The dream shattered abruptly. A moment ago, they were amidst summer wildflowers; now, an acrid chemical scent invaded Elara's senses. Smoke—a fire twisting into something toxic.
Elara jolted awake, gasping for air through lungs that felt stitched shut by panic.
Gray smoke filled the cabin, its thickness stifling any coherent thought. This wasn't woodsmoke—it was sharper, searing her throat with each breath. Accelerant meant danger—meant trap.
Damien sat at the bed's edge, his body tense as steel wire, eyes fixed on his phone's glow which washed his face pale and ghostly.
"Damien?" Her voice rasped painfully from her throat. She shifted upright, furs falling away as cold air pierced her skin. "What's burning?"
His head turned slowly, eyes meeting hers like cavernous voids rimmed with gold—a terror she'd never seen in him before. He tossed the phone aside roughly.
"Get dressed." His words grated out metallically; gone was the warmth he'd shown hours earlier. "Now."
He rose unsteadily, muscles quivering beneath his skin. His legs threatened to buckle but he steadied himself against the mantle, veins stark under taut flesh. A wound near his shoulder oozed black venom toward his heart.
Fingers fumbling over clothes, Elara fought against paralysis brought by fear. "The pack—"
"Not pack," he cut her off, voice raw and feral as he moved toward the gun cabinet like it might save them both. "Mercenaries—Iron Fang."
The keypad beeped dull affirmation; steel clicked open. Damien extracted an assault rifle first then a handgun with deliberate haste.
"How?" Elara's heart thundered louder than her whispered disbelief. "This place is supposed to be—"
A branch snapped outside—both froze mid-motion; their eyes locked amidst smoky shadows thickening between breaths.
"The poison," Damien rasped, voice raw as he slapped the rifle's magazine home with a metallic click that echoed in the cramped cabin. Muscles knotted under his threadbare jacket. "It had a tracker. I was an idiot—I didn't scan the wound for tech." He wheeled on her, jaw tight, and thrust the handgun into her trembling palm. "Do you know how to use this?"
Elara stared at the cold steel, every gasp of her breath fogging the barrel. "I… I know the theory," she whispered.
"Safety off. Aim. Squeeze." His eyes burned. "If anyone comes through that door who isn't me, you pull the trigger—right between the eyes. Do you understand?"
"Damien, you can't fight," she pleaded, heart hammering as she watched him sway. "You can barely stand. We need to run—"
"We can't run." He pointed at the frosted window. "Look."
She peered out. Through the maelstrom of wind-driven snow she saw them: torches and flashlights flashing like angry fireflies. Dozens, circling close now, tightening like a noose around the burning lodge.
Then came the voice, amplified through a megaphone, slicing the wind. "Damien Blackwood!" It dripped venom. "We know you're in there—and dying. Sad end for a king, rotting in a cabin while your empire burns."
Damien said nothing. He shuffled to the window, low to the floor, peeking through the slit in the curtains.
"We don't want you," the voice sneered. "We want the girl. Send out the White Wolf, and we'll let you die quietly."
Elara held her breath. The White Wolf. They'd spoken her name with cruel confidence.
He turned to her—face ashen, eyes dark rings of pain and dawning horror. The firelight flickered across a realization dawning like lightning in his brain: the void scent, her uncanny healing, the whispered rumors of witch magic. "White Wolf?" he murmured, awed. "Is that… you?"
Elara's gaze fell. Tears glinted on her lashes. "I'm the last one," she whispered. "My blood—divine. It makes Alphas invincible, cures madness, grants power." She braced herself for his cold calculation, the way everyone reduced her to some prize.
He laughed, low and bitter, shaking his head in disbelief. "Of course," he said, voice dark with wonder. "Why would my mate be anything less than a goddess?"
He lifted the rifle, jaw set. "They'll hook you to machines, drain you dry."
Elara stepped forward. "If I go out there, they'll spare you. They have the antidote—" She sniffed the metallic tang of promise on the wind.
He whirled on her, movement too swift for her heart. "Don't you dare," he snarled, staggering as he fought the poison tearing through his veins. "You're dying—"
"Then I die!" he roared, voice breaking the cabin's fragile calm. "I die on my feet. I defend my mate. I will not barter you for my life, Elara!"
Glass shredded as a bottle hurtled through the window. It crashed midair, erupted in a geyser of napalm that painted the rug, curtains, and timbers in living flame. The cabin exploded in heat, wood roaring as the fire devoured. Smoke surged, thick and black, choking the room.
"Upstairs! Move!" Damien bellowed, seizing her arm and dragging her into the spiral of smoke.
On the second-floor landing the heat pressed upward like a fist. The fire alarm wailed a manic scream. Gunfire spat through the walls, sending splinters whizzing by like deadly hail.
Damien shoved Elara into the master bedroom and kicked the door shut. With a grunt that ended in a raspy cough, he yanked a heavy dresser across the threshold, masonry of resistance against the onslaught.
He collapsed against it, rifle slipping from lifeless fingers. "Damien!" Elara dropped beside him, panic flooding her chest.
His skin was ash-gray, veins blackening with poison. He clutched his chest, each breath a rasping death knell. "Too many," he gasped. "They'll—too many…."
"We can jump," she urged, eyes darting to the frost-orange glow beyond the window. "The snow—"
"Snipers," he croaked. "In the trees… mid-air…"
He squeezed her hand with tremulous force. "Elara… listen to me."
Tears blurred her vision. "Don't you say goodbye—"
"In the closet," he panted. "Loose floorboard. Cash. IDs. Car keys—hide there."
She shook her head. "I won't leave you—"
"I'm already dead!" he whispered, voice hollow. "I can't protect you. I failed you…"
He closed his eyes, breath shallow, rattling like dry leaves.
Elara stared at him—the man who'd risked everything to buy her a coffee, who'd shielded her from bombs, who'd charge into gunfire for her safety. He believed himself powerless. He thought her powerless.
She stood, and the fear that had shackled her for a decade—the cages, the experiments, the terror—fell away like ash.
"You didn't fail," she breathed, voice trembling with fierce resolve. She crossed the room to the window, hand lingering on the ice-crusted glass. Below, Kane and his mercenaries stood in the snow ring, faces illuminated by the blaze, waiting for prey.
"You didn't fail," she repeated, leaning over Damien's prone form. She unclasped the onyx pendant at her throat and laid it gently on his chest. "You protected the human. Now let the wolf protect you."
Elara closed her eyes. She reached inward, past every fear, every control she'd built like a dam around her soul. She found the lock she'd forged ten years ago—and she shattered it.
SNAP.
Energy exploded outward in a spine-shivering shockwave. The bedroom windows didn't break—they disintegrated into motes of light. The dresser slammed across the room as though hurled by an invisible titan. A crackle of electricity hummed through the air.
Damien's eyes flew open, pupils dilated with stunned recognition. Ozone burned his nostrils as he watched Elara rise—not walking, but hovering inches above the floor. Her clothes shredded on the pressure of her aura. Every pore in her skin poured blinding white radiance.
"Elara?" he whispered, shielding his eyes.
She drifted to the balcony doors as the storm raged around her, the fire beneath her curling away in reverent arcs. Outside, the mercenaries froze, rifles lowering as they stared at the impossible vision.
She lifted her head and howled—a primordial song that rattled the bones of the earth, beautiful and terrible and divine. Snowflakes hung suspended, frozen in midair.
CRACK.
Her form dissolved into pure light. And in that brilliance stood the White Wolf.
Larger than any beast known to man, its fur shimmered with starlight and frost. Two suns of golden fire blazed in its eyes. Nine ethereal tails of pure energy trailed behind, majestic as comets.
It looked down at the mercenaries, not as prey, but as judgment incarnate. The storm stilled. Even the forest held its breath.
And then the White Wolf sprang.