Page 10

CHAPTER 9

LUCAS

A s my eyes take in her note, a deep stillness settles over me, yet turmoil brews beneath the surface.

Had to follow the wind. Don’t come after me.

Does Sophia truly think that a few hastily written words can keep me away? After everything we've faced side by side, everything we know, the intense emotions that have bound us together? That is complete and utter bullshit. There’s a small part of me that thinks I should respect her wishes, but another part is pulling me to chase after her, knowing I can’t let go so easily.

Ryder's still at the lodge, half-talking with Isabella, but he sees the shift in my expression and strides over. "What happened?"

I hold out the note. His eyes scan it fast. His jaw tightens.

"She went to Ash Creek. Alone," I say.

Isabella curses under her breath. Ryder scrubs a hand down his face. "How long has she been gone?"

I don’t answer. I’m already moving. I storm through the lodge, down the corridor to my room, grabbing my field pack, tactical gear and a spare gun. I don’t stop to change. I don’t eat. I just run. Out the door, through the courtyard, across the training field.

The wind tears across the ridge as I tighten the field pack against my chest, cinching the straps until they bite into my palms. Everything I need is inside—clothes, water, an extra clip of ammo in a comms bead just in case she’s stupid enough to have brought one and hasn't turned it on.

She didn’t leave a trail so much as a damn flare. Only a note that says ‘Had to follow the wind. Don’t come after me.’ Yeah, like that was going to work.

I crouch low beside the tree line, nose to the dirt, fingers sifting through crushed pine needles and broken brush. The ground is soft here. She was moving fast, but not recklessly. Her prints are clean. Even in her anger and frustration, she’s calculated. My jaw tightens.

A low growl hums in my chest as I rise to my feet. The scent of her curls around me—wildflowers, lightning, stubborn pride. I roll my neck, tilting my head toward the dark horizon. She’s heading southeast, toward Ash Creek. Of all the reckless, dangerous, suicidal… I stop myself before the thought finishes. No. I don’t get to rage at her yet. Not until I have her in front of me.

I step back from the trail and drag in a slow breath. The storm building inside me is clawing for release. My wolf presses hard beneath my skin, impatient, coiled, wild. I can’t track her on foot and keep my head at the same time. I need my wolf—the hunter.

My boots hit the dirt with a thud as I strip, one layer at a time—jacket, shirt, jeans. I roll them quickly, stuffing the bundle into the side pocket of the field pack. I leave the bag where I’ll be able to pick it up easily with my teeth. It’s not ideal, running like this with extra weight, but I’ll be faster than any vehicle.

Faster than fear.

The shift crashes through me like lightning hitting dry forest. Mist curls up from the ground, drawn to my skin like it remembers the shape of me. Shards of blue and gray whip through the air as the storm pulls tight. Thunder answers, not from the sky—but from inside my chest. The wind howls and the earth cracks beneath my knees. A surge of lightning and fire, mist curling like a cyclone around my form. Then in the blink of an eye, the storm clears, and I stand on four legs, fur thick and dark as smoke, muscles coiled beneath my hide, breath steady and deep.

The world sharpens instantly. The forest isn’t quiet—it’s alive. I can hear the rustle of wings high in the trees, the scurry of a fox three ridges down. But all I care about is the scent trail that punches through the air like the heat of a wildfire.

Sophia.

Her path cuts east, weaving through narrow rock passes and creek beds, following ridges only someone born to the wind would dare. Typical. She never picks the easy way. I pick up the pack. My paws dig into the dirt, and I move—fast and low, slipping between trees and across stone without a sound.

The pack is a weight I barely register. What I do register is the rapid beat of my heart and the way my mind keeps flicking between what I’ll say when I find her… and what I’ll do.

She ran from me. Again. After everything. After what we’ve said. What we’ve done. Outside the cabin—our bodies tangled together, her mouth on mine, her hands dragging me in like she wanted to keep me buried inside her until she forgot her own name.

And now she’s gone. Out here alone. Tracking a madman whose idea of science involves torturing shifters and cracking holes in the veil between worlds.

I leap over a fallen log, landing in a low crouch, nose to the ground. Her scent is still strong, but it's shifting—saltier now, like sweat and adrenaline. She's pushing herself hard. Good. Maybe she’s finally afraid.

The wind changes direction and her scent hits me harder—closer now. Less than two miles. I push harder, muscles burning. My mind races with everything I want to tell her. That she’s reckless. Brilliant. Infuriating. Mine. That if she dies before I see her again, I’ll burn every inch of Ash Creek to the ground just to drag her ghost back and yell at it.

And maybe I’ll kiss her so hard she forgets how to argue, or maybe I’ll pin her against the next wall and remind her she is mine.

Branches slap against my fur, snapping behind me. I don’t slow. The closer I get, the more the scent changes. Something else is in the air now—sterile, chemical, metallic. My lip curls. I recognize the same stench from the cabin. Cain’s work.

I hit a clearing and skid to a stop, dirt spraying in a wide arc. Ahead, through a veil of fog and underbrush, I catch a glint of old glass. A building—half-collapsed, brick bones showing through decades of ivy and rot. The old Cain estate.

And right there in front of it, crouched low behind a boulder with her dagger in hand and her braid whipping in the wind, is Sophia. The scent trail is faint, but it’s there—wildflowers and ozone. Hers.

The ground drops into a ravine, but I don’t slow. I leap, but it wasn’t clean. It wasn’t right.

I stagger for a breath. Too fast. Too much.

Something's wrong. Not with me. With the land.

The wind tastes like rust. The air's too still. The closer I get to Ash Creek, the more the world feels… off. Unnatural.

I run faster.

Sophia's scent pulls me forward, curling through the pine and ash. The old estate is barely a structure anymore—a rotting husk swallowed by time and forest. Moss-covered stone, collapsed walls, a wrought-iron fence half-buried in dead leaves.

She's standing outside the rusted gate. Her back is straight, arms folded, but I can see the way her fingers twitch near her blade. Her head turns just slightly when she hears me.

I shift, the mist curling around me again, this time steadier. Controlled. When it clears, I step from the trees, fully clothed thanks to the spare pack strapped to my flank.

"You disobeyed me," I say flatly.

Sophia doesn’t flinch. "Disobeyed you? I wasn’t aware I owed you my obedience."

I close the distance between us quickly until we’re toe-to-toe. "You left me a damn note,” I growl low. “You knew I’d follow."

"As I recall, I didn’t ask you to."

"You think I care?"

Her jaw clenches. "Lucas…"

I grab her arm, just enough pressure to make her look at me. "You don’t go dark on me again. If you need to run off and play Windrider warrior’s solo mission, you damn well take me with you."

“Kind of defeats the whole concept of a solo mission, don’t you think?” she quips before tilting her head and studying me for a long beat. Then her voice drops. "But you came."

I let her go. "Of course I came."

We stand in the quiet a moment longer, then she turns back toward the estate.

"This is it," she says. "The Cain estate. Or what’s left of it."

We pass through the broken gate together, moving silently over cracked stone. The front of the estate has collapsed, but the east wing remains partially intact, overgrown with vines and rot. Every step we take feels heavier. Like the land itself is warning us back.

I draw my blade. Sophia mirrors me. Guns are fine in their place, but their noisy and knives work better for close fighting. And if a dragon shows up? Well, guns don’t work all that well either.

We enter through a side door; the hinges groaning in protest. Inside, the air is stale, metallic. Debris fills the main hall—shattered glass, remnants of machines, broken tile. But it’s what lies deeper inside that turns my stomach.

The lab.

We find it in the east wing, behind what used to be a bookcase. A hidden room, long and narrow.

Tanks. Empty now, but their walls are coated in slime. Some still hold bones, scraps of fur, claws that never belonged to any species I recognize.

Syringes. Dozens of them. Some labeled. Some not. One marked with the Windrider glyph for the bond . Another marked “ hybrid series 3B .”

Sophia crouches near one of the tables, brushing dust from a yellowed folder.

"He was cataloging them," she whispers. "Cross-referencing genetics, matching them to lunar cycles, elemental readings. There’s Windrider script in here… Cain was working with someone who knew our ways."

I grit my teeth. "Your father?"

She looks up sharply. "No. He warned me away from this. Practically ordered me to stay out…”

“Practically?” I quip.

She grins. “He said Cain worked for someone who opened the door."

I nod slowly. "So he’s not just experimenting. He’s implementing.”

“Yes. Someone opened a door during the War of Mists, and it seems Cain wants it wide open again."

She moves to the far wall, where jars line a rusted shelf. Most of the jars are shattered. One remains intact. She lifts it carefully. Inside, suspended in some kind of fluid, is a fetus. Small. Wolf-shaped. But wrong. Too many joints. Double rows of teeth.

Sophia goes still. "They’re breeding them."

I take the jar from her and set it down slowly. "No. They were breeding them. Now they’re releasing them."

Her eyes meet mine, wide. "This is why the land feels off. It’s not just energy. It’s corruption. Like something is leeching the balance from the earth."

I step in closer. Her pulse flutters. She doesn’t step back. "You still think I should’ve stayed behind?"

"No," I admit. "But next time you vanish, I’ll tie you to the damn bed."

Her lips twitch. "Kinky."

"Deadly serious."

She nods. "Good. So am I."

SOPHIA

I press my hand against a cold metal table. The slab bears a stain of something that looks like blood but smells like antiseptic and something darker—like rot baked under glass. The tanks lining the back wall are tall, reinforced, and long-abandoned, but they still hold residue, faint traces of whatever was once inside them. Lucas steps past me, jaw locked, golden eyes scanning every corner of the room.

“You recognize any of this?” he asks, voice low but sharp.

“Some,” I answer, voice unsteady. “Not the tech… but the symbols etched into the metal.” I move toward the nearest tank, brush away a layer of grime. “That one’s Windrider. Corrupted, though. Twisted.”

Lucas turns, moving toward me in two silent strides. “Corrupted how?”

I trace the symbol with my fingertip—not touching it, just hovering close enough to feel the pull. “This one’s supposed to mean ‘threshold.’ It’s used in rites when you’re about to cross into a new phase. But here…” I nod toward the jagged lines branching off it, scorched into the metal like claw marks. “Someone added fracture runes. Like they wanted to break the threshold—not just cross it.”

Lucas mutters a curse and kicks a broken syringe across the floor. “This place feels like a tomb.”

“No,” I say. “A breeding ground. For monsters and mutants.”

He stops moving. His eyes meet mine. “You shouldn’t have come here alone.”

I laugh, but it sounds hollow. “You think I don’t know that? But I didn’t have a choice. The wind led me.”

“I would’ve come with you. I would’ve backed your play.”

I want to tell him I know. I want to say I believe him. But the truth is harder to choke down than I expected.

Instead, I kneel near a collapsed desk and start rifling through the rusted drawers. Most of it is useless—molded paper, broken clamps, what looks like the spine of some small creature, shriveled and curled in on itself. I pick up a bloodstained folder and straighten slowly.

Lucas is watching me. Not the room. Not the shadows. Me.

“What?” I ask, folding the folder under one arm.

“You’ve got that look again,” he says.

“What look?”

“The one you had the first time we met. Like you’re five seconds from bolting and thirty seconds from breaking.”

I flinch. Then I laugh—because he’s not wrong, and because pretending I’m fine is easier than admitting I’m unraveling at the seams.

“I’m scared, Lucas.”

The words come out before I can stop them. My voice is quieter now. Not a whisper, but not loud enough to echo in this godforsaken building, either. Just truth, laid bare like cracked porcelain.

“I’m scared of Cain. I’m scared of what we’re going to find next. I’m scared that whatever's coming is going to tear through the world before we can stop it. And…” I hesitate. The hard part isn’t admitting the fear. It’s the second part. The part that makes my throat tighten.

“I’m scared of you,” I whisper.

Lucas doesn’t move. His hands stay loose at his sides, but his whole body is alert, tuned to me like he can sense the tremble beneath the words.

“Because of what I am?” he asks. “Because I’m dominant? Dangerous?”

I shake my head. “No. Because when I’m near you, I don’t feel like running. I feel like staying. And I’ve never… I don’t know what to do with that.”

He crosses the distance between us slowly, like approaching a wounded animal. Or maybe a wildfire. His hand rises, knuckles brushing my cheekbone.

“Me too,” he says.

Two words. Simple. Honest. And somehow, they crack something in me that even the wind can’t repair.

He touches my face, his thumb sweeping beneath my eye, and I lean into him without thinking. He doesn’t kiss me—not this time. He just presses his forehead to mine and stands there, letting silence do the talking.

I close my eyes and breathe him in. Earth. Storm. Something uniquely Lucas.

The quiet between us is a balm, and maybe that’s why I almost miss it—the faint hiss. The air shifts. My eyes snap open. Lucas jerks his head up, too. We spin at the same time, eyes searching the ceiling, the corners, the seams of the walls.

“What is that?” I whisper.

“Trap,” he growls. “It’s a fucking trap.”

A vent in the ceiling releases another hiss, this one louder, urgent. A pale gas begins to pour into the room from the ducts above, slow and swirling like mist with teeth.

Lucas grabs my arm, dragging me toward the door. “Move!”

We stumble through the lab’s main corridor, but every exit slams shut before we can reach it. Metal doors seal with a mechanical clang, one by one. My vision’s already going spotty. Gas. Hallucinogenic? Paralytic?

I don’t know. I don’t get the chance to ask.

Lucas pounds against the final door, snarling in frustration. “Sophia—stay with me.”

I’m trying. I swear I am. But my limbs are heavy, like they belong to someone else. My knees buckle. He catches me before I hit the ground. His arms wrap around me, hauling me against his chest.

“Breathe slowly,” he says. “I’ve got you. Just—fuck, just hold on.”

I blink up at him, but his face is swimming now, blurred at the edges like I’m staring through water. His body tenses beneath me—not a shift, not yet—but the power in him coils tight, like it’s straining against the edge. I can feel his wolf clawing for control, pulsing beneath his skin, but Lucas holds the line, jaw clenched, eyes wild with the effort.

“Don’t pass out,” he growls, but his voice is warping. Slurred.

He’s going under too. I try to say his name. Try to fight the pull. But everything is fading, and the last thing I hear before the dark takes me is the sound of Lucas snarling, the echo of my name on his lips.

And then—silence.