Chapter 22 Caelan #2
“I’m looking for answers,” Riley said. “About my past. My parents. This is the only connection I have to my childhood, and I thought... maybe there might be records here. Information. Anything.”
Wen and Malachar exchanged a look. Some silent communication passed between them, the kind that only mates could share.
“My grandparents kept extensive records,” Wen said finally. “Diaries, journals, correspondence. I’ve been meaning to go through them for years, but...” She swallowed. “It’s been hard. Too painful.”
“I understand,” Riley said softly.
“But if there’s an answer in there that could help you...” Wen straightened, resolve settling over her features. “Come with me. The archives are in the back.”
Wen led Riley toward the back of the store, chattering as she went. She was talkative, warm and open in a way that seemed to put Riley at ease.
“The archives are a mess, honestly. Gran kept everything, but her organizational system was... creative. We might be here a while.”
“I don’t mind,” Riley said. “Thank you for doing this.”
“Of course. If there’s even a chance it helps...”
Their voices faded as they disappeared into the back room.
I stayed behind, as did Malachar.
“She’s your mate,” Malachar said. Not a question.
“Yes.”
“Human?”
I paused. “That’s... complicated.”
Malachar’s eyebrows rose. “Complicated how?”
“She shifted. Two days ago. Into a white wolf.”
The other king’s expression went from curious to genuinely shocked. “That’s not possible.”
“And yet here we are.” I ran a hand through my hair, frustration bleeding through. “We’re trying to figure out why. She was raised human, had no idea what she was until I claimed her and... woke her up.”
“The claiming triggered a shift?” Malachar shook his head. “I’ve never heard of such a thing.”
“Neither have I. Hence the road trip in a death trap vehicle to a tiny human town looking for answers about her past.” I gestured vaguely at our surroundings. “Her parents.”
Malachar considered this, then nodded. “Goddess. So almost all of us have found our mates. You, me, my brother, Xander. The goddess must be onto her games again.”
“That’s one way of putting it.”
We stood in companionable silence for a moment before Malachar spoke again.
“The portal that brought you here. The one connecting to Duskmere. When did it open?”
“Recently. A few months ago. I was sent to investigate. The opening was unexpected, the stability uncertain.” My mouth curved into a ghost of a smile. “I found more than I expected.”
Malachar nodded slowly. “The portals have been behaving strangely. New ones opening where there shouldn’t be any. Old ones becoming unstable. The fabric between our worlds is shifting.”
“You’ve noticed it too?”
“Hard not to, when you’ve been living between realms for years.
” Malachar crossed his arms. “There are theories. That the goddess is weaving a pattern. That the separation between realms is weakening for a reason. That the human mates, all of us finding them at once, it’s part of some larger design. ”
I considered this. I’d had similar thoughts. The coincidences were too numerous to be random.
“Come,” Malachar said. “Let’s see if the archives have yielded anything useful.”
We followed the sounds of rustling paper and murmured conversation into the back room. Wen and Riley were surrounded by boxes, journals, letters, bundles of documents tied with ribbon. A paper explosion.
“Any luck?” I asked.
“We’re getting there,” Wen said, not looking up. “Gran really did keep everything. Birth records, death records, correspondence going back decades...”
Riley was flipping through a journal, her brow furrowed in concentration. She looked tired, determined, beautiful even covered in dust. My wolf rumbled with the urge to go to her, but she wasn’t ready for that yet.
Instead, I joined her and started helping sort through the nearest box. Malachar did the same, working alongside Wen.
We read.
The first hour passed in silence punctuated only by the rustle of pages and occasional murmurs of “nothing here” or “not this one either.” Wen made coffee that went cold before anyone touched it, then made more.
The second hour brought frustration. Riley’s shoulders grew tenser with every dead end.
I wanted to touch her, comfort her, but I held back.
She wasn’t ready. Instead, I focused on the documents in front of me, reading letters about mundane things: book orders, supplier invoices, a dispute with the landlord in 1987. Riveting stuff.
The third hour, the light through the windows shifted from afternoon gold to evening amber. Empty cups accumulated on every surface. My eyes were starting to blur from reading faded handwriting.
“This can’t all be relevant,” Malachar muttered, setting down a stack of tax documents from the 1970s.
“Gran kept everything,” Wen repeated. “I mean everything. There’s a box over there that’s entirely receipts for cat food.”
“Did she have cats?” Riley asked.
“No.”
Naturally.
We kept looking.
The fourth hour brought desperation. We’d gone through nearly a dozen boxes with nothing to show for it. Riley was flagging, exhaustion written in every line of her body. She’d been running on adrenaline and anxiety for days, and it was catching up.
I was about to suggest we take a break when Wen made a sound.
“Wait.” Wen had a different journal in her hands, older than the rest, the leather cover cracked and worn. “This one is different. It’s personal. Not shop records.”
She started reading, and her expression shifted from curiosity to shock to grief.
“Oh,” she breathed. “Oh no. Oh, Gran.”
And then...
“Found it!”
Wen’s voice was a screech of triumph. She was holding the journal up, hands trembling slightly.
“What?” Riley scrambled over. “What is it?”
“An entry. From my grandmother’s personal journal.” Wen looked up at us, stunned. “I should have done this years ago. Holy shit.” She shook her head.
“What does it say?” I demanded.
“Read it.” Wen held the journal out. “All of you. Read it.”
We gathered around the journal. Four heads bent over faded handwriting, reading words written decades ago.
March 15th
Today we used the magic we swore we would never use again.
We made that vow years ago, Louis and I. After everything that happened, after we crossed to the human world and decided to leave that life behind forever. We said we were done. We said the magic would die with us.
But a witch from Lytopia found us. Contacted us through the old channels we thought were dead. She said the Mirabelles needed our help. That they were about to die. That they were being hunted.
Hunted. Because they discovered facts that needed to stay buried. Facts related to the crown.
We were close once, the Mirabelles and us. Before Louis and I crossed over. Before we chose this life. When they called for help, we couldn’t say no.
So we opened the portal one last time.
We expected a family to walk through. Parents, children, servants perhaps. We had prepared rooms, supplies, everything they would need to start over in this world.
But only a child came through.
A little girl. Covered in blood. Screaming that her parents were dead.
Riley Mirabelle.
We closed the portal immediately. Got what information we could from the child: fragmented, terrified, barely coherent. Her parents had been killed. Murdered in their own home. She’d escaped through a hidden passage they’d prepared for exactly this scenario.
She was alone. Orphaned. Traumatized.
We couldn’t keep her ourselves. Louis and I, we’re too old, too connected to the magical world. If whoever killed her parents came looking, they would find us. Find her.
So we called a friend. Someone who knew about our world but lived apart from it. A lone wolf named Maris Hawkins. She’d left Lytopia decades ago, cut all ties, made a life for herself in the human realm. She was safe. Hidden. Perfect.
Maris agreed to take the child. To raise her as her own. To keep her safe and hidden until... until when? We don’t know. Maybe forever. Maybe until the danger passes.
We gave Riley to Maris, along with the only thing that came through the portal with her: a watch bearing the Mirabelle crest. The child clutched it so tightly we couldn’t pry it from her fingers.
This is the end for us. Louis and I have made a new vow: no more magic. Ever. Whatever power we have left will die with us. We will not open another portal. We will not contact Lytopia. We will live out our days as ordinary humans in this ordinary town.
May the goddess protect Riley Mirabelle. And may she never have to learn the truth of what she is.
No one spoke.
Riley was staring at the page, her face pale, her breathing shallow. Through the bond, I felt the storm of her emotions: shock, grief, confusion, and underneath it all, a strange sense of relief. Finally, answers.
“My godmother,” Riley whispered. “Maris. She was a wolf. She knew all along.”
“And the Woods,” Wen said softly. “My grandparents. They had magic. They could open portals.” She looked as blindsided as Riley. “I had no idea. They never said anything. Never even hinted...”
“They were protecting you,” Malachar said, voice gentle. “The same way Maris was protecting Riley. Some secrets are kept out of love.”
Riley’s hand came up to touch the watch on her wrist. The Mirabelle crest. Her parents’ legacy.
“They were killed,” she said. “Murdered. Because they’d found out things that someone wanted to bury. Truths related to the crown.”
My mind was racing. The crown. Which crown? Duskmere’s? Another kingdom’s? What could the Mirabelles have discovered that was worth killing an entire noble family over?
“We need more information,” I said. “Thessa is searching the archives in Duskmere. If there are records about what happened to House Mirabelle...”
“There might be more here,” Wen interrupted. She was flipping through more of the journal, scanning pages. “My grandmother kept everything. If there was correspondence, follow-up entries, anything about what the Mirabelles discovered...”
“Keep looking,” I said.
But Riley wasn’t moving. Her gaze was still fixed on the journal entry, tears streaming silently down her cheeks.
I crossed to her side and hesitated. For two days, she’d refused my comfort, refused my touch, kept me at arm’s length. I reached for her anyway. My hand settled on her shoulder, gentle, tentative, ready to pull back if she flinched.
She didn’t flinch.
Instead, she turned into me, pressed her face against my chest, and for the first time in two days, she let me hold her.
“I have answers,” she whispered against my shirt. “But I have so many more questions.”
“We’ll find them,” I promised. “All of them. Together.”
She held onto me and I held onto her. The road ahead was uncertain, but at least we were facing it as one.
“Wait,” Wen said suddenly. “There’s more. Look at this.”
She held up another piece of paper, a letter this time, not a journal entry.
“It’s addressed to my grandmother. From... someone in Lytopia. Dated a month after the journal entry.” Wen’s voice trembled. “And it mentions the crown. Specifically, it mentions a prophecy.”
Everyone went still.
Malachar frowned. “A prophecy? That’s unusual. Prophecies are rare, and they’re a witch’s domain, not ours. Wolves don’t have foresight. Only witches do.”
“Which makes sense,” Wen said slowly. “The letter is from a witch. The same one who contacted my grandparents about the Mirabelles.”
“What does it say?” Riley asked, pulling back from my chest but staying close. I kept my arm around her. She didn’t pull away.
Wen scanned the letter quickly, her face growing paler with each line.
“I don’t... I can’t...” Her eyes met ours, wide with disbelief. “Apparently there’s a prophecy about a white wolf. Born of noble blood, hidden in the human world, destined to...” She trailed off.
“Destined to what?” I demanded.
Wen swallowed hard.
“Destined to end a war. Or start one.”
The words hung in the air. Riley stiffened against me, her shock and fear and absolute disbelief flooding our connection.
A white wolf, noble blood, hidden in the human world. Riley. The prophecy was clearly about Riley.
My mate wasn’t just a lost noble with dormant wolf blood. She was the subject of an ancient prophecy that spoke of war.
Well. That complicated things.
“That’s why they were killed,” Malachar said, the pieces clicking together. “The Mirabelles. Maybe they knew what their daughter would become?”
“And someone wanted to make sure she never got the chance,” Wen added. “Someone wanted the prophecy to die with her. Could be.”
But Riley hadn’t died. She’d survived. Escaped through a portal, raised in hiding, her true nature suppressed for decades.
Until I found her, and my bite awakened the wolf that had been sleeping inside her all along. No pressure or anything.
I pulled her closer, my arms tightening around her protectively. Whatever this meant, whatever was coming, I would face it with her. Fight for her. Kill for her if necessary.
She was mine. And I would let nothing, not prophecy, not war, not the goddess herself, take her from me.
“Well,” Riley said finally, her voice cracking. “That’s... a lot.”
“Understatement,” Malachar muttered.
“I went from ‘maybe a romance novelist’ to ‘definitely a werewolf’ to ‘apparently the subject of an ancient prophecy’ in, what, four days?” Riley laughed, but there was no humor in it. “That’s a lot of identity crises for one week.”
“To be fair,” Wen said gently, “you were always the subject of the prophecy. You just didn’t know it.”
“Oh, that makes it so much better. Thanks.”
“What do we do now?” Wen asked.
I looked down at Riley. At the woman I loved, who had just discovered she was the center of a prophecy that could shake the foundations of our world.
“Now,” I said, “we find out exactly what that prophecy means. And we make sure the war it speaks of never happens.”
Riley’s gaze found mine. Her eyes were wet, but steel glinted beneath the tears.
“And if it does happen?”
I cupped her face in my hands, resting my forehead against hers.
“Then we fight,” I said. “Together. And we win.”
“That’s very confident of you.”
“I am confident. I have you.”
“The white wolf of prophecy,” she said, the words bitter on her tongue.
“My mate,” I corrected. “My Riley. The rest is just details.”
She almost smiled. Almost.