Before the Final CutNicholas’s POVThe forest screamed around us.Branches shook without wind. In the sky there were bruised clouds that were inwardly lighted with flashes of violet lightning which never reached down to the ground. The origins of our very roots at our feet were apparently chanting in language even older than time.And still—I ran.I didn’t look back.Didn’t breathe unless it was to scream her name.Azaria.Her bond flickered like wildfire through my veins, tugging, pulling, guiding.And I followed.Ashley followed me close, with her bow in her hand, with half her eyes shut, as though she was riding on her visions as on a swell. Killian was making an unnatural motion, I was facing him with pistol in hand, and fangs bared, with the drawblade extending beneath his hand.“She’s close,” Ashley said. “I can feel the heat. Something’s rising.”Killian slowed, nostrils flaring. “There’s blood in the air.”I didn’t need to be told.My heart felt it first.A snap in the bond.
Fangs and FireNicholas’ POV*MOMENT EARLIER*The pain hit like lightning.One second, I was gripping the edge of the shrine’s window frame, breathing through the cold night air.The next—I doubled over with a roar.My hand ignited in searing fire. Not literal—but something far worse. Deeper. The bond.Azaria.Ashley turned sharply. “Nicholas?”I looked at my hand, the veins glowing faint gold under my skin.The mark. The damn mate mark.It burned across my wrist like a brand—sacred, ancient, and dying.“She’s in trouble,” I growled, already sprinting to the car. “Move. Now.”Azaria’s father followed without a word, his own face pale, lips pressed in fury.Ashley jumped into the back seat as I slammed into the driver’s side and hit the ignition.The forest roads twisted violently as the engine screamed beneath us.I didn’t care.All I knew was this: She was calling me.And she was fading.---Ashley gripped the seat tightly as I swerved a corner.“Nicholas, slow down—”“Do you feel t
The Mark of a MateAzaria’s POVI felt the tether light up.Burn.Then explode outward like wildfire.My body gave out.My vision blurred at the edges.But I smiled.He would come.He always came.---The world tilted.The trees leaned too far.My mother’s chanting grew louder, sharper.The blade hovered above me.The wind screamed.The blood burned.And then—Everything went dark.Stone.That’s the first thing I feel when I wake up. Cold, ancient, and humming with power.Then pain.It rushed back in like a wave crashing against my spine. My side throbbed. My limbs burned. My wrists—bound—ache with a steady pulse that’s in sync with the blood dripping from them.Drip.Drip.Drip.The sound was maddening.I opened my eyes.I was no longer in the forest. Not even in the cottage.I was underground.The air is heavy with damp soil and ash. Faint blue mushrooms cling to the walls, casting an eerie glow across the chamber. It was a forgotten space—long sealed by time, now unearthed for one
Blood and BetrayalAzaria’s POVThe air had changed.I felt it before I opened my eyes—thicker, heavier, like the cottage itself had stopped pretending. As though it now was no longer wearing its mask.I woke, and, not a little slowly, out of the small, wooden-framed bed, the blankets about me tangled in a sleepless sleep. My heart beat too loudly in my ears, and whispers that I heard outside my window were not wind anymore.They felt like warnings.Something was wrong.The hearth fire was out, in spite of the fact that my mother had always made a practice to keep it alight, on the ground of protection. Shadow filled the room corners, like stains that would not go away.I dropped my legs to the floor, which was cold and I grabbed the dagger considered I placed under my pillow some time ago because I had seen how weird her eyes were. Not rage. Not fear.Control.That’s what she wanted.And suddenly, I could feel it in the walls—the layers of charm and spellwork weren’t just for safety.
Fates IntertwinedNicholas’s POVAshley hadn’t had a vision since the day her favorite pet died. Everyone assumed her gift had been buried under the trauma. But it had never been gone. Only sleeping.She pressed trembling fingers to her temple. “There was fire. Smoke. The ground was cracking beneath her feet. And behind her—something. A shadow in the shape of a woman, but wrong. Not real. Like a memory with claws.”She choked on a breath. “And then I heard Azaria scream. Not loud—but raw. Like it was the last thing she’d ever say. It tore through me like it was my own voice.”Azaria’s father sat upright. “The bond’s still active, then.”Ashley turned toward him. “I think… I think the connection I made with her when we were kids—during the trial rites—never broke. I think I’ve been blocking it for years. But now that she’s awakened… it’s dragging me with it.”I stared at her, heart pounding. “You said shadow. Are you sure it wasn’t just her magic?”She shook her head. “I know the diffe
The Price of SecretsNicholas’s POVThe mansion reared above the hill like a too cumbersome memory.The heavens over it were blurred into hazy gray, as though it was even the clouds themselves had stopped to mourn. I hadn’t been here in a while—not since the fight between Azaria and me, not since she slammed the door on everything we built with a look in her eyes that haunted me even in sleep.Not since her father made it clear that anyone loyal to the crown—or me—was no longer welcome inside.But I wasn’t here for sympathy. I wasn’t here to seek forgiveness.I was here for the truth.I pulled the jeep under the old, bent cedar tree which was bending like a sentinel at the outskirts of the courtyard. Ivy climbed the stone walls like veins under weathered skin. Windows were dark. I mounted the stone steps one by one more heavy than the other. Within a single moment my heart had beaten up against my ribs like war drums as I neared the door.Nevertheless I knocked.The door opened secon