Page 22 of Shattered and Saved

“You specifically said members of Azure Smoke Pack, which excludes me,” he observed with a hint of playfulness before his tone became more serious. “Besides, it seems like too intimate a ritual of yours for me to intrude.”

“Well, you might not be an Ashen Wolf,” I said, pointing out the obvious. “But while you’re here, you might as well join us.” As I walked past him, I glanced over my shoulder, a playful grin on my lips. “Let us show you the true meaning of freedom.”

Unceremoniously, I invited Kea to come forth. Her muscles rippled with anticipation as her paws touched the ground, and she honed her claws against the dirt. When she turned around to look at our former mate, I found Columbus already running toward her. He pounced on her, yet she easily ducked, runningahead. The alpha wolf wasted no time to follow her, the two engaging in a carefree game of chase as we joined the rest of the pack.

As we ran together, I couldn’t help but be mesmerized at the regal white wolf. Col stood out among the shades of gray, exuding royalty. He was a beacon of light amidst the shadows; pure, untouched by darkness.

And he is all mine, Kea and I thought in synchrony.

If it weren’t for the thrill coursing through my veins, I might have lingered on the words echoing in my subconscious. But as animal and human spirits blended within me, my wolf and I becoming one, there was no rationality to question my desires - only instinct. Lust. Craving.

Tonight, there was nothing stopping me from surrendering to these raw emotions and letting them take over.

14

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A V R I L

Everything becamemore intense in animal form. As Kea raced freely, I felt the earth pulse beneath her paws and the gentle caress of the wind brushing through her fur, not blowing against us, but moving with us. Each breath filled my lungs with the essence of life, boosting my strength and urging me to surge forward. Always forward.

There was something mystical about sprinting through our sanctuary, especially when celebrating another victory, no matter how small. These lands rejoiced with us, becoming more alive than ever. The energy surrounding me was extraordinary. I wondered if Koen could feel it too.

When my wolf glanced back at the majestic white beast following us, the intense glow in his vibrant green eyes made me believe he could sense everything, even without being one of us. With each powerful stride, he seemed unbound, just like us. I couldn’t help but associate it with the tragedy that had befallen his pack.

Whispering Hills was his home. His family. His purpose. But it was also a heavy weight on his shoulders - a burden he had inherited. Trying to fix his father’s mistakes was like pouring water into a sieve, draining him the harder he tried to clean a stain rooted too deep. Now, for better or worse, he wasunchained from that load. Freed. As he ran after us, it was clear that nothing was holding him back anymore.

It had been a while since I started noticing that perhaps Koen and I truly weren’t as different as I had once believed. The more time we spent together, the more similarities I found. Like the Ashen Wolves, Koen had lost his purpose. Yet he hadn’t lost his will to fight, his drive. Against all odds, he continued to thrive. He was more than a simple survivor.

He was a force of nature.

As Columbus caught up with Kea, she decided to spice it up. A wolfish grin lit up her face, and I saw him squint his eyes, as if he could already anticipate what she would do. In a poof, she shimmered from Col’s right side to his left. As if he could feel her presence, he darted his head in the direction where she reappeared, but she didn’t stay there long. A blink later, she teleported directly in front of him. Then, further ahead, and even further afterward.

Accepting the challenge, the white wolf picked up speed, pushing his muscles past their limits. He couldn’t teleport, but he poured a hundred and ten percent of his power into keeping up with us. The faster he ran, the louder the pounding of his paws against the ground, dirt flying up with every stomp. His pupils should have been dilated from the effort, yet surprisingly, they were constricted - a tiny black spot in the center of his emerald eyes. A sign of his bewitched state. Columbus chased us as if he was a predator chasing after a lamb.

Little did he know, we were the ones leading the hunt, and he was the prey.

The world around us became insignificant. Before I realized it, we had strayed from the rest of the pack, with Kea leading Columbus straight into our trap. When we reached the waterfall, she shimmered, disappearing an instant before she could plunge into the water. Col sank his paws into the ground to halt hismomentum, but by the time he realized our intentions, it was too late.

Reappearing behind him, Kea barely needed to nudge him before he tumbled into the water.

As a drenched Col emerged, my wolf looked down at him, standing proudly by the edge. Defeated, the alpha swam back to the bank. I watched as he placed his paws on solid ground, crawling back up to dry himself.

However, I soon came to realize he was a quick learner. Despite coexisting with Ashen Wolves for less than a week, he was already beginning to understand that he had to be nimble to match us. He was so swift, I never saw what he was planning behind his innocent expression. Before Kea could shroud herself in smoke and vanish, Col lunged upward like a shark, nipping the side of her neck and dragging her into the water with him.

As soon as Kea managed to swim back up, recovering from the surprise, I took control again. Koen shifted back to his human form at the same time. As I stood on my feet, the floor shallow enough for me to reach, I wiped my wet hair off my face to find Koen grinning mischievously.

“That was a dirty move!” I complained.

Raising his eyebrows in amusement, he retorted, “Oh, because you were playing fair?”

“I’m a survivor of mass extinction. I don’t play by the rules,” I shot back, then added playfully, “But I didn’t expect therighteous alphato stoop to my level.”

He stepped closer, the water swirling around our shoulders as if responding to the shifting atmosphere between us. I could feel the bond between me and Koen - not the one that had been broken for five years, but the one we had been carefully rebuilding. There was no divine intervention. No immutable destiny. No irresistible pull of fate. Just two people experiencing something real and ordinary.

That didn’t make the moment any less magical. If anything, in a world where our partners were chosen before we even took our first breaths, it felt rebelliously empowering to choose who I wanted to be with. There was something intoxicating about the forbidden. Something I couldn’t get enough of.

And it appeared he felt the same way.

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