear them anymore. Twenty-three steps. The same age he is. The same number of years he's been alive, still finding reasons to smile in a world that doesn't make it easy.
I hope he gets to find something good too.
Church is called at sunset.
The brothers gather in the meeting room, settling around the long wooden table with expressions that range from grim to grimmer.
Kieran sits at the head, his face carved from stone, and Barrett stands at his right hand with a tablet full of intelligence reports.
The air is thick with tension, the kind that precedes violence, and I feel the beast stir restlessly beneath my ribs.
"Bloodtusk is massing," Barrett says without preamble. His silver eyes sweep the room, cold and calculating. "Multiple staging areas, coordinated movement. This isn't a raid. This is an offensive."
"How major?" Roman asks from across the table. The Sergeant at Arms is always steady, always ready, but even he looks tense.
"Major enough that they're not hiding it anymore." Barrett pulls up a map on the screen behind him, red markers scattered across the territory like blood drops. "We've identified at least three staging locations. Could be more. They're moving equipment, weapons, bodies."
"Timeline?" Kieran's voice is calm, but I can hear the steel underneath.
"Could be tomorrow. Could be a week. The intelligence is incomplete." Barrett's jaw tightens. "But when they move, they're going for a knockout blow. Everything they have, all at once."
The silence that follows is heavy with implication. We've been at war with the Bloodtusks for months, trading skirmishes and territory, but this is different. This is the kind of assault that ends wars, one way or another.
"Can we hold?" Elias asks. His usual humor is absent, his golden features set in uncharacteristic seriousness.
"If we're lucky." Barrett doesn't soften the truth. "If we're not, we fortify here and pray."
"What about the women?" The question comes from Harlan, quiet and intense. "They're all in the compound."
"They stay in lockdown. Increased interior security.
No one leaves the main building for any reason.
" Kieran's gaze sweeps the table. "Our priority is protecting them and preparing for whatever comes.
I want every brother on high alert. Rotations doubled.
Communication constant. If Bloodtusk breathes wrong, I want to know about it. "
The meeting continues, but I stop hearing the details.
My attention has drifted toward the hallway, toward the common room where Esmerelda is sitting with the other women, probably laughing at something Eliza said, probably bringing warmth to a room that desperately needs it.
She doesn't know what's coming. None of them do.
They're living in the eye of the hurricane, surrounded by calm, unaware of the storm that's about to break.
I think about Marcus's words. When you pull your head out of your ass and actually claim her. I think about Kieran's blessing and Kira's warning. I think about the beast purring when Esmerelda smiles, the way it goes quiet when she's near, the way it growls when anyone else looks at her too long.
I think about what I would do if Bloodtusk touched her.
The beast rises in my chest, sudden and savage, and for one terrifying moment the hum becomes a roar.
The red creeps into the edges of my vision, and I grip the table hard enough to dent the wood beneath my fingers.
Not here. Not now. I count to seven, breathing through it, forcing the beast back down into the quiet place where it's been resting for days.
It settles. Reluctantly, resentfully, but it settles.
"Stellan." Kieran's voice cuts through my spiral. "You're on interior security for the duration. Primary responsibility: the women."
"Understood."
The word comes out steady, controlled, but inside I'm already making calculations.
If they come, I'll be between them and her.
If they break through, I'll be the last thing they see before the beast tears them apart.
I've spent fifteen years trying to contain the violence inside me, to keep it locked away where it can't hurt anyone I care about.
But for her? I'll let it loose.
Church ends, and the brothers scatter to their assignments, preparing for a war that could start at any moment. I stay in my seat for a long minute, counting my heartbeats, steadying myself for what's coming.
Then I walk back to my post near the common room, where Esmerelda is waiting with coffee and patience and a smile that makes the beast go quiet.
Tomorrow could be the end of everything. Tomorrow could be blood and fire and the kind of violence I've spent my whole life trying to avoid.
But tonight, I'm going to sit beside her and count the seconds between her laughs and let myself believe, just for a little while, that this could be real.
The storm is coming. I can feel it in my bones, in the restless stirring of the beast, in the tension that's building throughout the compound like electricity before lightning.
But she makes me want to be human. And for one more night, that's exactly what I'm going to be.