The dawn crept slowly, gray and trembling, over a world torn apart. Smoke curled from the earth, and the scent of burnt pine clung to the air like a scar that refused to heal. The battlefield—the place where Killian had stood—was now just dust and silence.
And me.
I was still here. Barely.
Every step hurt. Every breath felt like shards of glass cutting through my ribs. My wolf whimpered inside, restless, confused, searching for the bond that had once thrummed so fiercely between us.
But it was gone. Or at least, it should have been.
Yet something still pulsed faintly in my chest—a rhythm that didn’t belong to me.
Killian.
The name echoed in my mind like a prayer and a curse all at once. I could still feel him. Not in the way I used to, not the magnetic tug of the mate bond—but somet
