The Mate Who Waited

Sera POV(Sera and Thomas’s Suite)The air was wrong the moment Sera crossed the threshold.Not cold—frozen.The suite was dark except for the low amber glow near the sitting area. Shadows clung to the walls as if they had nowhere else to go. The wards hummed faintly under her skin, unsettled, as if unsure which Alpha they answered to tonight.Her wolf lifted her head inside her.So, the voice murmured with grim clarity. Tonight is the night our mate finally admits who he is.Sera didn’t stop walking. She didn’t reach for a weapon. She didn’t call out.Be ready, she replied silently. We may have to kill our mate tonight.Her wolf didn’t bristle. Didn’t snarl.She stood.Attentive.It would not be the first time they had chosen their children over a bond.Thomas stood near the vanity, his back half-turned, one hand in his pocket, the other holding a glass of dark amber liquid. Whiskey. The good kind. The kind he drank when he wanted to savor something.Or someone.He watched her in the

Last Updated : 2026-01-14

Sera & Thomas

“We’ve been through worse,” Sera said quietly after Thomas had quieted.Thomas scoffed and turned away toward the drink bar. “Yeah. And I don’t want to have to kill my mate over it.”The words landed harder than a slap.Sera didn’t respond immediately. She rose slowly, deliberately, and crossed the room until she stood directly in front of him. Then—without hurry, without apology—she lowered herself to her knees in front of him.Not submission.Calculation.Her hands slid up his thighs, gentle, familiar, touching him in the precise way she knew unraveled him every time. The way that bypassed anger and went straight for instinct.Something he loved.“Thomas,” she said softly. “I would never betray you.”His eyes tracked her movements with sharp caution, assessing even as heat flickered beneath it.“I know what I’m doing,” she continued. “I don’t need you micromanaging my every move.”He didn’t respond.So she pressed—because silence from Thomas was never neutrality. It was a strategy.

Last Updated : 2026-01-14

Something’s Changed

Road Trip — Graves LandingThe sign rose out of the fog like a declaration.Not subtle.Not polite.Black iron, bolted into stone.WELCOME TO GRAVES LANDINGBeneath it, in smaller but unmistakable lettering:ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISKTRESPASSERS BEWARERaven slowed the truck instinctively as they passed beneath it.Ash let out a low breath. “Damn.”“Sienna wanted to make a statement,” Luca said quietly. “This is where our children will be raised. It stays separate from Black River.”Ash leaned forward to read the sign. “Honestly… that’s kind of conflicting. Like, welcome—but also beware or we’ll kick your ass.”Luca huffed a quiet laugh. “Sienna wanted it unmistakable.”“She nailed it,” Ash said. “Polite threat. Very on-brand.”Ash nodded slowly. “I like it. Keeps Grandfather’s legacy clean.”The word lingered.Grandfather.They’d never met him, but Elias Graves had been a legend in their house. A man who had built something rare. Something that had lasted.“He was an amazing man,” Luca s

Last Updated : 2026-01-15

Quiet Threat – The First Breach

Sera felt it before the wards finished settling.The air had the wrong density—too thin, too alert. Magic didn’t hum so much as hold its breath.The breach had already happened.Not a tear wide enough to walk through. Not yet. Seraphine hadn’t crossed physically—couldn’t. The old laws still held. The land still resisted her body.Then the alarms sounded.Thomas was already moving, crossing the room in long, urgent strides as he reached for weapons along the wall.“Beta Luca just called it in,” he said. “Perimeters are tightening. Something pushed through—but nothing physical.”Sera’s chest tightened.“Mommy,” Sienna’s voice came through the link, thin with strain. “Something touched Luca’s mind. And I feel something pressing on the ward lines… like a presence.”Sera frowned. Oddly, she didn’t feel it with the same intensity. But Sienna was pregnant. Wolf-mothers had a different kind of perception—protective, primal, heightened when danger neared their unborn.“Stay where you are or com

Last Updated : 2026-01-15

The Placeholder Card

Amalia and Jael had claimed one of the oldest alcoves in the Shadowmere library—the kind built directly into the mountain, where the stone still hummed faintly with warded memory. They sat on the floor amid towers of ancient volumes, Amalia’s back resting against the wall, her heavy belly curved beneath a pile of half-closed grimoires.She was glowing in that dangerous way first-time mothers did—radiant, soft, and oddly reckless.“My goddess,” she breathed, turning a page with reverent delight. “This is some of the best reading I’ve ever encountered. Kaela was bad. I love her.”She giggled.Jael, stretched beside her with another thick volume braced against his knee, grunted in agreement, entirely absorbed in a separate chronicle of the same wolf’s exploits. His brow was furrowed, jaw tight with concentration.Amalia suddenly inhaled sharply.Jael looked up instantly. “What is it, love? The pup? Do you need a back rub?”She burst into laughter at the concern—soft, delighted, unguarded

Last Updated : 2026-01-16

Who Removed the Chapters — And Why

The person who removed the chapters didn’t do it in a panic or a rush.They did it while wearing gloves.Years later—long after Zahara’s death became myth and Seraphine became a nightmare—someone returned to the Shadowmere library when the mountain was quiet, and the wards were relaxed by complacency.They knew exactly which shelf.And they knew exactly which binding.They moved through the archive as if they had grown up inside it.Jael’s fingers traced the cut edge again, as if the angle of the cut could tell him a name.“It was a royal blade,” he said finally. “Not steel. Not common iron. This was enchanted to slice warded parchment without triggering protection spells.”Amalia’s eyes narrowed. “Meaning access from within.”Lucian’s voice went low. “A king’s access.”Dorian looked at the placeholder card again—blank, unmarked, deliberately unhelpful.“It wasn’t just to hide Kaela,” Dorian said. “It was to hide the solution.”Talia felt Kaela shift, listening.Because if there was a