The Wolf Who Shattered Her Oath to Luna

Chapter 9

The world snapped back like a rubber band.

I was on my knees, hand stuck to the ward‑stone, every nerve buzzing. Shouts and snarls crashed around me. Someone yelled my name.

“Rhea!” Kael. Closer. “Let go—”

“I can’t,” I gasped.

The ward‑web still clung to me—threads of Luna‑light whipping where the line had just blown. Through it I felt rogues carving through underbrush, warriors meeting them, Cassian’s power like a storm front between.

And that other presence. Cold. Focused. Watching.

Found you, little Hollow.

Rage sliced through the fear. “Get out,” I snarled—to the stone, to the thing on the far side, to all of it.

A hand clamped around my wrist—hot, real.

Cassian.

“Share it,” he said, voice rough. “Don’t hold it alone.”

His power slammed into me through his grip, heavy Alpha current crashing into the fractured line. For a heartbeat it almost crushed me—then threaded through, bracing the break where I’d only managed to patch.

“Breathe with me,” he ordered. “In. Out. Follow.”

On each inhale I dragged Luna‑light in; on each exhale I shoved it into the crack along the track his power cut. Outside, steel rang, something screamed, the reek of rogue blood hit the air.

The foreign presence shoved again.

This time it hit both of us.

Cassian flinched, a curse skittering down our joined link. The presence hesitated, clearly feeling him too now. It probed along the new current, tasting him.

Alpha, it noted, almost curious.

Cassian bared his teeth. “Get out of my wards,” he growled—out loud and through the flow—and drove his will into the gap.

Three minds slammed together in that narrow space: mine, hanging on because if I let go people bled; his, furious and immovable; theirs, sharp and cold. For a breathless second everything hummed on the edge of tearing—

Then the pressure on the far side eased.

Not gone. Retreating. Watching.

With a last, cool brush against my mind, the presence withdrew. Rogues’ claws stopped worrying the weak edge; one went down under Rowan’s blade, the others scattered as the opening they’d been funneled toward narrowed.

I forced more light into the crack until the line knit enough to hold.

The web steadied.

I slumped. Cassian wrenched my hand off the stone and hauled me to my feet, keeping a bruising grip on my arm.

“You’re done,” he said. “It’s holding. For now.”

My palm was raw, runes imprinted angry‑red into the skin. The clearing was a mess of blood and broken underbrush. Two rogues lay dead. One limped away into the dark; Elen was already ghosting after it, silent and lethal.

Kael hovered just out of reach, eyes wide. “Remind me never to shake your hand again,” he tried, voice a little too high.

Sera and Helena appeared at the edge of the trees, faces pale.

“We felt that from the village,” Sera breathed. “The wards flared, then twisted. Rhea, what did you do?”

“Not on purpose,” I managed. “There was a crack. Something pushed. I pushed back. Cassian—”

“Connected,” Helena said quietly, studying us both. “For a moment, Nightwind’s wards were running through you.”

My stomach dropped.

“And now,” she added, eyes steady on me, “whoever tugged on that line knows exactly which wolf to pull on next.”