Chapter 72

Chapter 72

Kael’s POV

The mountain air cuts sharp, carrying the tang of snow and pine, but I barely taste it. My men march behind me, a disciplined line of steel and fur, yet the true weight pressing down on me is not the climb of Ashpeak Pass.

It is the bond. It hums with a raw, dangerous pulse, beating against my chest like a second heart. Every flare makes my wolf bristle, claws itching just beneath my skin. I feel her my mate, my Luna straining against something she should not touch. Evelyn.

A growl rumbles deep in my throat before I can stop it. The men behind me go tense, steps faltering for the briefest instant. They know the sound. They know it means the Alpha is about to unleash hell.

Three nights ago, her power hit me like a strike of lightning. I staggered in the dirt, vision white, the air ripped from my lungs. My soldiers thought it a fit of temper. Fools. They didn’t feel what I felt glass shattering, fire clawing, her body trembling as she pushed herself too far.

Since then, the bond hasn’t been silent. No. It burns. Surges. Flickers with exhaustion one moment and reckless hunger the next.

She hides it from me. Tries to shield me out like I am some ordinary male. The audacity.

I am her Alpha. Her mate. She belongs to me. There is no wall she can build strong enough to bar me. The bond itself would tear her shields apart if I willed it.

And yet… I let her try. Let her lie. Because I want to see how far she dares go before she breaks.

A rider approaches, cutting through the column with dust rising under hooves. Rulfen, captain of my scouts, bows his head low before speaking. “Alpha.”

The title is not just respect. It is instinct. Submission. His voice trembles under it.

“Speak.” My word cracks like thunder.

“Messages from the fortress,” he says, swallowing hard. “They concern the Luna.”

My wolf lunges forward at the name, snarling. My grip tightens on the reins until leather creaks. “Say it.”

Rulfen wets his lips. “The servants whisper of strange sounds in her chambers. Shouts, cracks like thunder. Guards swear they saw light leaking under her door though no torch burned. they whisper worse.”

The column stills. Every soldier listens without daring to lift his gaze.

“Worse?” My voice drops, low and lethal, the Alpha command lacing each syllable.

He bows deeper. “They say witchcraft, Alpha.”

The silence that follows is absolute. Even the horses freeze, ears flat, as if the mountains themselves hold their breath.

My fury is a living thing. It slams through the bond, through my pack, through the marrow of every wolf who dares stand near me. I smell their fear, sharp and sour, and it only sharpens my rage.

“Who dared speak it first?” The words are not a question but a decree.

“I, The message did not name them—”

“Find out.” My command crashes like stone. “Drag them before me when I return, and I will gut them in front of the pack. I will make a pyre of their bones so every servant, every coward, learns what it means to spit venom on my Luna’s name.”

Rulfen bows so low he nearly topples from his horse. “Yes, Alpha.”

I spur forward, fury burning hotter than the torches my men carry. Evelyn plays with fire, and the fortress dares to whisper against her? Both defiance and insult. Both unforgivable.

My wolf roars in my chest, pacing, demanding I abandon the campaign and return to her this instant. My blood screams to obey. Every mile between us is agony, a leash I long to snap.

Then the bond pulses again. A sharp flare. Pain.

My breath catches, vision tunneling red. She’s hurting. My mate is hurting, and I am not there.

Her voice slides across my mind, fragile but searing: “Kael… forgive me. I can’t stop.”

Forgive?

No.

There will be no forgiveness. She will kneel. She will bare her throat and confess every lie, every secret. And when she trembles, it will be because I demand it not because her power eats her alive.

But gods help me that fire inside her calls to me. It is wild, unbroken, dangerous. She is no longer the fragile girl I found. She is becoming something more. Something worthy of me.

The hunger coils low in my gut, sharp as claws. She will be mine in truth not just bound, but matched. My equal. My Luna.

Night falls. We camp at the foot of the pass, the men busying themselves with fires and rations. I cannot rest. I stalk the perimeter like a beast chained, bond searing every time she falters, every time her strength slips.

Then I feel it. Someone enters her chamber. My wolf snaps, furious, and my vision floods crimson. If they laid a finger on her if they so much as looked at her while she burned I will rip their throat out with my teeth.

The flare dulls. She sends them away with cold words. Clever, defiant liar.

I snarl into the night.

“Soon, little mate,” I whisper into the bond, letting the Alpha edge bleed through so she feels it coil around her throat like a leash. “Soon, you’ll learn what it means to hide from your Alpha. You’ll beg me to take the fire from you. You’ll break, and when you do, you’ll understand you were made to be mine.”

The wolves around me bow their heads, instinct bending their spines though they do not know why. They feel it my claim, my fury, my need.

And when I return, if even one servant has dared breathe the word witch beside her name, I’ll slaughter them all. Slowly. So the fortress learns the price of daring to brand my Luna anything but sacred.

Because she is mine. And I am Alpha. And I will burn the world before I let anyone else touch her.