Zain didn’t even hesitate.

The words left his mouth like a promise carved in stone, not something said in anger.

"And that I will do if anybody even thinks of it."

Something inside me snapped.

Not loudly. Not dramatically. Just... cleanly.

Like a thread pulled too tight, finally giving way.

I shoved against his chest harder this time, "Then stop," I said, my voice shaking but sharp. "Just stop talking like that."

His stride faltered. Only for a second. But I felt it.

"You think that fixes anything?" I continued, breath coming faster now, my fingers still clenched in his shirt. "You think burning everything down makes me safer? It doesn’t, Zain. It just leaves me with nothing."

His jaw tightened, but he didn’t interrupt.

So I kept going.

"Do you even hear yourself?" I whispered. "You’re talking about killing my father... my sisters... my entire world like it’s nothing."

"They made you their enemy first," he shot back, his voice low and dangerous. "They trained you to kill me. They will come for you again."

"And I know that," I snapped. "I know that better than anyone. But that doesn’t mean I want them dead. It doesn’t mean I want to stand beside you while you wipe out everything I came from."

Silence fell between us again, heavy and suffocating.

The forest blurred past, but slower now.

He was listening.

Even if he didn’t like it.

"I’m already losing pieces of myself, Zain," I said more quietly. "Every day. First, my home. Then my identity. Now this..." My hand drifted weakly to my stomach. "And you want to take what’s left and turn it into a battlefield."

His arms tightened instinctively around me.

"I’m trying to protect you."

"I know," I whispered. "But you’re doing it like I don’t get a say."

That hit.

I felt it in the way his chest rose sharply under my palms.

In the way his grip loosened, just barely.

"You always get a say," he said, but there was less certainty in it now.

"Then listen to me."

That made him stop.

Fully this time.

We were deep in the forest now, far enough that the camp was nothing but a distant memory behind us. The wind died down as he set me gently on my feet, though his hands didn’t leave me completely. They hovered at my waist, like he wasn’t sure if letting go was even an option.

I swayed slightly, dizziness hitting me now that the adrenaline was fading.

He steadied me instantly.

"Careful," he murmured, his voice softer again.

I ignored the warmth that spread through me at the sound.

"Zain," I said, forcing him to meet my eyes. "If you go to war with the humans, you’re not just fighting enemies. You’re fighting my past. You’re asking me to stand there and choose."

"You already chose," he said quietly. "You chose me."

"I chose you," I agreed. "Not war."

Zain looked down at me, his golden eyes searching my face with a desperate, burning intensity. The blackness that had threatened to completely swallow his gaze only moments ago receded, leaving behind a raw, wounded vulnerability that shook me to my core. His hands remained at my waist, his fingers twitching against my skin as if he wanted to pull me back into the safety of his chest but forced himself to respect the boundary I had just drawn in the dirt.

"You speak of them like they are a memory, Violet," he said, his voice dropping to a low, gravelly whisper that vibrated with a lifetime of bloodshed. "But they are a threat. A hunter does not stop tracking until the prey is dead. Your father will not care that you carry my child; he will see it as an abomination that needs to be purged."

"I know what my father is," I said, the truth tasting like copper on my tongue. "I know the hatred he carries. But if a war starts, Zain, it won’t just be him. It will be innocent people. It will be the entire human realm. And it will be the child we are creating, brought into a world built on the ashes of everything I used to be."

I took a step closer, closing the small distance he had given me. I reached up, my trembling fingers brushing against the side of his neck, right below his jaw, where his pulse was hammering like a trapped bird.

"If you truly want me to have a say," I murmured, "then let me find a way. Let us protect this child without giving my sisters exactly what they want—a reason to destroy us."

Zain’s chest rose and fell in a sharp, ragged breath. He leaned into my touch, just a fraction, his eyes closing as he fought the roaring instincts of his wolf. The sheer force of his desire to obliterate anything that posed a danger to me was a living, breathing thing across the bond. But beneath it, tying it all together, was his absolute devotion to me.

"You ask for the impossible, little hunter," he breathed, opening his eyes. The gold was soft now, like molten honey in the dim forest light. "But I will try. For you."

Before the relief could fully settle into my bones, a sharp, cold tingle rippled across the back of my neck.

The forest didn’t just go quiet; it went dead.

Zain’s entire body went rigid beneath my hands. The soft, yielding mate vanished in the span of a single heartbeat. His jaw locked, and his nostrils flared as he caught a scent on the shifting wind.

"Zain?" I whispered, my hunter instincts instantly snapping to attention.

He didn’t answer. Instead, he smoothly stepped in front of me, his massive frame shielding me entirely as he forced me back against the trunk of a massive oak. His hand drifted to his side, his claws sliding out with a lethal, metallic click.

From the dense thicket ahead of us, a low, rhythmic clapping echoed through the trees.

"How touching," a smooth, venomous voice purred from the shadows. "The Demon Alpha, tamed by a traitor."

My breath hitched. I knew that voice.

Out of the gloom stepped my sister, her silver-threaded hunter’s cloak billowing slightly behind her. Her dark hair was pulled back tightly, and in her hands, she held a heavy, custom-built crossbow, the massive silver bolt tipped with a glowing, violet fluid. Eclipse-root extract. Pure, concentrated, and lethal to an Alpha.

And behind her, stepping out from the mist like ghosts, were six heavily armed hunters from my father’s elite guard.

"Hello, sister," April smiled, her eyes flicking down to my hands, which were instinctively shielding my stomach. "Father sends his regards. And he wants his trophy back."