Chapter 186
“Is she here? The sorceress, I mean.” I glanced around the clearing, seeing nothing but trees and shadows.
“Yeah, come with me.” He put his shirt back on and led me deeper into the forest, following a path visible only to his enhanced
senses.
We reached a small hut nestled among ancient trees, its windows glowing with a strange, greenish light. Kieran knocked three times, and the door swung open without anyone visibly operating it
Inside, the air was thick with the scent of herbs and something else something primal and unsettling. A woman sat by a small fire in the center of the room, her age impossible to determine. She might have been thirty or three hundred; her face seemed to shift in the flickering light, never quite settling into one configuration.
“My services are not cheap; pay up,” she said without preamble, her voice like dry leaves rustling.
I reached into my pocket, producing the velvet pouch. The jewelry inside clinked softly as I placed it before her.
She ignored it, her eyes fixed on me with an intensity that made my skin crawl. “The Banished Queen,” she said, the title making me
flinch.
“I know what you came here for; I see it in your eyes; you are in search of a gift never freely given to you; you are here because you want to fight fate, and could that be impossible?” Her voice had taken on a hypnotic rhythm.
She finally glanced at the pouch, opening it to examine the contents. A slow smile spread across her face. “This is payment enough.
Without warning, she reached out and snatched a strand of my hair, adding it to the payment. I winced but didn’t protest.
“You,” she pointed at me. “Come.”
I stepped forward, my heart hammering against my ribs.
“You do know what you are about to do,” she said, not a question but a statement.
“Your wolf could be overcome, but you will be powerful. This is what you want.” Again, not a question.
I nodded anyway. “Yes.”
“Your arm, now.” She extended her hand, and I rolled up my sleeve, offering her my bare arm.
She took a knife from her belt, its blade gleaming oddly in the firelight. With one swift movement, she drew it across my skin, opening a shallow cut that immediately welled with blood.
“Do what you must,” she said to Kieran, who had moved to stand beside me.
He looked at me one last time, his expression apologetic. “I’m sorry, he whispered.
Then he shifted–not fully to wolf form, but partially, his face elongating, teeth sharpening into fangs. He took my bleeding arm in his hands and, with a swift movement, bit down hard where the sorceress had cut.
Pain exploded through me, not just from the bite but from something else–something in his saliva or blood that burned like acid in my veins. I tried to pull away, but the sorceress held me in place with surprising strength.
Now,” she commanded, and Kieran bit down harder, the pain intensifying until my vision blurred.
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Chapter 186.
Something was wrong. This wasn’t just pain–this was something male, something deeper. It felt as if my very cells were being torn apart and reconstructed. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think through the agony.
The room spun around me as I collapsed, Kieran’s arms catching me before I hit the floor. I heard voices–Kieran’s, alarmed; the sorceress’s, commanding–but couldn’t make out the words through the roaring in my ears.
This was death. It had to be. No one could survive this level of pain
As darkness claimed me, I had one last coherent thought: I’d made terrible mistake, and I would never see my mother again.
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