Page 20 of Claws for Celebration (Hollow Oak Mates #3)

MOIRA

T he Shadowheart Codex had been calling to Moira since before dawn, its ancient binding humming with urgent energy that made her fingertips tingle even from across the room.

She'd woken alone at the inn, finding a note from Lucien explaining that Council business required his attention but that he'd return by morning.

The brief message had been signed with a simple "L" that somehow conveyed more affection than flowery endearments could have managed.

Now, settled in her usual chair at the bookstore with steaming coffee and the first rays of sunlight filtering through tall windows, Moira opened the grimoire with the reverent care she'd learned to apply to artifacts that possessed their own consciousness.

The pages fell open to a section she'd never seen before, though she was certain she'd examined every inch of the ancient tome. Elegant script in faded sepia ink told stories that made her blood run cold.

The Binding of Shadows: A History of the Shadowheart Sacrifice

"Sacrifice," she whispered, her hands trembling as she began to read. "What kind of sacrifice?"

The text that followed painted a picture of her family's history that went far darker than anything she'd previously discovered.

Her ancestor, Seraphina Shadowheart, hadn't just been a powerful witch who helped establish Hollow Oak's protective barriers.

She had been the architect of a magical working so profound and terrible that it had required the willing sacrifice of her own life force to complete.

In the year of our Lord 1847, when the shadow entities first sought to claim our sanctuary, Seraphina Shadowheart made the ultimate choice.

To bind the ancient evil that threatened to consume our community, she wove her very essence into the defensive wards, creating barriers that would endure for generations but at the cost of her mortal existence.

Moira's coffee cup clattered against its saucer as her hands began to shake. "She died to create the protective wards. She actually died."

But the grimoire wasn't finished revealing its secrets.

The binding required not just Seraphina's sacrifice, but the promise that her bloodline would continue the work.

Each generation of Shadowheart witches would carry the burden of maintaining the wards, feeding them with blood magic until the ancient evil could be permanently banished.

Only when the final battle is won can the family line be freed from its inherited obligation.

"Inherited obligation," Moira repeated, the words tasting like ashes on her tongue. "We're bound to this place. Bound to keep fighting whatever Seraphina originally sealed away."

More text appeared, flowing across the page like liquid silver.

Elara Shadowheart, last daughter of the bloodline to walk Hollow Oak's protected paths, chose exile over obligation.

In 1923, she fled the sanctuary with her newborn child, believing that distance could break the ancestral bonds that tied her magic to the town's survival.

For nearly a century, her gamble appeared successful.

"But it wasn't," Moira said, understanding beginning to crystallize in her mind. "The bonds weren't broken. They were just... dormant."

Blood calls to blood, especially when the shadows stir once more. The granddaughter returns when the need is greatest, drawn by forces older than conscious will. Destiny cannot be denied indefinitely.

The final entry on the page made Moira's vision blur with unshed tears.

Margaret Shadowheart died never knowing the true reason for her mother's exile.

She lived and loved and raised her own daughter in blissful ignorance of the magical heritage that slumbered in her veins.

But the granddaughter, ah, the granddaughter carries the full weight of three generations' accumulated power.

In her hands lies the choice to either complete Seraphina's work or watch everything our ancestors died to protect crumble into shadow.

"Three generations of accumulated power," Moira whispered, looking down at her hands with new understanding. No wonder her magical abilities had been developing so rapidly. She wasn't just inheriting her own potential, but the dormant magic of her mother and grandmother as well.

The implications were staggering. Every unconscious spell she'd cast, every protective ward she'd woven around the bookstore, every golden thread of magic that had responded to her emotional state—all of it had been powered by inherited abilities that had been building strength for decades.

"So that's why Grandmother never talked about her family," she said aloud, needing to hear the words to make them feel real. "She wasn't just protecting me from knowing about magic. She was trying to protect me from a destiny that would require everything I have to give."

The grimoire's pages rustled softly, drawing her attention to new text that appeared with ethereal beauty.

But destiny freely chosen is different from destiny imposed. The granddaughter who embraces her heritage willingly, who accepts both the power and the responsibility with full knowledge of their cost, can reshape the very nature of the Shadowheart obligation.

"Reshape it how?"

Through bonds freely given and received. Through love that amplifies power rather than demanding sacrifice. Through partnership that shares the burden rather than bearing it alone.

Moira thought about the mate bond concepts Lucien had explained, about the way her magic had responded to their physical and emotional intimacy, about the sense of completeness she felt when they were together.

"You're talking about Lucien," she said. "About what we could become together."

The panther shifter carries protective magic in his very bones.

United with Shadowheart blood power, their combined abilities could not only maintain Seraphina's wards but strengthen them beyond anything previously achieved.

The final battle could be won not through sacrifice, but through the joining of complementary souls.

"And if I choose not to accept this destiny? If I decide the cost is too high?"

The grimoire's response was immediate and chilling.

Then the wards fail within days rather than years. The ancient evil breaks free of its bindings. And Hollow Oak becomes ground zero for a supernatural catastrophe that will spread far beyond these mountains.

Moira closed the ancient tome carefully, her mind reeling with the weight of information that transformed her understanding of everything.

Her quiet research assignment hadn't been academic curiosity or even cosmic coincidence.

It had been destiny calling her home to face a responsibility that her family had been running from for generations.

She heard the door open in the front, and she looked up to see Lucien entering with the silent grace she'd grown to love. But something in his expression suggested he carried news that would complicate her morning revelations even further.

"You're back early," she said, noting the tension in his shoulders and the way his dark green eyes swept the bookstore as if checking for threats. "Everything all right with the Council business?"

"Not exactly." He moved toward her with purpose, settling into his usual chair with fluid efficiency.

"Moira, we need to talk. About what's really happening in Hollow Oak, about the dangers that are growing stronger every day, and about choices you're going to need to make sooner than either of us anticipated. "

"Choices about what?"

"About whether you're willing to become what this community needs you to be." His voice carried the weight of urgency barely held in check. "About whether you're prepared to accept a destiny that goes far beyond anything we've discussed so far."

Moira looked at the closed grimoire, its leather binding still warm from revealing secrets that had been hidden for generations, then back at Lucien's serious expression.

"You mean about the Shadowheart obligation.

About the fact that I'm apparently supposed to save Hollow Oak from some ancient evil that's been bound for over a century. "

Surprise flickered across his features. "You already know?"

"The grimoire decided it was time for the complete truth.

" She gestured toward the ancient tome with hands that had finally stopped trembling.

"All of it. The family curse, my grandmother's exile, the reason my presence here isn't coincidence but destiny calling me home to finish what my ancestor started. "

"And how do you feel about that?"

Moira considered the question carefully, noting that her first instinct wasn't panic or denial but rather a deep sense of pieces finally clicking into place. "Terrified," she said honestly. "But also relieved. Like I finally understand why I never felt like I belonged anywhere else."

"There's more," Lucien said gently. "Things the grimoire might not have explained about the immediate situation."

"Such as?"

"Such as the fact that we have maybe two weeks before the protective wards fail completely.

Such as the supernatural entities that are actively probing our defenses, looking for ways to break through.

Such as the probability that you're going to have to attempt large-scale magical workings that could either save this community or destroy it. "

The weight of his words were heavy. "Two weeks."

"At most. Possibly less if the attacks escalate." Lucien leaned forward, his hands reaching across the small table to cover hers. "Moira, I need you to understand what we're asking of you. What I'm asking of you."

"What are you asking?"

"Everything," he said simply. "Your magic, your commitment to staying in Hollow Oak permanently, your willingness to risk everything on magical techniques you've never attempted before.

" His voice grew soft with an emotion she was learning to recognize as carefully restrained love.

"And possibly your willingness to accept a mate bond that would amplify your abilities but also tie you to this place and to me for the rest of our lives. "

The conversation she'd been expecting, the full revelation she'd known was coming, had finally arrived.

But instead of feeling overwhelmed, Moira found herself thinking about the golden magic that had danced around them in the moonlit garden, about the sense of rightness she felt when Lucien's arms were around her, about the protective instincts that had been driving her unconscious spellwork since the day she'd arrived.

"Before I answer," she said, squeezing his hands gently, "I need to know something."

"Anything."

"Are you asking because it's what the Council needs, or because it's what you want?"