MasukXavier’s POVI had felt it the moment he stepped forward — a ripple in the air that had nothing to do with magic and everything to do with the blood in my veins.It wasn't just power. I had faced powerful men before. It was something far more primitive.Recognition.It wasn’t mine at first. It belonged to my Lycan. Marcus hit the back of my ribs like a physical blow, his claws raking against the cage of my restraint. He didn't just growl; he roared a name I hadn't let myself think in a decade.“Stay back,” I said, the words barely a vibration in the air.I wasn't talking to Ronan or Rylan. I was talking to the monster inside me. Marcus didn’t listen. For the first time since we had crossed the threshold into this godforsaken place, he was trying to snap the leash. He pushed, hard and violent, trying to seize control.‘You know him,’ Marcus hissed, his voice a distorted echo of my own.“I don’t,” I muttered, though the lie tasted like copper in my mouth. But even as the denial left me,
Alara’s POVThe deeper we ventured, the more the world seemed to withdraw."He’s here," I whispered.No one argued over it. The air was thick with a gravity they could feel, even if they didn't share any connection with him like I did.The structure we’d glimpsed through the treeline finally revealed its true scale. It wasn't a ruin or a repurposed fortification. It was built, dark stone layered with a precision that defied nature. The edges were too sharp, the geometry too perfect to have been shaped by mortal hands.There were no guards at the entrance. No movement along the entrance, only the crushing weight of being watched."I don't like this," Ronan muttered, his hand hovering around his weapon."You're not supposed to," Rylan countered, though his own eyes were narrowed, scanning for the trap we all knew was there.Xavier remained silent, but the tension radiating off him was palpable. Marcus was clawing at the surface of his consciousness, restless and snarling, sensing a riva
Ronan’s POVI slowed my pace, my boots crunching softly on the blackened soil. Beside me, Xavier and Alara drifted a half-step forward, their bodies coiled like overwound springs. Rylan held the flank to my left, his eyes darting through the skeletal remains of the treeline."No movement," I murmured, the words barely hitching on the air."That’s the problem," Rylan replied, his voice a low grate of gravel. "Everything in these woods should be screaming right now. Instead, it’s like the forest is holding its breath."He was right. Nothing moved. Nothing breathed. And yet, beneath the surface of that quiet, I felt a flicker. It wasn't a sound or a scent. It was a phantom connection — a tether of intent that didn't belong to any of us."Wait—" I started, the warning dying on my lips.They didn't emerge from the shadows; the shadows simply solidified into teeth and fur. There was no theatrical growl, no rustle of dry leaves. There was only the sudden, violent impact.A massive, grey-furr
Xavier’s POVThe land began to decay long before the visual evidence appeared.“We’re close,” Rylan murmured at my shoulder.I didn't bother responding. The confirmation was already vibrating through my body. The pull was there, but as relentless as a physical tether. With every stride forward, the thread only tightened.Deep within the cages of my mind, Marcus stirred. He was eerily focused. Alert.“She’s here.”“I know,” I breathed.The words were barely a ghost of a sound, but they were the only things keeping me grounded. Ronan moved a few paces ahead, his eyes tracking the treeline with lethal precision. His frame was a coiled spring. “This place is wrong, Xavier. Down to the dirt.”“It was made to be,” Rylan added, his voice analytical even in the face of the macabre.He was right. The terrain was uneven, stained with dark patches that looked less like burns and more like a systemic corruption.We pressed deeper into the blight, moving with the silent efficiency of a hunting pa
Alara’s POVThe moment I crested the northern ridge, the world as I knew it ceased to exist.The air didn’t just turn cold; it turned heavy. It became a thick, pressurized substance that didn't necessarily impede my physical movement, but instead pressed relentlessly against my senses, dulling the sharp edges of my perception. Sound didn't travel; it died.The rustle of my own movements was swallowed by an oppressive silence, and the wind, which had been biting at my back moments before, became a stagnant, breathless weight. Even the ground beneath my boots felt fundamentally wrong.I came to a halt just beyond the skeletal remains of the tree line, my gaze sweeping across a valley that defied every instinctual map I carried. It wasn't merely unfamiliar territory; it was land that had been stripped of its identity. There were no pack markings here, no scent-trails of territorial claims, no natural boundaries defined by the ebb and flow of a healthy ecosystem. This was a dead zone — l
Xavier’s POVSomething was wrong.The realization didn't arrive through a sudden sound or a visual cue; it arrived through a void. It was the crushing weight of absence. The corridor leading to her private chambers was too still, the air unnervingly stagnant, as if the very atmosphere had been hollowed out.I didn't slow my pace as I reached her door. I didn't knock. I simply shouldered it open.Empty.My mind stalled, momentarily refusing to process the vacant space. She was supposed to be here. I swept the room with a clinical gaze. There were no signs of a struggle. No overturned furniture, no scuff marks on the stone, no evidence of an intrusion.That was infinitely worse. It meant she hadn’t been taken by force. She had walked out on her own."Where is she?"The words were a serrated blade as I turned toward the guard at the threshold. He snapped to attention, a flicker of raw dread crossing his features."My King, she—""Don’t hesitate," I snarled."She didn’t pass through the
Xavier’s POVThe scent hit me first — wrong, oily, metallic, and slithering through the corridors like a smear of rot. It didn’t belong anywhere in my wing, not in the guarded heart of the palace, not within twenty steps of where Alara slept.My Lycan surged to the surface before my mind could fully
Xavier’s POVI hadn’t slept properly in days — not since the argument in my office, not since the moment Alara’s eyes had gone cold and she turned her back on me. My lycan hadn’t stopped snarling at me since then, pacing relentlessly under my skin, demanding that I fix what I had broken.But she had
Alara’s POVThe moment Xavier tore his mouth from mine, grabbing my wrist — the one with the pulsing crescent mark — I knew the charade was over. My breath hitched as he pulled me hard against his side, turning instantly toward the main doors.“Rylan,” Xavier’s voice was a low, guttural growl that r
Alara’s POVThe morning should have been soft — warm sheets, tangled limbs, the quiet aftermath of a night neither of us would dare put into words just yet. But the moment I opened my eyes, the air felt wrong. Dense. Heavy. Like the world itself was holding its breath.Xavier felt it too.He was alr







