Chapter 142 ASHES STILL BURNING
AMBER’S POV
I did not understand my own heart anymore. I had told myself I was settled, I had children. I had a life. I had chosen Derek when everything fell apart, and I stood by that choice every day. He was the father of my babies. He had held me when I was weak, he had stood in front of danger without thinking twice. That had to mean something but every time Damien walked into a room, something inside me shifted.
It was not small, it was not something I could brush off. It was there, loud, clear and alive. I hated that part of myself.
I could be standing beside Derek, listening to him speak, nodding like I was paying attention, but if Damien stepped close, my body would know before my mind did. My skin would tighten and my breath would change, my wolf would lift her head like she had been waiting.
I tried to tell myself it was history. We had shared something once and that did not just vanish. Feelings do not die because you decide they should but it felt deeper than that and he had changed.
At first, I thought I imagined it. Damien had always carried light around him. Not real light, but something close. He used to walk into a room and it would feel easier to breathe. War, anger, grief… all of it softened when he was near.
Now it was different. He was stronger, that much was clear. Power rolled off him in quiet waves. Not loud or wild but controlled but heavy. Like something ancient had settled into his bones and beneath that strength, there was something else.
A shadow. Not evil, not cruel. Just… deeper. Like he had seen something no one should see and had brought a piece of it back with him.
Still, he treated me the same. He spoke gently and he listened when I talked. He knelt to our children… my children with Derek and smiled at them like they were his own blood. There was no bitterness in him. No blame.
That made it worse. If he had been angry, it would have been easier. If he had pulled away, I could have used that distance to bury what I felt but he did not.
He looked at me the way he always had. Like I mattered and my heart answered every time.
At night, my magic grew stronger.
I had been practicing quietly. Feeling the threads of power that lived under my skin. The more I used it, the clearer my mind became. Spells that once left me tired now felt natural. I could hold energy longer, shape it better and with that strength, my dreams changed.
They had started as fog. A shape in the distance, a voice that echoed but never formed words I could understand. Now the fog has thinned. The place in my dreams felt endless. White and silver. Like standing inside a light that had weight, I was not afraid there. I never was.
The figure stood farther away at first. Tall, still. Each night, I stepped closer and each night, she became clearer.
Her form was made of light, but it was not blinding. Soft like moonlight resting on water. Long hair flowed down her back, moving though there was no wind. Her face was calm, almost sad.
She was female. The first time I saw her clearly, my breath caught in my throat.
“You are growing,” she said.
Her voice did not echo anymore. It was steady and real.
“What are you?” I asked.
“I am a messenger,” she answered. “Nothing more.”
Her eyes held mine, and I felt no threat. No push, only weight.
“There is truth you must hear.”
My chest tightened. “Derek was never your true mate.”
The words did not explode and they did not shake the world.
They simply landed, heavy and cold.
I shook my head slowly. “That’s not possible.”
“It is,” she said. “You bonded by choice and by circumstance by survival but not by fate.”
My heart pounded so hard I thought I would wake up. “Then who?” I whispered, even though I already knew.
She did not hesitate.
“Damien.”
The name felt like it had always been there, waiting.
“He is the one your soul recognizes,” she continued. “The one it was meant to meet.”
I felt anger rise, but it was not at her. It was the situation and the timing. At the life I had already built.
“I have children,” I said. “I have a family.”
“Yes.”
She did not argue, she did not try to twist my feelings.
“If you choose to remain with Derek,” she said carefully, “you must reject your true mate. That is the only way to close the bond fully. There is no path where both can exist.”
Her words were not cruel. They were not demanding, they were simple and factual.
“You cannot stand between two bonds forever,” she added softly. “It will tear you apart.”
I felt tears on my face. “This is not punishment,” she said. “It is true.”
The light around her began to thin. “You will decide.”
Just then I woke up. I sat up in bed with my heart racing.
The room was dark and quiet. Derek slept beside me, his arm thrown over the pillow where I had been moments ago.
My skin felt cold, it felt real. Too real to brush away as a dream, Damien is your true mate.
The words replayed over and over. I pressed my hand to my chest, like I could calm whatever storm had started inside me, it did not work.
I wanted to dismiss it. To call it magic is playing tricks on me but my magic had never lied before. It had only grown clearer and the way I felt around Damien, I could not deny it anymore.
The next day, I watched him carefully. He did nothing unusual, he helped repair a section of the fence. He laughed with one of the younger wolves, he carried one of my children on his shoulders when she ran toward him.
Every movement was steady and kind and when his eyes met mine across the yard, something passed between us, not guilt but recognition.
Did he feel it too? I did not ask because I could not.
Days passed and I waited for sleep like someone waiting for a judge’s final word. I needed more, more explanation and more clarity. Something that would tell me what to do but when I closed my eyes, there was nothing, there was no silver space, no ethereal woman and no voice.
Just darkness, I tried again the next night and the next.
Nothing. It was like the door had closed the moment she said what she came to say, that frightened me more than the dream itself.
If it had been imagination, it would have returned. If it had been a warning, it would have repeated. Instead, I was left alone with it. Derek kissed my forehead one morning before leaving for a meeting. His touch was warm and familiar and I loved him.
I did but love and fate were not always the same thing.
I spent hours with my children, trying to drown the thoughts out. Their laughter helped and their small hands in mine grounded me but yet when Damien walked past, the air shifted again and it was stronger this time around.
My wolf stirred with a quiet certainty that made my stomach twist.
Reject your true mate.
The words felt final. If I chose Derek, I would have to look Damien in the eye and cut the bond that tied our souls and if I chose Damien…
Everything would change, the pack and my children’s lives. Derek.
There was no version of this where no one got hurt. That night, I stood alone outside under the sky. The moon was full, bright against the dark.
I whispered into the air, “Give me another sign.”
Silence answered. Only the sound of my own breathing and the distant howl of wolves in the trees. I closed my eyes and felt the pull inside my chest, two directions and two futures and somewhere in the distance, I felt Damien’s presence like a steady flame in the dark.
I did not know which path I would choose but I knew I could not stand still much longer because something inside me was already beginning to break. The pressure built quietly, like a crack spreading through glass.
The next morning, I woke with a sharp ache in my chest, not pain exactly, but strain. As if the bond I had tried to ignore was stretching too far. Derek touched my shoulder and smiled, and I smiled back, but it felt thin. Across the yard, Damien looked up at the same moment. Our eyes locked, and the air went tight. My wolf stepped forward inside me, not growling, not fighting.
It was claiming and for the first time, I felt the edge of something bigger than choice.
Something that would not wait forever.
FRACTURED SILENT BOND