Chapter 51
The witness pov:
I'm dying. I know it.
I can feel it in the way my breath rattles like dry leaves in my chest. The way blood pools beneath me, no matter how many times I try to stanch the wounds.
His claws tore through me. Shredding my ribs, shoulder, and throat. He didn’t just want to kill me; he wanted to erase me.
The illusion held just long enough for me to crawl into the shadows, but now it flickers like a dying flame.
One moment, I’m him—huge and powerful. The next I’m just... me.
Broken. Human. A man who thought if he loved her enough, it might make her love me back.
I press my hand to the gaping wound in my side and keep moving. The snow is stained a violent red behind me. A map of my failure leading straight to where I crouch.
He’ll find me eventually, but not before I reach her.
Just a little further.
I can see the blue flames from here—the hum of old magic, pulling forward his blood that I still carry.
I’ve guarded her for so long, and she’s there with him. This can’t be how it ends. I didn't come this far— didn’t sacrifice my name, my face, my very soul, just to let him have her again. Not in this life.
She was mine first. I loved her first. And if I can just get to her. If I can just make her see—
My leg gives out, and I collapse into the snow. The cold should burn, but I’m too far gone to feel it. My vision tunnels, edges going dark, then bright, then dark again. My heartbeat is erratic, skipping and stuttering, fighting to keep going.
The forest is so quiet. I should hear the wind or the shifting of trees, but there is nothing but the steady patter of my own life hitting the frozen ground. Drip, drip, drip.
Get up. Get up!
I drag myself forward, my fingers scraping through the ice. Teeth gritted until they crack. The illusion glitches again—Andrik’s face, then mine, then a blur of green features that belong to neither of us.
I don’t care what I look like when I get to her. She’ll understand when she sees me. She’ll see the man who watched over her when the world turned cold. She has to.
I hear something behind me. A soft rustling that finally breaks the silence.
When I glance back, there are green vines pushing through the frost, slithering after me.
They’re covered in flowers that have no business blooming in winter.
Blooming where only bane should grow. They don’t try to stop me.
.. if anything, it’s like they’re trying to comfort me.
The clearing comes into view. Blue flames burn low in a protective ring.
I see them inside, wrapped safely together in the aftermath of their bond.
Her body curled into his. His arms are wrapped around her like she’s the only thing in this world that matters.
He’s different now—a pure black stripe runs down the front of his fur.
A mating mark, I bet. Proof of what I will never have.
He holds her so gently, like he isn’t afraid she’ll leave if he loosens his grip—that is something I’m not sure I’d ever be able to give her.
Something breaks inside me. A soundless scream that shatters through what’s left of my chest.
No. This isn’t the ending I wrote. This can’t be right.
All of the signs pointed to her. The nightmares of her falling.
The pull that consumed me every time I saw her.
I couldn’t have misread everything. Unless the universe was cruel enough to show me a love I could never attain.
To give me hope, only to watch me drown in it.
I gather what’s left of my tattered strength and push myself upright.
One step.
Two.
The godfire hisses as I step next to the threshold, the blue light blinding me.
They both look up. Her eyes widen, terror and confusion warring on her face. His eyes narrow, a predator scenting a carcass.
“Lumi,” my voice cracks, a hollowed-out rasp. “Please. I just need you to listen—”
He moves in front of her, a wall of white fur and muscle, shielding her from me.
“You’re already dead,” he snarls. “You just don’t know it yet.”
“I don’t care.” I take another step forward, swaying as I go. “I just need—I need to tell her—”
“Get away from her,” he bellows.
But I can’t. I’ve loved her for longer than I can remember. I’ve waited through too many winters.
Even now, bleeding, dying, and broken—I can’t let her go.
“Lumi, please. Look at me. Really look at me.”
Lumi POV-
My blood runs cold, the warmth of the bond-sealing turns to ice in the drop of a hat. Someone’s at the edge of the mating circle.
It’s him. But he looks even worse than before—a walking corpse held together by nothing but sheer will.
The illusion is failing. It flickers between Andrik’s face and a blur of someone else’s.
Andrik doesn’t even glance at me. With one heavy, fluid sweep of his arm, he catches me across the waist and tucks me behind him.
His fur bristles along his nape, his claws extending longer than I’ve ever seen them.
Tremors rack his frame, and I know he’s a whisper away from leaping forward to rip out the stranger’s throat.
“Lumi. Please,” the man rasps. Look at me. Really look at me.”
Andrik takes a threatening step forward, and a warning growl rings through the air, but the man doesn’t stop. He doesn’t even flinch. He just keeps stumbling forward, dragging his ruined body toward the fire.
The illusion blinks one last time, a final shudder of magic before it fails completely. And for the first time, I see his face. I really see it, like he asked me to.
And in that heartbeat, the world stops spinning. The air in my lungs turns to lead.
“Mark?” I choke on a terrified whisper.
My brain screams in protest. It’s impossible. I saw him decomposing in the woods. I saw him!
“I’m not Mark,” he rasps. “I’m Micah. I’ve always been Micah.”
My chest tightens under an invisible pressure.
“You—” I can’t breathe. It feels like thousands of hands are wrapped around my throat. “You’ve been—”
“I was protecting you.” He takes another swaying step, and Andrik snarls loud enough to rumble the moss beneath my feet. “I saw you in the snow, Lumi. All those years ago. And I knew. I knew you were supposed to be mine. Not his.”
“You’re delusional.” Andrik spits, his bones along his spine starting to shift.
“No!” Micah’s voice breaks, a wet, rattling sound. “I loved her first. I watched over her. I kept her safe before you even knew she existed!”
“You terrorized her,” Andrik roars, the fire lapping higher in response to his fury.
“I saved her!” A fresh spray of blood spills from Micah’s mouth. “From falling—”
He collapses to his knees, his hands digging into the frozen earth, in an attempt to anchor his soul to this world.
Andrik steps toward him, claws raised, the blue flames gleaming off the lethal points.
“Wait!” The word tears out of me before I even know why I’m saying it.
“Lumi—” Andrik’s voice is sharp with disbelief.
“Just—give me a second. I need to know.”
I move around the shield of Andrik’s body, stepping slowly until I’m standing directly in front of Mark’s double. He looks up at me, his eyes bloodshot with agony and a heartbreaking thread of hope.
“Why?” I ask quietly, my voice trembling. “Why me? Why go through all of this... for me?”
“I fell for you the moment I saw you. It was this bone-deep pull—a gravity I couldn’t fight, a resonance I didn’t understand. I knew we were meant to be together, but my brother...”
He chokes on a ragged breath, the fire casting long, dancing shadows on his ruined face.
“He didn’t understand. Mark had always been twisted and unpredictable—an unfortunate side-effect of our upbringing—but he was my twin. My other half. I thought I could contain him. I thought I could keep his darkness from touching you.”
I go absolutely still. All that time I followed Mark. It was never Mark at all. It was Micah.
My stomach lurches, a cold wave of nausea rolling through me.
“I started watching you,” he continues, his voice fading in and out. “It felt innocent at first. I just wanted to know you. Where you went. What kind of coffee you liked. The way you laughed when you thought no one was looking. I was guarding you, Lumi. Even back then.”
I take a step toward him, drawn by the horrific magnetism of the truth.
“Lumi, stay back,” Andrik growls, his hand twitching at his side.
Micah doesn’t even look at him. He doesn’t take his eyes off me.
“But the need grew too loud. I wanted to be with you, but I wanted you to choose me. Mark... Mark wasn’t so patient. He saw me struggling and wanted to end it.”
He sways, blood bubbling at the corner of his mouth. The world seems to tilt. I know what’s coming. I can feel the ghost of Anna’s scream in the back of my throat.
“He went to your apartment that night. New Year’s Eve. He went to take you—to bring you to me like some sick, twisted gift. A reward for all the times I’d fixed his messes.”
No-no-no. I know where this is going.
“He didn’t know Anna would be there,” Micah whispers, a tear slipping from his eye, carving a path through the grime on his cheek. “He injected you to keep you quiet... but Anna woke up. She fought, and he panicked.”
Oh my God. The air is sucked out of the circle. My sister. My beautiful, brave sister died because of a mistake in a plan to kidnap me. This is all my fault. Her blood is on my hands.
His eyes fall to the ground, heavy with so much shame.
“I didn’t know, Lumi. I swear I didn’t know.” Tears pour from his eyes. “When I found out—when he told me what happened—it was too late. I couldn’t—”
His voice breaks.
“I had to protect you from him. From anyone who might hurt you. I couldn’t let you go. But I couldn’t have you either. Not after—” He collapses forward, and I move instinctively, catching him before his face hits the frozen earth. He’s heavy, his body fading into the winter air.