To Break a Wolf

Chapter 14: The Healer

Bastian caught Mira before she hit the ground.

One moment she was standing in a blaze of light, trembling and radiant, her eyes wide with complete and utter shock, and the next, she collapsed. Not a sound or any warning. There was just sudden, terrifying silence as her body went slack in his arms.

His knees hit the earth hard, but he barely noticed. Everything narrowed to the woman in his arms.

Mira.

Her skin was too hot, heat rolling off her like a furnace. Her pulse fluttered beneath his fingers, fast and failing, as if it didn’t know how to stay steady anymore. Energy still clung to her, wild and electric, threaded with a force that didn’t belong to just her. At least not entirely. Whatever she’d unleashed, it hadn’t dissipated. It had sunk in.

“Mira,” Bastian rasped, his voice raw. “Stay with me.”

Bastian had no idea what to do.

Mira was dying. That much was clear, and whatever strength he had as Alpha, it was useless against the way she burned in his arms.

He’d expected pain when he severed the mate bond with Selene, expected the ache, the loss, the rupture. What he hadn’t expected was the silence that followed, and then the explosion. A bond crashing into place where another had just torn apart. A connection that wasn’t a choice nor an accident. It felt older than time. Inevitable. Alive.

The true mate bond struck him hard, silent but instantly blinding. The second he’d spoken the words cutting the tie to Selene, a new one had ripped wide open inside him, and Mira had flooded and invaded the space left behind, and now, she was breaking apart.

Her body trembled violently, breathing ragged and too shallow. The heat rolling off her skin was unnaturally feverish and oh, so wild, as if her veins no longer knew how to hold what surged through them.

She didn’t have a wolf. She wasn’t one of them. That was the only thing that had made sense until now because every nerve receptor in him recognized her, and not just his wolf, he did. Bone, blood, and breath. She belonged to him, and if she died before he understood why… before he could ask her who the hell she was… he didn’t know if he’d survive it.

The pack watched in stunned silence as he carried her through the clearing. He heard the whispers, venom-laced and sharp, cutting through the night.

“She’s cursed…”

“She stripped his wolf away.”

“She’s not one of us.”

Ellie. She was the only one who could do something. His eyes scanned his surroundings, searching desperately for the elder, but she was no where in sight.

Her cabin, he had to take Mira there. Somehow, he knew it was Mira’s only chance. He carefully picked Mira’s limb body and broke into a run.

Bastian didn’t break stride. He didn’t look at them. He focused on the only thing that mattered, the woman in his arms and the one person he knew could help save her.

Ellie’s cabin stood at the far edge of their territory, deep in the woods, where even the trees seemed to know not to breathe too loudly. The air changed as he approached, becoming thicker, more charged, and laced with something old, sacred, and respected.

Ellie was waiting outside the door.

She said nothing as he passed her. Simply turned, opened the door, and led him through.

Inside, the space smelled of herbs and earth, the air hazed with candlelight. Strange symbols shimmered faintly across the wooden walls. Everything hummed with quiet, ancient power.

He laid Mira gently on the cot in the center of the room. She didn’t so much as stir. Her breath came in uneven pulls, her skin pale and slick with sweat.

Ellie knelt beside her, fingers moving lightly over Mira’s arms, her brow drawn tight. The moonstone at her throat pulsed with a soft, rhythmic glow.

“She’s burning through herself,” she murmured.

Bastian stiffened. “What does that mean?”

Ellie looked up, her eyes sharper than they had been before. “Her blood is waking.”

His jaw clenched. That wasn’t an answer. But before he could press further, she stood and turned toward the door.

“We need him.”

Bastian frowned. “Who?”

She didn’t reply. Instead, she lifted her chin and called out as if she knew someone was already approaching.

“Liam.”

The words had barely left her mouth when the door creaked open.

A man stepped inside, and the moment he did, the energy in the room calmed somewhat but retained a slight charge.

He was tall, broad-shouldered, with a casual grace that didn’t quite hide the weight he carried. Tousled golden hair, warm eyes that gleamed with amusement even as they flicked straight to Mira, and a faint smile that slipped away the moment he saw her.

“Well,” the stranger murmured, “That’s unfortunate.”

The words snapped every nerve in Bastian’s body to attention.

“Who are you?”

The man ignored him, moving straight to Mira, kneeling at her side as if he’d done it a hundred times before, placing two fingers to the thready pulse in her throat and releasing a slow breath.

“Too fast,” he muttered. “She’s not stable enough.”

Ellie stood beside him, her presence steady, unreadable. “She needs to be grounded.”

Liam sighed. “I know, except that’s not exactly easy.”

Bastian had heard enough. He took a step forward, tension rippling down his spine.

“Answer the damn question.”

Liam finally glanced his way, a slow, almost lazy smirk curling at the edge of his mouth.

“Relax, Alpha. I’m here to help.”

Bastian didn’t so much as blink.

The man sighed dramatically. “Alright, fine. Liam. Healer. Traveler. Brother to the woman you know as the Wise One. Also: charming, brilliant, and slightly underappreciated.”

Bastian was not in the mood.

Liam’s smirk faded. He looked back toward Mira, and when he spoke again, urgency stripped his voice of all humor.

“She needs an Alpha’s mark.”

The words landed hard.

Bastian froze. “What did you say?”

Liam didn’t even flinch. “You heard me.”

Ellie stepped in, her voice gentler but no less firm. “Her blood is too powerful. It’s eating through her. The only way to stabilize it is through the mark of an Alpha.”

His breath caught.

A mark. His Alpha mark.

Everything inside him reeled. He was supposed to mark Selene. That was the plan. To fulfill the legacy, as the elders told them. The tradition burned into his bones. Except his wolf had never reached for Selene. It had never roared, clawed, or demanded. Not as it did for Mira now.

He stared down at Mira, fragile and burning, and undeniably his.

“What happens if she doesn’t get it?” he asked, the words scraping out of his throat.

Liam looked at him, all warmth gone. “She won’t survive the night.”

Silence.

Then a slow, guttural growl built in Bastian’s chest. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. She was a human and had no choice in this, but none of it mattered now. He had no choice. Well, he did, but letting her die was not one he could live with, literally. A bond as powerful as this one would surely kill him, if not instantly, then bit by bit, and perhaps even make him as mad as it did with his father. He couldn’t let that happen, nor would his wolf let his mate die.

He knelt beside her again, brushing sweat-soaked hair from her clammy forehead. She looked as if she was already halfway into the underworld.

“Mira,” he whispered, voice thick with unspoken words. She didn’t move. Didn’t stir a muscle.

His jaw clenched as his wolf growled, restless and insistent beneath his skin.

Ellie and Liam stepped back, saying nothing.

He leaned in, pressing his forehead to hers. “Forgive me,” he breathed, barely audible.

Then he let instinct take over.

His lips brushed the curve of her neck, and the second his teeth broke through delicate skin, Mira’s entire body convulsed.

She arched off the cot with a ragged, guttural scream, so raw it scraped across the walls and punched through Bastian’s chest. Her back bowed, muscles stiffening, her fingers clawing into the blanket beneath her. The scent of blood filled the room, sharp and metallic. But it wasn’t just pain; this was agony. White-hot, soul-splitting agony. Her body had no wolf to buffer the bond. No instincts to surrender to it.

Bastian felt it, all of it.

The pain surged into him, searing up his spine. Her fear. Her fire. Her fight. The bond didn’t settle gently. It crashed. Mira’s scream turned into a ragged, choking gasp, her skin scorching beneath his hands.

He held on, fighting his very nature, knowing this was the only way to save his mate.

Heat roared through him, her power curling tight around his soul, a tether pulled too taut. It tore at him as much as it did her. His wolf snarled, not in triumph now, but in fear. Using force wasn’t how it was supposed to happen.

Then, as if a storm were breaking, her body gave out. Her breath shuddered, then slowed. Her pulse, which had been fluttering like a dying bird, finally steadied.

The bond snapped into place, and she took a steadying breath.

Bastian pulled back, his lips stained red, his mark etched into the soft skin of her neck. The moment their connection locked, Mira’s body fell still, not limp, but anchored. Grounded. The fever broke, the violent trembling stopped, and the color began to return to her cheeks.

She was alive, but Bastian… was not fine. The heat she carried didn’t leave her. It transferred into him.

His chest constricted, breath turning ragged. Inside him, a deep, thunderous pull in the center of his being occurred.

“What…” he gasped, trying to rise. “What’s… happening?”

Ellie and Liam exchanged a look.

Liam exhaled. “Well, that didn’t take long.”

Ellie’s voice was calm, but the undercurrent was firm. “Power seeks a balance.”

Bastian’s knees buckled.

“What does that mean?” he choked out.

Liam met his eyes. “You’re the anchor, Alpha.”

The world tilted. Bastian’s heart roared in his ears. Then, nothing as darkness overtook him.