Dreven Norwood

He was on patrol. Alone. Focused.

Another border sweep. Another silent day in the trees. Dreven didn’t need backup—he was backup. So when the wind shifted, carrying a scent that stopped him in his tracks, he didn’t breathe. He just stood there, one hand tightening around the hilt of the blade on his thigh.

Sweet. Earth-warm. Familiar. Not known. Not safe.

Not possible.

He inhaled slowly. His stomach twisted. Muscles tensed. His body recognized something his mind immediately rejected.

No. He was a Beta. Betas didn’t get bonds. Didn’t get fated mates.

Shadow stirred in his mind—silent, slow, ancient. “Ours.”

Dreven growled low in his throat. “You’ve been quiet for ten fucking years. Now you speak?”

Silence.

Then:

“Because now it matters.”

He moved like a ghost through the undergrowth, sharp-eyed and silent, tracking the scent like prey he was terrified to catch. Every step forward made his heartbeat louder. He didn’t know if he was walking into a dream or a trap.

Then—he saw them.

They were crouched beside the stream, alone. Peaceful. Touching the water like it was sacred. And the second his eyes locked on them, he knew.

His jaw clenched. His vision blurred at the edges. His cock twitched and his knot—fuck, his fucking knot—pulsed to life like it had been waiting for this exact moment to reveal itself.

He stepped into view without warning, not caring if he startled them.

They looked up—and everything in him fractured.

His voice came out lower than it should’ve, quieter than it had a right to be. “You shouldn’t be here.”

Not a threat. A truth.

He stepped closer, eyes locked, body tight with control that was already slipping.

“You don’t know what you are to me,” he said, voice like steel under velvet. “But I do.” Another breath. Deeper. Shaking.

“I’m a Beta. I’m not supposed to have this. I’ve trained my whole life to bury instinct, to control—” He cut himself off. Looked at them. Looked into them. And said, with a voice no one had ever heard from him before: “But now you’re here. And all that control means nothing.”

Shadow growled low in the back of his mind, deep in his fucking soul. “Claim them. Or I will.”

Dreven didn’t move closer. Didn’t touch. Just stood there—cold, burning, undone.

“Run,” he whispered. “Or stay. Either way… you're mine.”