The guest suite was a cavernous expanse of silver-threaded tapestries and cold, white marble, but Mack had already lit the hearth, turning the room into a pocket of flickering warmth. He set Violet down on the edge of the massive, four-poster bed as if she were made of spun glass, his obsidian eyes still searching hers for any lingering tremors from the sensory flood.
Violet let out a long, shaky sigh, the plush silk of the duvet feeling strange beneath her fingertips. Everything in the palace was so grand, so permanent. It made her feel like a temporary visitor in a world built for giants.
"Are you still tasting the honey?" Mack asked, his voice low and cautious. He remained standing, his tall frame cutting a stark silhouette against the firelight.
"It's fading," Violet murmured, rubbing her temples. "It's more like… a faint memory of a butterscotch candy now. And the voices have settled into a dull hum. It's manageable."
She looked up at him, her curiosity finally overriding her exhaustion. "Mack, where do you actually go when you aren't standing in my rafters? Do the Seven live here? In the palace?"
Mack shook his head, the tension in his shoulders easing just a fraction. "No. The palace is for the Crown and for the business of the Kingdom. It is a place of stone and protocol. We are wolves, Violet. Living inside stone walls for too long makes the Lycan inside us restless. It starts to feel like a cage, no matter how much gold is on the ceiling."
He walked toward the window, looking out over the dark expanse of the King's sprawling estate. "Each of the Seven has their own land within the King's territory. We have cabins- homes tucked away in the woods, far enough apart that we don't kill each other, but close enough to reach the palace in minutes if the bells ring. We can stay here, in suites like this, if the weather is foul or the work is late, but we rarely do."
Violet's eyes brightened, a spark of her usual spirit returning. "You have a cabin? A real home? I want to see it."
Mack went remarkably still. He turned back to her, a look of genuine alarm crossing his face. "My cabin? Now?"
"Well, maybe not tonight," she giggled, leaning back against the pillows. "I think I've had enough 'new' for one day. But soon. I want to see where you've spent your centuries."
Mack cleared his throat, his ears tinging a faint pink that Violet found utterly endearing. "You can see it, eventually. But I'll need… time. A significant amount of time."
"Why? Is it guarded by more grumpy squirrels?"
"No," Mack mucked, rubbing the back of his neck. "It's just that… I haven't expected company in nearly three hundred years, Violet. It is not exactly prepared for a guest. It is mostly books, maps, and dust. And more books. It's a place for a ghost to sleep, not for a lady to visit. I'd rather not have you see the state of it until I've had a chance to make it look like a civilized being lives there."
Violet smiled softly, her heart aching at the thought of him alone in a cabin for three centuries, surrounded by nothing but the silence of the woods and the weight of his own thoughts. "I don't care about the dust, Mack. I'm a librarian. I was born in dust."
She patted the spot on the bed next to her, a silent invitation. Mack hesitated, then crossed the room and sat down, though he kept a respectful distance. The bed groaned under his weight, the sheer size of him making the furniture look small.
"Mack?" she asked, her voice turning quiet and serious. "I read about the King. Before Selene arrived, the histories say he was… falling into madness. They say a King without a mate is like a storm without a center. But you… you've been alone just as long. Why haven't you gone mad?"
The question hung in the air, heavy and pointed. Mack stared into the fire, the flames reflecting in his black eyes like distant, dying stars.
"There is a difference between the hunger and the hole," Mack said, his voice dropping into a gravelly register that vibrated through the mattress. "Leo was born for a mate. He was a vessel waiting to be filled. His madness came from the pining- from the raw, empty hunger of a soul that had never known its other half. He was a predator looking for a missing piece of himself, and when he couldn't find it, his wolf began to eat his mind."
He paused, his fingers tracing a pattern on his leather trousers. "But I… I was different. I wasn't pining, Violet. I was grieving."
Violet felt a lump form in her throat. She shifted closer, the heat of his body acting like a magnet.
"I had already found my mate," Mack continued, his voice devoid of its usual strength. "I knew the shape of the bond. I knew the weight of her hand in mine. When Taylor was taken, the hole wasn't empty- it was filled with the memory of her. Grief is a heavy anchor, Violet. It's agonizing, and it's dark, but it's solid. It keeps you grounded in a way that longing doesn't. I didn't go mad because I wasn't looking for something I didn't have; I was mourning something I had lost."
He looked at her then, his expression raw and vulnerable in a way that made Violet's breath catch. "The King was a man starving to death. I was a man who had already eaten a poison meal. We were both dying, just in different ways. Grief doesn't make you lose your mind- it just makes you wish you could."
Violet reached out, her hand sliding into his. This time, she didn't just touch his fingers; she laced them with hers, feeling the calloused strength of his palm.
"I understand," she whispered. "The madness comes from the 'unknown.' But for you, the pain was 'known.' It was yours."
"Yes," Mack said, his grip on her hand tightening instinctively. "And for three hundred years, I convinced myself that the grief was all I had left. I made a home in the shadows because the light reminded me of what was gone. I became the Ghost because ghosts don't have to feel the sun."
He turned his hand, pressing her palm against his chest, right over his heart. "But then you fell on the ice. And the bond… it didn't feel like grief. It felt like a door opening in a room I thought was a tomb."
Violet leaned her head against his shoulder, her eyes fluttering shut as the warmth of his presence enveloped her. The sensory overload of the garden had left her drained, but this- this quiet, heavy honesty, was the most intense thing she had felt all day.
"I'm sorry you were alone for so long," she murmured. "But I'm glad you kept your mind, Mack Woods. I'm going to need it to help me figure out how to be a white wolf."
"I'll be there for every step," Mack promised, his voice a low vibration against her temple. "Even if I have to clean the cabin twice a day to keep you from seeing the dust."
Violet chuckled, the sound muffled by his shoulder. "I told you, I like books. If your cabin is full of them, I might never leave. You'll have to carry me back to the palace every time the Queen calls."
"I'm getting quite good at carrying you," he teased, his thumb stroking the back of her hand.
They sat in silence for a long time, the only sound the popping of the logs in the hearth. The tension of the palace, the fear of the Council, and the shock of the Goddess's blessing all seemed to fade away, leaving only the two of them.
"Does it hurt?" Violet asked after a while, her voice slurring slightly with sleep. "The bond? Does it hurt you that I'm human?"
Mack looked down at her, his heart swelling with a protective ferocity that nearly took his breath away. "It doesn't hurt, Violet. It's the only thing that doesn't."
He stayed with her until her breathing went deep and rhythmic, her head heavy against his arm. Even then, he didn't leave. He sat in the firelight, watching over her, a General who had finally found something worth more than a kingdom. He thought about his cabin- the dark, dusty corners of his solitude. and he realized he wouldn't need to clean it. He would need to rebuild it. He would need to make it a place for the light.
He looked at the white-threaded tapestries on the wall and imagined a white wolf running through the snow, and for the first time in his long, shadow-filled life, Mack Woods wasn't afraid of the dawn.