For this to work, for Aden to demonstrate to the squad that even their most broken could have a second chance at life, his partner had to be strong and deadly and kissed by darkness. 

“It’s the alpha’s responsibility and his privilege to create that environment—we are the guardians of every heart in our care.” Aden Kai might not be changeling, but he was an alpha and he held within his hands the power to change his people from the inside out. 

Aden had always seen beauty in her darkness, hope in every Arrow’s soul. 

Aden. Somehow, he’d survived his childhood and come through Arrow training with his spirit intact. Not only intact but strong enough, generous enough, to embrace each and every broken soul in his care. 

The two packs had a blood bond that went deeper than any relationship they had with another pack. While neither alpha would admit it, Judd had the sense that the packs were becoming one while remaining distinct and separate. They were two branches of a powerful family, a truth that would be sealed the day Mercy gave birth. 

“We’re all special to the people who are our own.” 

“You are written indelibly on my soul, Zaira. Nothing will ever alter what you are to me.” 

“Don’t feel guilty for loving her.” His own love for Sascha pulsed through the mating bond. “At this instant, she’s simply your mother and you’re her cub. That’s a bond that’s difficult to break.” 

“It is from history that we learn lessons about the future, is it not?” 

"...a man does many things for love.” 

We can protect ourselves, but what of the Carolinas, the Tavishes, and the other children we don’t even know about yet? If people start to fear Arrows, it’s a short step to start eliminating those who might grow up into Arrows. 

Telepaths or telekinetics, strong or weak, the Psy are now free to feel, free to love and hate, free to laugh and cry.
And the darkness at the heart of the Psy race is once more a vicious truth no one can ignore. For what happens to the murderers and the insane in this new world? What happens to the broken? They still exist. They still kill.

He really was a very bad leader in that respect—and it was why his Arrows gave him their unswerving dedication. All of them rejects from the world, from their families. No one else had ever come for them, ever would. Silence or not, it mattered that Aden would. Perhaps that exposed a flaw in the heart of the Protocol and perhaps it was simply a sign that even Arrows had a soul. 

Love isn’t finite, she’d told him, it is infinite and it has infinite facets. 

Not every changeling with the dominance to be alpha has the heart for it. 

You aren’t an “it,” Zaira. You’re right. I’m not an it. I’m a nightmare. 

You, Zaira, are priceless as an individual. Don’t ever permit them to erase you. 

Every white knight needed a deadly black sword at his back. 

she listened to his heartbeat strong and steady under her ear . . . and thought that perhaps the other races understood a truth she’d only just realized: that even a tiny physical network connected by trust held a potent, raw power. 

“It just means that when you screw up,” Remi added, “you don’t lose your place in the family. You might get a reaming, might be punished, but you’ll always have a home where you’re loved and where you feel safe.” 

“I’m yours.” It was his turn to stop her words. “Just stay with me,” he said. “In any way you want.” 

Would you do what you did at the aerie? Touch me, kiss me, own me? You forgot the biting. Anything you want, Zaira. I’m yours. 

And for the first time since she’d returned from RainFire, she felt as if she could sleep again, no screaming aloneness in her skull, no crying deep in her soul from missing him.
Because no child should ever grow up surrounded by coldness and fear. 

A single act of kindness, she thought again, could change a life. 

“If you’re mad, then I will walk with you into the darkness,” Aden said, his grip tightening on the side of her face. “Don’t you choose to leave me, Zaira. Don’t you do that.” 

Zaira blew out a breath and, getting out of bed, began to pace. Since she was dressed in only a pair of black panties, the sight was distracting despite the serious nature of their discussion, but Aden didn’t tell her to put on clothes. He was an Arrow, not an idiot. 

He was her hope and her dream and her passion, and the knowledge brought him to his knees.

Besos,