All Chapters of The cursed mate's return : Chapter 261 - Chapter 270

276 Chapters

Too clean to fake it

Maia's pov“Maia, don’t move.”Kael’s voice cuts through the noise before I even realize there is noise. Metal groans somewhere below us. People are shouting. The floor tilts just enough to throw Eli against the wall, his shoulder hitting hard.“I’m fine,” I say, already pushing myself upright.“You’re bleeding,” Kael says.I look down. He’s right. Blood runs down my forearm, warm and steady, dripping onto the floor. I don’t remember when it happened.“It’s nothing,” I say. “Where are we?”Eli laughs, breathless and sharp. “Middle of the city’s main broadcast hub. Or what’s left of it.”That gets my attention.I look around properly this time. The space is wide and circular, screens lining the walls from floor to ceiling. Most of them are cracked or flickering. Some are completely black. Cables hang loose like torn veins. Sparks jump from an exposed panel, hissing every time they hit the floor.“Why are we here?” I ask.Kael doesn’t answer right away. He’s watching the screens.“They

Real comforter

Maia's pov“Maia, if you move one more step, they will see you.”“I already know.”“You say that like it makes it better.”“It makes it honest.”The room is too bright. Flat white light, no shadows, no corners to hide in. The kind of room that exists only to make people tell the truth or break trying. I stop anyway, my hand hovering inches from the door panel.Behind me, Kael exhales sharply. He is trying not to raise his voice. He always does that when he is scared.“We can still walk away,” he says. “No alarms. No broadcasts. We disappear.”I turn to face him. “You know that is not true.”His jaw tightens. “I know you think it is not true.”I step closer. Close enough that I can see the faint cut on his cheek, the one he never notices until it starts bleeding. Close enough that my voice does not need to be loud.“If I walk away now,” I say, “they erase everything we just did. Everyone who woke up forgets again. Everyone who spoke up vanishes quietly.”“And if you go through that doo

Difficult to end now

Maia's pov“All channels are open.”The words come from the ceiling, flat and wrong.I freeze with my hand still wrapped around Kael’s wrist. He looks at me, sharp and alert, already reading the shift in my face.“Say that again,” he says.“I didn’t say it,” I reply.The room trembles. Not violently. Not yet. Screens along the walls flicker awake one by one, no longer showing diagnostics or schematics, but faces. Thousands of them. Millions. Homes, streets, transit cars, offices. People staring back at us in real time.Eli swears. Loud. “That’s a public feed.”Kael’s grip tightens. “How public?”“All of it,” Eli says. “Every node. Every relay. There’s no filter.”My pulse spikes. I step forward without thinking.“Who opened it?” Kael asks.I already know.“I did,” I say.He turns to me sharply. “Maia.”“I didn’t mean to,” I add, but even as I say it, I feel the lie collapse. I did not stop it. I felt the lock break and I let it happen.A woman appears on one of the screens. She is cry

Don't turn it off

Kael's pov“What do you mean live?” I asked.Eli swallowed. “I mean there’s no delay. No regional partitioning. Whatever goes out now goes everywhere.”Maia turned toward the main screen. “How long?”“Ten seconds ago.”I felt my pulse spike. “Who triggered it?”Eli shook his head. “No one did. The system unlocked itself.”That was the moment I understood we were past improvisation.Maia stepped closer to the screen. Her face was calm, but I knew her well enough to see the tension in her shoulders, the way her fingers flexed like she was holding something invisible and heavy.“Can you shut it down?” she asked.“I can slow it,” Eli said. “Maybe. But I can’t stop it without cutting half the city dark.”Maia didn’t answer right away.I moved to her side. “If you don’t want this, say it now. We can still pull the plug and run.”She looked at me then. Really looked. There was no fear in her eyes. Just resolve, sharp and unmistakable.“No,” she said. “If this is happening, then we finish it.”

Becoming the fearless luna

Kael's povThat frightened me more than explosions ever could.Maia walked ahead of me through the lower access levels, her steps steady despite everything that had just happened. She did not look wounded, but I could feel how tightly she was holding herself together. I stayed close enough that my shoulder almost brushed hers, close enough that she would know I was there without needing to look back.Neither of us spoke.The corridor opened into an abandoned operations deck overlooking a section of the city core. Transparent panels stretched from floor to ceiling, revealing layers of infrastructure and traffic far below. Screens along the walls flickered with raw data feeds, uncensored and fast, spilling information that had been buried for years.Someone had already started watching.Public channels were lighting up. Faces filled the screens. Ordinary people at kitchen tables, in offices, in transit cars. Confusion spread first, then anger, then something sharper as patterns began to

Consequences of an authority

Kael's povI knew everything had crossed a line when the people stopped reacting like my supporters and started reacting like a witness.Systems did not reboot cleanly. They hesitated. Transit grids stalled mid-pattern. Broadcast towers stayed live but silent, as if someone had forgotten what they were supposed to say. People poured into streets and balconies, not running, not hiding, just standing there with the same expression I’d seen on Maia’s face earlier. The look someone gets when a truth lands and refuses to soften.Maia stood at the edge of the space overlooking the lower levels, hands braced on the rail. She was steady on her feet, but I could tell how much it was costing her. Every breath was controlled. Every blink deliberate. She was holding herself together because she knew if she didn’t, everything else might follow her lead and come apart too.I stayed close without touching her, because I knew she needed space to be herself before she needed anyone else.The city scree

Stranger in our midst

Kael's povI smelled blood before I heard the fight.Maia walked ahead of me, steady but slow, her hand brushing the wall as if she could read what had passed through here before us.She stopped.Her shoulders went tight, not frightened, just alert.“Someone’s hurt,” she said.“I know,” I answered.That was when I heard it. A low grunt, pain dragged through clenched teeth, followed by the scrape of boots on concrete. I moved without thinking, pulling Maia back with one hand and stepping forward, body already bracing for impact.A man stumbled into view from the side passage. He was tall, broad, dark hair plastered to his forehead with sweat and blood. His jacket was torn open at the side, soaked through, and the way he held himself told me the wound was bad. Not clean. Not recent.He froze when he saw us.His eyes flicked to Maia, then back to me, and something sharp passed through his expression. Recognition maybe. Or assessment.“Don’t,” he said, voice rough. “I’m not here for you.”

Enemy within

Maia's pov“Stay close,” he said without turning around.I did not answer. I did not need to. I stayed close anyway.Kael noticed my hesitation. He slowed just enough to glance back. “You feel it too.”I nodded once.We reached the junction where the lights flickered unevenly, one side bright, the other dim. That was where I saw him.He leaned against the wall like he belonged there, arms crossed loosely, head tipped forward as if listening to something only he could hear. He was tall, taller than Kael, with dark hair pulled back at the nape of his neck and eyes that caught the light in an unsettling way. .When he straightened, I felt it clearly then. Not fear. Recognition.“You’re late,” he said.Kael raised his weapon. “Don’t move.”The man smiled slightly. “Relax. If I wanted you dead, you would already be bleeding.”I stepped forward before Kael could stop me. The man’s attention snapped to me instantly, and his expression changed. The sharpness faded into something closer to curi

Crawling wolves

Kael’s POVBy the time the moon rose, I already knew something was wrong.Those things had become background noise in my life. You learn to ignore them the same way you learn to ignore pain that never fully leaves. This was the wrongness that crawled under the skin.Maia felt distant.She was walking a few steps ahead of me through the industrial stretch beyond the transit docks, her coat pulled tight, her posture controlled. Anyone else would have thought she was calm, she moved when she was lying to herself.“You’re too quiet,” I said.She didn’t slow. “So are you.”That was fair. The air smelled like metal, oil, and rain. It should have smelled like the moon. I tilted my head slightly, letting the instinct rise. The animal part of me was restless, pacing, scraping its claws against the inside of my ribs.We weren’t alone, then i stopped walking.Maia took three more steps before she noticed. She turned, brows knitting. “Kael?”“Someone’s following us,” I said. “And they don’t care

Wolf blooded

Kael’s POVI knew something was wrong the moment the forest died it's noise.Maia was a few steps ahead of me, moving carefully, her boots barely disturbing the damp ground. Moonlight filtered through the canopy in broken shards, silver against her dark hair. She hadn’t said a word since we crossed the river, but I could feel her tension in the way her shoulders stayed tight, in the way she kept her hands too close to her sides.“Stay close,” I said.She glanced back, nodded once, and kept going.The scent hit me next.Wolf erupted. It looked fresh, fierce, unfamiliar.I slowed, letting my senses stretch. The old instincts stirred under my skin, restless and impatient. I hadn’t shifted in days, not since the city burned itself open and forced us into the wild. My body didn’t like restraint when danger was near.“Maia,” I murmured. “We’re not alone.”“I know,” she said quietly. “He’s been following us since the ridge.”We reached the clearing just as a figure stepped out from between th

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