Chapter 127

Elora's pov

I wanted to answer, but my voice wasn’t there. My head spun, everything heavy. The mark under my skin still throbbed, faint and annoying, except nothing was there. No spark. Just dead air.

Silence. The kind that crushes.

Dante grabbed my face, hands warm, desperate. “Say something,” he begged. “Did it work?”

I swallowed, throat dry as bone. Managed a whisper. “It didn’t.”

He froze up. His face just crumpled.

I could see him thinking it, the healer’s words rolling around in his head. They echoed in mine too. True love’s mark, right? That magic that’s supposed to fix everything.

Should’ve worked. Would’ve, if I’d really loved him the way the stories say.

And that’s the part that sucks most.

Because I did love him. Just… not enough. Not in the way it mattered.

My neck burned, but underneath that pain, there was another pull. Barely there, but real, like something tugging me away. Not Dante.

Dominic.

Dante’s voice broke. “Elora…”

My vision blurred.

I tried to reach for him, but my arm wouldn’t cooperate. “I’m sorry,” I whispered.

Everything tilted again, the world going all gray and fuzzy. Last thing I felt was Dante’s hand clutching mine, his voice desperate, cracking...

“Elora, don’t you dare leave me.”

Dante’s POV

Thought it worked at first. No lie.

The second my teeth hit her skin, something exploded in the bond, hot, wild, like grabbing a live wire. Her heartbeat roared in my mouth, her scent everywhere, burning. For a blink, I was sure she was mine.

And then… nothing.

The heat died.

I jerked back, gasping, staring at the mark on her neck. Red, then just… gone. Like it never happened. My stomach bottomed out.

“Elora?” I whispered, shaking her. “You hear me?”

She breathed... barely. Eyelashes fluttered, lips twitching, but no words. Just the ghost of something.

My throat closed up. This wasn’t right. The mark should’ve sealed it. Tied her to me, made her stronger. That’s the fairy tale. That’s what everyone says.

I spun on the healer, who stood frozen by the door, clutching her pouch. “Why isn’t she responding?” My voice cracked with panic. “You said true love’s mark would save her!”

She swallowed, eyes wild. “It should have.”

“Then why didn’t it?” I nearly yelled. I could feel my wolf rising, clawing at my insides.

“Calm yourself,” she tried, but her voice shook. She moved closer, hands hovering over Elora’s chest, searching for her heartbeat. Her brow furrowed. “Her heart… it beats strangely.”

“Strange?” I snapped, grabbing her wrist. “What the hell does that mean?”

She stared at me, eyes dark. “It means your love reached her,” she whispered, “but something else pulled her back.”

I froze. Panic mixed with confusion. “Something else?”

She hesitated, glancing at the mark on Elora’s neck. “She accepted your mark, yes. But her soul… It’s tied to someone else. Another bond. Not yours.”

Her words hit hard. “No,” I said, shaking my head. “You’re wrong. She’s my mate. The Moon Goddess chose us. There’s no one else.”

She didn’t flinch. “And yet, your mark didn’t take.”

I stared at Elora, heart pounding. She looked too peaceful. Like she’d just stepped out for a minute and might never come back. Pale. Lips parted, like she was stuck halfway between two dreams.

My hands shook. I brushed her cheek with my thumb. “Wake up,” I begged. “Please, Elora. You said you loved me.”

But she just lay there. Didn’t move, didn’t even twitch.

“Tell me how to fix this,” I snapped. “Just tell me what to do.”

The healer’s eyes got all glassy, like she might cry or maybe she was just tired of me. “You can’t fix what isn’t broken, Alpha Dante. Her body’s doing everything it can to hang on, but her spirit… her spirit’s split down the middle.”

I just stared at her. My brain couldn’t catch up. “Split?”

She nodded slowly. “Two bonds. Two hearts. One dragging her back toward life… the other keeping her stuck between worlds.”

My chest went tight. Breathing felt shallow. “Who?” I spat out, but honestly, I already knew. The answer was already poisoning my gut.

She kept quiet, lips pressed tight, like saying it would make it too real. But then, in this tiny voice, barely more than a breath, she finally said it.

“Because her heart isn’t yours alone.”

Those words? Might as well have been a knife.

I couldn’t move for a while. Couldn’t think. My brain just looped back on all those stupid moments... the way Elora looked at him, Dominic, when she thought nobody was watching. The way her whole body seemed to relax when he walked into a room.

I stumbled back, throat dry. “No,” I said, but it sounded pathetic, even to me.

The healer just dropped her gaze. “Love doesn’t always pick sides,” she mumbled. “Sometimes it splits. And when it does, the body’s the one that gets torn up.”

My hands shook. I wanted to break something... anything. Rip the room apart or just yell. But all I did was stare.

At her. The woman I’d built my world around.

At the mark on her skin that refused to do a damn thing.

I sank down next to her, forehead pressed to her hand. “You’re mine,” I whispered, voice splintering in the middle. “You promised.”

But even as I said it, some part of me... the part that hated me most knew it was a lie.

She might be my mate, sure. But there was a piece of her heart, some secret place I’d never reach, that belonged to Dominic.

No mark, no vow, nothing I could do would ever wipe that away.