Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
Kieran
The afternoon sun filters through the canopy as I make my way into the woods, following the path I’ve walked twice before. The wolves know I’m coming—I can feel them tracking me through the trees, silent and watchful.
I need answers. I need to know what happened to her, who did this. For Daciana’s sake.
The grave comes into view, marked by the stone I helped place and the flowers that Daciana left. They’re wilting now, but somehow that makes it more poignant. More real.
I kneel beside the grave, feeling the earth beneath my knees. The wolves emerge from the shadows, surrounding me in a loose circle. They aren’t threatening me; they’re just…watching. Waiting to see why I’m here.
“I know what I’m about to do borders on forbidden,” I say to them quietly, my hand hovering over the stone. “But I need to understand. I need to see.”
The largest wolf—the new alpha of this small group—tilts his head, amber eyes fixed on me.
“I will protect Daciana,” I continue, the words feeling like a vow. “With everything I have, with everything I am. I swear it to you.”
I press my palm flat against the gravesite, and magic rises to the surface unbidden. The earth begins to glow beneath my hand—a soft, pulsing purple that makes the wolves shift restlessly.
I should stop. Should walk away and leave well enough alone.
I remove my hand slowly, watching as the purple light follows my fingertips like smoke. The magic feels wrong already: too heavy, too eager. This is the kind of power that demands payment.
I draw the symbol carefully, each line precise despite the tremor starting in my fingers. It’s an old symbol, one I learned from texts I wasn’t supposed to read. One that opens doors that should stay closed.
When I complete the circle around it, the ground doesn’t just glow.
It opens.
The ground disappears beneath the symbol, replaced by a round basin filled with swirling, translucent images. I stand up and take a step back, my heart pounding as I see her—the female wolf—in her final moments.
She’s running. Suddenly, she stops, her head jerking up like she has heard something.
Then, I hear it, too.
The whistling cuts through the vision like a blade, high-pitched and so wrong that I wince, my hands flying to my ears. It doesn’t help. The sound is coming from the basin, from the past, but it feels like it’s drilling directly into my skull.
In the basin, the wolf collapses.
My stomach clenches as I watch her hit the ground, her body convulsing. This is what I came to see, but witnessing it now makes rage and grief explode in my chest.
She writhes on the ground, her legs kicking uselessly as whatever magic that horrible sound carried tears through her. Then, a figure appears—tall, shrouded in shadow, moving with deliberate calm.
I strain forward, desperate to see his face. This is it. This is the bastard who did this.
But the angle is wrong. The wolf can’t lift her head, can’t see anything but his legs, his torso. And I can only see what she saw.
“Come on,” I mutter. “Show me. Show me your face.”
The figure kneels beside her, and for a moment, I think I’ll finally see him. But his face remains in shadow, too far above her line of sight.
His hand extends toward her, and I freeze, every muscle in my body going rigid.
There, on the inner side of his wrist, is a scar. Ugly and puckered, the kind that comes from a deep burn. The tissue is raised and twisted, like whatever burned him went all the way through the skin to the muscle beneath.
The mark of old magic. Of rituals that demand blood and pain as payment.
The wolf’s vision begins to darken, fading at the edges.
I hold my breath, bracing myself for what comes next. I’ve seen death visions before, felt the echoes of final moments. When someone dies in agony, there’s always a flash—white-hot and searing, the pain so intense it burns itself into the magic.
I wait for it. Brace for it.
But it doesn’t come.
The vision simply…fades. Gently. Like falling asleep.
Relief floods through me so powerfully that my head spins. The wolf didn’t suffer at the end. Whatever that bastard did, however he killed her, at least it was quick. At least Daciana won’t have to live with the knowledge that her friend died in prolonged agony.
At least I can tell her that much.
The basin disappears, the swirling images collapsing in on themselves until there’s nothing but dirt beneath the symbol again. The purple glow fades.
And then, my body reminds me exactly what I’ve just done.
My knees give way.
I barely catch myself on the trunk of the nearest tree, my palms scraping against the rough bark. The coughing starts immediately—violent, wracking spasms that tear through my chest like claws.
Forbidden magic always demands its price.
I taste copper before I see the blood spattering the ground beneath me. Each cough brings more, my lungs burning as if I’ve inhaled fire. The magic I used—looking into the last moments of the deceased—borders so close to necromancy that most practitioners won’t risk it.
The strain on my body is immense. Black spots swim across my vision. My ribs feel like they’re cracking with each breath.
Worth it, I tell myself, even as another coughing fit doubles me over. Worth it for what I learned.
When I can finally breathe again, I wipe the blood from my mouth with the back of my hand. My fingers come away crimson.
I’m not repentant. Not even close.
Now I know that the necromancer has a scar on his inner wrist. An old burn, distinctive and ugly.
It’s a start.
I push myself upright, using the tree for support. The wolves are still watching me, their eyes glowing in the dappled sunlight. They saw what I did. They know what it cost me.
But they also know I meant my promise.
I incline my head to them—a sign of respect—and begin the walk back to the palace. Each step feels heavier than the last, my body protesting the abuse I’ve just put it through. But I’ve had worse. I’ll recover.
And now I have information. A lead.
The walk back takes longer than it should. By the time I reach the palace, the sun is lower in the sky, and my legs feel like lead. But I keep moving, climbing the stairs to my chambers with grim determination.
I need to tell Daciana what I found. Need to see her face when I tell her that her friend didn’t suffer.
I push open the door to my chambers, already knowing they will be empty.
The room feels too large without her in it, too quiet. The bed is still made from this morning, untouched. Three days ago, I stood in her room after telling her everything, and she told me that she wouldn’t die. That she refused to. That she’d fight alongside me to break this curse.
But she said nothing about…us.
My chest tightens with something I don’t want to name.
Three days, and she has resumed her duties as my liaison like nothing happened between us.
Professional, efficient, focused entirely on the work at hand.
We’re waiting for the gypsy witches to arrive, and in the meantime, she is throwing herself into her responsibilities with focused determination.
The curse, the investigation, her duties—these are what matter to her.
Not the bond. Not us.
At the end of each day, when the work is done, she leaves. Returns to her own chambers without hesitation, without a backward glance. Like there’s nothing pulling at her to stay with me. Like the bond between us isn’t something that occupies her thoughts at all.
She has managed to control it: the fated mate bond that should be tugging at her, demanding her attention, making her wolf restless.
She has somehow wrestled it into submission.
I can feel my own wolf straining against my control every moment Daciana is near.
There is a constant ache to reach for her, to close the distance between us.
But her? She seems completely unaffected.
This is the first life in which she is a warrior. Strong, independent, disciplined enough to control even the primal pull of a fated bond. She doesn’t need me the way the others did. And maybe she doesn’t want me, either.
The thought sits like a stone in my chest.
I am the one who refused to give her the mating mark. The one who slept with her and then held back from claiming her fully. And now, watching her treat our bond like an afterthought—something that exists but doesn’t demand her attention—I’m beginning to wonder if she even wants it at all.
Maybe she’s strong enough in this life that she’d rather focus on survival than whatever this is between us. Maybe the bond is just another obstacle to her, something else to manage and control while she fights to break the curse.
I have no right to want more from her. No right to feel this ache in my chest when she leaves each evening without a word about us. No right to wish the bond mattered to her the way it matters to me.
Not when I’m the one who won’t fully commit.
“Kieran.”
I turn to find Artisem in the doorway. He takes one look at me, and his eyes widen slightly.
“What happened? You look—”
“I’m fine.” I wave him off, moving to pour myself some water from the pitcher on the side table. My hand shakes slightly as I lift the glass. “Where have you been? I thought we were going to go over the supply requests.”
“I came by earlier to discuss them, but you weren’t here.” He steps further into the room, his gaze sharp. “Where were you?”
“The forest. Following a lead.” I take a long drink, the cool water soothing my raw throat. “Did anyone come by?”
He nods. “Daciana did. Twice, actually.”
My hand tightens on the glass. “When?”
“About an hour ago, then again maybe thirty minutes after that. She peeked in both times, looked around, then left.”
My chest constricts. She came looking for me. Twice. And I wasn’t here. “Where did she go?”
“The second time, a servant gave her a summons while she was standing in your doorway. I was coming down the hall and saw the whole thing.”
A summons. My jaw clenches. “From whom?”