Of Ashes and Vows

CHAPTER 3

I heard her voice, over my senses repeatedly commanding. “Dream it.”

And so I did.

I stood still, consumed by terror and rage unsure which part of all these experiences was a vision and which was real. She knew I had this power to tap into the astral realm, she knew me very well, she spoke like she knew where my mate was. Her words were like a map and that which I knew to follow. “You should have run, run to the truth, at the end of the city where the fog divides.” That was where I intended to go, through the astral realm.

The night set heavy upon the clouds and the radiance of the moonlight broke the sky and lit the surface of the concrete grounds. It's light cast against tall objects inciting perfected shadows to smear the grounds.

It was that time.

I gazed at myself, laying naked and form, lifeless standing naked in the realm between consciousness and the void. I let the night sky above me swirl with ominous clouds. The wind sent shivers down my spine as I tapped the harmony of the moonlight. I clenched my fists and took a deep breath. Just then did the words break from my lips.

“Dream it.”

I cast my gaze at the ground before me and watched it dissolve. A blinding light enveloped me and what was the first time in many years, the dream…the vision, it was different. The terrors were gone, the curses, memories of my father haunted me no more. It was silent, but dark.

Then, the shift came violently. The darkness exploded into a form of sound and color. I was no longer standing on solid ground but floating in a vast landscape. The air thick with the scent of ozone was what I last perceived and my eyes opened up to something new. There I stood on the fine line of confusion unaware of where I was.

I stood frozen at the end of the fog-choked street, moonlight dripping like melted silver across my skin. My heart hammered against my ribs, each beat screaming one word: Mate!

The old woman's warning slithered through my mind. "Something stands in your way."

I tried to move forward. My body refused. An invisible force wrapped around my limbs, pulling me back like puppet strings.

"What is this place?" My voice sounded too loud in the unnatural silence.

Then the change began.

It started with my hands. Bones cracked and reshaped themselves, fingers curling inward as dark claws punched through my fingertips. I cried out, but the sound morphed into something inhuman as my jaw unhinged with a sickening pop.

Pain radiated through every inch of me. My spine twisted, vertebrae snapping into new alignment. Fire raced under my skin as coarse fur erupted across my body. I fell to all fours, nails scraping against cobblestones as they lengthened into deadly points.

The agony should have been unbearable. Yet beneath it coursed something terrifyingly beautiful. My wolf surged forward, wild and free, howling in triumph after years of confinement. For the first time in my life, I felt whole.

I gathered my powerful hind legs and launched toward the wall of fog.

The sky split open.

Blinding white light struck me like a physical blow. My fur burned away. My newly formed muscles convulsed. A scream tore from my throat, neither human nor wolf but something ancient and broken.

Then darkness.

I woke, gasping on cold stone, human fingers clutching at unmarked skin. The street stood empty. The fog had vanished.

But the scent lingered.

Eucalyptus and storm winds.

Hers!

I opened my eyes once more watching the light dim to realize I had returned to my home. Not being able to see her was one thing, but while I struggled to stand and bond with my flesh, I felt the rot take place. I was dying. The light…it was killing me.

Dark veins slithered down my neck, pulsing beneath my skin like living things. My body moved on its own, muscles jerking, jaw clenched so tight I tasted blood. I was a passenger in my own flesh.

"What is this?" My voice came out strangled. "What's happening to me?"

The moon burned overhead, too bright, too close. I tried to fight whatever force controlled me, but my limbs wouldn't obey. Then the world tilted sideways.

My bedroom melted away.

At the edge of my vision, light exploded. Not just light - understanding. The fog wall loomed closer now, towering over me. Its base churned with pale mist where before there had been only shadow.

And then I saw the hand.

Pale fingers stretched through the fog, reaching for me. My chest seized. I knew that touch without ever feeling it.

Mate…my mate!

I looked down at my own arm. Black tendrils curled beneath my skin, spreading like spilled ink. The cobblestones beneath my feet glowed with bloody words:

“Your union shall provoke a new revolution

One that comes with the fall of the Triad.”

Suddenly, a piercing scream shattered the silence—raw, desperate, and filled with terror.

"CAELAN!"

My name tore through the air just as she was yanked backward, vanishing into the thick, suffocating fog.

I lunged forward, but there was nothing. No sign of her, no shadow, no lingering warmth where she had stood. Just the cold, creeping mist swallowing everything whole.

And then—silence.

The kind that comes before something terrible happens.