Kiera's POV
The cell door slammed shut with a sound like a death sentence.
I stumbled forward, barely catching myself before hitting the cold stone floor. My wrists screamed in pain where the silver chains had finally been removed, leaving raw, bleeding circles of burned flesh.
Wait! I spun around, but Theron was already walking away down the dark corridor. You can't just lock me up without
I can do whatever I want, he said without turning back. I'm the Alpha King.
His footsteps echoed until they faded to nothing, leaving me alone in the darkness.
I wanted to scream. To rage. To demand answers about what he'd meant in the wagon—they stole you from me—but he was gone.
And I was trapped.
The cell was tiny. Maybe six steps across. Stone walls on three sides, iron bars on the fourth. No window. No bed. Just a thin blanket thrown in the corner and a bucket I didn't want to think about.
This was Blood Court. The place prisoners whispered about in terror.
I sank down against the wall, wrapping my arms around my knees. My whole body hurt. The burns on my wrists throbbed. My muscles ached from sitting in that wagon for hours. But worst of all was the exhaustion crushing down on me—not just physical, but soul-deep.
I'd killed Damien less than twenty-four hours ago.
Twenty-four hours since my entire life had shattered.
The bond with him was completely gone now. I couldn't feel even a whisper of where it used to be. But the new bond—the one with Theron—pulsed steady and strong in my chest. Even now, I could feel him somewhere above me. Angry. Confused. Conflicted.
He felt everything I did.
And I felt him right back.
How was this possible? How could I kill my mate and immediately bond with someone else? It went against every law of nature, every rule our kind had lived by for thousands of years.
Unless Theron was right.
Unless Damien had never really been my mate at all.
But if the bond was fake, how had I felt it so strongly? How had every wolf in Shadowmoon Pack witnessed it snap into place between us? The pack elders had confirmed it. The healers had tested it. Everyone agreed we were fated mates.
They couldn't all be wrong.
Could they?
Time crawled by. Hours maybe. It was impossible to tell in the windowless cell. I tried to sleep but every time I closed my eyes, I saw Damien's face. Heard his last words.
You'll never save her now.
Lyra. My brave, sweet sister who'd only wanted to help people. She was supposed to be dead, but something in my gut told me she might still be alive. Damien had been cruel enough to lie with his dying breath just to hurt me one last time.
I had to believe she was out there. Had to believe I hadn't killed him for nothing.
Footsteps echoed down the corridor.
I jerked upright, heart pounding. Through the bond, I felt Theron's presence getting closer, and with it came a wave of dark determination.
He was coming for answers.
The cell door swung open. Theron filled the doorway, backlit by torchlight from the hall. His silver eyes found me in the darkness.
Get up, he commanded.
I stood on shaking legs. Where
I'm not taking you anywhere. We're talking here.
He stepped inside and the door clanged shut behind him, locking us both in. The space felt even smaller with him in it. His presence took up all the air.
Tell me why you killed him, Theron said. Not a question. An order.
I lifted my chin. I already told you. To save my sister.
Details. I want every detail from the beginning.
So I told him. Everything.
I told him about Lyra's arrest three months ago. How the guards had dragged her from the healing house in the middle of the night, claiming she'd sold pack secrets to enemy territories. How I'd begged Damien to investigate, to see that she was innocent, but he'd refused.
He used her imprisonment to control me, I said, my voice shaking with remembered rage. Every time I questioned him, every time I didn't obey fast enough, he'd threaten to move up her execution date.
Theron's expression didn't change, but through the bond I felt his anger stirring.
I continued, The mating ceremony was supposed to be my reward for good behavior. Damien said if I completed the bond, if I submitted completely to him as his Luna, he'd let Lyra go. I believed him because I was desperate and stupid and—
My voice broke.
Theron waited, saying nothing.
I forced myself to keep going. But when we were alone in the mating chamber, he told me the truth. Lyra would die no matter what I did. The execution was scheduled for dawn. He'd lied about everything just to see me broken.
So you killed him, Theron stated flatly.
He gave me a choice, I corrected. Let him force the bond and consummate our mating while my sister died in a dungeon, or fight back. I fought back.
With a silver dagger you'd hidden in your wedding dress.
Yes.
Premeditated murder.
Self-defense, I shot back. He was going to rape me and murder my sister. What would you have done?
Theron's eyes flashed gold—his wolf rising. Fated mates don't kill each other. The bond creates a physical barrier. You literally cannot deliver a killing blow to your true mate. The bond won't allow it.
I felt the bond with him! I shouted. It was real! Every wolf in my pack felt it snap into place when we met!
Then you should be dead right now, Theron said coldly. Wolves who kill their mates don't survive the severing. The pain destroys them within hours. Their hearts stop. Their wolves die. Yet here you are—alive, whole, and apparently bonded to me instead.
He stepped closer, and the bond between us flared hot.
Explain that, Kiera.
I couldn't. My mind spun in useless circles trying to make sense of the impossible.
Maybe I'm dying slowly, I whispered. Maybe it just hasn't caught up to me yet.
You're not dying. I can feel your life force through our bond. You're perfectly healthy.
Then I don't know! The words burst out of me. I don't know why I'm alive! I don't know why I feel you! I don't know anything except that I had to save my sister and I'd make the same choice again!
Silence fell between us, heavy and suffocating.
Theron stared at me for a long moment. I couldn't read his expression, but through the bond I felt his confusion. His suspicion. And underneath it all, something that felt almost like... belief.
Until I know the truth, he said finally, his voice arctic, you stay in this cell. You don't leave. You don't see anyone. You answer my questions when I ask them.
He turned toward the door.
Wait! I grabbed his arm without thinking.
The moment my hand touched him, the bond exploded. Heat and light and electricity shot through both of us. Theron sucked in a sharp breath. His hand covered mine, pressing my palm against his forearm.
For three heartbeats, we just stood there, connected, feeling the raw power of a true mate bond.
Then Theron ripped away from me like I'd burned him.
Don't touch me again, he snarled.
But his eyes told a different story. His eyes were wide and shocked and hungry.
He practically ran from the cell, slamming the door behind him.
I stood there shaking, my hand still tingling from where we'd touched.
Through the bond, I felt him stop just outside my cell. Felt him lean against the wall, breathing hard.
Then I heard his voice, so quiet I almost missed it:
What did they do to us?