A Warrior’s Fate (Wolves of Morai #1)

Chapter 49

CHAPTER 49

KAI

B arely anyone knew who Isla was, but that hadn’t stopped Kai from ordering every Goddess-damn person in the arena, everyone in the city and over the radio who could hear, to look for her. It wasn’t long before the truth spread. That the female warrior they were so frantically searching for was the alpha’s mate—his fated, their queen. He didn’t mention that he’d felt something off with their bond, but it was obvious by his demeanor that something had happened. Something bad.

The city was on lockdown, Ezekiel was watched by the guard, and Kai was alone as he sought Isla’s scent. Sebastian’s, too. All his family had scattered, either scouring within the arena or somewhere outside. Even her father had tracked Kai down for confirmation, and all it had taken was one look at him for the Imperial Beta to run off searching for his children, too.

Every moment that ticked by, every turn without a trace, was too much.

She couldn’t be—

No. Kai wouldn’t even entertain the thought, even with the void. Maybe this was what made those who lost their mates fall into madness. This pit that grew with every breath, every heartbeat, taken in a world bare of that connection. A world he wanted no part of—a duller world, quieter, colder.

He should’ve had protection for her, should’ve sent her with more guards. Maybe they should’ve told people, the whole pack—but that could’ve put her more at risk. Right?

As he was about to exit the arena and head into the city, the Imperial Heir, his wolf’s eyes the hue of a flame, cut into Kai’s path.

Before he could growl at Adrien to move, a panting woman dressed in a uniform of the Imperial Guard came up behind him. Her brown cheeks were flushed red, and her dark spirally hair flew in all directions. She’d been running for a while it seemed, trying to keep up with Adrien’s wolf.

“She can help,” he said, giving Kai an answer to the question he hadn’t spoken.

This was Cassius’s witch, the one Isla had told him the Imperial Alpha was bringing.

What was her name? Raana?

Despite Adrien’s claim, Kai couldn’t hold back a snarl. He was done with witches. Done with magic.

The Heir returned the gesture with equal ferocity, crossing a paw in front of the witch, shielding her enough to make Kai let up from the shock. Isla hadn’t directly said it, but he figured from her words that the Heir had a fondness for the woman. But he didn’t expect this.

Though not waifish, she was small, at least by their standards, barely reaching the top of the Heir’s shoulder and disappearing behind his body. Kai couldn’t scent anything off with her. From that enchantment. The witch hadn’t used any of her magic and broken it.

“Adrien,” she whispered with a harshness Kai was surprised the Heir let pass. She had an accent to her tone. Adrien didn’t remove his eyes from Kai as he stepped back, exposing her completely. Raana was bold or knew nothing of protocol when she looked Kai dead in the eye. “Let me help. I think I can find her, but I need to go somewhere where no one will…” She trailed off, and he knew what she meant.

Maybe he could accept magic this one last time.

He racked his brain for a spot where scent wouldn’t carry and then led them to one path he and Isla had trekked. Where his mate had remarked there was the stronger brine of the river water, where the air had become thick with the brackish scent, the ground muddy. It was an abandoned section of the arena’s underbelly. With Raana throwing an arm over her nose as they descended further into it, he knew he’d made the right choice.

It became dark quickly, only faint, intermittent crystal light and wall lamps for their path, and though Kai knew she could barely see, Raana didn’t protest.

When they stopped at a section with some brighter light that was a decent distance from the masses, she looked at him. “I need you in your human form,” she said and then caught onto his question before he asked. “Even when you’re human, it’s not easy to do anything to a wolf. Like this, it would be hopeless.”

Kai would only let himself think about it briefly. Too much time had gone by already.

His arms and legs were unfamiliar to him after he shifted back, worse than they had been after the Hunt. He felt an all-new kind of off-kilter without Isla there now, and he’d been so distracted by his own dizziness he nearly missed the new flush over Raana’s face. The blush only intensified after a glance back at the Heir, now also on his two feet.

She shook her head, muttering something to some spirits, before stepping towards Kai with an outstretched hand, palm facing him. “May I?”

Kai didn’t know what she was planning but nodded. Her cold touch went to his chest, over his heart. “What are you doing?”

Raana met his eyes, hers a dark, rich brown. “You two are a part of each other. I’m using you to find the piece you’re missing. That she has.”

Hope in the form of Isla’s light he held sparked. “It will work?”

“It should. If she’s still—”

“Don’t say it.”

Raana took a long breath and closed her eyes. Kai glanced at Adrien, who was watching closely, before doing the same.

He felt something like tiny pinpricks over his skin, spanning from that spot where the witch’s hand lay. Spreading and retreating. Spreading, retreating. She was mumbling something under her breath in a language he didn’t understand.

“You need to relax,” she interrupted her chant. “I can’t get through.”

Kai’s eyes snapped open. “Relax? ”

Raana’s remained closed, her brows pinched in focus as if she had a hold she didn’t want to lose. “Think of something else. Go somewhere else. Think of her.”

Think of her— he’d done nothing but that for months.

Kai swallowed before shutting his eyes again. He forced his shoulders to ease and focused on that light again, traced it back to the memories it held.

“The moon. Beautiful.”

“Yes, it is.”

“Are you from Callisto?”

“No…Io.”

The feeling of magic spread further over his body. From his chest, over his shoulders, down his back, up his neck, but a piece of him fought against it. Only a piece. But the other…

“You did not mesmerize me.”

“The pounding of your heart says otherwise.”

The other part of him, the void, seemed to like the magic and called him to embrace it.

To take it.

Kai battled that piece away, focusing on Isla. Only Isla.

“I wasn’t sure what to expect when I realized my mate was at that dinner, but you definitely weren’t it.”

“Sorry to disappoint you.”

“You didn’t.”

Not at all.

She’d woken him up that night on the terrace like a new morning—a new beginning—and stoked a flame, encouraged it to burn, just enough, when it was ready to simply go out. Finally, with her, he could breathe. He felt hopeful. Saw a future.

“I love you.”

Words he never thought he’d hear her say. He had hoped, hoped that she could love him, hoped that she’d stay, but he never thought she would.

Kai pictured Isla sitting beside him at the tavern’s bar. When he realized he fell more and more in love with her every second they spent together. Remembered the image of her. Not the tear-stained face he’d walked away from, but the one from last night. That glowed in the firelight as she smiled at him, as she moved on him. Pressed against his chest, her heat enveloping, her enveloping all his senses. When all he knew was a base need and the desire to worship her with everything he had, everything he was. Beautiful and powerful and yet, soft. Her skin, her curves, her lips. Her.

That void beckoned again, that well of power, as Kai’s mind became clouded by shadows, and he suddenly felt like he was—everywhere. The light, her light, glowed and expanded out like a traced line through walls and barriers. He didn’t push back against any of the magic. He pulled at it greedily as the void grew and all became clearer, as shadow swirled and eventually parted to—

Isla.

Only her face, her closed eyes. There was blood.

Kai nearly fell over when Raana ripped her hand away, them both panting. She braced herself against the wall, brushing off Adrien’s assist, and looked Kai up and down with wide eyes,though she didn’t speak. Because she didn’t know what to say or because Kai had interrupted before she could. “Was that real? Where was that? Where is she?”

“I don’t know where that is, but I think I can get you close,” Raana said with hesitance, fear.

His fists were clenched at his sides, his wolf an unsteady presence beneath his skin. Suffering, angry, and ready to do whatever was needed to get Isla back.

“How?”

“I’ll need you to let down your defenses entirely. You need to completely yield to me.”

Kai ground his teeth, nostrils flaring as if that were the craziest thing he’d ever heard.

“I cannot have you fight me on this. So, if you want to get to her fast and alive, you need to trust me.”

Kai looked to Adrien, who nodded like he’d gone through whatever the reason was for Raana’s outstretched hand. He’d yielded to the witch and seemed fine—and he would never jeopardize Isla. This was Kai’s only chance.

So, he took Raana’s hand but watched her this time, even when her eyes had closed. Kisses of cold traveled up his body, and he glanced down to find darkness like its own entity surrounding him. Cloaking him.

“You need to yield,” Raana said firmly, her voice strained. The grip she had on him tightened, and instinct howled for him to rip away, to figure out another method of finding Isla, but this was it.

Kai let go, embraced whatever was happening, and everything dropped out from under him. All he knew was the feeling he likened to being underwater and a swirling obsidian sea of nothing and everything, everywhere. Of bone-chilling cold but comfort. Familiar.

And it was only a blink.

Kai was unsteady on his feet when they met cold stones. His mind spun as he coughed and observed crystals embedded in walls and wooden markers. It took little for him to deduce from what he’d been told that they were in the tunnels beneath the pack. Kai wouldn’t bother asking Raana how she did it. He didn’t care. Not now.

Raana had said she could get him close, and Isla wasn’t here in front of him. The tunnel spanned in two directions.

Bringing his wolf to the surface to hone his senses, he listened to the crowd moving above them, frantic footsteps and yelling. There was the moving of metal, like a gate. They were beneath the arena. This was where Isla had been.

He sought her scent and tried to find that thread of light, a shred of their bond, but it was nothing but a flickering ember. What had happened to her?

But then—there. A familiar scent, a rise of lilies but twined with something metallic, putrid.

He ran left.

Raana made some kind of sound before her footsteps echoed behind him. They faded into nothing. Even without his wolf, he was faster.

And then he found her.Found Sebastian, too, unconscious and slumped against a wall a few feet away. Breathing, his lumerosi emitting the softest glow, likely deep in sleep as he healed.

It was Isla’s name Kai shouted as both relief and disbelief washed over him. Before dread and grief overtook them.

He skidded to a stop at her body on the tunnel’s stone floor. Her skin was pallor, covered in slow-healing scrapes and bruises and caked in blood. Not her own. Not one he recognized. It was a mixture of drying crimson and then something even darker,like bak.

The smell.

It was bak.

They’d been down here. She’d fought them.

Why the fuck didn’t she say anything?

Why was that even a question—he knew the reason.

Kai dropped to his knees, not recognizing the black cloak wrapped around her. He looked up at Sebastian, who’d had a covering wrapped around him to keep warm, too. Both looked entirely bare beneath. Kai pulled her head into his lap, finding her heavier than he’d expected as he cradled her. She was completely out, and her skin when he went to touch her cheek was freezing.

“Isla.” His voice was just above a whisper but echoed through the cavern.

This was a nightmare.

He put a hand over her chest, even though he could hear it—her heart was beating but barely. The same sluggish cadence of her breathing.

“Isla,” he chanced again, brushing blood-crusted hair from her face. He needed her to open her eyes, needed to hear her voice. “Isla, wake up.” He dug deep for that light again, that thread, but it was dimming, nearly gone. Fuck. “Come on, I’m not doing this without you.”

He lifted his head, taking in what was around them. He had no idea where they were or how to get either of them out.

He heard footsteps and panting, followed by, “Oh, no.”

Kai turned to Raana, and with the movement came the jostling of tears he hadn’t realized were forming. “Can you get us out of here?”

Raana frowned. “I can barely travel with one person. I could never do all of us.”

“Then take her. He seems stable. I can carry him.”

“It’s not an easy trek. I can’t guarantee she’ll survive it.”

“What can you do?” Kai snapped, and Isla’s breath caught, becoming shallower. He lowered his head in an apology. “She’s dying.” The word gutted him. “And there’s nothing I can do. And I can’t…I can’t lose her. None of us can lose her, so if there’s something you can do. A spell, a potion, or whatever, I need you to do it. Take whatever you need from me. Any of my power, all of it. Just save her.”

Kai’s chest felt heavy, his breath hampering as if he could feel Eternity over his shoulder, ready not to take him away as he’d wondered this morning, but her.

“My mother’s a healer,” Raana began quietly, and Kai turned to her again. “And I know…something, but my magic is different. I don’t know if it’ll work. If I’ll hurt her or hurt you.”

Hurt him?

He didn’t ask. He didn’t care. “Please.”

Raana gave a firm nod and went to kneel at Isla’s other side. “Whatever you do, whatever you feel, don’t let her go. Focus on that piece of her. You’re her anchor. If she starts to pull away—just—just tell me.” She hesitated before removing the ring from her finger. A hiss passed her lips, and Kai felt something in the air shift, a new scent emerging and energy beating and twining with the world around them.

As she steeled herself, he inspected the metal. Iron.

The pieces came together oddly hard and fast, and he lifted his head, examining Raana’s face, her ears. It couldn’t have been possible.

“Why is your magic different? ”

Raana stiffened and met his eyes briefly. There was something different about hers now, brighter. She looked down and seemed to debate whether she should share. “I have fae blood. From my father’s side.”

Kai jerked back, though something deep inside him had already felt that answer coming.

Even after the torment the mortals had endured under the domination of the fae, even after they thought they’d been free from them since they’d been locked away a millennium ago after the Realm’s War, their magic still lingered here. Lived within people. As if they’d never truly left and were simply biding their unending time.

As if she could see Kai’s train of thought, feel the weight of history, Raana drew her hands back. Hurt crossed her face. “Do you still want me to—”

“Do it.”

There was no other option. Isla would die .

Raana nodded before tying back her hair. She pulled at the chain around her neck, settling a smooth, opalescent crystal over her chest. As she clutched it tightly in her hand, she muttered something in that foreign tongue, and then her eyes closed as her palms hovered an inch from Isla’s body. “I’m starting. Don’t let go.”

There was a near-pleading part of her voice that also said, don’t let me kill her.

The air cooled and pulsed around them, and Kai took hold of Isla’s hand. As Raana murmured, darkness seemed to gather, encroaching on them, circling them. The shadows responded to her, danced with her, and Kai’s thoughts briefly wandered to the scarce amount he’d ever learned of the forsaken fae courts.

His heart was a steady drumming, calling Isla’s to beat in time, and he tightened his hold on her as he pulled at whatever shred of their bond was left, what he could forge.

For a moment, he thought he felt a warmth, that glimmer of light, but the air became sharp. The light fell away.

“Shit.”

Kai snapped his head up. Raana still had her eyes closed, still focusing. Sweat beaded on her brow. “What happened?”

“Don’t let her go,” she gritted. The shadows began pulling up Isla’s body, her lower half disappearing in time with when Raana’s hands, her forearms, starting from the tips of her fingers, became piercing white light that morphed into the darkest black at her elbows. Kai squinted as the air became hollow. He had a sinking feeling Raana hadn’t wanted to push this far as she flickered between becoming something else entirely.

Exactly how much fae blood did she have?

Darkness like webs crawled up her skin, consuming her. This wasn’t the magic of witches. This was something greater. And that part of him, that power, responded to it. Rose not to fight but to acknowledge, to greet. Kai blinked at her before feeling a pull.

He looked down, and through the darkness, Isla’s cuts healed, and her skin warmed. Yet still, she was fading. Something was happening that he couldn’t see.

“Stop.” He reached out to Raana. Her skin was so cold it burned, and the touch sent a chill down to what felt like his soul. He threw a wall up to fight it away. “You need to stop. ”

He was about to lunge at her when everything fell. Darkness collapsed and evaporated like a cloud of smoke, tendrils snaking away but not far as if waiting for when she was ready to call upon them again. Raana blanched, falling forward and bracing herself on her hands as sweat poured from her face, mixing with what seemed to be tears. She shuddered, swallowing hard as if to keep down bile. She met Kai’s concerned stare. “I can’t go anymore,” she panted and flicked her gaze to Isla. For Kai to check, to see.

He looked down, brushing his hand over her cheek. There was color to her face, and her heartbeat was slow but becoming faster. Faster.

“Isla,” he called, not broken but hopeful. And though she did not answer—

She opened her eyes.