Chapter 3
CADE
The pulse hits me like a punch to the gut. Not necessarily pain, but more like a tether snapping into place. Ancient, familiar, and wrong.
I freeze mid-step, one boot sinking into the damp forest floor.
All around me, the gnarled trees creak in the wind, their bare limbs clawing at the overcast sky.
The scent of pine needles and wet earth hangs thick in the air.
My wolf stirs beneath my skin, hackles rising, breath caught between fury and revelation.
No.
I shove the sensation down, grinding my teeth hard enough to crack molars. This isn’t real. It can’t be. I’ve felt echoes of power before—old magic, wild and hungry. But this? This is different. It coils around my spine like a curse. It breathes with the heartbeat of a storm.
And it’s coming from NightShade Manor.
I’m not sure if this is some twisted scheme or just the fates looking for a good show, but I haven’t been to this holding in years. Yet, the moment I’m within miles of it, I sense what I always hoped to be a fable.
I sense what needs to be destroyed.
A hybrid Hollowborn.
The energy licks along my skin, tempting me just as it did my father when he first read the prophecy—the Ashmark.
I snarl at the memory of his blood-soaked journals and desperate eyes.
I thought his death ended it. That I buried the last piece of this nightmare with his bones, but if I’m right, if the power smacking me in the face right now is what I suspect, it’s alive and well.
My wolf rises to the surface, ready and eager to attack. Let me get us there faster.
His voice is gravel and violent, ragged with loss, but resolute. He’s felt our grief as much as I have, and I don’t hesitate to give him control.
I close my eyes, letting the shift move through me.
Pinpricks of magic lance down my spine, sharp and swift, before giving way to fire that pours through my limbs. Yet, this burn isn’t pain. It’s freedom.
My skin stretches, snaps, and reforms. Bones break and transform in rapid succession. It’s not a graceful thing, not like the old shifter tales would have you believe. It’s brutal, raw, and necessary.
Clothes shred from my frame, but the witch’s rune glows bright on my chest—silver light flaring as it shields my shift, protecting what little modesty I care to maintain.
My muscles expand, limbs contorting. My hands become paws. Dark russet fur explodes across my back, and my jaw elongates, teeth sharper than any blade.
My vision narrows then brightens as my enhanced senses take over. Vivid scents and sounds become clearer, but there’s very little out here that interests me or my wolf outside of what’s north of us.
Power. Fear. Death.
All of it calls me forward.
I dig my claws into the earth for half a heartbeat, and then I run.
The wind tears past me, cold and biting, ruffling my thick coat as the trees blur into shadows.
My paws thunder against the forest floor, crushing fallen leaves and broken twigs.
I don’t slow or hesitate as the silhouette of NightShade Manor begins to rise through the trees.
A so-called sanctuary for the supernatural, run by humans who think their inability to be killed by us makes them our equals.
Just because they can’t die by our hands doesn’t mean they understand the weight of our survival.
All I’ve known the Hollowborn to do is cause problems, and I wouldn’t be headed in this direction if I had any other choice.
There’s always a choice, my wolf reminds me as he closes in on NightShade. We don’t need the answers you seek, but you’ve decided not to live without them.
I rumble at his reply. He’s right, of course.
It’s been over a decade since my mother was killed.
Murdered in the middle of the day, on pack lands.
And yet, there’s been nothing done about it.
For a few years, I thought my father was trying to avenge her, that his obsession with immortality was rooted in grief.
But it wasn’t. It was hunger. He didn’t want justice—he wanted to conquer death, unlike her.
Her murder unhinged something in him, tore loose the last thread of his sanity. And when he died chasing that impossible prophecy, I thought the madness would end with him.
It didn’t.
I tried to walk away from it all. From my legacy. My pack. My fate.
But vengeance manages to cling tighter than blood. Without it, I have nothing. No home. No family. Just scars and questions that never seem to fade.
Again, that’s a choice you made, my wolf reminds me as he so often enjoys doing.
What other option did we have? I snap back. We have no one to trust anymore.
An alpha only needs to trust himself.
I ignore his words. I haven’t been an alpha in years.
NightShade looms ahead with its towers that reach for the night sky. Light glimmers through an upstairs balcony, and that’s where the pull is strongest. My chest tightens, and I pull my wolf’s power back so I can take over.
Once again, bones break, and muscles tear as my body reforms. The world tilts and realigns in the split seconds it takes to go from beast to man. My spine straightens, and my ribs shift into place with an audible pop.
Heat flares across my chest, searing and familiar—the witch’s mark doing its job. The rune pulses once before fizzling out, and with it, my clothes knit themselves back into place, as if the initial shift hadn’t destroyed the jeans and t-shirt.
My gaze snaps to the glowing door once more. That damn pull tugs at my chest again, harder now, like it knows I’m close. A growl tears from my throat as I crouch low and leap.
Fifteen feet in the air, my fingers catch on an old stone ledge. I climb a few more feet before launching myself upward again until I’m directly beneath a window in the room I know the hybrid is behind.
There’s no time to think. No need for hesitation.
With a loud snarl, I throw myself through the glass.
It shatters around me, tiny shards catching moonlight as I crash boots-first into the room. The curtains whip back in a dramatic flourish, and a scream pierces the air—sharp and startled—but it barely registers.
I land in a crouch, breath controlled, eyes already scanning. One heartbeat, then two.
There she is.
But it’s not her who greets me first.
Iris, the old woman who has run this manor for far too many years, stands there in a robe, looking every bit as pathetic as I believe her to be.
She holds a crossbow to her shoulder, the silver-tipped arrow aimed at my heart.
I take a step forward, but stop cold as I make the mistake of meeting the stare of the hybrid.
Mate.
The word isn’t mine. It’s my wolf’s, rasping through me with quiet devastation.
Time slows. Her scent—wild jasmine and summer rain—hits me like a memory I never lived. My knees nearly give out. Every instinct I’ve buried roars to the surface, not with lust, but with something worse: need.
And just as quickly, revulsion crashes in. Because this isn’t fate. This is a curse with a name.
And just like that, my entire world fractures.
This is so much worse than I could have imagined because, as furious as I might be, I know one absolute truth.
I’ll never let anyone harm her. Prophecy be damned.
My chest burns as I take rapid, painful breaths. My gaze remains locked on my mate, and it takes every ounce of strength I have to stay upright.
She stands there, wide-eyed and far too beautiful for someone who is supposed to be a walking curse.
Golden-brown hair spills loose around her shoulders, wild and untamed, catching the dim light like strands of fire.
Her bluish-green eyes are fierce and vulnerable all at once.
There’s a stubborn tilt to her chin, a defiance that makes her seem taller than she is, like she’d challenge the world itself before bowing to it.
Power radiates from her skin, subtle and raw, clinging to her like the scent of rain before a storm. My chest tightens painfully as her presence wraps around me like a noose.
And still, even in that moment, with fear and confusion etched across her face, I can’t stop thinking—she is the most devastating thing I’ve ever seen.
The hybrid.
The prophecy.
The Ashmark.
She’s all I’ve hated for so long.
“You didn’t make a reservation, Cade.” Iris’s voice slices through the static in my skull. “I think it’s time you leave.”
“Mine.” I don’t mean to say the word out loud, but I also don’t regret it.
“You’ve got to be shitting me.” Iris doesn’t even blink as she shifts her stance, placing herself firmly between me and the girl I came to eliminate. “Rowan doesn’t understand this world yet. Give me an hour—just one damn hour to explain—”
I blink, and just like that, my fury is back. What does she mean this woman doesn’t understand what she is? I can sense her wolf even now.
This isn’t right. Everything about this is wrong. The roar that bursts from deep within me shakes the entire room. Damn it, how can this be real?
“What did you do, Iris?” I snarl. “The prophecy—”
“You don’t think I realize that, furball?
” Iris’s eyes turn to fire as she faces me without an ounce of fear pulsing from her.
“She’s my granddaughter, and I’ll protect her with everything I have left.
Even from you. Prophecies and death threats be damned.
Now get the hell out before you break every law we have left. ”
“I don’t give a damn about our laws.” There’s an ache in my voice I don’t mean to let slip through. “They’ve never served me.”
“This arrow’s about to serve you.” She lifts her chin, determined. “So, unless you want to be a twitching, paralyzed mess for the rest of the evening, I’d suggest you back off.”
I don’t doubt for a second she’ll follow through. Iris has always teetered just left of unhinged—maybe even embraced it—and that glint in her eye and the steady hands on that crossbow confirm she’s one bad mood away from pinning me to the wall like a taxidermy project.
Still, I don’t move.
My eyes find Rowan, as Iris called her, and I stare, hoping that something will begin to make sense.
She’s our mate, my wolf says. What more do you need to know?
She’s the hybrid from the prophecy, I remind him. The one who could unravel the very foundation of our world with a single heartbeat. She could take down the packs.
I thought they meant nothing to you? He presses. Isn’t that why we’ve been alone all this time?
I don’t dignify him with a response. It’s either silence or admit he’s not entirely wrong, and I’m not stable enough at the moment for self-awareness.
“What’s your choice going to be, Cade?” Iris asks with far too much satisfaction in her voice. “Either way, I win, so it doesn’t much matter to me.”
Gods, that smugness. I take two long strides toward her, and the tip of her arrow instantly presses against my chest, right over my heart. One more inch and it’ll do as it’s meant to.
“Don’t be a fool, Iris. I might not be able to kill you, but I can make you wish I could. I’m taking her before anyone else comes. The curse—”
“The hell you are,” Rowan interrupts as a squirrel-looking creature climbs onto her shoulder. “You bust through the window like a feral dog, and now you think you own me? I don’t think so. Neither of you does. I’m leaving this place and pretending this was all some sort of fever dream.”
“Rowan, wait.” Iris turns toward her granddaughter, the tip of her arrow scraping across the surface of my skin.
I let out a quiet hiss of pain, making the old woman snicker as she chases after Rowan.
“Please, let me explain,” Iris begs. “I know this is confusing, but it will all make sense soon.”
Rowan barks out a short, humorless laugh. “Oh, I’m not confused at all. Actually, I feel enlightened. Turns out my mom was completely justified in running away from her medieval murder-club of a family. And guess what? I get it now. Crystal. Freaking. Clear.”
She storms out, and it’s not until the echo of her footsteps fades that Iris turns on me with a look that could strip paint.
“Look what you’ve done,” she snaps, and before I can even blink… Thunk.
The arrow sinks deep into my shoulder, just inches from my heart.
“You insane bit—” My knees buckle from the jolt of poison, and I collapse onto the broken glass, a curse stuck in my throat.
“I warned you,” Iris mutters, not even remotely sorry as she lowers the crossbow. “Stay out of my way, mongrel, before you scare her off for good.”
The door slams behind her as I let out one last roar while she leaves me writhing on the floor like some wounded animal on the side of the road.
I’ll kill her a thousand times over for this. In creative, cathartic, and deeply satisfying ways.
Just as soon as I can walk again.