Chapter 25 - Thane
The world is crumbling apart around me.
Snehvolk wolves are being taken down, barely scraping through the demons’ attacks. We're hanging on by a fine thread thanks to Rissa and Yvonne and their magic, but they're already becoming exhausted and won't hold on any longer.
The demon’s claws dig deeper into my throat, the pressure closing my windpipe until I can’t breathe.
I thrash, shift halfway, thinking I can get out, but the strength drains from my limbs before I can finish.
The stench of the demon's burning smoke fills my nose, thick and oily, choking the air, like the smell of defeat.
I close my eyes, surrendering to this defeat if death means an escape from the vicious grief in my chest. I already howled it out, but it did nothing to take this gaping hole out of my being.
Willow is suspended in the air, covered in magic, having taken the potion with the lethal amount of wolfsbane in it. I know how this ends. I just wish she'd listened to me.
I squeeze my eyes tighter, tears pushing through the corners. I know why she did—it seemed like the only way to save us all—but I can't forgive her for not giving me a heads up.
One last embrace.
One last kiss.
This should be my last breath.
It escapes my lips, and just as I'm about to sink into the throes of darkness, a bright light surges, forcing me to snap my eyes open.
It starts as a pulse, a lively heartbeat—Willow’s heartbeat—before it expands into the most powerful force field we've ever experienced in Girdwood.
The glow builds behind her, a shimmer of molten gold seeping from her pores until she’s no longer just Willow Barker, she’s something divine, something ancient, something otherworldly.
Her hair floats around her like a halo of sunlight, her eyes burning brighter than any moon.
The demon holding me pauses, almost…afraid as it turns its eyes toward her.
Every creature on the battlefield stops, wolves, witches, and demons alike, and my heart stops with them.
“Willow…” I rasp mentally, a paw reaching toward her as best I can. The demon snarls and crushes my throat with a tightening claw just as the largest one rises in the air to face Willow.
My vision blurs, the edges darkening, and I can’t move, can’t breathe.
But I can see her.
Her arms are spread, face tilted toward the sky as the light grows stronger, pulsing in waves that ripple through the snow and soil. The air hums with the vibration of power—her power—a power so majestic that no witch has ever wielded before.
Aurora, Rissa, and Yvonne have gathered behind her, hands joined, their voices rising in that same ancient chant that first tore the ground apart. Their magic flares emerald and silver, merging with Willow’s gold until the entire clearing glows like the inside of a sun.
I feel the demon tremble on my neck, even as its leader roars in my eardrums.
“This is your end, Willow Barker…the end of you and the Snehvolk pack,” the demon levitating in front of her bellows, its sinister speech echoing all around the clearing. “You cannot win.”
Willow's eyes flicker to mine, and there's a leaded weight of sadness and grief in them when she sees me pinned down by a demon. She looks up then, as if drawing strength from the moon, her eyes menacing in gold when she turns her face back to the demon.
“You are wrong, demon!” Her voice pulses through the mind link and can be heard everywhere. “This is your end!”
My heart skips a beat because I just heard a voice again—a voice I thought I'd never hear again, a few moments ago. The ground begins to quake beneath me, the snow hissing and melting under Willow’s feet.
The gold light permeating from her skin condenses, rising from her body, twisting into a thick column that pierces the clouds above.
The air folds inward, reality itself bending under the weight of her magic.
Then the sky splits.
A tear opens above her head like the ground split before, but it's nothing like the ragged holes the demons crawl through. It's a clean, circular rift of light. Inside it, shadows writhe and scream.
It's the main portal to the underworld.
The pull is immediate and violent, a roaring wind dragging everything toward that opening.
The demons begin to scream and screech.
The one strangling me howls and releases its grip, clawing at the ground as it’s dragged backward.
I collapse, gasping, clinging to my wolf form to brace myself against the force.
My claws gouge the frozen soil, snow whipping around me in a cyclone of light and ash as the demons are pulled like they're being drawn by a magnetic force.
One by one, the demons are torn from the battlefield, their bodies twisting, their shrieks echoing through the mountains as they’re sucked into the portal. Their forms disintegrate, black smoke unraveling into the nothingness on the other side.
All except one.
The largest of them—the one that taunted Willow—remains, suspended midair, defying the pull. Its molten eyes flare brighter, its claws reaching for her through the roaring wind.
“Willow!” I warn through the link, my voice raw.
But she doesn’t move. Her expression is calm, serene, glowing with the same otherworldly strength that can only be associated with the Moon Goddess Herself.
There's a certainty in her stature, an inner knowing that the demons are done for.
She lifts her hands, palms out, and the gold around her explodes outward in a blinding, raging surge.
The light slams into the demon, and it lets out a sound that isn’t a roar, but more like a death cry, vibrating through the marrow of every living thing in the valley.
The creature convulses as it’s finally ripped into the air, sucked toward the rift.
For a moment, its claws catch the edge of the portal, but Willow’s light surges again, this time from her heart.
The portal snaps shut around the last demon, sending a shockwave of glittering gold rippling across the meadow, flattening the trees in a circle and sending wolves and witches sprawling into the snow.
The silence that follows is deafening—frightening, even—no growls, no screams, no sound at all except the ringing in my ears.
And then I see him, baby, Emile, falling from the sky like a fragile leaf when there isn't a demon imprisoning him in the air any longer.
“Elias! Emile!” Aurora cries out to her mate, and Elias shifts mid-run, catching their son in his arms and crumpling to his knees, sobbing with relief into his mate’s hair as she falls to her knees beside him, the picture of relief.
The others are stirring, groaning, alive in the aftermath of the battle.
Everyone except Willow.
Her body begins to fall when the light that held her up flickers out.
“No!” I howl, sprinting toward her with everything I have left in my tortured bones. The earth still smolders from her power, but I don’t care. I leap across the gaping fissure that once opened beneath her and catch her limp body just before she falls into it.
We hit the ground hard, rolling through the snow until I land on my back, clutching her against my chest. Her head lolls, her hair tangled with my fur, and I shift into human form while cradling her.
“Willow…?”
Panting, I sit upright, my hands trembling as I brush the hair away from her face, noticing how cold her skin is.
Too cold.
I press a finger to her nose, but there's nothing.
No breath warms her lips.
“Come on,” I whisper, pressing my forehead to hers. “Please, angel…please wake up….”
Nothing.
The world blurs, and for a moment, I forget the pain in my ribs, the blood dripping from my shoulder, the chaos around me as everyone stirs back to a semblance of life. All I can see is Willow, pale, perfect, and unmoving.
I get to my knees, carrying her with me, shaking her shoulders, my voice breaking.
“D-don’t you dare leave me, Willow! You hear me? You don’t get to save everyone and leave me behind!”
My hands fumble as I lay her on the ground, then press stacked palms against her chest, counting compressions the way I was trained long ago. I breathe into her mouth…once, twice, the taste of blood and ash stinging my tongue.
“Breathe,” I beg between sobs. “Breathe, dammit! I love you. I love you, you stubborn woman, I love you!”
The words come out like a prayer, a confession torn from the ruins of my soul.
“Thane…”
It's Dawson, placing a hand on my shoulder as if to console me, as if it's a condolence for the loss.
“No, get off me!” I bellow, slapping his hand away and delivering more compressions to Willow's chest.
“Please, Willow…wake up, baby…don't leave me like this!” I grab her chin with one trembling hand, then crush my lips to hers, breathing air into her mouth as my chest pulls taut, as if containing the broken pieces of my heart.
“P-please…” I choke, pressing my forehead to hers. “You can't leave me like this. You can't leave me alone. I love you….”
Silence stretches like a rubber band that will snap back and scatter the broken pieces of my heart all around the meadow. Hopeless, I lift my head, wiping my tears with the back of my hand when I see it.
The movement is slight, but her fingers twitch as a gasp rips through her throat, small and sharp, like the world exhaling.
I freeze, my heart stuttering.
Her eyelids flutter open, her lips parting on a shuddering breath. She blinks up at me, dazed, golden flecks glowing faintly in her irises. “What…what did you just say?”
Relief crashes into me like a wave. I let out a broken laugh, tears spilling down my cheeks. “I said I love you, Willow Barker. I’ve always loved you. Since the greenhouse. Since before I was brave enough to say it.”
A weak smile curves her lips. “Took you long enough,” she chuckles lightly.
I choke out a laugh, leaning down to press my forehead against hers as my arms wind around her. I pull her up onto my lap, and her hand rises slowly, trembling, to touch my cheek.
“I love you, Willow,” I say as I turn my face into her hand and press a kiss on her palm. “I really love you.”
“I love you too, Thane.”
The kiss that follows isn’t born of desperation, but it’s a solemn oath filled with relief. Slow and sacred, her warmth seeps back into me, pulling me out of the nightmare, reminding me that somehow, impossibly, she’s still here.
When we finally pull apart, the others have gathered in a loose circle, Aurora clutching Emile, Elias’s head bowed in silent gratitude, Rissa and Yvonne wiping tears from their cheeks as they cling to their mates.
The forest around us is quiet again, blanketed in pale gold light that drifts down like dust particles from the heavens.
For the first time in months, there's unmistakable peace in Girdwood.
I tighten my arms around Willow, brushing the hair from her face as her breathing steadies against my chest. “It’s over,” I whisper, mostly to myself. “It’s really over.”
As the snow begins to fall again, soft and silent, a tremor runs through the earth beneath us, so faint that it could almost be imagined, and our surroundings sigh in relief.
Willow's lips curl into a tired smile as she looks up at me, and I cradle her face.
“You did it, my angel.”
She shakes her head slowly. “No. We did it.”
“Together,” I return her smile, the pad of my thumb tracing her cheek where her scar used to be. Leaning in for another chaste kiss filled with promise, Willow and I look up at the sky, the moon winking at us as we bask in the glory of our victory.