Chapter 64 Breaking Point
The tenth day of training broke young Sera.
Not physically. Her body had grown stronger over the past week and a half. Muscles she did not know she had ached in ways that spoke of growth rather than damage. She could hold a defensive stance for minutes without shaking. Could move through basic combat forms with something approaching grace.
Not mentally either. The laws and history and political strategies were beginning to make sense. She could explain the pack hierarchy. Could recite the fundamental rights all omegas were supposed to have, even if most packs ignored those rights. Could identify which Alphas were likely to support the Northern Kingdom and which ones Victor Kane had probably corrupted.
The breaking happened emotionally.
It started small, the way these things always do.
Lyra was demonstrating a blocking technique in the training yard. The same technique they had practised dozens of times over the past week. Young Sera knew the movements. Understood the theory. Should have been able to execute it without thinking.
But her hands would not cooperate.
Every time Lyra came at her with the practice sword, young Sera froze. Her body locked up. Her mind went blank. Instead of blocking or redirecting, she just stood there, waiting for the blow to land.
“Again,” Lyra said patiently after the third failed attempt.
They reset. Lyra attacked. Young Sera froze.
“Again.”
Reset. Attack. Freeze.
“Again.”
Reset. Attack. Freeze.
“What is happening?” Lyra asked, lowering her practice sword. “You know this technique. You have done it successfully before. Why are you freezing now?”
“I do not know,” young Sera said, frustration building in her chest. “I know what I am supposed to do. But when you come at me my body just stops.”
“Are you afraid of getting hit?”
“Maybe. I do not know. Everything just goes blank.”
Lyra studied her for a long moment. Then something shifted in the Beta’s expression. Understanding, tinged with sympathy young Sera had rarely seen from the fierce warrior.
“Take a break,” Lyra said quietly. “Sit down. Drink water. We will try something different.”
Young Sera sat heavily on the bench where Maya usually watched the training sessions. But Maya was not there today. No one was watching except Lyra and young Sera herself, which somehow made the failure feel even worse.
Lyra sat down beside her, close but not touching. Giving young Sera space while making it clear she was not going anywhere.
“Your body is remembering something,” Lyra said after a moment of silence. “When I come at you with the sword, even though it is just training and you know I would never hurt you, your body is remembering every time your father came at you with violence. And it is doing what it learned to do to survive those moments.”
“Freezing.”
“Freezing. Because fighting back would have made things worse. Because your father was bigger and stronger and would have hurt you more if you resisted. So your body learned to shut down. To go numb. To wait for it to be over.”
Tears burned behind young Sera’s eyes. She blinked them back angrily. “That is stupid. I know you are not going to hurt me. I know this is just training. Why can my mind know that but my body refuses to believe it?”
“Because trauma does not live in your mind. It lives in your body. In your muscles and nerves and instincts. Your mind can understand that you are safe now, but your body is still carrying eighteen years of learning that sudden movement from a stronger person means pain.”
Young Sera pressed her palms against her eyes, trying to hold back the tears that wanted to fall. “Then how do I fix it? How do I make my body understand that I am not in that house anymore? That I am not that helpless girl waiting to be hurt?”
“You cannot fix it in ten days. You probably cannot fix it in ten months. Maybe never completely. But you can learn to work with it instead of fighting against it.”
“How?”
Lyra stood and offered young Sera her hand. “Come. I am going to teach you something your grandmother taught me years ago. When I first came to the Northern Kingdom, I was angry all the time. Violent. Ready to fight everyone about everything. Your grandmother saw that anger was just fear wearing a different mask. She taught me how to acknowledge the fear without letting it control me.”
Young Sera took Lyra’s hand and stood, curiosity cutting through her frustration.
They walked away from the training yard, through the pack grounds, past the main buildings, into the forest that surrounded the Northern Kingdom territory. They walked in silence for twenty minutes until they reached a small clearing where sunlight filtered through the trees in golden shafts.
“Your grandmother used to come here,” Lyra said, stopping in the centre of the clearing. “When things got overwhelming. When the weight of leadership pressed too hard. She would come here and just scream.”
“Scream?”
“Scream. Yell. Rage at the universe. Let everything out in a place where no one could hear her and no one would judge her for falling apart.”
Lyra gestured to the empty clearing. “So that is what we are doing today. No training. No lessons. No pressure to be strong or capable or ready. Just screaming until your throat hurts and your body remembers that it is allowed to make noise. That it is allowed to take up space. That it is allowed to be angry about what was done to it.”
Young Sera looked around the clearing. Trees surrounded them. No one was nearby. No one would hear except Lyra, and Lyra was looking at her with an expression that said she would not judge whatever happened next.
“I do not know how to just scream,” young Sera admitted.
“Yes, you do. You just have not let yourself. Your father taught you that making noise brought violence. That expressing emotion was dangerous. So you learned to be quiet. To swallow everything. To never let anyone see or hear what you were really feeling. This is your chance to unlearn that.”
“What if I cannot?”
“Then you cannot. And we will try something else. But you will never know unless you try.”
Young Sera stood in the centre of the clearing, feeling ridiculous and exposed and afraid. She opened her mouth but nothing came out. Just silence and the feeling that if she let anything out, it would consume her completely.
“Start small,” Lyra suggested. “Just make a sound. Any sound. It does not have to be loud or dramatic. Just let something out.”
Young Sera tried. A small sound escaped her throat. Barely audible. More breath than voice.
“Good,” Lyra said. “Again. A little louder this time.”
Another sound. Slightly louder. Still not really a scream. More like a whimper.
“Keep going. Do not think about it. Just feel whatever you are feeling and let it out.”
Young Sera tried again. This time something real emerged. Not quite a scream but not a whimper either. Somewhere in between. A sound of frustration and pain and eighteen years of swallowed silence.
“Yes,” Lyra said. “That. More of that.”
The next sound was louder. The one after that is louder still. Young Sera felt something cracking open inside her chest. Something that had been locked down tight for as long as she could remember. Something dangerous and powerful and absolutely terrifying.
She screamed.
Really screamed. A sound that ripped out of her throat with force that surprised her. A sound that carried eighteen years of abuse and fear and helplessness. A sound that said I am still here and I am angry and I am allowed to be angry.
She screamed again. And again. And again.
Her voice broke. Her throat burned. Tears poured down her face. But she kept screaming. Letting out everything she had been holding inside. Every moment her father had hit her. Every time she had been told she was worthless. Every second she had spent making herself small and quiet and invisible just to survive.
She screamed until she had no voice left. Until her throat was raw and her body was shaking and she collapsed onto her knees in the dirt, sobbing so hard she could barely breathe.
Lyra knelt beside her and wrapped strong arms around her shoulders. Holding her while she fell apart. Not trying to fix it. Not telling her to be strong. Just being present while young Sera broke into a thousand pieces in the middle of a forest clearing.
“I am so angry,” young Sera gasped between sobs. “I am so angry at him. At my father. At everyone who hurt me. At the universe for letting it happen. At myself for not fighting back. At everything.”
“I know. And you have every right to be angry. That anger is valid. It is real. It is yours.”
“But what do I do with it? I cannot let it control me. Cannot let it turn me into something bitter and broken.”
“You do not have to let it control you. But you do have to acknowledge it. Give it space to exist. Let yourself feel it without immediately trying to make it go away. That is what your grandmother taught me. That anger is just energy. And energy can be transformed. Can be used to fuel something other than destruction.”
Young Sera cried until she had no tears left. Until her body was empty and exhausted and somehow lighter than it had been in weeks. She sat back, wiping her face with shaking hands, looking at Lyra through swollen eyes.
“Thank you,” young Sera whispered. “For bringing me here. For letting me fall apart without judgment.”
“Your grandmother did the same for me when I needed it. I am just passing on what she gave me.”
They sat in silence for a while, letting the forest sounds wash over them. Birds calling. Wind moving through leaves. The peaceful emptiness of a place where no one demanded anything.
Eventually, Lyra stood and offered young Sera her hand again. “Come. Let us go back. But we are done with training for today. Today you rest. You let your body recover from what just happened. Tomorrow we try again.”
“Will I still freeze when you come at me with the sword?”
“Maybe. Probably. But maybe a little less than before. Because your body just remembered that it is allowed to fight back. Allowed to make noise. Allowed to take up space. That is progress.”
They walked back through the forest slowly, young Sera feeling raw and exposed but also strangely peaceful. The breaking had hurt. But it had also released something that needed to be released.
When they returned to the pack grounds, Kai was waiting outside the training yard, concern written across his face. He took one look at young Sera’s red eyes and tear-stained face and immediately moved toward her.
“What happened?” he asked, looking between young Sera and Lyra.
“Something necessary,” Lyra said simply. “She is fine. Better than fine, actually. But she needs rest and probably food and definitely you being exactly who you are to her.”
Lyra walked away without further explanation, leaving young Sera with Kai.
He looked at her for a long moment, reading her the way he always could. Seeing past the surface to the complicated emotions underneath.
“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked.
“Not yet. Maybe later. Right now I just want to sit somewhere quiet with you and not think about anything.”
“I can do that.”
They went to young Sera’s room and sat together on the bed in comfortable silence. Kai held her hand gently, his thumb tracing small circles on her palm. Not on the mark. Just on her skin. A reminder that she was more than the promise written there. More than the legacy she was trying to fulfil.
She was just Sera. A girl who had survived impossible things and was learning to live with the scars they left behind.
Hours passed. The sun moved across the sky outside her window. Eventually, Maya appeared with food and tea, setting them down quietly without asking questions. The pack seemed to understand instinctively that young Sera needed space today.
As evening fell, young Sera finally spoke.
“I broke today,” she said quietly. “Completely fell apart. Could not even do a simple blocking technique because my body kept remembering my father and freezing up.”
“That does not sound like breaking to me,” Kai said. “That sounds like your body protecting you the only way it knows how.”
“Lyra took me into the forest. Made me scream until I had no voice left. Let me cry until I have no tears left. Just let me be angry and hurt and broken without trying to fix me.”
“That sounds like exactly what you needed.”
“It was. But also terrifying. Because if I can break that easily after only ten days of training, how am I supposed to face Victor Kane in four days? How am I supposed to sit in that throne and convince an entire room of powerful Alphas that I belong there?”
Kai was quiet for a moment, considering his words carefully. “Maybe you are not supposed to convince them you never break. Maybe you are supposed to show them that breaking does not mean you are finished. That falling apart is just part of the process of becoming stronger.”
Young Sera looked at him, something shifting in her understanding. “My grandmother broke too. More than once probably. But she got back up. Kept going. Kept choosing to lead even when it was hard.”
“Exactly. Strength is not about never falling. It is about getting back up after you fall. You broke today. And tomorrow you will get back up and keep training. That is strength.”
Young Sera squeezed Kai’s hand, drawing comfort from his steady presence. Outside her window, stars were beginning to appear in the darkening sky.
Four days remained until the summit.
Four days to pull herself together and become the Luna Queen the Northern Kingdom needed.
But tonight she could just be Sera. Broken and healing and learning that both things could be true at the same time.
She closed her eyes and let exhaustion pull her under, Kai’s hand warm in hers, the promise on her palm a constant reminder.
She chose us. Now we choose life. For her.
Even when choosing life meant breaking apart first.