LOGINKeanuI didn’t want to. The story belonged to me and Tempest and the forest where we’d spent one night together that had changed everything about who I was. But Eldric had the kind of presence that made confession feel less like vulnerability and more like laying down something heavy you’d been carrying too long.“I met her in the forest. She helped me find the cure for my sister. We spent the night together.” I stared at the stream. “When I woke up, she was gone. I searched for her every day. Never found her. She’s an elemental dragon who hides because the world punished her kind for existing. And I don’t know if she left because she’s afraid of being found or because …” I stopped.“Because?”
KeanuThe training was brutal.Not physically. I could handle physical. Physical was easy.This was internal. And internal was where I had no idea what I was doing.The goal was simple to explain and impossible to execute. Dragon fire, in its natural state, was destruction. My golden flame consumed whatever it touched. My fire was powerful, hot, and had all the precision of a sledgehammer hitting a walnut.What Eldric needed me to produce was the opposite. A blue flame. Pure, azure, cool to the touch. A healing fire that could enter a living body and target individual cells without damaging anything around them. The blue flame wasn’t born from power. It was born from calm. From peace. From a stillness inside th
KeanuThe entrance to the druid enclave was a crack in a mountain.Not a cave. Not a grand archway or a carved entrance or anything that suggested people actually used it. A crack. Barely wide enough for my shoulders, hidden behind a waterfall that poured over a cliff face so seamlessly that you’d walk past it a thousand times without knowing the rock behind it was hollow.Iris led the way without hesitation, stepping through the waterfall like she’d done it a hundred times, which she probably had.The crack opened into a tunnel. Narrow at first, then wider, cutting through the belly of the mountain in a downward slope that made my ears pop. The walls were smooth, not carved but worn by centuries of passage, and they hummed. That was the only word for it. The stone hummed with a frequency I could feel in my bones, a vibration that had nothing to do with sound and everything to do with the magic saturated into every inch of this place.“How old is this?” I asked.“Old,” Iris said witho
Darien“Months she may not have comfortably,” Iris clarified, as if the distinction between dying and suffering was a comfort. “The witch cannot kill her. Your wolf prevents that. But the constant battle drains her. Her quality of life will deteriorate. The fatigue will worsen. The seizures may return. She will be alive, but she will not be well. She would almost be a vegetable at times … sleeping constantly.”The room was quiet. The smoke from the herbs had dissipated, leaving behind the faint scent of something burned. The sigils on the bedframe had gone dark.The door opened and Cain stepped in. He’d been listening. Of course he had. Cain always listened.“There may be another option,” he said. He looked at Keanu, who had appea
DarienThe witch arrived at noon.She came in a black SUV with tinted windows, escorted by two younger witches who flanked her like bodyguards as she stepped onto the cobblestones of the kingdom’s main courtyard. She was older than I expected. Not frail, nothing about this woman suggested fragility, but the lines on her face spoke of decades of power wielded and consequences absorbed. Her hair was silver-white, pulled back from her face in a tight braid that fell to the middle of her back. Her eyes were dark, nearly black, and they swept the courtyard with detached precision. She looked to be someone who was cataloging every potential threat and every potential weakness in the span of a single glance.Iris. Mother Witch of the Petalis Coven.Cain had called in a favor to get her here. The relationship between wolves and witches had been complicated. There was a betrayal that had shattered the fragile alliance between covens and packs. Most covens wanted nothing to do with canine packs
LeahThe healers came to the room quickly. Maren ran every test she had. Blood draws. Magical scans. Vital assessments. The examination took over an hour while I lay on the bed in our room, Darien on one side holding my hand, Keanu on the other. He hadn’t let go of my arm since the stairs. His fingers were still trembling.“The viral markers are gone,” Maren said finally, scrolling through results on her tablet. “The noctis bloom eliminated the mountain infection completely. Your bloodwork is clean.”“Then what just happened?” Darien’s voice was steady, but his hand was crushing mine.“I don’t know.” Maren looked up from the tablet. I could see the frustration in her expression, the professional d
DarienI took a breath, steadying myself. This was it. My chance to do what Cain had suggested. To show interest. To connect with her. "I wanted to ask you something," I said, keeping my tone casual. "You’ve been to the small town built down in the underground bunkers—"She blinked, clearly not exp
DarienMy hand rested over Leah's, warm and still, as she slept. I'd been sitting in this damned chair for hours, my back screaming in protest, but I couldn't bring myself to move. Not when her breathing had finally evened out. Not when she looked so peaceful for the first time since she'd arrived.
DarienI grabbed the phone from my desk, my jaw tight as I dialed the number. The line rang twice before Anton’s voice crackled through.“Darien? What’s—”“Don’t be cute with me, Anton,” I cut him off, my voice hard. “I need answers. Now.”There was a pause, and I heard the shift in his breathing,
Leah"Why would you say they are already ranked?"Darien's voice was ice, sharp and cutting, each word measured and controlled. He stood in the doorway of the Tundra Arena, his silver eyes fixed on me with an intensity that would have made most people back down. His arms were crossed, his posture r







