The wind shifted as we crossed into rogue territory–sharper, colder, laced with the iron tang of old magic and war.
It moved through the trees like a whisper with teeth, brushing the back of my neck, making the hair rise along my arms even though I was already half–shifted. My senses were running wild, heightened not by adrenaline, but by something far more visceral. Something instinctual. Something wrong.
Jiselle’s scent no longer lingered on the earth. But I could feel her. Not in the way I used to, with the bond burning bright between us like a constant thread. That was gone–severed by the suppression rune that yanked her into the void. But sometimes, in the space just between waking and memory, she flickered. A pressure behind my ribs. A whisper under my skin. An ache in my spine that didn’t come from the long days of travel but from something deeper.
Something my wolf didn’t understand. And wouldn’t let go of.
“We’re close,” I muttered, even though Bastain didn’t ask. He said nothing, only tilted his head and pressed his palm against the next ley stone embedded in the forest floor. The stone pulsed faintly beneath his fingers, a soft shimmer of silver–blue. Another trace. Another echo.
“She passed through here,” he confirmed. “Maybe a day ago. Two, at most.”
I exhaled slowly, forcing my hands to unclench. My claws were halfway out again. I hadn’t meant to shift. Lately, my control came and went like a storm current. There was something off about the way my wolf reacted to her absence. He didn’t mourn her like a lost mate–he thrashed, roared, circled endlessly inside me like he was searching for something that wasn‘ t quite dead.
Not grief.
Not yet.
We pressed deeper into the woods, and the air thickened. Not with fog, but tension. My pulse beat harder the closer we got to the heart of rogue territory, and my skin prickled with the sensation of being watched. Not by rogues. Not by enemies.
By something older.
“We shouldn’t be this far in,” Bastain said quietly, but he didn’t stop walking. “The ley lines are starting to twist. This isn’t Council magic anymore.”
“I don’t care,” I said. “If she walked through fire, I’ll do the same.”
He gave me a look. “Even if she’s not the same when we find her?”
I didn’t answer.
Because I didn’t know.
A rustle in the underbrush snapped my head around–and suddenly, I wasn’t in the forest anymore.
For half a second, the world shifted. My vision tunneled. The sky turned red. The trees vanished. In their place, flames danced across black stone, and above it all stood a figure cloaked in silver light, her back to me, her body surrounded by burning wolves. Her hair whipped in the wind like wildfire.
Jiselle.
Her power pulsed outward like a heartbeat, and it nearly knocked me to my knees.
Then it was gone.
Just like that.
I staggered, breath catching, head spinning. Bastain caught my arm.
“What did you see?” he asked urgently.
“I–I don’t know, I rasped. “It wasn’t real. But it was her.”
“A bond echo,” he said. “You’re still connected.”
“No, the bond is broken.”
He stared at me. “Maybe it didn’t break the way you think it did.”
My chest tightened.
“Whatever they’ve done to her,” he said carefully, “she’s changing. That wasn’t a vision. That was a tether. A scar. You felt her power. Not her fear. That’s important.”
I wanted to deny it. But I couldn’t. My wolf was howling in my head now, restless and primal. He didn’t want to run. He wanted to fight. But not against the rogues.
1/3
Chapter 93 Against time.
We came upon the rebel camp by accident–or maybe fate.
The forest thinned near the edge of a ravine, where the river had carved deep scars into the earth. Bastain paused, frowning.
“There’s a shield here,” he said. “But it’s not rogue–made.”
I stepped forward, letting my wolf rise behind my eyes. And sure enough, the air shimmered faintly in a half–circle around the bend. Not a physical barrier. A magical one. Camouflage.
“Drop it,” I said.
Bastain didn’t argue. He muttered a low chant under his breath, fingers sketching runes in the air. The moment the spell cracked, a spear of fire flared up in front of us.
“Don’t move.”
A woman emerged from the trees, followed by two more. They weren’t Council. And they weren’t rogues.
They were something in between.
“I’m not here to fight,” I said calmly, raising my hands.
The woman studied me, her eyes sharp as flint. “Nathaniel Vareen.”
“You know me?”
“Hard not to.”
She lowered the fire. “You’ve come looking for the girl.”
“Her name is Jiselle.”
“And she’s not just a girl anymore.”
Something cold slid down my spine.
“We’ve been watching Kael’s movements for weeks,” the woman continued. “He’s consolidating power. Gathering gifted. Preparing for something.”
“War?” Bastain asked.
“Worse,” she said. “Ascension.”
I frowned. “What the hell does that mean?”
“Kael believes he’s the true successor to the Ethereal line. That he was forged, not born. And that Jiselle… is his match.”
My heart nearly stopped.
“He’s going to try to claim her,” she said. “Not as a hostage. Not as a prisoner. As a queen.”
Bastain swore under his breath.
The woman looked at me. “And from what we’ve seen–she might let him.”
“No,” I said automatically. “She wouldn’t.”
“She’s changing,” she said. “We’ve seen the fires. Felt the ley shifts. She’s waking up into something new. And that kind of transformation comes with a price. Loyalty bends. Memory fades. The more power she accesses, the more she’ll forget who she used to be.”
“No,” I said again, but the ground felt unstable beneath me.
“You’re not just racing to save her from death,” she said gently. “You’re racing to save her from becoming someone else.”
I turned away, every nerve on fire. My wolf paced behind my ribs, wild with panic.
“She’s not lost yet,” I said.
“Maybe not, the woman said. “But you better find her before she forgets what it means to be found.”
I nodded once, the scar in my chest pulsing again–not pain, but pressure.
A warning.
A countdown.
I would find her.
Even if I had to follow her into fire.
