Chapter 17 - Sera
The stench of Thornridge wolves haunts me all the way back to the border.
Reeyan handled the situation with Llewelyn’s border patrol—explaining what we found, arranging for increased surveillance, and coordinating with the warriors who looked at him with slightly less hostility after he reported the threat.
But the whole time my mind kept circling back to one unavoidable fact.
Thornridge knows I returned to Llewelyn territory. They were watching. Waiting. Gathering intelligence about our defenses while we spoke with Isla about breaking a curse, they probably want to exploit.
I guess Reeyan was right. Staying with him is the safest option.
The drive back toward Grayhide passes in silence for the first twenty minutes. Frozen tundra gives way to scrubland, then gradually to the desert landscape that characterizes his territory. I watch the terrain change through the passenger window and try to organize the chaos in my head.
I’m the key to breaking the curse. Me. A Llewelyn woman with psychic abilities bonded to her true mate. The legend Isla dismissed as wishful thinking turned out to be real, and I’m apparently the one who’s supposed to fulfill it, just like the Hysopp coven said.
No pressure.
My thoughts drift back to the morning I left Llewelyn territory.
I packed my bag in secret, slipped out through the archives' back entrance, and told no one where I was going.
At the time, I felt guilty about the deception.
Cowardly, even. But the vision was so specific—don't tell anyone in Llewelyn territory, someone will try to stop you—that I didn’t dare risk it.
Now, sitting in Reeyan's truck with Isla's stories echoing in my head, I finally understand why.
If I had gone to my mother first, she would have dismissed the vision as stress.
Overwork. Perhaps even early signs of a mental break brought on by the Bastian situation.
She would have insisted I rest, maybe even called for a healer to examine me.
And if I pushed back, if I insisted the vision was real and that I needed to investigate…
She would have confined me. For my own protection, of course.
Because that's what Llewelyn women do when one of their own starts acting erratically; they close ranks and contain the problem.
They don't let their people run off to enemy territory chasing supernatural explanations for cultural traits.
And Thora. Gods, Thora would have been worse.
She already sees the inter-regional agreement as a mistake, already believes that opening our borders to male wolves led directly to the Bastian infiltration.
If I'd told her I was having visions about our pack being cursed, she would have used it as proof that outside influence was corrupting me.
She might have demanded I be kept away from anyone connected to the other packs.
Might have convinced Aunt Lydia that I needed to be isolated until I came to my senses.
The vision wasn't just warning me about danger. It was warning me about love.
My mother loves me. Thora, in her rigid way, cares about protecting our pack.
But the curse would have used that love against me.
Would have turned their protective instincts into a cage.
They would have stopped me from discovering the truth, and they would have done it believing they were saving me.
That's the cruelest part of all this. Three hundred years of well-meaning women perpetuating their own imprisonment because the magic made them think isolation was safety.
Reeyan glances at me from the driver’s seat. “You’re thinking too loud. I can practically hear your brain working overtime.”
“Isla gave us exactly what we needed.” I turn away from the window. “The oral histories confirm what we learned from the Hysopp archives. The matriarch commissioned the binding, thinking it was protection. Moira Ashwood wove her revenge into the magic. Three hundred years later, here we are.”
“And you’re processing what it means that you might be able to break it.”
“You know, my mother has struggled her whole life to express affection, even more than most of the women in my pack. She even thought something was wrong with her because she couldn’t connect the way she wanted to. She’s spent her entire life thinking she’s simply cold by nature.”
“She isn’t cold. She’s cursed.”
“Which she never knew. Which none of them know. How many Llewelyn women have lived and died thinking they were broken? How many gave up on finding mates because the bond couldn’t form properly through the curse’s suppression? How many children grew up believing their mothers didn’t love them?”
Reeyan doesn’t answer at first, just keeps driving while I stare at my hands and try not to drown in guilt for things I had no control over.
“You’re taking responsibility for something that happened three centuries before you were born. The curse isn’t your fault. Your mother’s struggles aren’t your fault. You’re not responsible for fixing problems you didn’t create.”
“Except I’m the only one who can fix them.
” I look at him. “According to the legend, I’m the woman with psychic abilities bonded to her true mate.
Which means if I don’t break this curse, it just keeps getting stronger until Llewelyn women can’t feel anything at all.
Until we’re living ice that can’t melt.”
“So we break it.”
The confidence in his tone almost makes me laugh. “You say that like it’s simple.”
“It’s not simple. It’s necessary.” He checks the rearview mirror, probably checking for threats out of habit.
“Evangeline said breaking a curse of this magnitude requires enormous magical power and willing participation from someone inside the affected bloodline. You have both. The mate bond provides the power. Your psychic abilities provide the sight. The Hysopp Coven provides the magical expertise to guide the process.”
“And what if I’m not strong enough? What if the curse fights back and wins? What if I channel all that power and it’s still not enough to shatter three hundred years of binding magic?”
“Then we try again. And again. Until it works or we find another way.”
“There is no other way.” I shake my head. “If I fail, the curse continues. Gets stronger. Eventually reaches the point where Llewelyn women can’t connect to their wolves at all. We become shells of what we’re supposed to be.”
The truck barrels over a deep puddle. Reeyan steadies the wheel and continues driving like we’re discussing historical theory rather than the potential extinction of everything that makes my pack who they are.
“You won’t fail.” He says it with such certainty that I almost believe him.
“How can you possibly know that?”
“Because you’re already doing things the curse was designed to prevent.
Developing psychic abilities despite magical suppression.
Forming a mate bond strong enough to crack the binding.
Trusting someone outside your pack enough to investigate rather than retreating into isolation.
” He glances at me again. “You’re stronger than the curse, Sera.
You’ve been proving it since the moment you had that first vision. ”
The words settle in my chest, warm and solid. I want to believe him. To trust that I’m capable of breaking magic that’s held my pack prisoner for generations. But the doubt remains, whispering that I’m just one woman facing centuries of accumulated power.
“What if breaking the curse changes me?” I question out loud without meaning to. “What if channeling that much power through the mate bond means I lose myself? Become someone my pack won’t recognize?”
“You’re already changing,” Reeyan points out, reaching across the console. “Already becoming someone different from the woman who left Llewelyn. That’s not the curse breaking or the bond overwhelming you. That’s you discovering who you really are without magical chains suppressing everything.”
I stare at his outstretched hand for a long moment. Taking it feels like accepting something I’m not sure I’m ready for. Admitting that he’s right. That the woman I’m becoming is who I was always supposed to be, and the reserved Llewelyn archivist was just the curse’s version of me.
I take his hand.
The mate bond warms between us. Not overwhelming or demanding. Just there. A constant reminder that I’m not facing this alone.
“My aunt is going to lose her mind when she finds out.” I lace my fingers through his. “The matriarch’s niece bonded to a Grayhide wolf, investigating a curse that undermines everything Llewelyn claims to value. She’ll see it as betrayal.”
“Or she’ll see it as exactly what your pack needs.” Reeyan’s thumb rubs circles on the back of my hand. “Someone brave enough to challenge the status quo. Someone willing to sacrifice her own comfort to free future generations.”
“That’s a generous interpretation.”
“It’s an accurate one.” He pulls his hand back to navigate a turn, and I immediately miss the contact.
“You could have run back to Llewelyn the moment you learned about the curse. Could have told your aunt and let pack leadership handle it and stayed safely behind your walls, and let someone else take the risk.”
“Instead, I stayed in Grayhide and slept with a man I barely knew. Really living up to Llewelyn values there.”
“You stayed because the investigation required it. You bonded with me because the mate connection was real, and you chose to act on it. Stop letting three hundred years of curse conditioning tell you that wanting something makes you weak. That needing someone means you’ve failed.
Those are lies the curse wants you to believe. ”
He’s right. I know he’s right. But knowing something intellectually and accepting it emotionally are completely different things.