Kaelen's body convulsed beneath me.
The glow on his chest dimmed, but the rune still pulsed, angry and alive.
I pressed my hands against him, my magic seeping into his skin. But it wasn't working not healing, not binding, not doing anything except... burning.
It felt like pouring water into fire and watching it boil away.
I bit back a curse. Not at him. At fate. At the gods. At whatever ancient force thought it was poetic to bind a cursed Alpha to a blood-damned witch.
"Kaelen," I whispered. "Stay with me."
His breathing hitched.
Good.
Still here.
Still fighting.
But the bond wasn't easing. If anything, it was digging deeper, like claws into my soul.
Malric's voice from earlier haunted me.
"Forty nights. Tick, tick."
That wasn't a prophecy.
It was a death sentence.
I tried again. I whispered a grounding chant, one my grandmother taught me to stabilize bloodlines. Maybe the magic didn't have to be grand. Maybe it needed to be old.
"Blood to blood, root to root, awaken the line, silence the root"
Kaelen spasmed.
The rune on his chest flashed white. A whisper hissed through the trees.
I jerked my head up.
No one.
But something was there.
Watching.
I stood, trembling. The moon hung high overhead, red and full a Blood Moon. Of course it would be.
"Ancient ones of my line," I whispered, letting power stir in my bones, "if you see me, speak."
The air dropped.
Frost crept across the dead leaves.
And then a whisper, carried on wind and memory:
"Split blood. Forbidden bond. He will die beneath the wrong moon."
I stilled.
"What moon?" I asked.
"The one that rises before the half-born falls."
Half-born?
The term echoed like thunder in my head. I'd read it before. Once. In a banned grimoire buried under the High Library.
A child born of both bloodlines. A myth. A curse. A salvation.
A danger.
I turned back to Kaelen.
He was shaking. Sweat beaded on his brow, mixing with blood.
He groaned, then whispered something too faint to catch.
"What?"
His lips barely moved. "It's inside me now... burning. Like your fire…"
I dropped back to my knees. "You have to hold on."
His eyes fluttered. "I'm not strong enough."
"Then I'll be strong for both of us."
My fingers hovered above the rune. It looked almost alive. Like it pulsed to its own rhythm not his heartbeat, not mine.
Something else.
Something ancient.
Behind me, a shadow moved.
I turned.
Malric.
Of course.
He leaned against a tree, arms crossed, expression unreadable.
"You called out," he said. "Did the dead answer?"
I stood, fury crackling at my fingertips. "How long have you been watching?"
"Long enough to see your bond try to kill you. Again."
I stepped toward him. "You knew this would happen."
He shrugged. "I had theories. You proved them."
I wanted to blast him to ash. But that would mean letting go of Kaelen and I couldn't.
"What do you know about the half-born?" I asked instead.
His eyes flickered. "So they mentioned it to you. Interesting."
"Don't play games with me."
"Too late for that, darling witch. You chose your mate. Now you get the consequences."
My hands burned red.
Malric laughed and stepped back. "Careful. You might just finish what the curse started."
He vanished before I could strike.
Coward.
I turned back to Kaelen.
His body had gone still again. Not dead. But close.
And the rune?
It was fading.
Which meant so was he.
I breathed in. Out. Pulled myself together.
If Malric knew something, others might too. Scrolls. Prophecies. Forgotten truths.
Somewhere in the High Library, or deeper. Maybe even in the ruins below the Wyrd Caves.
If I was going to save him, I needed to learn what the hell the "half-born" really meant.
And why my ancestors were terrified enough to bury it in whispers.
I bent beside Kaelen again and gently brushed his hair back. He looked peaceful now. Like he was already half-ghost.
"You won't die," I whispered. "I won't let you."
He didn't respond.
Not even a twitch.
I lay my hand over his heart again, searching for the faintest echo of life. Still there. But weakening.
I looked up at the moon.
Time was bleeding.
And every second wasted brought him closer to the end.
I remembered the stories. The old ones. The ones the coven didn't like us reading. The tales of witches who dared to cross lines, who loved across species, and who bore children too powerful to be controlled.
Those children were said to carry the fate of nations.
And every one of them was hunted down.
Erased.
But not all were caught.
One survived.
If the whispers were true, the last half-born was hidden behind runes older than the moon.
And she was the only one who could unwrite the curse.
I stood, suddenly cold despite the fire in my blood.
"I'm going to find her," I said aloud, not to anyone in particular. "Whoever she is. Wherever she is."
A choice.
A promise.
A war waiting to be born.