Kael's POV
Sera stopped struggling the moment we entered the Void Forest.
That should have relieved me. Instead, it terrified me.
Because I knew what came next. I'd walked this cursed path a thousand times, searching for her. Every single time, the forest showed me my worst nightmare—the night I lost her.
And now it was going to show her what she'd forgotten.
"What is this place?" Sera whispered against my shoulder. Her voice shook. "Why does the air feel wrong?"
"The Void Forest." I adjusted my grip on her, holding her closer. "Magic runs wild here. It shows you what you've lost. What was taken from you."
"I don't understand—"
The whispers started.
Soft at first, like wind through leaves. Then louder. Clearer. Taking shape into words I'd heard a million times in my nightmares.
"Kael? Kael, where are you?"
Sera's voice. Frightened and confused.
She went rigid in my arms. "That's... that's me. But I never—"
"Someone's in our room. Kael, wake up!"
"No! Get away from me! KAEL!"
Her screams echoed through the trees—screams from three years ago, preserved by dark magic like a recording that would never stop playing.
"Make it stop," Sera begged, her hands fisting in my shirt. "Please make it stop!"
"I can't." I kept walking, my jaw clenched so hard it hurt. "The forest feeds on loss. On stolen moments. All we can do is keep moving."
More voices joined hers. Mine this time.
"Sera? SERA!"
"Where is she? WHAT DID YOU DO WITH HER?"
"I'll kill every last one of you! BRING HER BACK!"
My roar of rage and grief from that first morning, finding our bed empty and the mate bond suddenly muted. Like someone had built a wall between us.
Sera twisted in my arms, trying to see my face. "You sound... broken."
"I was." Still am, I didn't add. "Losing you destroyed me."
The shadows around us shifted, taking form. I saw figures moving through the trees—memories made solid by the forest's magic.
There. A woman being dragged through the darkness by hooded figures. She fought and screamed, her silver-blonde hair wild around her face.
Sera gasped. "That's me. I'm watching myself be kidnapped."
"Don't look." I tried to turn away, but she grabbed my face, forcing me to stop.
"I need to see." Her violet eyes were wet with tears. "I need to know what happened."
So I stood there, holding my mate while she watched her own abduction play out in shadow-form.
The hooded figures threw shadow-Sera to the ground. One of them pulled back their hood, revealing a face I'd memorized from wanted posters.
"Morgana," I growled. "The dark witch Marcus hired."
Shadow-Morgana placed her hands on shadow-Sera's head. Black magic poured from her fingers, and shadow-Sera screamed—a sound of pure agony that made real-Sera flinch against me.
"Forget him. Forget the bond. Forget who you are."
"NO! I won't forget! I WON'T—"
Shadow-Sera's screams cut off abruptly. She went limp, her eyes blank and empty.
Then Marcus appeared in the memory, smiling down at unconscious shadow-Sera like a hunter over a prize kill.
"Perfect. Take her to Crescent Moon Pack. By the time she wakes up, she'll believe she's always been mine."
Real-Sera made a sound like a wounded animal. "He was there. Marcus was there when they took me."
"He organized the whole thing." Rage burned through my veins, but I kept my voice steady. For her. "Paid Morgana to erase your memories and lock your wolf away. Then convinced you he'd saved you."
"Three years." Her voice broke. "He lied to me for three years."
"And I searched for you for three years." I started walking again, needing to get us out of this nightmare forest before it showed us anything worse. "Every day. Every night. Following false leads and dead ends. Going slowly insane because the bond told me you were alive but I couldn't find you."
More whispers surrounded us. Fragments of memories.
"I love you, Kael. I'll always love you."
"Promise you'll always come back to me."
"You're my home. My safe place. My everything."
Sera's voice, saying things she didn't remember. Promises she'd forgotten making.
She buried her face against my neck, sobbing. "I said those things? To you?"
"Every day." My throat tightened. "You loved me, Sera. Completely. Fearlessly. You chose me when everyone said I was a monster. You saw something in me worth saving."
"I don't remember." Her tears soaked into my shirt. "Why can't I remember?"
"Because Morgana's magic is strong. She didn't just erase your memories—she buried them. Locked them behind walls your mind can't break through alone."
"Then how do I get them back?"
I hesitated. "Tobias—our pack doctor—thinks your healing magic might be able to restore what was taken. But it's dangerous. If you push too hard, the backlash could kill you."
She pulled back to look at me, her eyes red but determined. "So I'm supposed to just... live without knowing? Without remembering what we had?"
"No." I held her gaze. "I'm going to help you remember. Carefully. Safely. Even if it takes years, I'll prove to you that what we had was real."
The trees started to thin. We were almost through.
One last whisper echoed through the forest—my voice, raw with pain:
"I'll find you, little mate. Even if it takes forever. Even if you don't remember me when I do. I'll find you and bring you home."
Sera's eyes widened. "You kept your promise."
"Always." I stepped out of the forest into clear air, and Blackstone Keep rose before us. "I told you I'd find you. And now that I have, nothing will take you from me again."
Rogue wolves lined the fortress walls, their eyes tracking us. When they recognized Sera in my arms, gasps rippled through the crowd.
"The Queen!"
"She's alive!"
"Our Queen came back!"
Sera stiffened. "Why do they keep calling me that?"
"Because that's what you are." I carried her through the gates into the courtyard. Rogues dropped to their knees as we passed. "My mate. My wife. Their Queen."
An old woman reached out with shaking hands, tears streaming down her weathered face. "Thank the gods. Oh, thank the gods you're home."
"I don't know you," Sera whispered, but the woman just smiled through her tears.
"You healed my grandson when he was dying. Saved his life with your magic. You gave hope to all of us."
More rogues crowded closer, all of them looking at Sera like she was a miracle.
"You made us a family," a young man said.
"You showed us we were worth saving," added another.
"You made the King smile again."
Sera looked overwhelmed, her breathing quick and shallow. I felt her panic through the bond and growled at the crowd. "Back off. Give her space."
They scattered immediately.
I carried Sera up the stairs to the royal chambers—our chambers. The room I hadn't been able to sleep in since she disappeared.
I set her down on the bed gently, and she immediately scrambled backward, putting distance between us.
"This is insane," she said, her voice shaking. "All of it. You can't just kidnap me and expect me to believe—"
"I didn't kidnap you." I stayed by the door, giving her space even though every instinct screamed to hold her. "I rescued you. There's a difference."
"You threw me over your shoulder and ran!"
"Because Marcus was going to drug you again!" My control cracked. "Keep you locked in that false life forever! At least here, you have a chance to remember the truth!"
"Or I'm trapped with a man who thinks I'm his wife when I don't even know him!"
The words hit like a physical blow. She was right. To her, I was a stranger. A terrifying stranger who'd stolen her from the only life she remembered.
I took a breath, forcing myself to calm down. "You're right. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have—" I ran a hand through my hair, exhausted. "I've spent three years imagining what I'd do when I found you. None of those scenarios involved you being afraid of me."
Something in her expression softened. Just a fraction.
"I'm not going to hurt you," I continued quietly. "And I'm not going to force you to do anything. But I'm also not letting you go back to Marcus. So we're at an impasse."
"What do you want from me?" she asked.
"Time." I met her eyes. "Give me time to prove what we had was real. To show you the woman you were before they stole you. And if after all that, you still want to leave—" The words tasted like ash. "I'll let you go."
She studied me for a long moment. "You're lying. You'd never let me go."
"No," I admitted. "I wouldn't. But I'd try. For you, I'd try to be better than the monster they made me become."
Before she could respond, someone knocked on the door.
"My King." Damien's voice. "We have a problem."
I opened the door to find my second-in-command looking grim.
"What now?"
"Marcus didn't retreat," Damien said. "He's gathering the Northern Alliance. They're planning to lay siege to Blackstone Keep."
My blood went cold. "When?"
"Three days. Maybe less." Damien's eyes flicked to Sera. "He's calling it a rescue mission. Says you kidnapped an innocent woman and they need to get her back."
"Of course he is." I clenched my fists. "Anything else?"
"Yes." Damien stepped closer, lowering his voice. "There's someone here who says she knows Sera. A red-haired woman. She's been trying to get past the guards, screaming that her best friend is in danger."
Sera shot to her feet. "Red hair? What's her name?"
"Lyra Voss."
The color drained from Sera's face. "I... I know that name. I don't know how, but—"
"She was your best friend," I said. "Before you were taken. She's been searching for you too."
"Let her in." Sera's voice trembled. "Please. If she really knows me—if she can prove what you're saying—"
I nodded to Damien.
Two minutes later, a red-haired woman burst into the room, took one look at Sera, and burst into tears.
"You're alive." Lyra crossed the room in three steps and pulled Sera into a crushing hug. "Oh gods, you're really alive. I thought—we all thought—"
Sera stood frozen in the embrace, her eyes wide and confused.
But when Lyra pulled back, still crying, and said, "Do you remember me? Please tell me you remember me—"
Something in Sera's expression cracked.
"I... I don't remember you," she whispered. "But I feel like I should. Like I'm supposed to."
Lyra's face crumpled. She turned to me, her eyes blazing with fury. "What did they do to her?"
"Erased three years of her life," I said grimly. "Including you. Including me. Including everything that mattered."
Lyra grabbed Sera's hands. "Then we'll make her remember. We'll fix this."
"How?" Sera asked desperately.
Lyra smiled through her tears and pulled out her phone. "I'll show you who you really were. Starting with these."
She held up the screen, and Sera gasped.
Because there, in photo after photo, was proof of the life she'd forgotten.
Sera laughing with Lyra. Sera healing wounded rogues. Sera standing beside me at our wedding, looking at me like I'd hung the moon.
And in every single picture, she looked happy.
Happier than I'd ever seen her look with Marcus.
"That's me," Sera whispered, staring at her own face. "But I don't... I can't..."
Then she saw the last photo. The one taken the day before she was kidnapped.
Her and me, wrapped in each other's arms. Her hand resting over my heart. My lips pressed to her forehead. And written across the bottom in her own handwriting:
"My Kael. My home. My forever."
Sera's legs gave out.
I caught her before she hit the floor, pulling her against my chest as sobs wracked her body.
"I loved you," she cried. "I really loved you, didn't I?"
"More than anything," I whispered into her hair. "And I loved you back. Still do. Always will."
She clung to me, broken and lost and trying so hard to remember.
And through the bond, I felt it—a crack in the walls around her memories.
Small. But there.
She was starting to come back to me.