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Well, one thing is true: the witch and I collided.

And what she can end is the curse, if we get so lucky. But now, I have a more pressing concern: like where the hell Astra went. And if she’s okay. Maybe she depleted her magic and can’t return. Maybe she doesn’t know how.

I grit my teeth and head out the door.

If anything, my wolf will be able to track her better than me.

At the edge of the woods, I shed my clothes and shift. Immediately, that pulse of a bond is strengthened. I let him follow his instincts and hope that it’ll guide me right to her. Argument or no, she can’t do that. She can’t just… disappear on me like that.

He yanks on the bond harder than I ever would’ve. I wince at the sensation that rebounds through our wolf chest. He puts his nose in the air, scenting, then suddenly takes off running.

Do you think the blood witch will have the answers we need? I ask suddenly.

I think it would be wise to assume that she’ll give us information. Whether or not it will lead to the answers we seek, and whether or not that information can be trusted, is another matter.

Awfully wordy for a usually quiet wolf.

I ponder it as we run, but he forces me back into the present. I sense his innate joy at the way his muscles stretch and the wind in his fur. He speeds up, sprinting through the woods with his tongue lolling out. He’s happy to be here, even when worry crowds in.

I absorb it and let it lift my mood.

If nothing else, we get to run.

He skirts the edge of the town, the lights flickering through the trees in the distance. The sounds of human life filter toward us, too.

That witch was the first to call us the Winter Wolf. It wasn’t until almost ten years later, shortly after my twentieth birthday, that I earned the name in earnest.

My wolf snickers.

He likes that memory.

We can reminisce later, I tell him.

He huffs.

Suddenly, pain lances through the bond with Astra. The pain obscures everything else. We stumble and fall, and I can’t stop my shift back to human. I land at the base of a pine tree, naked and sore.

It takes me a moment to focus through the agony. It feels like I’m being ripped from the inside out. I hate that this isn’t the first time I’ve felt it. That this is similar to how I felt when Gage had her.

My heart skips, pounding faster through the pain. Did he grab her again? Did the vampire witch find her?

It abruptly cuts off. The pain. The strength of the bond. It’s all radio silent.

Chapter 29

Astra

One minute I’m in the stairwell of the hotel after an argument with Kian. And the next, I’m surrounded by sunshine. The landscape is craggy and barren, the sun hot on my skin. I stand slowly and spin in a circle, my jaw working. In the distance is a huge city. And farther beyond it, glittering with its perpetual motion, is the ocean.

I’ve never seen the ocean in person before.

I shield my eyes from the sun. I’m not sure exactly what to do. I could try to get back to Kian, I suppose, but part of me relishes the panic he must’ve been feeling. It’s what he deserves after what he said to me.

Well, I hoped he was panicking.

He wants us to reject this bond. It’s completely illogical of me to want to keep it, even though I don’t want to be a wolf. But the connection is something precious, and it deserves safe-keeping.

Doesn’t it?