Chapter 34
We were leaving in a week. Early graduation. Accelerated training. Scotland. A witch who might unlock everything. And now we were supposed to eat.
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Alpha Draven cleared his throat once the staff slipped back out. “Elowen,” he said, his voice steady but not unkind. “There’s something else, isn’t there? You said one of your father’s letters mentioned a prophecy.”
I froze mid reach for the toast. Of course, he remembered. I nodded, wiping my palms on my leggings before pulling the folded paper from my back pocket. The edges were soft from being handled too many times.
“It was in the letter he sent me. I haven’t told anyone the full version yet. Just pieces.”
Ash’s brows arched slightly. Daxon stopped chewing. Across the table, Taya leaned forward like I was about to drop the secret to the universe. I unfolded it with a deep breath and read aloud:
A child of wolf and fae.
Born under a blood moon.
Marked by magic and fate.
A vessel for the Moon Goddess herself.
She will carry five marks.
Five mates.
Five species.
She will burn the cages.
She will howl the world back together.
If she survives.
The silence was deafening. Jace whistled under his breath. “No pressure or anything.”
Taya blinked. “Wait, five mates?”
‘Five species,” Ash said, his voice like ice over glass. “And five marks. That’s not a metaphor. It’s literal.”
“I’ve already got two,” I muttered. “Wolf. Vampire.”
Daxon leaned back in his chair, his arms folded. “So let’s talk about the obvious, why is this happening now? Why
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Chapter 34
you? Why fated mates again, after all this time?”
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“That’s the part that won’t leave me alone,” Taya said, frowning. “No one’s had a true mate in decades. Not since the Alpha and Luna. We all just assumed… it was over.”
“It’s not over, Ash said. “It’s been interrupted. Controlled. Bred out.”
“By Aegis?” Jace asked. Ash nodded. “Why do you think they hunt hybrids so aggressively? Hybrids are the only ones who can cross lines. They’re threats to the system. Threats to the lie.”
“The lie being,” Rylen said, “that species are better separate. Safer.”
“But we’re not,” I said quietly. “We’re weaker like this. Disconnected. Mistrustful. The prophecy even says it, I’m supposed to ‘howl the world back together.”
Taya nudged her plate aside. “So maybe that’s why you’re getting all five. All the power lines that were split apart… bonded in one person.”
Ash’s eyes flicked to me. “A living bridge.”
Daxon looked like he wanted to argue, but couldn’t. “You’re not just the product of a forbidden pairing. You’re the weapon Aegis fears the most.”
I swallowed hard. “You think they know about the prophecy?”
“They knew something,” Draven said. “They’ve been targeting different bloodlines for years. The way your father went into hiding here with us? It was to keep you off the grid. The second they sensed your magic when you turned
18…”
“They started hunting again,” Aelira finished. We all went quiet.
“I thought this was just about my magic,” I said. “But it’s not. It’s the mate bonds. The species connections. That’s what they’re really afraid of.”
“Because if you survive,” Taya said, her voice soft but strong, “you won’t just unite the lines… you’ll make everyone else question why we were ever separated to begin with.”
Ashrian reached out, fingers brushing mine. “And that’s what starts revolutions.”
Jace took a huge bite of bacon. “You know… for a doomsday prophecy, this is kind of hot.”
Taya rolled her eyes and threw a piece of toast at him.
But I sat there, staring at the letter, the truth, the fire starting to build in my chest. They weren’t just scared of me. They were scared of us. My mates, and my pack.
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Chapter 34
Me and this messy, chaotic, bonded family that was starting to believe in something bigger than bloodlines. That
made me smile. Just a little.
But it was enough.
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