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Astra escaped. I feared as much, but I didn’t expect her to have help. Another witch.

I hunted the witch’s car until she got moving faster than even I could sustain, and I had to turn back for my bike. I cursed myself out the entire way back. Then, shifted back into my human form, I raced out of town on my bike, chasing her wake.

I made a mistake and continued north—exactly the route the witch wanted me to take, I think, until I realized there was no sign of them. I retraced my steps while my anger stoked hotter and hotter.

Following Astra was hard to explain. Harder to reason. The tug in my chest guided my efforts, making sure I took the right turns. All I had to do was trust my instinct.

Instinct is a fickle thing. Over the years, I’ve had to rely on it and ignore it in equal measure—but undoubtedly, things always go better when I give in and listen to it. Like finding Astra in the first place, my gaze drawn to her like a magnet. Fighting demons and witch covens alike. Trying to find the Seer.

Ah, well, there was too much planning with the Seer. She probably saw us coming from miles away. But did she see the demons?

My wolf won’t stop whining. He thinks we pushed her away on purpose, that it’s my fault the witch got to her. And while that may be true, I also know that he would’ve made things a lot worse if I gave in to his instinct. The one that tells him to bite her, to turn her.

Imagine that? A wolf-witch hybrid?

My pack would never forgive me. My betas might stay loyal, but I’d face more challenges than any other alpha. Being mated to Astra the only way I could, with her as a wolf, would result in both of our deaths.

That doesn’t stop me from trying to find her.

I’m on the verge of losing hope, going on nothing but tracking the smell of fumes from the witch’s car, when I feel it.

An intentional pull.

It’s faint, but exactly how it felt after Astra vanished out from under my cousin. When she called to me on the edge of consciousness, and I followed the sensation directly to her. She was calling for help. She was calling for me.

I didn’t tell her that. I hated it at the time. I hated that my wolf had tied us together, that he started the mate bond process, that I could feel Astra in my chest. She’s closer than I hold my pack, even. And every instinct that I keep shunning wants more from her. More from the bond. But right now, I’m grateful for the small piece of it that I do have.

She seemed confused about how I found her, and I wasn’t going to reveal it. She doesn’t need to know the way of packs and mate bonds. Anything I tell her, she could use against us.

But then it comes again, and I give in to it. I leave my bike on the side of the road and shift outside of a town on the edge of a cluster of mountains. Besides the town, there’s nothing around for miles on end.

If a witch was going to hide anywhere, it may as well be here.

My wolf form feels her bond even more strongly. He guides us down a series of streets, constantly trying to catch her scent, until we reach a quiet neighborhood. The houses are far apart, set for privacy, but no one is outside.

Searing pain burns through me, and I suddenly shift back. Viciously, like my wolf is ripped away from me. My knees hit the gravel a second before my palms, the bite of pain nothing compared to the agony that suddenly echoes in my chest.

The intensity is too great. It’s wave after wave of assault on the mate bond, and I drag my gaze up to the house.

Maybe she was running to them—to destroy the bond. Maybe I didn’t give her enough credit, and she did recognize it for what it is. And now she wants to burn it out of her?

That will destroy us both.

But then I hear her scream from within the house. It’s guttural. Not of pain, but of fury.

We rise to meet it.

I can’t control the shift again. My wolf just bursts out of me, my willpower a thing of the past. My bones snap, and we pant with the renewed ache of it.

Her scream gets louder, notes of pain sliding in amongst her anger.

The mate bond, our fragile start of it, is unraveling.

No, it’s being torn out of her. I’ve heard stories of this happening, but not in a long, long time.

I lurch toward the house. There are too many cars parked out front—the whole fucking coven must be inside.

It’s the worst pain I’ve felt.