Chapter 43

Esther’s POV

The first sign that the night was different came as a low, rolling tremor under my bare feet. The Blood Moon Pack compound sat silent, but the walls themselves seemed to vibrate like the inside of a drum. Outside my barred window, the moon was swollen and white-blue, leaking silver down the corridor walls like spilled mercury. Full moon nights had always made Nicholas strange—quicker to rage, slower to remember—but tonight his power felt like a living, breathing thing clawing at its cage.

I’d been in the east cell three days. I’d kept track by scratching lines into the mortar with a shard of tile. Three days of no word from Carl. Three days of pacing the same five steps, three days of trying to pray Sharon awake inside me and hearing only silence.

Until now.

Norman’s growls echoed faintly down the corridor, not words but vibrations that brushed over my skin like claws. The guards stationed at the end of the hall were muttering, their voices tight. Every so often, a flash of golden light flickered beyond the far door, like lightning behind storm clouds.

I sat on the cot, hugging my knees, staring at the cell door. My heart raced as a distant crash split the air, the sound of metal twisting. The guards shouted. Another crash followed, louder, closer.

Then I felt him.

It wasn’t a scent or a sound but a gravitational pull, dragging at my ribcage. The mate bond had been dormant for so long it was like a scar, but now it flared like a reopened wound. My breath hitched.

A guard sprinted past my cell, his eyes wide with panic.

“He’s broken the chains—” he barked to the other two. “Get the sedatives!”

“Sedatives won’t work at full moon,” the second guard snapped, fumbling for a tranquilizer rifle.

My stomach dropped. Nicholas was in trouble.

Sharon, I whispered inwardly. Please wake up. I need you.

But Sharon only stirred faintly, like a sleeper turning over.

Another roar—deeper than anything human—shook the walls. The torches flickered. The scent of ozone and wolf musk rolled through the corridor.

Then Nicholas appeared.

He came out of the shadows like an animal uncaged, his shirt shredded across his shoulders, eyes glowing gold, claws half-formed at his fingertips. His breath steamed. Norman was in control, or something worse.

He was a meld of man and beast.

The guards raised their weapons. “Alpha, please—”

He swatted one aside with a flick of his arm, sending the man crashing into the wall. The other fired a dart. Nicholas caught it mid-air and crushed it between his fingers. His head whipped toward my cell, and for a heartbeat our eyes locked—mine wide, his blazing.

The mate bond jolted through me like an electric shock. My lungs forgot how to breathe.

“Stay back!” one guard shouted at me. “He’s not himself!”

But I was already on my feet.

“Nicholas!” My voice cracked but carried. “Stop this!”

His head tilted. His nostrils flared. A rumble started deep in his chest.

“He’ll kill you,” a guard hissed, grabbing for my arm through the bars. “Get back from the door!”

But some instinct stronger than fear pulled me forward. “Open it,” I said.

“You’re insane!”

“Open. It.” My voice came out low and sharp, Sharon’s echo buried in it. The guard hesitated, then something in my face must have convinced him. He fumbled with the keys, swore, and the lock clicked.

I stepped out into the corridor. The air was thick with the metallic tang of power. Nicholas—or Norman—snarled, a sound that vibrated in my spine.

“Alpha King,” I said softly. “Look at me.”

He took a step closer. The guards scrambled back, clutching their rifles.

“It’s me.” I forced my voice steady, though my knees shook. “Esther. You know me.”

His claws flexed, scraping sparks from the stone wall. His breath came in ragged gusts.

I inched closer, palms out. Every instinct screamed at me to run, but I focused on his eyes.

“You’re not gone. You’re still in there.”

A growl. A step closer.

“Breathe,” I whispered. “Like we used to. In, out.”

For a heartbeat nothing changed. Then his shoulders twitched, as if remembering the rhythm.

“That’s it.” My voice trembled but didn’t break. “In. Out. Nicholas.”

He stopped. His claws retracted a fraction. The glow in his eyes flickered.

It was like a cord snapping tight between us, heat and gravity and an ache older than memory. Sharon lurched inside me, not just stirring this time but pushing and scraping her claws against the inside of my ribs, trying to rise.

I pressed a hand to my chest, gasping. “Sharon—”

Nicholas blinked, head tilting, like he’d heard the name.

“Come back,” I whispered. “Please.”

Another growl, but softer. His shoulders slumped. The gold in his eyes dimmed.

“Esther…” His voice was a rasp, barely human.

“Yes,” I breathed. “I’m here.”

He sagged against the wall, sliding down until he was crouched, hands braced on his knees. His claws melted back into fingers. Sweat ran down his temple.

The guards stared, mouths open. One muttered, “What the hell…”

“It’s over,” I told them without looking. “He’s done.”

They didn’t argue.

I knelt beside him, careful but close enough that my knee brushed his. “Nicholas.”

He lifted his head. His pupils were still too wide, his breathing ragged, but his gaze had found mine.

“You’re all right,” I whispered. “You’re safe.”

He stared at me like he didn’t understand the words. Then he reached, fingers trembling, and caught my wrist.

The touch was a spark thrown onto dry tinder. Sharon lunged upward again, claws raking my insides, eyes flashing somewhere behind my own. For a second I felt fur beneath my skin, teeth pressing against my lips.

I yanked my hand back, pressing it to my chest. “Sharon…”

Nicholas flinched as though burned, then folded forward, elbows on his knees, face in his hands. “I—I almost…”

“I know.” My voice shook. “But you didn’t.”

He made a rough sound. Not quite a sob, not quite a growl.

I stood, swaying a little. The surge of Sharon’s power left me dizzy, like I’d inhaled lightning.

“I need to…” My hand pressed against the wall. “I need to go.”

He lifted his head. “Esther—”

But I was already walking, weaving past the guards who parted like ghosts. “Get him water,” I said hoarsely. “And lock my cell.”

“Lock? After what you just did?” one blurted.

“Do it,” I snapped.

They obeyed.

I didn’t go back to the cell. Not yet. I kept walking, farther into the quiet back corridors of the palace wing, until I found the little medical library off the infirmary—an unused room full of dust and old tomes. I closed the door, leaned back against it, and let myself shake.

Sharon was awake—or at least flickering—inside me. I could feel her pacing in the dark, testing the walls of her cage.

My fingers trembled as I lit a lamp. Shadows danced across shelves lined with leather-bound volumes. The air smelled of paper and herbs.

“Mate bond,” I whispered. “Show me something.”

I scanned spines until I found a book on wolven physiology, then another on bond lore. I dragged them to a table and flipped them open. Diagrams of twin souls, sketches of wolves glowing with overlapping auras, notes scribbled by ancient healers.

There, half a page, a single paragraph:

In cases of prolonged separation, the mate bond may lie dormant; however, exposure to the bonded partner during heightened lunar activity can accelerate wolf re-emergence. Healing abilities, if present, may surge as the bond reawakens.

I stared at the words until they blurred.

Exposure to the bonded partner during heightened lunar activity… accelerate wolf re-emergence.

That’s what I’d just done. Without meaning to, I’d calmed Nicholas’s feral episode and jolted Sharon awake.

I pressed a fist to my mouth. “It’s real.”

Another page spoke of healers whose powers amplified through mate contact—how their wolves could pour strength into sick pack members, even reverse curses if their bond was strong enough.

My knees gave out and I sat hard on the bench, book sliding off onto the floor.

If I stayed near Nicholas—if I endured him, risked him—I might wake Sharon fully. And once she was awake, her healer’s power might actually save Carl.

But it would mean surrendering every boundary I’d rebuilt over six years. It would mean living in the same house as the man who had broken me.

I closed my eyes, trembling.

“Anything,” I’d whispered to Carl.

Was this “anything”?

Outside the window, the moon had slid higher, glowing like a coin of ice. I thought of Nicholas crouched in the corridor, clawed hands shaking, and for a moment the memory wasn’t of the Alpha King but of the man who had once touched my face as though I were made of glass.

Sharon pushed at my ribs again, a low, hopeful rumble.

“I can’t,” I whispered.

But even as I said it, I knew I would.

I stayed in the library until dawn, tracing the diagrams over and over, memorizing the passages. When at last the lamp guttered, I blew it out and sat in the pale morning light, book in my lap, my fingers still trembling.

Carl’s small, fever-burned hand. Nicholas’s gold eyes flickering back to amber under my touch. Sharon’s claws scraping awake.

Pieces of a puzzle aligning, whether I wanted them to or not.

I pressed my forehead to the cool wood of the table and whispered, “Hold on, baby. Mommy’s coming for you. I’ll do anything. Anything.”