Chapter 107 Never

Chapter 107 Never

/Nelson/

The ground split open before us.

For one second, I couldn’t understand what I was looking at. Then the darkness came crawling out.

It poured from the crack in the earth like smoke, spreading across the battlefield and swallowing everything in its path. Warriors shouted as they scrambled backward, weapons raised and shaking.

Sunny was already snarling inside my head. Those things are wrong.

“I know.”

I looked at Edlyn. She stood between Luca and me, her hands glowing faintly, casting soft light against the darkness pressing in on all sides. She wasn’t afraid. At least, she wasn’t showing it.

But I knew her well enough now to see past the calm. She was scared underneath it, holding herself together through sheer will.

I reached for her hand. She looked at me.

“You don’t have to be brave every second,” I told her, quiet enough that only she’d hear it.

Her lips curved into a small, tired smile. “I know.”

“Good.”

Luca reached for her other hand, his voice steady. “Because we are here to do the worrying for you.”

Edlyn looked between us, something almost fond breaking through the fear. “You two really have decided to become one annoying team.”

“I prefer effective team,” Luca said.

I snorted. “You’re definitely annoying.”

He looked at me, unbothered. “And yet you keep standing beside me.”

“Because unfortunately, you’re useful.”

Edlyn laughed softly, and it was such a small sound, but it made something inside me loosen just enough to breathe easier. With an army approaching, our kingdoms surrounded on every side, and Edlyn’s mysterious father standing nearby watching all of it unfold, hearing her laugh felt almost like a small victory in itself.

Then the darkness stopped spreading.

Something stepped out of it.

My hand tightened around my weapon. The creature was tall, much taller than an ordinary wolf, its body covered in black armor. Unlike the Collectors, there was no mask covering its face.

Its eyes were completely white.

And behind it came hundreds more, moving in perfect formation. No shouting. No growling. No battle cries.

Just silence.

That was worse than any war cry could have been.

My father-in-law, if that was even the right word for whatever he was to me now, stepped forward.

“They are the Bloodborn.”

Luca’s eyes narrowed. “Bloodborn?”

“They were created from ancient blood magic.”

I looked at him, unease coiling tighter in my chest. “Created by who?”

He didn’t answer.

Edlyn did, her voice quiet and distant, like the words were coming from somewhere she wasn’t fully present in.

“The gods.”

Everyone looked at her at once. She seemed just as surprised by her own answer as the rest of us.

Moon stirred inside her. I remember.

Edlyn closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, she whispered, “They were created to hunt beings like me.”

I stepped closer to her. “Then they’ll have to get through us first.”

The leader of the Bloodborn lifted its hand. Every creature behind it stopped instantly, frozen in place like puppets on the same string.

Then it looked directly at Edlyn.

“First Daughter.”

Edlyn stepped forward, chin lifted. “I have a name.”

The creature tilted its head slowly. “Edlyn.”

I didn’t like the way it said her name. Like it already belonged to them. Like she was something they had lost and simply come to reclaim.

“Give yourself to us.”

“No.”

The answer came from both Luca and me at the same moment, without either of us planning it.

Edlyn looked at us, exasperated despite everything. “Guys…”

“No,” I repeated, firmer this time.

Luca stepped forward, his voice cold. “She already answered.”

The creature looked between the two of us, something almost amused in its blank white eyes.

“Two kings.” Its mouth twisted into something resembling a smile. “Two mates.”

I felt Sunny’s claws scrape against the inside of my mind, restless and furious.

The creature continued. “You are the reason she awakened.”

Luca’s expression hardened into stone. “Then we have nothing to discuss.”

The Bloodborn leader raised its hand.

“Kill them.”

Everything happened at once.

The battlefield exploded into chaos. Our warriors charged forward. The Bloodborn moved faster than I expected, faster than anything should have been able to move.

I shifted immediately. Sunny took over, and we slammed into the first creature that came at us, claws scraping across our fur, drawing blood that steamed against the cold night air. I bit down on its shoulder and threw it aside.

Another attacked. Then another.

I fought through them, but there were too many, and they weren’t ordinary soldiers. Every time one touched me, my strength dropped, siphoned away like water down a drain.

Don’t let them drain us.

“I know.”

I attacked harder, forcing myself past the exhaustion pulling at my limbs.

Across the battlefield, Luca disappeared into a cloud of darkness. He reappeared behind three Bloodborn and sent them flying with a single motion. Vampires rushed in behind him, and werewolves fought beside them, weapon for weapon, claw for fang.

For the first time in history, our people weren’t fighting each other.

They were fighting together.

And somehow, impossibly, it worked.

Then I heard Edlyn scream.

I turned instantly. She was surrounded, five Bloodborn forming a tight circle around her, closing in from every side.

I ran toward her, but before I could reach her, a wall of black energy exploded between us, solid and impenetrable. I slammed into it at full speed.

Pain shot through my entire body.

“Edlyn!”

She looked at me through the barrier, her face pale but determined. “I’m okay!”

“No, you’re not!”

“I can handle them!”

“I know you can!” I hit the barrier again, desperation clawing up my throat. “But you don’t have to handle everything alone!”

Luca appeared beside me, breathing hard. He placed both hands against the barrier. “Move.”

I looked at him. “Together?”

“Together.”

We attacked the barrier at the same time, my wolf strength meeting his vampire power head-on. The barrier cracked.

Again.

We attacked once more, throwing everything we had left into it.

It shattered.

We rushed through the opening.

Edlyn was standing in the middle of the broken ground, the five Bloodborn lying motionless around her. She stared at us, something like relief and exasperation both crossing her face.

“You’re late.”

I stared at her, my heart still hammering. “You nearly gave me a heart attack.”

She smiled, small and genuine. “I knew you’d come.”

Luca walked toward her, his voice low. “We always will.”

Her expression softened completely, and for a moment, the battle disappeared around us again. She reached for both of us, and we took her hands without hesitation.

“I love you,” she whispered.

“I love you too,” I said.

Luca kissed her forehead gently. “Always, kitten.”

I looked at them both, and something about the moment felt different somehow, charged with a weight I couldn’t quite name. The light beneath Edlyn’s skin began glowing again, brighter than before, and her power moved into both of us through the mate bond like something finally finding its way home.

Sunny didn’t resist it. Instead, he welcomed it completely.

This is right.

I didn’t know why he felt so certain. But I felt it too, settling into my chest like something that had always belonged there.

Edlyn looked confused, glancing between us. “Do you feel that?”

“Yes,” I said.

Luca nodded slowly. “The bond.”

The ground beneath our feet began glowing in response. The Bloodborn stopped fighting entirely. The Collectors stopped moving. Even the warriors on both sides seemed to notice, pausing mid-strike as the light spread outward.

Every supernatural creature on the battlefield turned toward us at once.

Edlyn’s eyes changed. Silver. Black. Then gold, shifting through colors like something ancient waking fully for the first time.

A pulse of energy exploded from her body, and the entire battlefield was pushed backward by the force of it. I wrapped my arms around her from behind, keeping her steady on her feet.

Luca stood in front of her, his hands hovering protectively. “Edlyn.”

She looked at him, panic flickering across her face. “I can’t stop it.”

“Then don’t.”

I held her tighter, pressing my chest against her back. “Let it happen.”

Her eyes widened. “You trust me?”

I smiled against her hair. “More than I trust myself.”

Luca nodded, his expression steady. “Me too.”

The power grew stronger, building until the air itself seemed to hum with it.

Then a voice echoed across the battlefield, deep and vast. Not from the Bloodborn. Not from the Collectors.

From the sky itself.

“You have made the wrong choice.”

Edlyn looked upward. The clouds twisted violently, and a massive shadow appeared above us, blotting out what remained of the moonlight.

My wolf growled low. Luca’s face hardened into something grim.

Edlyn’s father looked up too, and for the first time since he’d stepped out of the forest, I saw genuine fear in his eyes.

“No.”

Edlyn looked at him, alarm sharpening her voice. “What is it?”

He didn’t answer immediately, his jaw working like the words cost him something to say.

Then he whispered, barely audible over the wind, “The one who created you.”

The shadow descended slowly, and a voice filled the entire kingdom, reaching every corner of the battlefield at once.

“Come home, my daughter.”

Edlyn’s grip tightened around our hands, her whole body rigid. She looked at me. Then at Luca.

And this time, I wasn’t the one who spoke first.

Luca squeezed her hand, his voice fierce and unshaking. “We’re not letting anyone take you.”

I nodded, meaning it with everything I had. “Never.”

Edlyn looked up at the descending darkness, and her eyes burned brighter than they had all night.