"I know," she whispered, because she could feel what he was feeling, could sense the way the bond was rewriting fundamental parts of who they were. "I can feel it too."
The magic flowing between them stabilized, but it was no longer entirely under their conscious control. Power pulsed back and forth like a shared heartbeat, wolf energy and chaos magic finding perfect balance in their connection. The cellar stopped shaking, but the rune beneath their joined hands was glowing brighter than ever.
"The seal," Cade said, his shifted senses apparently picking up something she couldn't detect. "It's responding to the bond."
Lyra could feel it too—the way their combined magic was feeding into the rune, strengthening the binding that held the Mistbound in its prison. But she could also feel the cost. Every pulse of power that flowed into the seal drew energy from both of them, and she wasn't sure how long they could sustain it.
"How long do we have to—" she started to ask, but the question was cut off by a sound that made both of them freeze.
The crack in the rune was spreading again, but this time it wasn't caused by her uncontrolled magic. Something was pushing against the seal from the other side, testing the boundaries of its prison with patient, deliberate pressure.
"It knows," Cade said quietly. "It can sense that the bond is forming, and it's trying to break free before we can strengthen the binding."
"Can it do that?"
"I don't know. But we need to?—"
The rune cracked again, a fracture so deep it seemed to go all the way through the stone. Ancient power leaked through the gap, carrying with it the scent of something hungry and old and absolutely malevolent.
Above them, the inn's lights began to flicker in patterns that suggested something was trying to communicate. And fromsomewhere deep beneath the foundation, Lyra could hear the Mistbound's voice, no longer distant and ethereal but close enough to make her bones ache.
"Soon," it whispered, the words seeming to come from the stone itself. "Soon we will be free, and the daughters of magic will feed our hunger as they were always meant to do."
Lyra met Cade's eyes, seeing her own determination reflected in his golden gaze. The bond between them was complete now, unbreakable, but it might not be enough. The seal was failing faster than they could repair it, and the entity beneath the inn was growing stronger with every passing moment.
"We need help," she said quietly. "We need to find another way."
"There has to be another way," Cade agreed, his voice carrying the fierce conviction that had made him an alpha. "I won't share you with anyone, bond or no bond. And I won't ask you to sacrifice what we have for some ancient interpretation of how magic is supposed to work."
"Then we figure out a different solution," Lyra said, though she could feel the weight of responsibility pressing down on both of them. "We find a way to make this work without giving up what matters most."
The rune pulsed once more beneath their joined hands, its light flickering like a dying flame. Through their bond, Lyra could feel Cade's determination matching her own—they would find another way, no matter what the council believed about ancient requirements.
But first, they had to survive whatever the Mistbound was planning to do next.
And somewhere in the darkness beneath Mistwhisper Falls, something ancient and patient began to laugh.
13
CADE
The magical storm arrived at sunset, rolling over Mistwhisper Falls like the wrath of ancient gods made manifest in wind and lightning.
Lyra felt it building before she saw it—a pressure in the air that made her mark burn and her magic twist restlessly in her chest. She was in the inn's main parlor, surrounded by research books Nico had delivered that morning along with a note that simply read "Knowledge is power. Use it wisely." She'd been trying to understand the intricacies of triad bonding, hoping to find some alternative to the path everyone seemed determined to push her down.
The first rumble of thunder made every window in the inn rattle simultaneously.
"That's not natural," Lyra said to the empty room, moving to the front windows to peer out at the approaching storm. The clouds were wrong—too dark, too uniform, moving against the prevailing wind patterns. Lightning flickered within them, but it was the wrong color, cycling through purples and greens that belonged in aurora displays rather than mountain thunderstorms.
Her phone buzzed with an emergency alert: "SUPERNATURAL WEATHER EVENT. SEEK SHELTER IMMEDIATELY. AVOID CONTACT WITH ELECTRICAL SYSTEMS."
"Well, that's specific," Lyra muttered, but she was already moving away from the windows as the first drops of rain began to fall. Except it wasn't quite rain—the droplets glowed faintly as they hit the glass, leaving trails of phosphorescence that pulsed in rhythm with her heartbeat.
The storm reached the inn with enough energy to make the entire building shudder. Wind howled around the Victorian structure, finding every gap and weakness in the aged construction. The lights flickered once, twice, then went out entirely, leaving Lyra in darkness broken only by the eerie glow of the storm's lightning.
But it was the voices that made her blood run cold.
They came with the wind, dozens of them, speaking in languages she didn't recognize but somehow understood. Ancient words of hunger and binding and the promise of freedom that had been denied too long. The Mistbound was riding the storm, using the chaotic energy to push against the boundaries of its prison.
