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CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

NOVA

G et up.

Soul-consuming dread yanks me from my sleep. My eyes snap open, lungs heaving as I sit up in bed, gasping for air and sweat drenching my skin. The feeling lingers, wrapping around my chest like icy tendrils, squeezing until I can barely breathe.

I feel, rather than see, Fang’s little body jump onto the comforter, pacing at my feet. Whatever it is I’m feeling, it’s got her on edge, too.

“What is it?” Tai shoots out of bed, hands raised and ready to defend us as he scans the room.

Fang makes a little sound of impatience as she makes herself visible, probably just so he can see her annoyance with him for disrupting her gait.

I shake my head, struggling to form words as the sensation intensifies. “I don’t know. Something’s wrong. Really wrong. My wolf, she’s?—”

He needs us.

Callum?

Now.

I leap out of bed, panic compressing my lungs and barely registering Tai's startled expression as I frantically pull on clothes. "It's Callum. He's in trouble. I can feel it."

Tai frowns, lowering his hands. "How do you know? Did he?—”

The sound of my phone ringing cuts him off mid-sentence, and the harsh glow illuminates the room. I lunge for my side table, heart crashing as I see the name flashing on the screen.

A war between relief and dread takes residence inside me as my trembling hands accept the video call.

“Callum?”

Tai crowds behind me to look at the screen with me. The camera angle is askew, like the phone is lying on the ground.

Static crackles over the line, and for a moment, nothing happens. The shitty lighting distorts the screen, making it impossible to see anything clearly, but then?—

A breath. A ragged, wet breath.

My heart stops.

“Callum?” My voice comes out thready, hysteria-laced.

A twitch of movement. A shadow shifting. My fingers tighten around the phone as the camera readjusts, the grainy image sharpening just enough to make out skin.

Raw. Bloodied. Wrong.

Tai swears under his breath.

And then?—

The camera jerks, and a pair of lips part—split, cracked, moving soundlessly before a hoarse, barely-there rasp bleeds through the speakers.

“N-Nova … tr … tra …”

The world tilts. My vision tunnels.

No. No, no, no, no ? —

"Callum." His name leaves my mouth on a choked breath as a keening, sorrow-filled whine launches itself out of my throat. I scramble closer, like I could reach through the screen and pull him back to me.

He tries again, voice little more than a scrape of sound. “Y-you c-can’t …”

His words dissolve into a cough, weak and gasping, and the screen shifts again. The angle tilts, just enough that I catch a glimpse of him.

My stomach drops and tears spill down my cheeks. I was wrong. So wrong. How could I have thought that my sweet, beautiful, loving Highlander would take what we have and walk away from it?

This whole time. This whole time!

His face—what’s left of it—is barely recognizable. One eye swollen completely shut, the other scarcely visible through a haze of blood and bruising. His lips are busted, a gash splitting his cheekbone, and his throat?—

A collar.

A fucking collar wraps around his neck, glowing with a pale pulse of some kind of magic.

I can’t breathe.

Tai’s gone still beside me. No words, no movement—just a slow, gathering rage that thickens the air around us. His shadows writhe on the ground, itching to consume.

“Where are you?” My words are raw, my wolf clawing at my insides, a rush of instinct screaming at me to find him.

The screen shifts again, but not by Callum’s doing. It’s lifted, angled, and suddenly I’m staring at a different face.

A familiar face.

Sylus fucking Creed.

Ice blasts through my veins as my wolf tries to take over, to hunt him down and make him pay

A cruel smirk twists his lips as he stares into the camera. His amber eyes, taking on a silver light, bore into mine through the screen. “I told you that you’d regret this.” A thick strand of white hair rests haphazardly against his forehead and he blows it out of his view.

“Don’t you fucking touch him!” I scream, spittle flying from my mouth as my entire body trembles with fury.

Sylus's smirk only widens at my outburst. "Oh, I think we're well past that point, wouldn't you say?" He tilts the camera back toward Callum's broken form. "He's not looking so good, is he? Such a pity."

My vision blurs with tears as I stare at my beta, broken and bleeding on the screen. I can barely make out the shallow rise and fall of his chest, each breath a struggle.

I can’t form words as I let out a broken sob. Tai’s arm comes around my waist and takes the phone from me.

“What do you want?”

Sylus hums, the sound slithering through the speakers, smug and unhurried. “Now, now. That’s the question, isn’t it?” The screen shakes as he crouches beside Callum, fingers tracing the tracks of blood down his face.

I see red. This is all my fault. I crash to my knees, breath sawing in and out of me as I brace against the floor.

I feel my wolf snarl inside me, pushing to the surface, shoving against my ribs, against my skin, against every fragile barrier keeping me fae.

Kill. Kill. Kill.

Tai helps me back to my feet and tightens his hold on me. His shadows stir angrily at our feet. “State your terms,” he growls.

Sylus’s smirk lingers, lazy, and satisfied. How I ever found him attractive is beyond me. He’s a monster . “You think this is a negotiation?” He lifts Callum’s chin with two fingers, making a show of it. “This is a lesson.”

The view tilts and we’re staring at a ceiling. After several moments, I hear several thuds, but my Highlander doesn’t cry out, just weak grunts. It’s my shrieks that fill the silence.

The camera shifts again, focusing on Sylus’s face. “I hope you’re paying attention, because this is what happens when you cross me, mutt,” he purrs.

I can barely breathe when he pans the phone, giving me a full view of Callum’s face .

Both of his eyes are swollen shut. His lip split. A trail of blood runs from his temple to his jaw, and his hands—his hands —are twisted at odd angles, his fingers swollen and bent like they were stomped on .

I lurch forward, a guttural sound tearing from my throat. Tai curses, barely managing to keep me from launching myself through the fucking screen.

Sylus laughs. “Oh, don’t be so dramatic, omega. He’s still breathing.” His fingers tighten in Callum’s hair, yanking his head back. “For now.”

I will fucking gut him.

The room warps around me, magic lashing out, uncontrolled. The air distorts, the temperature plummeting, the sheer force of my rage cracking through the foundation of my control.

Tai’s voice winds through the static in my brain. “Where is he?” His magic flares, wrapping around my own, suppressing the edges before I break something I can’t fix.

Sylus sighs, feigning boredom. “You want him back so badly?” He leans in, too close to the camera, his eyes gleaming with sick amusement. “Then come get him.”

The screen goes black.

Silence crashes into me. A ringing in my ears, a hollow space where sound should be. My breathing is jagged, broken, too fragile to exist. My fingers ache from clenching my fists too tight.

Tai curses, turning to me, but I’m already moving.

I grab my boots. My knives. My coat.

“Nova,” Tai warns. “Stop.”

I look up, my vision still burning with the last image of Callum—broken, bloody, and alone.

I snarl at him, a vicious, guttural thing, and he has the nerve to arch a fucking brow at me.

“I get it.” He holds up his hands like I’m a spooked animal, and I might as well be. Like I’m some wild thing he has to tame. His hand lands on my wrist, stopping me from opening the door. “But you need to think before you go barreling headfirst into a fucking trap.”

I yank my arm free. “Sylus took him.” My voice shakes with fury. “ Sylus fucking took him. And you think I’m going to just sit here and?—”

“What we need is a plan.” His expression hardens. “Callum is alive. And storming in there without knowing what you’re walking into is a sure way to make sure he stops being alive.”

The words rob air from my lungs.

My vision wavers, knowing Callum lays battered and broken somewhere, possibly moments from death. Something twists in my gut—like a voice in my head shouting that I should’ve done more. Should’ve insisted we find him earlier. He was trying so hard to adapt to this fae world, and I left him vulnerable. He’s the one who deserves a future, and now … he might never get it.

A desperate whine escapes me.

Beta , my wolf cries. Beta. Beta. Beta!

“This is my fault.”

“Nova, no?—”

“—it is.” I shake my head.

A bitter, stinging thought circles: I’m the one who got him tangled up in this place to begin with. I imagine all the good he’s done—leading that human resistance back in Espero, always fighting for people who needed it.

And all I’ve done is cause chaos. Because I’m a monster, too. I deserve to be the one suffering in his place.

A wild rush of regret hits me so hard I can barely see straight.

I suck in a sharp breath, my hands shaking so violently I have to clench them into fists.

But he’s right. I can’t just rush in there without a plan.

The guilt doesn’t fade. It clings, telling me I failed my Highlander—not once, but over and over. If I’d just tried harder, if I’d demanded answers before everything spiraled, maybe we wouldn’t be here. The sting of tears burns behind my eyes, but I force them back. There’s no time to cry. Not when he needs me.

I force myself to breathe. To push past the blinding rage, sorrow, and fear clawing at my ribs and think.

I lock my jaw, swallowing the sob that wants to break loose. This is for Callum. He needs me strong, not lost in self-pity. If I want any hope of saving him, I have to keep it together—no matter how hollow I feel inside.

“I’m tearing this fucking room apart. There must be something here. A clue as to where he might’ve been taken.” I yank open every drawer, toss the mattress halfway off the frame, and rummage through every crevice.

Tai joins in, checking behind shelves and under piles of clothes. We tear the place apart for several frantic minutes with nothing to show for it.

Finally, I duck down by Sylus’s bed. There's a gap between the frame and the wall, just wide enough for something to hide. My stomach churns as I reach into the darkness, fingers brushing against cloth. I pull it free and nearly drop it in horror.

A small doll, maybe the size of my palm, fashioned with dark yarn for hair. Elaborate designs wrap around its arms—exact replicas of Tai’s tattoos. Even the color of the thread matches the lines curling up his biceps.

“What the fuck is this?” I whisper, holding it out for him to see.

Tai’s entire body goes rigid. He takes the doll, turning it over in his hands. “It’s a siphon poppet.” He squeezes it. “Blood magic. Ancient blood magic.” His eyes widen in recognition. “Looks like Sylus’s handiwork. He’s been draining my magic all this time.”

My pulse hammers. “But … why?”

He grits his teeth, hard stare locked on the sinister little figure. “Because if I’m weak, I’ll need to … refuel. And if I slipped up, if I accidentally kissed you—” His eyes flit to mine. “The fae deal would kill me. And you’d blame yourself.”

“But he didn’t know about that.”

“The shower was on, but he’s a wolf fae. He would’ve heard everything.”

Dread pools in my chest. I swallow hard, looking from Tai to the doll. “That asshole planned this. He wanted you dead, and me destroyed.”

Tai tucks the poppet into his pocket. “Then we’ve got all the proof we need. Now we find Callum—and we stop Sylus for good.”

“I know who can help.” I motion towards Tai’s black coat hanging on the wall, and he takes my cue and starts getting fully dressed. My wolf thrums in agreement. “We’re ending this.”

I yank out my phone, opening the encrypted app.