“Hold the line!” I order. “I’ll end the source!”
The pack tightens formation. They know they can’t win—but they can buy me time.
But Nova. Her body hasn’t moved, but her presence feels farther away with each pulse. Her scar glows silver-bright now, spreading tendrils up her arm. Her eyes track something I can’tsee. She’s slipping into the pattern, becoming part of Faelan’s experiment.
Stabilizing the pack isn’t enough. We could stand here unified, and the circuit would keep running. Keep calibrating. Keep learning.
We need to break the pattern itself.
I step forward. Not toward Faelan. Toward the center of the circuit, where the suspended bodies hang. Where the energy flows thickest.
I place my hand on the nearest curve of light. The cold in my blood meets the circuit’s pulse. Static meets flow.
The pattern shudders. Not breaking but hesitating.
The Fade registers my presence.
Something probes my energy signature, testing boundaries and sampling composition. It feels like being scanned, mapped, and categorized. The Fade isn’t fighting me. It’s learning me.
“Interesting.” Faelan’s voice sounds both near and distant. “Your lineage runs deeper than I anticipated.”
I ignore him, focusing on the disruption I’ve created. The suspended bodies flicker, their stasis momentarily unstable. The energy flow redirects, compensating for my interference—seeking equilibrium.
Behind me, Nova makes a small sound.
My wolf snarls, hackles rising. Every protective instinct I’ve ever had blazes to life.
I turn to see her scar pulsing faster, silver light spreading up her arm in delicate, branching patterns. Her eyes unfocus, pupils dilating as she sinks deeper into the resonance field. Her magic rises visibly around her—violet threads weaving into the circuit’s silver lattice.
Faelan watches her with calm satisfaction, head tilted slightly to one side. The expression of a craftsman seeing the final piece slide into place.
“Perfect alignment,” he murmurs, almost to himself. “The equation completes.”
The realization hits me with brutal clarity. Nova isn’t being broken—she’s being incorporated. Her essence, her signature, her magic—all of it forming the keystone in whatever Faelan is building.
Like hell.
The circuit hums higher. The suspended bodies synchronize, pulses aligning. Faelan raises his hand, not toward Nova, but toward the center of the pattern—conducting without touching.
Nova’s breathing slows. Her resistance fades. The silver lines crawling up her arm reach her shoulder, curving toward her heart.
I step between them without hesitation. Pure Alpha instinct taking over. Placing myself directly in the path of whatever’s building.
The air compresses. The circuit tightens. Energy concentrates in a single point: precise, targeted, inevitable.
I feel it gather. Feel it focus. Feel it lock on.
Good. Target me instead.
Faelan’s eyes widen slightly.
The strike hits.
Light detonates inside my chest. Not outward explosion; inward collapse. My ribs feel like they’re folding toward my spine. My lungs compress. My heart seizes.
Then—
—silence.
