River gave a small smile. “Now I have a wolf… Tempest.”
“Damn right you do,” Tempest said smugly inside her.
Alia tilted her head, sensing the shift. “Tempest?”
River nodded, and Alia’s eyes lit up with something ancient—recognition, and perhaps, fear touched with reverence.
“That name… it hasn’t been spoken for generations. You know what it means?”
River hesitated, then shook her head.
Alia gave her a serious look. “It means you are not just any wolf. You are a Dark Alpha… and not just any Dark Alpha, either. Tempest was the name of the First—the one born in shadow and storm.”
River’s heart raced.
“But I thought… I thought the Dark Alpha was a title?”
“It is,” Alia said. “But it started with a being named Tempest. And now… she is within you.”
River sat back, stunned as food was
