The Human Among Wolves (Aurora) novel Chapter 295

Chapter 295

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Zayn

I looked at him, holding his gaze. “How do you do this?” I asked quietly. “How are you in my dreams? How were you in Aurora’s? Last time I checked, werewolves can’t do that.”

Zade’s lips curved into something sharp and pleased.

“You’re smarter than I thought, brother,” he said. “And you’re right.”

He pushed off the wall and began circling the room, his fingers trailing along the carved wood of the dresser like he owned the place. Like he

had never left it.

“Werewolves can’t,” he continued casually. “Not on their own.”

I stiffened. “Then what are you?”

He laughed softly, shaking his head. “Still so dramatic. I’m exactly what I’ve always been.”

He stopped in front of the window, moonlight cutting across half his face. But Father was never content with limits. You know that. He never believed power should be… inherited unchanged.”

My stomach twisted.

“You’re talking about magic,” I said.

Zade glanced over his shoulder, eyes glinting. “I’m talking about borrowing”

He turned fully now. “About bargains. About bloodlines that don’t end where they’re supposed to. About witches who owed Father favors they

could never fully repay.”

Cold spread through my chest.

“Aurora was easy,” he went on, almost lazily.

“Her mind doesn’t know how to lock itself yet. She feels too much. Thinks too openly.” His smile sharpened. “You, though? You were a

challenge.”

I took a step forward. “You don’t get to talk about her like that.”

Zade’s amusement didn’t waver. “Protective to the end. Admirable. Predictable.”

He moved closer, lowering his voice. “This isn’t about hurting her. Not yet. It’s about finding you. And you’ve made yourself… very difficult to

track.”

My hands clenched into fists. “You won’t touch her again.”

“Ah,” he said softly. “There it is.”

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12:39 Thu, Jan 29 BGB.

Chapter 295

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He leaned in just enough for me to feel the pressure, that subtle weight pressing against my thoughts. “You should know something, Zayn. I

didn’t come here to interrogate you.”

“Then why are you here?”

His eyes darkened, satisfaction bleeding through.

“To warn you.”

The room seemed to dim, shadows stretching unnaturally along the walls.

“Father is done waiting,” Zade said. “And next time I enter her dreams, I won’t be so polite.”

I stared at him, disbelief hardening into anger. “I can’t believe he brainwashed you like this,” I snapped, my patience finally cracking. “He’s a

monster, Zade. He-”

“I know!”

His voice thundered through the room, raw and uncontrolled, the sound slamming into the walls and echoing back at us. He turned away from me, his back rigid, shoulders tight as if he were holding himself together by force alone.

1 froze.

That–that–was not the response I expected.

“What do you mean you know,” I said slowly, carefully now, “and you still help him?”

He dragged a hand down his face, fingers pressing hard into his eyes like he was trying to erase something burned behind them. When he spoke again, his voice was lower, rougher, stripped of its earlier mockery.

“Shut up and listen to me, Zayn.”

The command wasn’t cruel. It was desperate.

I didn’t interrupt.

Zade let out a breath that sounded more like a fracture than a sigh. “You think I don’t see what he is? You think I don’t know what he’s done?” He laughed bitterly, shaking his head. “I grew up in the same halls you did I watched the same executions. Heard the same screams behind

closed doors.”

He turned back to face me, and for the first time since he entered the room, the smug confidence was gone. What replaced it was something

darker. Older. Tired.

“You got out,” he said quietly. “You fought him. You left. You found something–someone–worth burning bridges for.”

His jaw tightened. “I didn’t.”

I clenched my fists. “That doesn’t mean you become him.”

“I didn’t become him,” Zade shot back. “1 survived him.”

The words hung between us.

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“He doesn’t rule with loyalty,” Zade continued. “He rules with leverage. Fer. Blood. And if you think helping him is a choice, then you still

don’t understand how this family works.”

My chest tightened. “Then explain it to me.”

He hesitated, just for a moment.

“There are things he’s done,” Zade said slowly, “things he’s bound into place that can’t just be walked away from. Debts written in blood. Oaths

sealed before we were old enough to understand what they meant.”

My mind flashed to Aurora. To Cecilia. To erased memories and stolen years.

“You think I want this?” Zade asked, his voice sharp again, defensive. “You think I enjoy chasing you through dreams like some damn shadow?”

“You entered Aurora’s mind,” I said, cold now. “You don’t get to pretend that was necessity.”

His expression flickered. Guilt. Then resolve.

“I warned her,” he said. “That was mercy.”

12:40 Thu, Jan 29 BGB.

The Human Among Wolves