The Banished Shy Luna Chapter 68

“I want… not to be torn.” My voice steadied. “I want what makes us stronger. I want a pack that doesn’t break because of me.”

Tyson nodded once, as if I’d passed a test he hadn’t announced. Talon’s mouth softened. Toren’s palm found my knee, grounding me.

“Then that’s what we build,” Toren said. “But we have to be honest about what stands in the way.”

Tyson crossed his arms. “Say it.”

Toren looked at both of them and then at me. The decision he made next looked like it hurt, and it looked like the kind of pain a good Alpha learned to carry.

“Some of my warriors,” he said at last, voice low and true, “have told me they will refuse to follow anyone else but me.”

“What are you going to do about that?” Tyson asked.

Toren didn’t look away. “That’s the cliff we’re standing on.”

The room seemed to tip toward the edge with him. The moonlight from the window caught on Tyson’s scars. Talon’s hand slid, barely, toward mine.

The words cracked the air. For a moment, all three of them stared at one another, the tension snapping between them like live wires.

And then I’d had enough.

I straightened on the bed, lifting my chin. “Stop.” The word came out sharper than I meant, but I didn’t take it back. “All of you, listen to me. I’m not going to sit here and watch you tear each other apart over me like I’m some prize. You all have me. There’s plenty to go around. But I will not—” My voice broke, then hardened again. “I will not tolerate fighting amongst yourselves. It won’t just tear me apart. It will tear the pack apart.”

All three of them blinked, thrown by my tone.

“As for the warriors,” I continued, pushing through the heat climbing my chest, “if they only want to follow Toren, then so be it. Toren, you’ll be in charge of the warriors. Talon,” I looked at him, “you take the betas and the trackers. And Tyson…” I hesitated, looking at him openly. “I don’t know much about what you do. Or did.”

Tyson tilted his head, eyes glinting like the edge of a blade. “For my father,” he said, cutting into the silence, “I handled recruitment and training the cubs. The next generation. Making sure they could fight and think before they even shifted.”

Toren’s brows drew together, but he nodded slowly. “That could work,” he said, glancing between them. “But we have to agree that no decision—no major decision—gets made without the three of us talking it through first.” He turned his gaze to me, softer. “And if we still can’t agree… then Starlight will be the one who makes the call.”

My heart lurched. My throat went dry. “Me?” The word came out thin, scared, before I could stop it.

Toren’s eyes softened with regret. “Only if we can’t agree,” he said gently. “You won’t be alone in it.”

My fear must have shown, because Talon immediately slid onto the bed beside me. His arm wrapped around my back, warm and steady, his thumb stroking circles into my side. “Cupcake,” he murmured, “it’ll be okay. You won’t have to do it alone. We’ll be with you.”

Tyson’s brows knitted together. He looked between all three of us like a man walking into a room mid-conversation. “I feel like I’m missing something,” he said finally, voice low but rough. “What aren’t you telling me?”

The question was a knife. My stomach tightened; the old familiar pressure—the one that built before I screamed—began curling in my chest like smoke. I gripped my knees, fighting it down.

“Nothing you need to worry about right now,” Toren said tightly.

“That’s bullshit,” Tyson snapped, his golden eyes flashing. “If it involves me, it involves me.”

I shot to my feet before Toren could answer, the pulse in my head threatening to crack. “I—I need a minute.” The words tumbled out, raw. “Just a minute.”

“Starlight—” Toren’s voice reached for me.

But I was already moving.

I pulled away from Talon’s arm, from Tyson’s searching stare, from Toren’s steadying presence, and hurried across the room. The bathroom door clicked shut behind me, and I turned the lock with shaking fingers. My reflection in the mirror looked pale, wild-eyed, hair tumbling around my shoulders like a curtain.

I didn’t want to hear it when they explained who or what I was. I didn’t want to see Tyson’s face if he heard the truth and decided I was a mistake. My chest ached with it, that crawling sense of doom pressing tighter.

I twisted the shower knob, and steam began to bloom, curling around me, muffling the sounds of voices outside. My palms pressed against the cool porcelain of the sink as I tried to steady my breathing. What if Tyson ran? What if he hated me? What if everything I’d tried to hold together unraveled?

A muffled growl reached me through the door. Then Toren’s voice, lower, tense. “We tell him or we lose him.”

“I’m not losing anyone,” Talon replied, his tone a whip-crack. “But she’s not ready.”

“You think I’m blind?” Tyson’s growl rolled over both of them, rough and feral. “I can smell fear. I can smell secrets. If you don’t start talking—”

His voice cut off, but the weight of it pressed against the bathroom door like a physical thing. My hands trembled against the sink. The steam rose higher, blurring the mirror, until my own reflection was nothing but a shadow.

Somewhere in my chest, that bad feeling bloomed again—dark and coiling, like a storm gathering under the floorboards. I didn’t know what was about to happen.