Sera's POV
"You're insane!" I screamed, backing away from the phone showing Marcus's lies. "All of this is insane! Medical records? Mental illness? I'm not crazy!"
"I know you're not." Kael's voice was deadly calm, which somehow made it worse. "But Marcus has been building this narrative for three years. He's been documenting every 'anxiety attack,' every 'memory lapse,' every time you questioned your past. All of it designed to make you look unstable."
"Why?" My voice cracked. "Why would he do this?"
"Control." Kael crossed to a wooden chest in the corner. "If you're declared mentally incompetent, he becomes your legal guardian. Gets access to your healing magic. Your bloodline. Everything."
He pulled something from the chest—a leather-bound journal with my name embossed on the cover.
"But he made one mistake," Kael continued, walking toward me with the journal. "He couldn't erase everything. Some things leave marks too deep to hide."
I stared at the journal like it might bite me. "What is that?"
"Proof." He held it out. "Proof that you loved me. That we were happy. That everything Marcus told you was a lie."
"I'm not reading that." I shook my head violently. "You could have faked it. Written it yourself to—"
"Look at the handwriting, Sera." His voice turned pleading. "Just look at it. You'll recognize your own hand."
Against my better judgment, I took the journal. Opened it to a random page.
The handwriting was definitely mine. I recognized the way I looped my L's, the little hearts I drew as periods when I was happy. Details no one else would know.
"Today Kael brought me flowers—wild violets from the forest. He said they reminded him of my eyes. I told him that was cheesy. He said I loved cheesy. He's right. I do when it comes from him."
My hands started shaking.
"Keep reading," Kael said softly.
I flipped to another entry.
"Lyra says I'm glowing. Says being mated looks good on me. She's not wrong. I've never been this happy. Never felt this safe. Kael makes me feel like I'm worth protecting, worth loving, worth everything. And when he looks at me like I'm his whole world? I believe it."
Tears blurred my vision. "Stop. Please stop."
"You need to see." Kael's voice was rough with emotion. "You need to know what they took from you."
I turned to the last entry, dated three years and two months ago. The handwriting was messier here, like I'd been excited. Happy.
"I've never felt safer than in Kael's arms. Never felt more loved, more seen, more whole. Tomorrow we're planning to expand the healing sanctuary, and I can't wait to see his face when I tell him about
It ended mid-sentence. Just stopped, like someone had ripped me away while I was still writing.
"Tell you about what?" I whispered, touching the incomplete sentence.
"I don't know." Kael's jaw clenched. "That was the night you were taken. Whatever you were going to tell me, I never found out."
A memory flickered—just a flash. Me sitting at a desk, writing in this journal, smiling to myself. Planning something. Something important.
Then nothing. Like a door slamming shut in my mind.
"I can't remember," I gasped, pressing my hands to my head. "I can almost see it, but then it's gone
"The suppressants are still in your system." Kael moved closer. "They're keeping your memories locked away. But they're weakening. Every hour you're here, every hour you're not taking those pills, the walls around your mind get thinner."
"What if I don't want them to fall?" The words burst out before I could stop them. "What if remembering hurts too much? What if I remember loving you and then realize I can't get that back?"
Kael flinched like I'd struck him. "Then at least you'll know the truth. At least you'll know who you really are instead of the person Marcus made you believe you were."
He was right. I knew he was right. But knowing and accepting were two different things.
A knock interrupted us. Damien entered without waiting for permission, his expression urgent.
"We have a problem. A big one."
"Bigger than the Alliance declaring war?" Kael asked dryly.
"Yes." Damien held up his phone. "Morgana just contacted us. The witch who erased Sera's memories."
My blood turned to ice. "Why would she contact you?"
"Because Marcus stopped paying her." Damien's expression was grim. "And now she's offering to sell us information about the curse she placed on Sera. For a price."
"Absolutely not," Kael snarled. "We're not making deals with the witch who destroyed my mate's mind."
"She says she's the only one who can safely restore Sera's memories," Damien continued. "Says if we try to break the curse without her help, Sera's mind will shatter permanently."
The room spun. "What?"
"It's a kill-switch curse," Damien explained. "Insurance so Marcus could threaten Morgana if she ever betrayed him. If the curse is broken incorrectly, it doesn't just fail—it destroys the victim's mind completely."
"So I'm trapped," I breathed. "Either I never remember, or I go insane trying."
"No." Kael's voice was pure steel. "There's always a third option. We bring Morgana here, make her remove the curse safely, and then I rip her apart for what she did to you."
"She won't come," Damien said. "She knows you'll kill her. She's demanding we meet her at neutral ground. Alone. Just you and Sera."
"It's a trap," Kael said immediately.
"Of course it's a trap." Damien shrugged. "But it's also our only chance to fix this. Unless you want Sera living with half a life forever."
I looked between them, my heart pounding. "What if we just... don't break the curse? What if I just stay like this?"
"You'd still have gaps," Damien said gently. "Holes in your memory that would drive you slowly insane. And the mate bond would never be complete. You'd always feel like something was missing."
Like the ache in my chest. The one I'd carried for three years.
"When does Morgana want to meet?" I asked quietly.
"Tomorrow night," Damien said. "At the border between pack lands and the Shadowlands. She'll remove the curse if we pay her and guarantee her safe passage out of the territory."
"She gets nothing but a quick death," Kael growled.
"Kael." I touched his arm, and he immediately calmed. The mate bond again, soothing his rage. "If she can give me my memories back—my real memories—then we should at least consider it."
"She'll betray us the moment she gets the chance."
"Probably." I met his eyes. "But I need to know who I was. I need to remember us. And if this is the only way—"
A sound cut through the air. A horn. Long and low and full of warning.
All three of us froze.
"What is that?" I whispered.
Kael's expression turned deadly. "The warning horn. Someone's attacking Blackstone Keep."
We ran to the window. In the distance, torches blazed in the darkness. Hundreds of them. An army.
"The Northern Alliance," Damien breathed. "They're here. Now. They didn't wait forty-eight hours."
"Marcus pushed them to move early." Kael's hands clenched into fists. "He knew I'd use the time to prove the truth to Sera. So he forced their hand."
Below, I could see the army forming ranks. And at their head, mounted on a white horse, was Marcus. Even from this distance, I recognized him.
"Sera Ashford!" His voice carried through the night, magically amplified. "I know you're in there! I know he's holding you prisoner! I'm here to bring you home!"
"I'm not his prisoner," I said, surprised by the anger in my voice. "I'm—"
"You're my mate," Kael finished. "My wife. And he's about to start a war to take you back."
The army began to advance. Siege weapons rolled forward. Hundreds of warriors prepared to attack.
And somewhere in the back of my fractured mind, something whispered that this was all my fault. That if I'd never existed, none of these people would be about to die.
"I should go to him," I said numbly. "I should surrender. Stop the fighting before—"
"No." Kael grabbed my shoulders, forcing me to look at him. "You're not going back to that bastard. I don't care if I have to fight every wolf in the North. You're staying here. You're staying with me."
"People are going to die!"
"They were always going to die." His golden eyes blazed. "Marcus was always going to start this war. If not now, then later. At least now, you're safe. At least now, you're where you belong."
A massive explosion rocked the Keep. They'd fired the first shot.
The battle for Blackstone Keep—and for me—had begun.
Damien ran for the door. "I need to coordinate the defense. Kael, get Sera to the safe room—"
"I'm not hiding in a safe room!" I pulled away from Kael. "I'm a healer. I can help the wounded—"
"You're the reason they're attacking," Kael said bluntly. "If Marcus's warriors catch you, this whole thing is for nothing."
Another explosion. Closer this time. The Keep shook.
And then I felt it—a sharp, burning pain in my chest. Like someone had stabbed me through the heart.
I gasped, falling to my knees.
"Sera!" Kael caught me. "What's wrong?"
The pain intensified. The mating mark on my chest was burning, glowing so bright I could see it through my shirt.
"Something's wrong with the bond," I choked out. "Something's—"
Then I heard it. A voice in my head. Not my own. Not Kael's either.
Morgana's voice.
"Hello, little healer. Did you really think I'd wait until tomorrow to make my move? Marcus paid me well to curse you three years ago. But Kael Thorne will pay better to save you. So here's my offer: I'll break the kill-switch curse right now, from a distance. You'll get your memories back. But there's a price."
"What price?" I gasped aloud.
Kael's eyes widened. "You can hear her? Morgana's in your head?"
"The price is simple," Morgana's voice purred. "When I break the curse, you'll remember everything. Including the real reason Marcus took you. Including the secret you were going to tell Kael that night. Including the truth about what you are."
"What I am?" I whispered.
"You're not just a healer, Sera Ashford. You're so much more. And when you remember what you really are—when you access your full power—you'll have a choice to make. Save Kael and doom the world. Or save the world and watch Kael die."
The burning in my chest exploded into agony.
And then, like a dam breaking, the memories came flooding back.
All of them.
Three years of stolen life crashing into me at once.
I screamed.
And the last thing I saw before the memories dragged me under was Kael's terrified face and the words I'd written in my journal three years ago finally making sense:
"Tomorrow I'm going to tell him about the prophecy. About what I really am. About the choice I'll have to make. Gods forgive me, but I don't know if I'm strong enough to choose the world over him."
Then everything went black.