He knew her.
But I didn’t.
My brain scrambled. I’d never felt anything like this. Never heard that frequency, that tone.
Never smelled that exact scent-warm vanilla and sandalwood, the edge of something wild, yet fragile.
But Ashar… He knew. His voice was pure certainty.
“Mine.”
I stopped in front of a closed door I hadn’t meant to find. My hand went to the handle, already burning with tension I didn’t understand.
I was in my body.
Time stopped.
In the center of the room, a meditation circle. The soft haze of incense curled through shafts of golden light. And at the center of it-
My heart seized.
Her.
Sera.
Kneeling across from Lucian Reed, their hands clasped, her face flushed, her lips parted like she was caught mid-breath. Her eyes were closed. Her expression was softer than I’d ever seen it-unguarded, glowing with something deep and primal. A sheen of sweat clung to her brow, trickled down the back of her neck.
I felt it before I understood it: the low hum in the room, the frayed threads of something destined being stitched back together.
Ashar howled-not with rage, but with longing. With recognition.
He made me surge toward her, certain-of what I couldn’t name, only feel: this was it. Her.
The one.
The bond.
I didn’t understand it. But he did.
Then-her eyes flew open.
And everything changed.
She gasped, sharp and startled, as if waking from a dream.
And in the space of a single breath, the feeling disappeared.
Snapped. Cut clean.
Like whatever force had tethered us had retreated the moment she came back to herself.
Gone.
Just-gone.
I stumbled forward a step, desperate to feel it again. To confirm it hadn’t just been in my head. That the sudden… hollowness inside me had once been filled with something bright and burning and potent.
Ashar whined low, disoriented.
Lucian moved before I could reach her. He rose to his feet, placing himself squarely between us. Calm. Controlled. Possessive.
+
AL
“This is a sacred space, Alpha Blackthorne,” he said evenly.
I barely heard him. My focus was on Sera-now standing too, her expression shuttered.
She looked at me-but there was nothing in her eyes.
No recognition. No pull. Not even the echo of what had just lit me up from the inside.
Whatever I’d felt… she hadn’t.
Or she didn’t remember. Or it was already lost.
I stepped closer anyway, hand reaching out of its own accord. It wrapped around her arm.
“Sera-“
She flinched.
And I stopped cold.
Something inside me twisted. The connection-whatever it had been-was gone. The wolf
I’d felt rising to meet mine had vanished like smoke. As if it had never existed.
Ashar let out a low, pained growl inside me. A sound of protest. Of mourning.
I’d found something-and lost it in the same breath.
The door behind me slammed open, jolting me.
“Kieran?” Celeste’s voice was like ice water down my spine, dampening the last embers of the fire I’d felt.
I turned to find her standing in the doorway, eyes flicking between me, Sera, and Lucian.
Hurt was already blooming on her face, even though she didn’t know what she was seeing.
Sera pulled her arm out of my grip, putting space between us like she needed it to breathe.
Lucian was already at her side, steering her away without saying a word.
She didn’t look back as they left the room through a second doorway.
I stood there, heart pounding, chest hollow, the echo of something precious fading fast.
Celeste approached slowly, her voice careful. “Kie, what were you doing in Sera’s class?”
“I-” I could barely form the words, could barely understand their magnitude. “I felt something. Ashar did-a call. I don’t understand it, but…” I exhaled heavily. “It was intense.”
She frowned, confusion giving way to disbelief. “And that led you here? You thought Sera might be your mate?”
My silence was all the answer she needed.
“That’s not possible,” she snapped. “Werewolves without wolves don’t have mates. There’s no way Sera’s your mate.”
I ran my hand through my hair, feeling disheveled. “I don’t know what I felt, Celeste, I…
Celeste’s face shifted, wounded pride curling into something sharper. She looked away, voice tightening.
“My wolf’s been… off,” she said finally. “For the last decade. I haven’t told anyone, not even you. I didn’t want it to affect how people saw me. How you saw me.”
That caught me off guard.
She continued, softer now. “After what happened that… night, my wolf never fully recovered. The trauma of seeing you two together-it changed something. She stopped responding like she used to. Some days, I can barely feel her at all.”
I stared at her, guilt winding through me like barbed wire.
Celeste looked up at me, eyes glistening. “What you felt wasn’t Sera. Maybe it was my wolf.
I’ve felt her growing stronger since I’ve been training. Maybe that’s what you sensed.”
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