Chapter 151
Lynette's POV
The cold stone floor pressed against my back. My eyes opened slowly. Everything hurt.
But it was a different kind of hurt.
I lifted my hand. Stared at my fingers. They were long. Strong. Calloused at the tips from years of training. My fingers.
I sat up fast. Too fast. My head spun but I didn't care. I looked down at my body. At my arms. My legs. This was me. This was my body.
My real body.
I pressed my hand to my chest. Felt my heartbeat. And beneath it... something else. Something I'd missed so badly it had felt like a piece of me was gone.
My wolf.
She was there. Sleeping. Waiting. I could feel her presence like a warm weight in my chest. The connection hummed under my skin.
"It worked," I whispered. My voice came out rough. Shaky. "It actually worked."
I looked around. The silver powder on the floor had lost its glow. The ritual circle was just lines now. Nothing special. Dr. Helena stood near the wall, watching me with those purple eyes.
And beside me—
"Elara?" I turned. Saw my sister pushing herself up from the floor. She moved slowly. Carefully. Like she was testing her body.
She lifted her hands. Looked at them. They were smaller than mine. Paler. The hands that had been mine for months but had never really belonged to me.
Her hands now.
"Are you okay?" I asked. My throat felt tight.
She nodded. Turned to look at me. Her eyes—Elara's eyes, the ones I'd seen in the mirror every day—met mine. And I saw tears.
"We did it," she said. Her voice broke. "We actually did it."
I wanted to hug her. To grab her and hold on tight. But my body felt heavy. Tired. Like I'd run for miles. So I just reached out. Took her hand. Squeezed.
She squeezed back.
We sat there on the cold floor. Holding hands. Not saying anything. We didn't need to.
Dr. Helena's footsteps echoed across the stone. She appeared beside us, holding two cups. Steam rose from them.
"Drink," she said. Not unkind. Just matter-of-fact. "It will help your bodies recover."
I took the cup. The liquid inside was dark. Smelled like herbs and something bitter. I drank it anyway. It burned going down. But the moment it hit my stomach, warmth spread through me. The exhaustion started to fade.
Elara drank hers too. I watched color return to her face.
"The ritual was successful," Dr. Helena said. She crouched down. Looked at us both. "Your souls have returned to their proper vessels."
"Thank you," Elara said quietly.
The witch's mouth curved slightly. Not quite a smile. "Don't thank me yet. You still owe me a favor."
Right. The favor. The open-ended debt. The heavy price we had agreed to pay.
"I can heal the physical damage from the ritual," Dr. Helena continued. She was looking at me now. "But the scars will remain."
"Scars?" I looked down at my arms. That's when I saw them.
Long thin lines across my forearms. Jagged marks on my shoulders. Some fresh. Some older. All of them visible against my skin.
My stomach dropped.
These weren't my scars. I'd had scars before—from training, from fights, from being an Alpha. But these were different. These were new.
These were from Elara's time in my body.
"I'm sorry." Elara's voice was small. "I tried to be careful. But there were fights. And the Wild Hunt. And—"
"Stop." I cut her off. Looked at her. "You don't have to apologize."
"But your body—"
"Is covered in proof that you survived." I ran my finger over one of the scars. It was raised. Still pink. Recent. "These aren't something to apologize for."
Elara's eyes filled with tears again. "Lynette—"
"You kept this body alive," I said. My voice came out fiercer than I meant it to. "You fought in it. Bled in it. Survived in it. These scars are part of that story now."
I touched another scar. This one on my shoulder. "This one's from the Wild Hunt, isn't it?"
She nodded.
"Then it's a reminder that we beat them." I looked at her. Made sure she could see I meant it. "Every scar on this body is proof that we're both still here. That's not something to be sorry for."
Elara wiped her eyes. Took a shaky breath. Then she held out her arms. Showed me.
There were marks everywhere. Thin white lines on her wrists—old scars from before. But also fresher ones. Pink and raised. Along her ribs. Her shoulders. Places I remembered from the river. From dragging myself across rocks. From branches tearing at skin.
"I have scars too," she said quietly. "Some from before. Some from... what happened to you in Canada."
I looked at them. At the map of pain written across her skin. My pain. My survival.
"We both carry marks now," Elara said. "From each other's lives."
Something about that felt right. Like we'd traded more than just bodies. We'd traded pieces of ourselves. Pieces we'd carry forever.
Dr. Helena made a small sound. When I looked up, she was watching us with an expression I couldn't read.
"The scars will fade over time," she said. "But they will never fully disappear. That is the nature of soul magic. It leaves traces."
"Good," I said. And I meant it.
Dr. Helena stood. Walked to a cabinet near the wall. When she came back, she held out a small leather pouch.
"For the journey," she said. "Healing salve. Your bodies will be weak for a few days."
Elara took it. "Thank you."
The witch's purple eyes settled on her. "Remember your promise."
"I will."
Something passed between them. Something I didn't fully understand. But Elara's face had gone pale. Tight.
I stood up. My legs shook but held. Elara stood too. We helped each other. Like we'd been doing this whole time.