"Or me," Beau adds.
"None of you are going." My voice is flat, final. "I'm the only one who knows the terrain. I survived there for six months. I know how the shadows think, how they move. If someone has to go back—" The words taste like ash. "It has to be me."
"Like hell." Maren's grip on my hand turns painful. Fury and terror war in her eyes. "You just got free. You're not?—"
"I won't stay." I turn to face her fully. "Just long enough to anchor the seal. Then I come back. That's how it works."
"You can't guarantee that."
"No." I won't lie to her. "I can't. But I can guarantee what happens if we don't seal it. The shadows will keep coming, more and more, until they consume Redwood Rise. Until they consume everyone in it. Including you."
Her eyes fill with tears. "I just got you."
"And you're keeping me." I pull her close. "I promise you, Maren. I'm coming back. The mate bond will guide me home."
"How long?" she asks. "How long will you be in there?"
"Minutes," Calder says. "The seal should take hold almost immediately once it's anchored on both sides. But those minutes—" He looks at me. "They'll be dangerous."
"Everything about this is dangerous." I look around at my brothers, at the women they've bonded to, at the family I fought so hard to return to. "But we protect what's ours. That's what we do."
"When?" Sawyer asks.
"Now." Calder's expression is stone. "We move now. Gather the clan, prepare the ritual. We seal this tear before the shadow realm makes the decision for us."
My brothers disperse immediately, moving with purpose. Gathering supplies, alerting the other shifters, preparing for what's coming.
Maren stays pressed against me, her face buried in my chest. Terror bleeds through the mate bond, but also fierce love and desperate need to keep me here, safe, away from the darkness that nearly destroyed me.
"I'll be right there with you," she says finally. "At the tear. Helping with the seal."
"Maren—"
"Don't." She looks up at me, and her eyes are fierce. "I'm part of this clan now. Part of this fight. And if you're going back into that hell, then I'm staying as close to you as possible. So the bond can pull you home."
She's right. The mate bond is the strongest anchor I have to this reality. Having her nearby when I go through will make it easier to find my way back.
"Stay with me," I say. "No matter what happens in there, no matter how long it takes—stay with me through the bond. Keep calling me home."
"Always." She rises on her toes and kisses me, pouring everything she can't say into the press of her lips against mine.
When we break apart, the sun is higher in the sky. Morning sliding toward midday. Hours, Calder said. Hours before the shadow realm breaks through completely.
We have time to prepare. Time to gather our strength. Time to say goodbye, just in case. But not much time.
Through the trees, the ley lines pulse erratically, destabilizing with every passing minute. The tear is widening. The shadows are coming, and to stop them, I have to go back. Back to the realm that tried to consume me. Maren's hand tightens in mine, the mate bond blazing between us. It's the only thing that might pull me home again.
CHAPTER 11
MAREN
Being a bear shifter for three hours before facing an interdimensional threat wasn't how I planned to spend my day after bonding.
Yet here I stand in Calder's workshop, watching him sketch complex diagrams on a whiteboard while my entire body hums with energy I don't know how to control. My bear paces restlessly inside me, responding to the tension radiating from every Hayes brother in the room. She wants to transform again, wants to run, wants to fight whatever's threatening our clan.
Our clan. I was human when I arrived in Redwood Rise. Now I'm thinking in terms of territory and clan bonds and threats to my family.
The transformation broke how I see the world. The wood grain on Calder's desk fractures into impossible detail, each ring and knot sharp enough to hurt. Sounds assault me from every direction—Eli's breathing, the scratch of marker on whiteboard, clan members moving through the compound fifty yards away like they're standing beside me.
