Page 29 of Traitor Wolf (Bonded by Fate Duet #1)

“Hurry!” Kaelric’s voice was panicked as a scream rent the air, and I knew without looking that another initiate had been burned. I brought Valkaryn across the rune in one swift motion. The frost cracked down the middle, then shattered with a high-pitched screech, revealing a narrow stairwell.

We bolted through just as another flame roared to life behind us.

The stairwell spiraled upward, and we took it two at a time. It ended at a narrow ledge lined with chains that hung from somewhere above. A deep pit yawned below. On the other side was a wide platform.

I hesitated. “You go first.”

He grabbed a chain and swung easily to the other side.

I followed, arms shaking, every muscle screaming. When I landed, Kaelric caught me by the waist to steady me.

“Still with me?” he asked.

“Barely.”

“Good,” he smirked. “Because I think it’s about to get worse.”

We stood on a platform, and looming above us was a sheer wall coated in frost and oil-slick vines, with only narrow footholds carved at jagged intervals.

Of course, it was a climb.

Kaelric stepped behind me, hands braced beneath my hips.

“I’ll boost you.”

I didn’t argue.

His strength launched me up high enough to catch the first hold. I climbed, fingers numb, feet slipping. Valkaryn offered no help this time. This was all me.

To my left, a fellow candidate, the one who’d been burned, slipped mid-climb. She hit the stone edge hard, bounced once, then dropped into the darkness. Her bonded wolf roared with fury, but couldn’t follow.

That was two dead on this course alone… That meant it was just me and one other. My mind spun with panic, and the loss of concentration cost me. I slipped, my fingers gripping the oily vines. Valkaryn pulsed at my hip, and I finally found purchase, but had lost all the height I had gained.

‘Beside you,’ she called.

I looked over to see House of Vexalor Elite, Kirk Vexalor, and his wolf. They stopped mid-climb, and Valkaryn pulsed at my hip again.

‘I’m blocking his magic,’ she told me.

He was probably trying to boil my blood again.

I couldn’t reach for Val without letting go of the oily vines I was barely hanging on to.

So when the Elite’s foot kicked out quickly, connecting with my ribcage, I lost my grip and started sliding.

A scream ripped from my throat as the blackness below seemed ready to swallow me up.

As I was sliding past Kaelric, who was underneath me, his arm snaked out and caught hold of me. The sheer force of my falling weight dragged Kaelric down a few feet, but he was able to hold on to the slippery vines. My hand was coated in oil, and so was his. I could feel his grip slipping on me.

“Don’t let go,” I whimpered .

With a growl, he swung me, like a pendulum, once, twice.

“Grab the vines!” he commanded.

On the third arc, I grasped the vine, wrapping it three times around my wrist. At that moment, my hand slipped from Kaelric’s. But I was safe.

I glanced up to see House of Vexalor Elite and his wolf had reached the top.

“Don’t worry about them, let’s go,” Kaelric said beside me.

I nodded. My arms were so weak. I’d been hanging here for so long. But I had to push through. With every pull up the vines, I growled, screamed, and grunted.

Kaelric was right below me, cheering me on, ready to catch me if I fell.

I finally reached the top and was met with a closed gate.

Kaelric stood beside me, panting, peering at the gate in confusion.

Then realization dawned over his face. Reaching forward, he slammed his palm against a button I hadn’t noticed on the right side of the gate.

“You have to do it, too!” Kaelric urged.

I peered to the left and saw an identical button. They were about ten feet apart, too far for one person to reach with their single arm span. This was meant to bring only bonded pairs across. I mashed my hand across the button, and it flared blue as the gate opened.

Kaelric was beside me. We were both scratched, bruised, and coated in dust.

But we weren’t done yet. A bridge led to the next obstacle, which was my worst nightmare.

I peered out at a line of endless, rusted monkey bars suspended above another drop into nothing. A black chasm of death.

The crystal pulsed at the end, a beacon of salvation at the finish line.

The Vexalor team was already halfway across. The Elite bearer clung with shaking arms, his bonded wolf behind him. But I noticed blue ropes of light wrapped around his hands, keeping him magically stuck to the bars. He paused, looked back once at us, then kept moving.

My arms trembled already.

I glanced at Kaelric. “I don’t think I can do this,” I whimpered.

Arm strength wasn’t something I possessed. I was already so tired. I didn’t have magic to get me across. This was a death sentence for me.

“We have to. There’s no way back,” he told me.

I peered behind us, following his gaze, and nearly burst into tears. The bridge that had gotten us here was gone. Dust. I began to hyperventilate a little, dizziness washing over me .

Kaelric’s hands cupped my face. He forced me to look at him.

“I can get you through this. You have to trust me. We finish this together or not at all.”

Together or not at all resonated deep in my spirit. I wasn’t ready for not at all . I wasn’t ready for the black abyss of death.

“I trust you,” I told him, and I meant it with every fiber of my being. Something that scared me.

He nodded and released my face.

“Let me go first,” he said, already swinging up.

I followed, every muscle in my body screaming.

The cold bit into my fingers as I grabbed the first bar, my arms already trembling from the wall climb, the fire dodging, the frost and oil-shrouded wall. My palms were raw as I moved hand over hand behind him.

The monkey bars stretched out over a pit so dark I couldn’t see the bottom. Just mist and the faint, pulsing glow of the crystal on the finish line.

Ten rungs in, my grip started to slip. I blinked hard, and tears still spilled over. Not from pain, from frustration. From the heat of failure blooming behind my ribs.

I can’t.

The words pushed against my teeth.

“I can’t do this,” I whimpered .

My fingers slipped.

“Brynn,” Kaelric’s voice cut through the fog. It was sharp and commanding.

“Don’t let go!” he shouted.

I sobbed, just once, and hung there, arms burning.

“I can’t?—”

He was already moving.

In one impossible motion, he swung backward to me, hung by one arm, and caught me around the waist with the other.

His palm pressed against my lower back, pulling me flush against his chest.

“I’ve got you,” he breathed into my hair. “Let go.”

The bond between us thrummed so hard I thought it might snap. His heartbeat pounded against my spine. His breath was hot against my neck.

I trusted him. I trusted him with my life.

I nodded and let go.

He adjusted, just slightly, and I instinctively hooked my legs around his hips, arms around his neck.

A blush crawled up my neck. Straddling him mid-air was not how I’d planned to finish this trial.

But Kaelric didn’t flinch as I let go. He took my full weight, and then with a low grunt, he swung forward again, carrying both our weight, arm over arm, his body a steel machine beneath me.

I clung tighter, breath catching as each motion sent a jolt through us both.

Kaelric carried me across the impossibly long chasm of seemingly endless bars.

Carried me the entire way without complaint, without falling, both of our lives literally in his hands.

I didn’t know how something like this was physically possible without magic, even for a wolfkin.

But sheer determination seemed to push him along.

It felt like only seconds, and also forever, until we hit the final platform. Hard.

The crystal flared to life the second Kaelric’s boots touched ground, bathing us in a golden glow.

The trial was complete.

Kaelric’s grip on my back didn’t loosen. Not until I let go first.

Then he set me down gently, carefully, my body sliding down his slowly as heat flared to life between us. But he didn’t let me go, not fully. He just loosened his grip.

“You didn’t let go,” I said, eyes burning into his.

“Never,” he whispered, and that was the moment that I fell in love with Kaelric Morvain. My traitor wolf.

“You’re hurt?” Kaelric’s voice was deep and laced with possessive concern as he peered down at my bleeding hands. The platform was quiet except for the ragged pull of my breathing and the hum of the crystal behind us .

Kaelric wrapped one hand around my lower back; his other hand cupped the nape of my neck like he wasn’t quite ready to stop holding me.

Or maybe like he couldn’t. I leaned into him, chest heaving, hands shaking.

My palms stung so badly it hurt to breathe.

We stood there, hearts still syncing, sweat cooling on my skin.

For a moment, it felt like the rest of the arena had vanished.

But it hadn’t.

Footsteps thundered up the stone steps behind us. I turned just in time to see Cassian rushing across the platform.

“Brynn!”

I barely got the words, “I’m okay,” out before he pulled me away from Kaelric and into a hug.

His arms wrapped around my shoulders, and I winced when the pressure hit my palms. He pulled back immediately.

“Your hands, Brynn, they’re bleeding,” Cassian said.

“I—” I started, but Kaelric stepped between us so fast I didn’t see him move.

“I’ve got it,” he told Cassian, voice low, controlled but dangerous.

Cassian’s brows lifted in surprise.

Kaelric didn’t blink.

Cassian gave me a long look, then nodded slowly. “ I’ll take you both somewhere private.”

He turned back to me, and I nodded my thanks.

Cassian’s footsteps echoed down the long hallway as we walked down a long dark tunnel, no more abyss around us, just solid stone, which I was grateful for. There was a room off to the right, and Cassian unlocked the door magically with the wave of his hand.

“I’ll be out here if you need me,” he said.

Kaelric just nodded, and I noticed the two men were unusually icy to each other.

The second we stepped into the room, Kaelric shut the door.

“Sit,” he said, his voice softer now.

The room’s four walls each had a glowing sconce in the center. I lowered myself onto the edge of the bench in the middle of the room, legs trembling, heart still racing from the trial.

I couldn’t believe we had passed it. So many had died. I couldn’t believe it would just be two teams left to face the final trial next week. And I was one of them.

Kaelric dropped to his knees in front of me.

His hands hovered just above mine. “May I?”

I’d forgotten his healing powers. Probably ones he only had because he was an alpha. Something that still blew my mind.

I nodded.

He took my hands gently, one at a time. His thumbs barely brushed over the shredded, raw skin of my palms, but the moment his magic touched me, golden and cool, I gasped.

“Hold still,” he murmured.

I did.

He worked slowly, reverently. His magic stitched the torn flesh back together with the kind of care no one had ever given me. Not for something like this.

“You didn’t give up today,” he said after a long moment. “Not once. Not even when it got hard. I admire you, Brynn.”

“I did give up,” I corrected. He had to carry me across like a baby.

He shook his head. “Your body gave out on you, but your spirit never gave up.”

His assessment of me had pride filling my chest. “Well, you didn’t give up either.”

His lips twitched. “I almost did. Once. When you cried.”

“I wasn’t crying,” I said quickly, though it was a lie. Those endless monkey bars had broken me.

“You were.” He leaned forward so that his face was inches from mine. “I wanted to sprout wings and fly you away so that no more tears would ever leave those beautiful eyes.”

My breath caught .

It was the most romantic thing anyone had ever said to me.

His gaze fell to my lips, and everything inside me went still.

He leaned closer, slowly, watching me the entire time, like I might bolt. Like he’d stop if I told him to.

I didn’t.

“Brynn?” he breathed against my mouth.

“Yes?” I panted, praying to the Creator himself that Kaelric was about to kiss me.

“I’ve wanted to kiss you from the moment I laid eyes on you,” he said.

It was a confession, one I hadn’t realized I’d been dying to hear.

When his lips touched mine, it wasn’t soft. It wasn’t shy. It was claiming.

Like he’d been holding back for days. Weeks.

My heart shattered open in my chest as I kissed him back, body aching, mouth desperate.

He tasted like fire and sweetness and every impossible thing I wasn’t supposed to want.

His hand slid to the back of my neck as I pressed closer to him, my heart already shattered wide open. My hands gripped the front of his shirt, dragging him closer across the bench as his body caged mine in, careful but relentless.

His tongue slid across mine, and I moaned, feeling something in my very soul click together. There was a rightness to this kiss, to us being together like this. I felt like I’d waited my whole life to be kissed like this.

When we finally pulled apart, we were both panting, his forehead resting against mine.

“I’m not supposed to want you,” he breathed against my mouth. “But I do.”

There was nothing I wanted more than him right now.

“Why not?” I asked, breathless with confusion.

“You’re human, Brynn.”

I swallowed hard, pulling away from him. I hadn’t thought of that being an issue.

I hadn’t ever heard of a wolfkin and a human… having children, or being together… in that way. Not like this. Not in the way I suddenly, desperately wanted.

“So?” I pushed, my voice barely above a whisper.

He looked at me like I was breaking his heart. Maybe I was.

“So you might not know this, but if a wolfkin beds a human, it kills us. We’re forbidden. It’s cursed.” His words hit like stones. “We’re not supposed to…” His gaze dropped to my lips. “We can’t be together like that.”

He stood suddenly, like he needed distance to breathe, like he was waking from a spell. My heart shattered with the silence he left behind.

That kiss… no, my soul had felt that kiss.

“You can’t tell me we weren’t made to kiss like that,” I whispered, stepping forward and pressing my body to his back, desperate for him to turn around.

But Kaelric didn’t move.

He didn’t say a word.

He just walked away, opening the door of the mountain cell, burying me inside of it when he closed it and left me behind.