Chapter 21 · Blood SOS

The bond screamed and I was already running.

I didn't decide. My legs just moved. One second I was staring at Cain's blood smeared on stone, the next I was halfway down the ridge with gravel tearing up my palms and the wolf clawing at my ribs so hard I thought she'd split me open from the inside. The bond wasn't words. It was white noise and iron and Cain's voice shredded raw, and it dragged me east like a fishhook through my sternum.

I couldn't afford this. I couldn't afford him. Three years I kept my head down, worked graveyard shifts, swallowed the wolf every full moon with my teeth locked and my nails dug into my thighs until I bled. Three years I stayed small and I stayed human and I stayed alive. Then Cain Locke showed up and bound me to him like I was pack property again, like I didn't spend every night since exile learning how to not need anyone. And now he was dying and the bond wouldn't let me walk away.

Fine. I'd get him out. Then I'd leave. Contract's void if one party's dead anyway.

The forest thickened past the ridge.