His father was losing ground in the argument, but his fears were obvious through every single word. Vladimir was a concerned father through and through.

When Voren first showed interest in Seraphine at a young age, he had accepted it and told him to wait until she turned eighteen.

If Voren still felt the same way by then, they could move things forward. He had genuinely liked Seraphine when Voren brought her to the pack because of her sharp wits, even at that young age.

But the same girl who brought so much light into Voren’s life was also the one who ended up taking it away, leaving him in that deep, perpetual darkness afterward.

It was wrong for an Alpha to get involved with a human, but Vladimir realized back then that Voren’s obsession with Seraphine was so real and deep that he broke all the rules. He dated a human, and he even had a child with her.

Now the same woman was back in the picture, and as a father, his fears were completely justified.

"Voren please think about it. Having an ex-Luna become your Luna is an insult to the pack. The elders would never agree to it, and the other packs would laugh behind our backs."

He kept explaining as if Voren had forgotten the rules, but as an Alpha, Voren knew every single one of them by heart. He also knew exactly how painful it had been to live all those years away from Seraphine.

"A Luna who leaves an Alpha must never marry another. Isn’t that how we maintain respect for leadership? And what if you restore the mate bond and realize she’s still mated to Ravyn?"

That part caused Voren to shiver slightly, but he took a deep breath and responded firmly, "You don’t have to worry about that. I know exactly what I’ll be up against now that I’ve decided to give this another shot."

"But you’re forgetting that the Grimroot pack only became what it is today after I took over its leadership. And before you say anything else about judging Sera, there are things you don’t know yet. Things that are going to flip the whole picture upside down once they come out."

He took a breath. "Someone put a spell on her memory. That’s why she forgot me. It wasn’t because she stopped caring or chose to walk away. Someone stole that from her." He straightened up a little.

"And that night with Ravyn, she was drugged."

He heard his father’s breathing change on the other end of the line.

"So I’m asking you," Voren continued, his voice softer now, "to give her the same kind of fairness you’d want someone to give me if the roles were reversed. Just help me. Please."

He hated to beg, but he couldn’t stand watching Seraphine endure the pain anymore.

Another long silence stretched out. Then Vladimir cleared his throat in that way that meant he was adjusting his thoughts but would never admit it out loud.

"Have you slept with her?" he asked. Voren’s expression didn’t change much on the outside, but something moved behind his eyes. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"Just answer the question," his father demanded, but Voren could not talk about his bedroom matters with his father. He never had, and he never would.

"That’s a private matter and I’m not—"

"The remedy," Vladimir cut in, "isn’t something I can send you in a bottle, Voren. There’s no herb, no mixture, no package I can mail over." He let that sink in. "The remedy is you."

Voren went completely still as confusion filled his mind. His father didn’t drag it out this time, hitting the nail on the head.

"Activating her pheromones will take the pain away completely if there is any form of attraction between you two. You automatically become—" his father paused, searching for the right word, "her potential husband because you have to do it during the first day of every cycle."

"Your closeness, your touch, your specific presence, is the only thing that can fight what the pack’s curse is doing to her body right now. That is the antidote. It has always been the antidote."

Both ends of the line went quiet.

Then Voren said, "I have to go." He pulled the phone away from his ear and ended the call before his father could say anything else.

He stood there for a couple of seconds, the phone loose in his hand, staring at nothing in particular. Would Seraphine even allow him to do that for her? Their relationship had just started, and activating her hormones was pretty intimate.

It would be similar to oral sex.

Then movement at the bathroom door made him look up.

Seraphine was standing there in the doorway, one hand holding onto the frame for support. His shirt hung loose off her shoulder.

She was on her feet but barely, her face pale and drained, her eyes tired in that specific way someone gets when the pain has taken up so much space in their head that there’s not much room left for anything else.

"Did you get the antidote?"

Her voice sounded weak. She was trying to hold herself together like she always did, the way she’d probably done the first time it happened, keep it under control, don’t let anyone see how rough it really is.

Voren crossed the room in just a few steps and didn’t say a word. He simply slid his arms under her, one behind her back and the other under her knees, and lifted her up smoothly and carefully, like she didn’t weigh anything at all, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

He carried her back to the bed and laid her down gently against the pillows, then sat right beside her, close enough that the mattress dipped under his weight.

Seraphine looked up at him, waiting. Studying his face. Even through the pain she was still reading him, which was one thing about her that had never changed.

Voren opened his mouth.

Closed it, then tried again.

His jaw tightened. The words lined up in his head but wouldn’t come out in any way that made sense. He didn’t just love her, he also respected her body.

"It’s—" he started. "I—"

He pressed the heel of his hand against his forehead. 𝘧𝓇𝑒𝑒𝑤ℯ𝑏𝓃𝘰𝑣ℯ𝘭.𝘤ℴ𝘮

"Damn it." The word came out low and rough, almost to himself. How the hell was he supposed to say it?