Chapter 36
Dane
Cold sheets. Empty space. Nova’s scent lingers, but she’s gone.
I open my eyes, already knowing. The bond between us hums with purpose and distance: a thread pulled taut across miles. She’s gone to the ridge. The place she warned us about. Where Faelan’s energy concentrates.
No rage surges through me. No panic. Just clarity. I’ve been fighting this connection for weeks, denying what my wolf knew instantly. She’s my mate. The truth settles in my chest, no longer a question but a certainty as I track her presence through the bond.
I sit up and scan the room. Her clothes are gone. The obsidian blade she keeps at her thigh—missing from where she set it last night.
The sky outside is still dark, pre-dawn gray just beginning to soften the blackness.
I dress methodically—jeans, shirt, boots.
Minimal layers. I’ll be shifting soon. My shifter pack sits ready by the door.
I strap it on, checking the weapons inside.
The enchanted leather will reshape when I shift, fitting my wolf form without restricting movement.
Every motion is precise. My mind runs sharp and clear—not spiraling with what-ifs, just focused on what needs to happen next.
I don’t need to track her scent. The bond tells me exactly where to find her.
The compound is quiet when I step outside, frost crunching under my boots. Most wolves are still preparing, expecting to move out after dawn. Ben stands by the armory, checking gear. His head snaps up when he sees me.
“She’s gone,” he says.
“To the ridge.” I keep walking. “I’m heading out now.”
Ben falls into step beside me. “I’ll grab my gear.”
“No.” My tone isn’t harsh, but it is final. “Stay with the pack. Lead them north on schedule.”
“Dane—“
“This isn’t about trust, Ben.” I pause, meeting his eyes. “It’s about understanding what we’re walking into. I need someone here I can count on.”
His jaw tightens, but he nods once.
Kari approaches from the main cabin, Rafe a shadow behind her. Her posture screams tension.
“You’re going alone?” she inquires, voice low.
“Yes.”
Rafe steps forward. “I can provide backup. Something’s not right about this energy pattern.”
“I know exactly what she’s walking into,” I say, looking between them. “And she won’t face it without me.”
I don’t wait for their response. I’ve already wasted enough time. The compound perimeter slides past as I lengthen my stride. Twenty yards into the trees, I let the shift take me—bones cracking, muscles reshaping, consciousness expanding.
The transformation doesn’t break my momentum. My paws hit the forest floor at a run, barely disturbing the frost-covered leaves. The world sharpens through wolf senses—every scent intensified, every sound distinct.
The bond pulls me forward like a compass. Higher ground. Toward the heart of what’s coming.
As I run, the forest begins to change. Light thins, stretching oddly between trees. Sounds warp and echo. The air carries a metallic tang that doesn’t belong.
Something ahead is waiting. For both of us.
I push faster, following the thread that leads to her.
The wolf form drops from my skin at the edge of the clearing.
Bones pop, muscle reshapes, and the animal consciousness peels back to reveal the man.
I kneel in the dirt, naked, heart rate barely elevated.
I murmur the angelic words Shadow Peak taught me, and fabric weaves itself across my skin—jeans first, then shirt, boots last. Not comfort. Practicality.
The clearing is wrong. Too perfect. A circle cut from reality with mechanical precision. Trees bend at identical angles around the perimeter. Light doesn’t filter—it stands suspended, particles frozen in midair.
Nova stands at the center, her back to me. Beyond her, reality tears at the seams—a breach point where the Fade bleeds into our world. Not a portal yet. A wound. Waiting to be opened.
I step forward. The ground feels solid but sounds hollow under my boots.
She turns, unsurprised. Her eyes find mine immediately, clear and focused.
“You came.”
“You knew I would.”
Her expression doesn’t change, but something in her stance relaxes. She extends her arm, palm up. The silvery mark on her wrist pulses with faint bluish light, brighter than I’ve ever seen it.
“It’s a key,” she says. “The mark. Faelan put it there—I don’t know when, don’t remember how. But it’s what he needs to open the breach fully.”
“Then we don’t let him use it.”
“No.” She turns her wrist, studying it. “We use it first. On our terms.”
Beyond her, the breach shimmers—reality bending at sharp angles, light splitting like oil in water. The doorway to the Fade. Where Faelan waits.
“Once we cross, we find him. We end this.” She meets my eyes. “But we have to be on the other side to cut him off from his power source.”
I nod, understanding. The pack will follow eventually, but not soon enough. This moment—this choice—belongs to us alone.
But before I can take another step toward the breach, movement at the tree line stops me cold.
Marcus emerges from the shadows, Derek and Torres flanking him. Elena follows close behind, then Mateo and one unnamed younger wolf. Five wolves total, moving in tight formation.
They came.
Relief floods through me for exactly three seconds. Despite everything—the division, the doubts, the faction forming—they came to fight.
But something’s wrong.
They don’t approach us. Don’t join our position at the breach. They halt at the clearing’s opposite edge, a separate unit maintaining deliberate distance. Not with us. Just... here.
“Marcus?” I call across the clearing, confusion bleeding into my voice.
His eyes meet mine, and what I see there makes my blood run cold. Not defiance. Not anger.
Horror.
“Dane, I—“ His voice cracks. “I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t—”
The air shifts. Wrong. The clearing’s unnatural stillness intensifies, pressing down like a physical weight. The fracture behind Nova pulses once, twice, and I feel something ancient and terrible turn its attention toward us.
Then he’s there.
Not emerging from the breach. Not stepping from the shadows. Faelan’s projection simply exists in the space between our two groups—not fully solid, edges shimmering like heat off pavement. His real body is in the Fade. But his power reaches here just fine.
His smile is gentle. Pleased.
“Alpha Dane.” His voice carries unnaturally across the clearing, reaching both groups with perfect clarity. “Do you understand yet? Do you see what I’ve built?”
The purple light intensifies, and Marcus’s body goes rigid. Derek’s eyes flash with panic—not aggression, but fear. Torres tries to step back, but his legs won’t obey. Elena’s face twists with confusion and mounting terror.
“No—“ Marcus’s voice breaks with horror. “No, this isn’t what I wanted. I just thought—I was trying to help—”
“Shh.” Faelan’s gesture is almost paternal. “You’ve done beautifully. Questioned his leadership. Pulled wolves away. Created the perfect fracture.” His amber eyes gleam with cruel satisfaction. “Division was always the weapon. You were simply too useful to waste.”
Magic surges visible now—sickly purple tendrils wrapping around Marcus’s faction like puppet strings, sinking into their skin, their eyes.
“Stop!” I roar, Alpha command crashing through the clearing.
But Faelan’s magic is older, deeper. Rooted in the very fracture Marcus helped create.
Derek’s wolf form ripples, his body fighting the compulsion even as it forces him forward. His eyes lock with mine across the clearing, and I see the desperate plea there: I’m sorry. I can’t stop this. Please understand.
Torres’s movements turn jerky, wrong—a wolf controlled by something outside himself as he angles toward Wyatt’s last known position.
Elena lunges in our direction, her normally graceful form twisted by the magic driving her. Not toward Faelan. Toward us.
Mateo’s young face contorts with confusion and horror as his body moves against his will.
Marcus himself takes a step toward me. Then another. Every movement a visible battle. His lips pull back from his teeth, but tears streak from his eyes—wolf eyes that hold nothing but devastation and betrayal.
This is what Faelan wanted all along.
The rest of the pack bursts from the tree line—Wyatt, Ben, Callum, the others—and chaos erupts. Compelled wolves clash with loyal ones. Not a battle. A nightmare.
Nova’s fingers find mine, urgent. “The source. We have to cut it at the source or they’ll kill each other.”
She’s right. Faelan’s here, but he’s also there—in the Fade, controlling this through the breach. Fighting his puppets won’t stop this.
“Go!” Wyatt’s voice cuts through the chaos as he intercepts Derek mid-lunge. “We’ll hold them! End this!”
Nova’s hand tightens on mine. The breach pulses, responding to her mark.
“Together,” she says.
We step through.
Reality tears. The world inverts. And the Fade swallows us whole.