Sophie's POV
His hand was warm—warmer than the fire I'd just walked through.
Kael.
The real him.
Not a shadow. Not a test. Not a half-formed illusion conjured by my own doubts.
I didn't hesitate this time.
Fingers met fingers, skin against skin, and suddenly everything pulsed back to life—the bond, the air, the forest, my heart.
All of it.
Our palms pressed together like the lock and key we were always meant to be.
And then… he pulled me to him.
Not violently. Not like a warrior would drag a prize. But with a kind of reverence—like he couldn't believe I was real.
My chest met his. My breath hitched. His hand came around my waist, and he buried his face in the curve of my neck as if he'd been holding his breath since the day we met.
"I thought I lost you," he whispered, his voice barely more than a rasp.
"You almost did," I admitted, heart pounding.
"But you came back."
"To you," I whispered.
A breath caught in his throat, and Kael pulled away just enough to look into my eyes. His fingers trailed across my cheek, smudged with ash and dried tears. He looked older. Weary. But his golden eyes and soul-deep—still made my stomach flip.
He leaned forward, forehead brushing mine.
"No more running," he said.
"No more tests," I added.
Kael's lips twitched into the ghost of a smile. "Unfortunately, we're wolves. Everything's a test."
I laughed, broken but real.
He didn't kiss me yet. That felt important—like he wanted to earn it, not take it.
But he held me like I was sacred.
And I let him.
Because maybe I was.
Maybe we both were.
Kael's POV
The fire hadn't scarred her. If anything, it had stripped away everything false—her fear, her doubt, the lies others had planted in her mind.
What stood before me now wasn't just Sophie.
She was the moon-kissed. The one the legends whispered about. The girl who was never supposed to survive the first trial, let alone pass the Rite of Flame.
And she had walked through it.
Alone.
And found me.
I stared into the soft ocean blue of her eyes and saw the truth: she was more than just my bonded mate. More than a thread in the tapestry of prophecy.
Ronan's POV
I reached the circle just as the stones began to sing.
Low, vibrating hums rippled through the earth, shaking leaves from branches and pulling birds from their roosts.
Too late.
They'd reconnected.
And the pact had awakened.
"Damn you, Kael," I whispered, both in awe and fear.
I wanted to stop this.
But deep down, I knew I never could.
Sophie had done what none of us had.
She'd chosen Kael—after seeing his darkest self, after nearly dying in fire, after the world warned her to run.
And that kind of choice was dangerous.
Because it meant the curse might finally break.
And the crown might return to its rightful heir.
Sophie's POV
The forest erupted around us.
Not violently—but with presence.
Wolves emerged from the trees, their fur like woven starlight and shadow. Dozens of them. All shapes. All colors. Some had glowing eyes. Others bore marks carved into their fur like tribal patterns.
They weren't living.
But they weren't ghosts either.
"The Ancients," Kael said beside me. "The bloodline spirits."
I stepped closer to him, instinctively. "Are they… here to test us again?"
"No," came a deep voice—not Kael's. One of the wolves stepped forward, eyes like dying embers. His fur shimmered with the same gray Kael's wolf form wore.
He nodded once at Kael, then turned his gaze to me.
"They're here to see the one who passed the fire."
My throat tightened.
The spirits surrounded the circle in perfect silence. A judgment without words.
And then—one by one—they bowed.
To me.
To Kael.
To us.
Kael's POV
I couldn't breathe.
The Ancients—my ancestors, warriors and kings and queens long buried beneath mountain stone—had bowed.
No one bowed for cursed blood.
No one bowed for outcasts.
Unless…
I turned to Sophie.
She stood tall despite the ashes on her face, despite the trembling in her hands.
"I think," she said softly, "we're not the broken pieces they expected us to be."
"No," I said, heart thudding. "We're the ones they didn't see coming."
Sophie's POV
The spirits didn't speak, but I felt their approval echo in my bones.
Something else shifted too.
The sky.
The clouds above parted—not into sunshine, but a soft silver glow that lit the clearing in moonlight, even though it wasn't yet night.
Kael looked up. So did I.
And there, etched into the sky like a symbol only wolves would understand, the mark of the prophecy burned in silver flame.
A crescent pierced by a crown.
I didn't know what it meant exactly.
But Kael did.
He turned to me slowly, expression unreadable.
"That mark only appears when…"
"When what?" I asked, breathless.
"When the true heir is chosen," he said.
And then added, quietly:
"And when the mate of the heir accepts the throne."
My breath caught.
"Me?"
"I never told you this part," Kael said. "The prophecy doesn't just speak of a cursed prince. It speaks of a bride who walks through fire and binds the bloodline clean again."
I shook my head, overwhelmed. "I'm not royal. I'm not even a wolf."
"You're mine," he said, stepping close. "And in the old ways, that makes you everything."
The wind stirred.
And then I heard it—a sound so pure and ancient I nearly wept.
A howl.
But not just Kael's.
Mine.
The sound came from my throat, unbidden, and it answered his perfectly.
The spirits howled in response.
The stones pulsed one last time.
And then the light faded.
Ronan's POV
"They've done it," I whispered.
Beside me, the moonstone I carried for years—Kael's exile token—shattered in my hand like glass.
And I knew.
The curse had begun to unravel.
But curses never die quietly.
And someone… wasn't going to let this stand.
Far Away – Unknown POV
"She took the Rite."
A shadow stood before a mirror that shimmered with firelight.
A feminine voice—sharp, elegant, venomous—answered, "Then we proceed."
The man bowed. "Do you want her killed?"
"No. Not yet."
"She's awakened the bond."
"All the better," the woman said with a slow, cruel smile. "Let them think they've won."
She turned, revealing crimson eyes that bled darkness.
"Before the full moon rises, Sophie will beg to undo what she's just done."