Ash's POV
The moment Elara's lips touched mine, my entire world caught fire.
For six months, I'd been burning with the need to kiss her, touch her, claim her as mine. And now she was finally—
Then I felt it. The trap closing around us.
I tore my mouth from hers, spinning to face Caspian. Rage exploded through me so fierce it turned my vision red.
"You planned this," I snarled. My voice came out wrong—half-human, half-wolf growl. "The enforcers. The attack. All of it to force her to—"
"To activate her magic, yes." Caspian looked unbearably smug. "Two years ago, the betrayal ritual didn't steal her power—it simply locked it away with a very specific key." He gestured at me. "A bond forged in desperation and love. Once she accepted her feelings for you, the lock would open."
Elara's hand clutched my arm. "But you said you'd take it when it manifests—"
"Oh, I will." Dark energy crackled around Caspian's fingers. "The ritual I carved into your soul two years ago is still there, dormant, waiting. The moment your full power awakens—and it's awakening right now, I can feel it—it transfers directly to me."
Horror flooded through our bond from Elara's side.
"You used me," she whispered. "You used our kiss to—"
"Don't feel bad. You made it easy." Caspian smiled at me. "And you—you stupid beast—you've been in love with her so long, you couldn't help yourself when she finally gave in."
Protective fury surged through me. I started toward him, shadows pooling at my feet.
"Ash, wait—" Elara grabbed my hand.
But I was beyond reason. This man had destroyed her. Stolen from her. Used her. And now he dared to mock what we felt for each other?
I launched myself at Caspian.
He was ready. Dark magic slammed into me mid-leap, sending me crashing into the wall. Pain exploded through my ribs.
"ASH!" Elara screamed.
The enforcers moved in, surrounding her. I struggled to my feet, but my body wouldn't cooperate. Whatever spell Caspian used had paralyzed my legs.
"Now then." Caspian approached Elara slowly. "Let's complete what we started two years ago, shall we?"
"Stay away from her!" I fought against the paralysis, my body shifting between forms. Human. Wolf. Neither. Both. The pain was excruciating.
"Fascinating," Caspian observed, watching me struggle. "A familiar trapped mid-transformation. You really are an abomination."
"He's more than you'll ever be," Elara said fiercely.
Then I felt it through our bond—her magic was rising. Not slowly. Not gently. It was erupting like a volcano, two years of locked power exploding all at once.
Elara gasped, doubling over. Golden light began pouring from her skin.
"Yes," Caspian breathed. "Just like that."
He raised his hands, and the symbols on his palms blazed bright. Invisible chains shot from him toward Elara, wrapping around the light, around her magic, starting to pull—
NO.
Something primal roared inside me. Not just protective instinct. Something deeper, older, written into the very fabric of what I was.
She was mine. My witch. My partner. My everything.
And I would burn the world before I let him take her again.
The paralysis shattered like glass. I didn't think. Didn't plan. I just moved.
I threw myself between Elara and Caspian.
The chains meant to steal her magic slammed into me instead.
Agony. Pure, white-hot agony as dark magic tried to rip through me. But I was a familiar—I didn't have magic to steal. The spell didn't know what to do with me.
"What are you doing?" Caspian shouted, furious. "Move!"
"No." I planted my feet, shadows exploding around me like wings. Behind me, I felt Elara's magic still rising, wild and uncontrolled. But as long as I stood between them, Caspian couldn't complete the ritual.
"You're killing yourself!" Caspian snarled. "That spell will tear you apart!"
"I know." Blood dripped from my nose. I could feel the dark magic shredding me from the inside. "Worth it."
"Ash, stop!" Elara grabbed my shoulders from behind. "You're going to die!"
"Better than watching him take you again."
"You stupid—" Her voice broke. "I'm not worth this!"
I looked back at her. At this woman I'd loved since she was seven years old. Who'd been my entire world in every form I'd taken.
"You're worth everything," I said simply.
Then the dark magic hit a critical point. My body convulsed. I felt myself starting to tear apart.
But something impossible happened.
Elara's magic—wild, untamed, desperate—slammed into me from behind. Not attacking. Joining. Merging with whatever I was, creating something neither of us had been alone.
The bond between us didn't just strengthen. It ignited.
Power exploded outward in a shockwave so massive it blew out every window in a three-block radius. Enforcers flew backward like leaves. Caspian stumbled, his spell breaking.
And in that moment of chaos, I felt my body finally stabilize. Not stuck between forms anymore. Not human or wolf. But able to shift between them at will, the way familiars were meant to before the Council's restrictions.
I transformed fully human, spinning to catch Elara as she collapsed.
Her eyes glowed pure gold—not wolf-gold like mine, but something ancient and powerful.
"What did we just do?" she whispered.
Before I could answer, the bookshop floor cracked beneath us. No—not cracked. A magical circle was forming, intricate symbols burning themselves into existence.
"Impossible," Caspian breathed, staring at the circle. "That's—that's the True Bonding. It can't activate on its own unless—"
Unless the bond was already complete. Already real.
The Oracle's voice echoed in my memory: A bond deeper than any witch has dared.
"No!" Caspian lunged forward, trying to disrupt the circle.
But it was too late. The ritual was already happening.
Magic swirled around us—Elara's golden light, my shadows, twisting together like DNA strands. I felt our souls reaching for each other, connecting in ways that went beyond familiar bonds, beyond anything the Council had ever documented.
This was partnership. Equality. Love.
The kind of magic that could change everything.
"Stop them!" Caspian screamed at his enforcers.
But as the True Bonding completed, power unlike anything I'd ever felt surged through me. Through us. And I knew with absolute certainty that we could face anything now.
Together.
I pulled Elara to her feet. She looked at me with wonder and fear and something that made my dead heart somehow beat faster.
"Ready?" I asked.
She took my hand. "Always."
We turned to face Caspian and his enforcers as equals.
But then the bookshop doors exploded inward, and someone new stepped through the smoke.
Someone I recognized from Elara's memories of that horrible night.
Lord Aldric Thornwood. Her father.
He took in the scene—the magical circle, our joined hands, the power radiating from us.
"Elara," he said quietly. "We need to talk."
And the way he said it—urgent, almost desperate—made my instincts scream.
This wasn't an attack.
This was something worse.
Elara's hand tightened on mine. "You lost the right to talk to me two years ago."
"I know." Her father's voice cracked. "And I'll spend the rest of my life regretting it. But right now, you're in more danger than you know. The demons I made the deal with? They're not coming for you anymore."
He looked straight at me, and terror filled his eyes.
"They're coming for him."