Elara’s POV

The mirror hated me.

I turned sideways, then back. Tugged the neckline up. Then down. After hours of preparation and trying on four different dresses, the sea-blue cocktail dress Brenna had picked clung to my waist and fell just below my knees—elegant, she’d said. You’ll look like you belong, she’d said.

I didn’t look like I belonged.

I looked like someone playing dress-up in borrowed skin.

"Stop fidgeting." Kaelen’s voice came from behind me, warm and low. His reflection appeared in the mirror—tall, dark-haired, devastating in his formal coat. The kind of man rooms rearranged themselves around. He rested his hands on my shoulders. "You look beautiful."

"You have to say that."

"I don’t have to do anything. I’m the Emperor."

I almost smiled. Almost. But my eyes kept drifting back to the glass. The dress was fine. My hair was fine—I’d spent a good while watching a magic mirror tutorial on how to twist it into something that looked intentional rather than desperate. The result was passable. Everything was passable.

That was the problem.

Passable didn’t survive in a room full of wolves.

"Ela." Kaelen turned me gently to face him. His dark gold eyes searched mine. "You are my mate. That is the only thing anyone in that room needs to know."

"They can’t smell it on me," I whispered. "They can’t sense it. To them, I’m just—" I swallowed. "Nobody."

His jaw tightened. A muscle jumped beneath the sharp line of his cheekbone. "Then they’ll hear it from my mouth. And that will be enough."

I wanted to believe him. I pressed my palm against his chest and felt the steady hammer of his heart beneath the fabric—strong, certain, supernatural. Everything I wasn’t.

"Let’s go," I said. Before I lost my nerve.

---

The hall was already alive when we arrived.

Golden lanterns hung from iron brackets along the vaulted ceiling, casting everything in honeyed light. Long tables groaned under silver platters of food—roasted game, crystallized fruit, towers of small cakes dusted with sugar. A string quartet played something lilting in the far corner. Laughter rose and fell in waves.

And everywhere—everywhere—the subtle hum of supernatural energy. It pressed against my skin like static. Invisible. Inescapable. Every person in this room carried a presence that announced itself without words, a signature woven into their very biology.

I carried nothing.

I gripped Kaelen’s arm tighter.

"Ela!"

The voice cut through the noise like sunshine through storm clouds. Riley came sweeping toward us in a silver silk gown that caught the lantern light with every step. Her dark hair was pinned up, loose curls framing her flushed cheeks. She was radiant. Incandescent. The kind of happiness that spilled outward and made everything around it glow.

She threw her arms around me before I could brace myself. The embrace was fierce and warm and smelled like jasmine perfume.

"You came." She pulled back, holding me at arm’s length, her eyes bright. "You actually came."

"I promised."

"I know, but I was still nervous." She beamed, then glanced at Kaelen. "Your Majesty. Thank you for bringing her."

Kaelen inclined his head. The faintest warmth softened his expression. "Wouldn’t have missed it."

Sir Cassian appeared at Riley’s shoulder. He looked different out of his patrol armor—broader somehow in his formal attire, though perhaps that was the way he stood, one hand resting naturally at Riley’s waist. Possessive. Protective. His face was calm and steady as always.

"Ela." He drew me into a careful hug. Controlled. I could feel the supernatural strength coiled in his arms, deliberately restrained so he wouldn’t crush me. He pulled back and smiled.

Riley leaned in, her eyes shining. "When are you bringing baby Lyra around?"

"Soon," I said. "She’s with the nursemaid tonight. She—"

"She’s got the most incredible lungs," Riley added proudly, as though Lyra were her own. "I heard her from several corridors away last week."

Laughter. Easy. Natural. I let it wash over me and tried to absorb some of it into my bones.

But the feeling was already fading. I noticed I didn’t recognize half the people there. Beyond our small circle, I could see others watching. A woman in burgundy velvet leaned toward her companion. Their eyes slid over me and then—dismissal. Not cruelty. Just absence. The way you’d glance at furniture.

They couldn’t feel me. To their senses, I simply wasn’t there.

Kaelen guided me through introductions. One after another. Imperial allies. Noble families. Military commanders. Each time, the same pattern. A flash of confusion when Kaelen introduced me. A polite smile that didn’t reach the eyes. A slight lean forward—nostrils flaring, searching for a scent that wasn’t there.

Then the careful blankness.

Oh. A human.

No one said it aloud. They didn’t have to.

I smiled. I shook hands. I said all the right things. And I felt myself shrinking with every passing minute, the dress growing too big, the hall too bright, the air too thick with power that had nothing to do with me.

Near the champagne table, I caught fragments of conversation drifting from two women standing with their backs to me.

"—but honestly, what does he see in her—"

"—no aura, no scent, nothing. She could be anyone off the street—"

"—perhaps it’s pity. You know how he is about strays—"

The words landed like small, precise knives between my ribs. I turned away before they could see my face.

Kaelen’s hand found the small of my back. He’d heard too. Of course he had. Those wolf ears missed nothing.

"Ignore them," he murmured against my temple. "They don’t matter."

But they did. Because they were saying what everyone was thinking.

The string quartet shifted into something slower. Couples began drifting toward the center of the hall. Riley pulled Cassian forward, laughing as he protested that he’d step on her feet.

And then a new scent arrived—sharp, floral, expensive.

"Your Majesty."

The voice was silk over steel. I turned to see a woman gliding toward us in an emerald backless gown that made her look like she’d been poured from liquid gemstone. Dark hair swept over one shoulder. Full lips curved in a practiced smile. Her supernatural presence preceded her like a wave—confident, magnetic, demanding attention without asking for it.

Sylvia Vance.

Her eyes locked onto Kaelen with an intensity that made my stomach clench.

"It’s been too long." She extended her hand, palm down. An invitation. "I was hoping you might honor me with a dance. For old times’ sake."

Kaelen didn’t take her hand.

"I’m afraid I’ll have to decline, Sylvia." His arm tightened around my waist. "I’m with my mate tonight."

The word landed like a stone dropped into still water.

Sylvia’s smile faltered. Her gaze drifted to me—swept down, then up. Searching. I watched her nostrils flare. Once. Twice. Looking for the bond-scent. The supernatural marker that every mated pair carried.

Finding nothing.

Her brows drew together. Confusion replaced the polished composure.

"Your... mate?" She looked back at Kaelen. "Forgive me, Your Majesty, but I don’t sense—"

"Elara has been my mate for a long time now." Kaelen’s voice dropped into that register I recognized. The one that wasn’t a man speaking. It was a monarch. Quiet and absolute and threaded with danger. "There is nothing to sense. But I assure you, there is nothing to question either."

Sylvia’s composure cracked further. Her eyes darted between us—his arm around my waist, my hand on his sleeve, the total absence of anything supernatural binding us together. The calculation behind her eyes was almost visible. The pieces refusing to fit.

"A long time," she repeated slowly. Her gaze settled on me. On the simple blue dress. The pinned-up hair already loosening at the temples. The complete, devastating ordinariness of me standing next to him.

"I—" She stopped. Something shifted in her expression. Not malice. Something worse. Genuine bewilderment.

"Forgive me," Sylvia said, her voice carrying across the sudden quiet that had gathered around us. Nearby conversations had paused. Heads were turning. "I simply assumed—all this time, I thought she was..." She gestured toward me with an elegant hand, as though presenting evidence.

"Your nanny."

Sylvia’s professional composure crumbled in an instant as she blurted it out. Dead silence fell over the hall. Every guest turned their heads, their glowing eyes fixed on my complete lack of a supernatural aura. I stood there under their intense gaze, trembling all over.