“Come on, damn you,” Isaac growled.“Just fucking breathe!”
The silence was unbearable.Each second stretched, a scream in his veins.
“Breathe for me,” Nolan begged, voice breaking.“Please ...just breathe.”
A tiny wheeze.Then another.His chest shuddered once, twice, and finally began to rise and fall in fragile rhythm.Nolan’s eyes stung as the cat’s eyes fluttered open, one golden brown, one blue and piercing, and the relief crashed over him so violently he almost sobbed.
“Yes!”Nolan laughed, relief spilling out in a ragged shout.He pulled the animal against his chest, holding on too tightly in his desperation.The cat whimpered, then swiped with surprising strength, claws raking his cheek.He hissed in pain, then laughed again, a shaky sound.“Feisty little thing, aren’t you?”
Isaac’s lips curved in a rare smile despite the strain etched into his features.“Told you he’d bite back.”
Nolan lifted him away from him.“Um, yep, definitely a he.”
They searched frantically for an owner, calling out to survivors, scanning the chaos.No one claimed the animal.The thought of handing him over twisted in Nolan’s gut, though he swallowed the ache, unwilling to admit it.
“Guess he’s ours for now,” Isaac said quietly as the cat curled in Nolan’s arms, eyes watchful even in exhaustion.
They took him home.He ate little, moved carefully, but his gaze followed them everywhere.Over the next week, he appeared in strange places—perched on the bathroom sink as Nolan showered, curled on the dresser when Isaac dressed, his eyes too knowing, too old.More than once, Nolan muttered about abandonment issues, but the truth was, he liked his company more than he wanted to admit.
One morning, toweling off after a shower, Nolan caught the cat sitting squarely on the sink, eyes narrowed as though judging him.He scowled.“Do you mind?A little privacy never goes amiss”
From the hall, Isaac’s laugh rumbled.“He watches me, too.Think he’s got a thing for us?”
Nolan snorted, tugging on his jeans.“What, you think he’s ...into us?Can cats even be gay?”
Isaac leaned on the doorframe, smirking despite the sling still supporting his shoulder.“Love is love, little brother.Maybe we’re just his type.”
Nolan rolled his eyes, though a grin tugged at his mouth.“Well, he better learn boundaries.Next time he jumps in while I’m naked, I’m charging him a fee.”
And then one morning, he was gone.No pawprints, no sound, just emptiness.Nolan’s chest ached, though he kept his face neutral.Isaac said nothing, but Nolan saw the same hollow weight in his eyes.
Four days later it was the night of the new moon, both brothers were home, the house quiet around them.Sleep came heavy for Nolan.
And then the dream.
Isaac’s eyes shone, anguish as raw as Nolan’s own.And in that dream Nolan finally understood.This was not just Isaac, his brother of the present—this was Ryan reborn.Just as Nolan himself carried the spirit and soul of Alaric.Different men, different voices, different time—but the same bond, the same blood, the same destiny, relived through centuries.
Between them stood their Goddess, their mate—Saffron—with one golden eye and one blue, her alabaster skin drawn tight with sorrow, her sob carrying across ages.Her voice carved through him as it had in that other life, in that other time.
“We knew this was coming.”Her voice was thick with anguish.“His curse will rip through the shifters.It will kill those who already run with their animals.But if I weave myself into it, if I lace his spell with mine, the line will not end.”
He heard Ryan’s voice again, anguish searing through Isaac’s lips, “At what cost?”
And her answer—forever burned into him.“At ours.But if you can live with that, ending all shifters and knowing that there will never be another of your kind to walk this earth for all eternity, then speak now, and I will be the first one to stick my knife into that bastard’s heart.”
The truth wrapped around Nolan like chains.They had chosen this.They had agreed to die so their kind would live.Their twin brothers, Liam and Jacob, were already gone.Libby lay cold.And now Ryan and Alaric—Isaac and Nolan—would follow, giving up their mate to centuries of loneliness.
The love they bore her was all-consuming.Nolan’s heart shattered with it.He knew—they both knew—that their mate would work her magic to ensure their sacrifice was not for nothing.That somehow, someday, it would mean rebirth.
His wolf clawed at his chest, desperate and wild, then went still, extinguished.Nolan screamed as darkness surged, swallowing him whole.Just before it consumed him completely, a voice drifted through the void—soft, strong, luminous.The Moon Goddess.
“You had to die so your kind could live.”Her voice was soft, and pure.“But hold fast, fate of Alaric, fate of Ryan.She is close.Closer than you think.But you must work with her, to save her in this time.In order to have the happiness and future you all deserve, you must find the druid stone.Use it to save your mate, and in doing so, you will help to reunite another with her mates.”
Nolan woke with a strangled gasp, his body burning.Fire roared inside him, tearing through his veins.He stumbled into the lounge just as Isaac staggered in from his room on the other side, their eyes wide, golden light bleeding into them both.
Their bones broke.No, not broke.Shifted.Their muscles tore and reformed.Agony and ecstasy fused as they collapsed to their knees, their bodies twisting, reshaping, until fur bristled and claws gouged the floor.The first howl tore free of Nolan’s throat, raw and triumphant, answered by Isaac’s beside him.
They were shifters.At last.
