Chapter 21
Gia
The forest didn’t just go quiet.
It held its breath.
Not silence.
Attention.
It was listening.
The wind that had been moving lazily through pine branches stilled.
Dripping rain paused mid-fall.
Even the birds, who had scattered when blood hit soil, did not return.
The earth beneath my feet thrummed softly.
Not fear.
Recognition.
Something ancient had shifted.
Edward’s body lay broken in the mud, dark blood soaking into damp Montana soil like an offering.
The air still tasted metallic and sharp, like violence and rain had merged into one living thing.
The Forest Ridge Bears stood frozen in a semicircle beyond the clearing.
Their Alpha was dead.
Their structure fractured.
Their certainty gone.
And at the center of it all stood my mate.
My Bear.
My True Alpha.
Blood streaked across his chest and jaw.
His gorgeous, mismatched eyes were no longer wild—they were clear.
Focused. Controlled. Terrifyingly steady.
Not a Monster.
A verdict.
He stepped forward slowly toward the remaining Bears.
“Leave,” he said evenly. No roar. No theatrics. “You go back to Forest Ridge and you do not cross this mountain again.”
There was no hesitation in his voice.
One of the massive Grizzlies swallowed hard.
“B-but you’re our rightful Alpha,” he stammered.
The forest stirred again at that word.
Rightful.
Wreck’s jaw flexed once.
“No,” he said flatly. “You helped them banish me. I don’t want Forest Ridge. I don’t want your title.”
He stepped closer.
“If you come here again—I won’t hesitate. Understood?”
There was no threat in it.
Just fact.
The Bears lowered their heads.
“Yes… Alpha,” they murmured.
The title came instinctively.
They felt it.
The dominance that Edward never truly possessed.
They retreated one by one into the trees.
Hopefully, they would listen.
But the most shocking thing about all this wasn’t Edward’s death.
It wasn’t the submission.
It was Jeremy.
Because the moment I looked at him kneeling in the mud, vines coiled tightly around his legs and wrists, I understood something with terrifying clarity.
He wasn’t afraid of Edward dying.
He was afraid of losing clout.
I couldn’t believe I ever considered dating the Witch.
Wreck’s low rumble vibrated through my spine as he pulled me close for a second.
Possessive.
Grounding.
Sexy as hell.
I stepped from his arms slowly.
Because this wasn’t over.
Havoc and Justin approached us quietly, speaking low to Wreck in quick, tense murmurs.
I barely heard them.
The roots beneath the clearing were telling me a different story.
Trees always told the truth.
I let my magic sink down.
Past mud.
Past stone.
Into the web of life beneath the mountain.
What I felt wasn’t just grief from burned trees.
It was structure.
Contracts.
Magic circles layered into soil generations ago.
Not drawn in chalk.
Written in greed.
Signed in blood.
“You fucked up when you sold this land, didn’t you? Your Coven, the ones who came before you,” I said quietly.
Jeremy lifted his chin slowly.
His composure was slipping now.
Cold calculation remained, but the smooth polish had cracked.
“Yes, we were tricked,” he lied.
His words tasted like poison.
“No. You sold it, and now you tried seizing it.”
The vines around his ankles tightened slightly.
A reminder.
He inhaled slowly, then straightened as much as the roots allowed.
“Fine! But Gia, you must understand, Greener Earth is expanding,” he said evenly. “Montana is strategic. Mineral rights. Timber. Untapped leylines. There is real power here!”
My stomach twisted.
“You burned forests—threatened countless woodland lives—to manipulate power.”
“Yes.”
No remorse.
“And Forest Ridge?”
Jeremy’s lips curved faintly.
“They were useful.”
Edward hadn’t been a partner.
He’d been a pawn.
“You promised him power,” I realized.
Jeremy inclined his head.
“Yes. We promised him power. Land. Coven backing. Protection from dissent.”
“And in exchange?”
“He destabilized the territory for us. It was the most efficient way to get the new owner to sell.”
The earth trembled faintly.
Wreck went still beside me.
“They increased the random fires,” Justin said quietly.
And that was when everything changed.
Because when Justin stepped forward, the air itself shifted.
He wasn’t just the quiet third Alpha in a crew of feral misfits.
He wasn’t just a brooding Dragon with unresolved trauma.
He looked—old.
And not in a sexy silver-fox way.
Magical old.
Older than this clearing.
Older than the mountain.
He looked ancient.
“Efficient,” Justin repeated slowly.
The word carried weight now.
Jeremy frowned slightly.
“You were aware this land was already under private ownership?”
Justin’s eyes flashed gold.
Real gold.
“I suppose your Coven has forgotten who bought the deed.”
“What? Who are you?” Jeremy asked.
“I’ve had many names in my long lifetime, but all you need to know is I hold the deed to this mountain. It’s mine.”
Wreck growled deeply from where he stood between me and the Dragon, facing Jeremy.
My Alpha Bear wasn’t arguing Justin’s claim.
No.
It was more like his Bear was acknowledging it.
Havoc’s Wolf snarled, too.
Even the forest answered him.
Not fearfully.
Reverently.
My breath caught.
Jeremy blinked.
“I beg your pardon?”
Justin stepped fully into the clearing now.
Newly falling rainwater slid down his jacket sleeves, but it was like it turned to mist the second it touched him.
“This land,” Justin said calmly, “is the Dragon’s claim. Your Coven forfeited the right to question that deal more than a century ago.”
The Dragon’s claim.
The words vibrated down into the roots.
Jeremy scoffed.
“That’s folklore.”
Justin smiled faintly, and that was when I noticed smoke trailing from his nostrils.
“No, it’sssss not,” he hissed.
The air grew warmer.
Just slightly.
Like something massive had exhaled somewhere far above us.
“This mountain,” Justin continued, “is my treasure. The trees and plants and all the wildlife here are my hoard.”
The word hit me in the chest.
Treasure.
Hoard.
Not gold.
Not jewels.
Life.
Forest.
Water.
Balance.
He hadn’t just hired A-Feral Firefighters because they were convenient—he’d set the whole thing up.
He’d found other True Alphas, gathered them here because his Dragon needed a Clan and this mountain needed protectors.
Dragons did not integrate.
They destroyed.
But Justin?
He had chosen not to.
He’d chosen to try something different.
“You found Wreck and Havoc, you hired them,” I whispered.
Justin glanced at Wreck briefly.
“Yes.”
Havoc grinned.
“Guess we weren’t just glorified firefighters after all.”
Justin ignored him.
“I required guardians,” he said. “And I required True Alphas who wouldn’t cave to my dominance, and who didn’t crave throne politics.”
My gaze slid to Wreck.
He went still at that.
He had never wanted Forest Ridge.
Never wanted the title.
All my mate ever wanted was peace.
He’d wanted something to keep his Bear steady.
And somehow that selflessness had made him worthy of power.
Pride filled me.
And love.
And it was all for him.
My mate.
My Alpha.
Wreck.
But before I could go to him, Jeremy’s mask shattered completely.
“This is irrelevant!” The Witch snapped. “Greener Earth holds binding Coven contracts recognized under federal charter.”
“Fraudulent contracts,” I said quietly.
The roots pulsed in agreement.
“You forged all your claims,” I continued. “You tried manipulating supernaturals to do your dirty work, including me. None of this is sanctioned or recognized by a Council and I will make damn sure they know all of it. Or did you forget, I have the records.”
Jeremy’s eyes darkened.
“No! Your access to Greener Earth is gone. You have access to nothing.”
“You do know I have copies of every communication I’ve ever been party to on my own private server, don’t you?” I scoffed.
“You’re not a Witch! The Council won’t listen to you. You can’t do anything to me,” Jeremy said, scrambling.
“No, I’m not a Witch,” I agreed calmly. “I’m a Dryad and I don’t need your Coven to draw my powers.”
And as I always knew it would if and when I needed it, the Earth answered my call.
The mountain trembled.
Wind returned.
Soft at first.
Then stronger.
“You don’t get to own this,” I said.
“Ownership is defined by power,” Jeremy replied.
“Then you miscalculated,” Justin said softly. “Gia is more powerful here than any of us, Witch.”
He wasn’t wrong.
In that moment, I felt the earth beneath my feet, the roots, the vines, the trees, the shrubs, the flowers—all of it.
Every electric pulse—every quake and quiver that signified the life the mountain held.
It was all there.
Running through me like water.
Flowing through my veins like blood.
Endless as the tide and brilliant as the morning sun.
And it was just waiting for me to call on it.
I felt powerful right then. And not just because of all that Mother Earth had given me.
But because standing beside me was my True Alpha mate—the Shifter who owned my heart, who had just killed a full-blooded Grizzly for threatening me.
Standing behind him were two more Alphas—our Clan—a Wolf and a Dragon.
And here I was, standing with him—a Dryad who now understood exactly what she was protecting.
Wreck stepped closer to me.
The bond between us surged.
He wasn’t raging anymore.
He was steady.
And Goddess help me, that was even more terrifying.
I felt it then.
Fully.
The lethal feral edge in him.
The absolute certainty I felt that he would use all his might to keep me, and our baby, safe.
It wasn’t bravado.
It wasn’t possessive insecurity.
It was law now—our Clan law.
I was his mate and therefore untouchable.
And instead of fearing this new reality—I accepted it.
Because I knew something just as clearly.
Wreck was my soulmate.
Fated. Destined. Chosen by me.
And I was his.
He anchored to me.
And I anchored to him.
Alpha and Omega.
Jeremy struggled against the vines.
“You’re making a mistake.”
“No,” I said softly. “But you already did.”
The forest tightened around him.
For the first time?
Jeremy Steeler understood what was about to happen to him.
And when Wreck pulled me into his arms again, blood and rain and pine wrapping around us—I didn’t flinch.
I leaned in.
Because now I understood something fundamental.
The Coven had power.
Forest Ridge had lineage.
But this mountain?
This future?
It belonged to those who would bleed for it.
And I had chosen my Alpha.
Not because fate forced me.
Not because instinct demanded it.
But because when he turned lethal for me—he did not lose himself.
He became exactly what he was meant to be.
And I would stand beside him in that fire.
Every single time.