Chapter 3

Cold first. Seeping through stone into my bones.

I lay strapped to a narrow cot, silver-laced leather burning my skin, caging my wolf in silence.

The shaman stood beside me, checking a syringe filled with liquid wolfsbane. Poison gleamed in torchlight.

"Where am I?" My throat was raw.

He smiled without meeting my eyes. "Your Alpha believes grief has unseated your reason. I am here to quiet the chaos."

The needle entered before I could speak. My head spun, tongue thickening. I tried to summon my wolf, but silver bit deeper, driving her into darkness.

"Relax," he said, pressing carved bone to my temple. "The medicine burns away madness."

Agony split my skull. I screamed, back arching against restraints.

"Shh..." he whispered. "It is part of the cleansing."

Two days dissolved in toxin. My body ached from silver poisoning. Each time I begged to return to the packhouse, they forced more wolfsbane down my throat.

I heard attendants whispering when they thought I was silenced.

"Lysandra said leave no marks on her face."

"Pity. She pays so well in gold."

Lysandra had arranged this. Disguised as healing.

By the second evening, I couldn't weep. I stared at stone ceiling, my wolf whimpering in the dark corner of my mind, waiting for death.

...

That night, the oak door scraped open.

Pine. Musk. Lysandra 's perfume clinging to his skin.

Leon.

I thought I would rage. Instead, I stared, too broken to tremble.

He frowned, shadows bruising the skin beneath his eyes. "You look terrible. It is only been two days."

I said nothing. Rain lashed the high windows beyond the bars.

"Let us go," he said flatly, voice carrying Alpha command. "Lysandra is restless. She needs me."

He didn't offer his hand. I followed, each step burning through weakened muscles, silver sickness turning my blood to fire.

In the truck, silence suffocated. Forest blurred outside rain-streaked windows. My hands shook. He didn't glance over.

His phone rang.

"Leon!" Lysandra 's voice through the speaker, trembling, breathless. "Please, come quickly. The pup... something is wrong. I cannot feel him moving!"

Leon's grip whitened on the steering wheel. His wolf rose in his eyes.

He jerked the vehicle to the roadside. Unlocked my door.

"Get out."

My head snapped up. "What?"

"Get out, Seraphine. Lysandra needs me. Now."

"You are leaving me here? In the storm?"

His eyes met mine—golden, cold. "You will manage. You are stronger than you pretend."

The door slammed.

The truck sped off, taillights disappearing into driving rain. Into dark. Into the place where he had chosen her over me.

I stood by the roadside, storm winds howling. The bond stretched between us, thinning, fraying.

I tried to cross to find shelter. Vision blurred. Headlights flashed.

Impact.

Metal and bone. World spinning. Rocky embankment.

Then dark.

I woke in the pack infirmary. The air felt heavier, as if the spirits themselves mourned.

A different healer stood beside my bed, face grim, eyes avoiding the mark on my throat.

"Alpha Mate," he said quietly, "you are fortunate to be alive. We performed emergency surgery. The damage was severe. Silver poisoning from restraints combined with the trauma..."

My lips trembled. "What are you saying?"

He lowered his eyes. "Your she-wolf is dead. The womb cannot sustain life. You will never conceive again."

My world stopped.

Breath came in shallow gasps. The monitor beeped frantically. Tears slid down my cheeks, hot and silent.

The door knocked.

Lysandra stepped inside, dressed in silk the color of fresh blood, hands resting possessively on her round belly—the heir he had killed my wolf for.

"Oh, you poor dear," she cooed, voice dripping false honey. "I heard you had a little accident. Such a shame about... your fertility." She tilted her head, smiling. "But look on the bright side. Now you can help me raise my pup. Yours would have only been a distraction."

I gripped the fur blanket, nails scoring pelt. "Why are you here? Hunting me?"

She laughed. "I came to admire my handiwork. I am not pleased you survived the hit—those were very specific instructions I gave the driver—but at least now you cannot produce competing heirs. The fated bond can only do so much, can it not?"

My chest tightened. I lunged forward, grabbing her hair with what little strength remained.

"How could you? Is it not enough you killed my pup?"

"Help!" she shrieked, perfectly on cue.

The door burst open. Leon strode in, eyes wide, then hardening with fury—at me.

"Twelve hours and you are attacking her again?!" He grabbed my shoulder, shoving me roughly back.

I fell from the bed, back striking metal frame. Something tore deep inside my abdomen. Fresh blood bloomed across the white gown.

"Leon," I whispered, pain blinding. "She did this—she sent the ones who ran me down—"

He cut me off with a slash of his hand. "Stop lying! I am sick of your theatrics!"

I froze, bleeding onto the floor. "What?"

"I caught the driver." He tossed a file onto the bed. It landed near my hand, spattered with my blood. "He confessed. You paid him to strike you. To frame Lysandra . I am so disgusted I cannot look at you."

I stared up, horrified. "That is not true! You think I would do this? Destroy my own womb? Break my own wolf?"

He scoffed, jaw tight. "Of course you would. You would do anything for attention, anything to destroy Lysandra 's happiness. How low will you sink? You have lost your mind."

"I lost my pup, Leon!" I cried, voice breaking. "And now I have lost—"

He turned away before I finished, back to his fated mate. "Enough. Lysandra 's blessing ceremony is tonight. Try to act with dignity. Help her prepare."

Lysandra leaned close, lips brushing my ear. "Do not worry. I will make sure Leon saves you a piece of the celebration cake."

The door slammed. He led her away, arm wrapped protectively around her waist while I knelt in my own blood.

The bond between us was silent. Finally. Irrevocably.

I sat staring at the hospital gown stained crimson.

My phone buzzed.

A message from Harris:

"The mate-bond severance scroll has been delivered."

A tear slipped down my cheek—the last I would ever shed for Leon Ashford.

The last gift of a bond he chose to break.