Chapter 20
ISLA
Isla had never been to a coronation. She’d never been great at visiting the temples to worship the goddesses either, and during her lumerosi ceremonies, any stories from the Elders were of strength, power, and promise. But she’d never heard so much of the beginning.
She listened from beside Kai behind the altar as the High Elder, a portly and astute-looking man, told the tale of Selene, the Goddess—a woman who once walked upon the mortal realm as flesh and blood in defiance of the higher deities to live amidst those they’d created.
He told of her sisters, Destinare and Aeterna, who soon joined her.
But before they were united, amidst the treacherous, uncharted land that was the world of those who would come to pass, Selene had been attacked by a demon from the realm of the damned when all paths between the worlds were open, only to be saved by a wolf in what became known as the Forest of Selene.
A location that Rhea was able to tout as belonging to them.
As the story was recounted, and the High Elder explained her creation of the wolf shifters as protectors of the mortal world from those of the others, Isla’s eyes trailed over the spectators.
They were mostly high-ranking officials and other elders, and then there was her family.
Her father sat with Sebastian and Adrien, her brother and best friend failing to keep grins off their faces, while her father…
He wasn’t watching her. His eyes were fixated on her mate, his brows pinched.
Isla felt her wolf rise in a way she hadn’t in a while, in a way that would’ve thrilled her if she wasn’t so uneasy. Her father was acting strange—too strange.
She felt the brush of a hand against hers, the interaction hidden behind the solid marble. Both she and Kai did well not to make it obvious, not flinching or paying each other any mind. Kai’s pinky twisted around hers as if to say, what is it?
Isla breathed, her eyes dropping from her father’s roaming ones to the material on the altar as she tiptoed across the bond she’d worked even harder at reforging all morning.
But even if she could find a way to communicate with him, she wasn’t sure what she’d say or if she even wanted to acknowledge her fears about her father.
The Elders began shuffling, and Isla turned her head to watch as a box was brought forth.
No more than a hands-breadth in height or width, but long enough to expand beyond the chest of the young woman who held it.
Given the way her blinks timed with each of her steps and how her hands trembled, she was eager and anxious.
The metal-worked body of the box seemed heavy, too.
Slowly, Isla pulled her hand from Kai’s as they, not the story, became the center of attention.
It was almost time.
Heart in her throat, Isla watched as a heavy fabric was lifted from the altar, revealing a golden basin, its shell swiped in intricate details and patterns of dark paint. Inside were two crossed pieces of muddy-colored bark, dried enough that the small limbs must’ve been cut free long ago.
“Wood from the Forest of Selene sprouted from our goddesses’ spilled blood.” She recalled that from Marin’s lessons, as well as the oil in the palm-sized carafe that the High Elder lifted, harvested from the tree’s labors.
Isla counted off her fingers to banish the downward spiral of her thoughts, briefly contemplating her next moves if this went horribly wrong. Because this moment, this ritual, would change everything.
She hadn’t gone through the Luna Rite—she wouldn’t have survived it without her wolf, even with Kai as an anchor—which meant her wolf’s eyes had not yet shifted from their common blue hue to a queen’s signature amethyst.
If she stood before this crowd and the shift didn’t happen, not only would her mating bond with Kai be called into question, but her inability to shift would be wholly exposed.
Kai took hold of her hand now, stroking his thumb over the back of it as she fought to keep her breathing even. The Elder who held the box undid its latch and slowly pried open the lid.
What the hell?
Isla started, clamping her lips shut to prevent the words from falling out of her mouth. She blinked a few times to make sure what she was seeing was real, giving Kai’s hand a tight squeeze.
An eerily familiar dagger sat upon the cushioned surface lining the box. A blade that may as well have been the one Jonah had been keeping in the safe of his bookshop apartment. The one Lukas had tried to murder her with.
The dagger. But it couldn’t be.
She sought Jonah in the crowd, unable to stop herself, but he seemed more confused and intrigued by her attention than some mastermind with a plan.
Snapping her gaze forward again, Isla could feel Kai’s eyes on her, and she ran, sprinted, across the patchwork bridge of their tenuous bond, yelling into the smoky void for him to pay attention. Asking if he’d known—if somehow there were two of these.
“Nearly two millennia ago,” the High Elder continued, his voice heavier.
“Our goddesses crafted a blade of stone and stars and sky, of their essence, and used it to offer their blood to create the first of the alphas. Made in its image, blessed by the divine sisters, with this ceremonial dagger, our alpha will offer his blood, his goddess-blessed power to his fated.”
Isla wasn’t sure why, but a deep part of her screamed to stop this. To pause, to let her think. Her mind whirred, trying to scrape together a reason for the similarities.
Kai had the blade in his right hand now, his gaze never leaving hers, a darkness clouding his eyes that made her wonder if he was fighting a thunderous voice of his own.
A voice that may have made him hesitate as he looked down upon the hand that he’d already cut once.
A voice that was telling him to run, to fight.
Isla felt Fate shove at her back, hard, digging her claws in as her delicate whisper caressed Isla’s ear, I am not done with you yet.
No.
Kai drew the blade across his flesh, and the scent of his blood made something in Isla’s body twist. Come alive.
The crimson pooled and dripped onto the marble floor from the tip of the dagger as he turned and held it out to her.
All the while, an Elder poured the oil over the wood in the basin, using a match to set it ablaze.
The heat, though gentle, wrapped around Isla with grabbing fingers, leeching into her skin to pluck at those ever-present cold spots on her bones.
The smoke that invaded her nose carried the scent of jasmine.
With a hand sturdier than she felt inside, Isla reached for the outstretched dagger, her fingers brushing Kai’s as she took hold of the ancient hilt. His touch burned as much as the fire would’ve, and she couldn’t fight her desire to melt with that flame.
Isla took in the dagger, making note of how it compared to the one in Jonah’s keeping. This blade did not sing to her as the other did. It felt odd in her hand—too light, too tawdry.
Wait, she thought, scrambling to make connections, but Fate pushed at her again.
There were so many people watching her, watching them. Waiting. Isla breathed, fixating on the pale flesh of her right palm.
She pressed the cool metal to her skin and slid, not feeling pain but adrenaline. She couldn’t draw in a breath, as if something had coiled around her insides. Her wolf even wobbled to its paws, standing at attention. Waiting, too.
“Bound by destiny, blood, and power, alpha and mate will call upon the deities for a final blessing of their union and an entrustment of their gifts to lead us all.”
Kai held out his hand for her, looking and feeling more ethereal and otherworldly in his crown than Isla had ever seen of him before. And when she took his hand…
Nothing had ever been so intimate.
Not even when they slept together had she felt this stripped down and exposed. Never had she felt so certain that he was everything. That her soul would find his in every universe, over every lifetime. That it had. Over and over and over.
There was a shifting inside her, between them.
Everything peeled away to find this final pure essence of her.
Of him. Of why they’d been created. The pooling blood between their palms was molten ore, forging a universe between their clasped hands that they would not allow to fall and break. Could not.
Isla’s body moved of its own accord, Kai’s too, as they extended their arms over the blaze.
Together, they would do this. Together, they would get through everything.
Their grip on each other’s hands tightened, a crimson rivulet seeping beyond their grasp and kissing the writhing flames.
And then, everything erupted.