Page 98 of Protected By Her Mate

I spot my twin holding his wife, Vanessa, in his arms, his gaze anguished as he stares desperately down at her. But Vanessa is alright, isn’t she? She survived; I know she did. I was in a room with her two hours ago.

“Keenan!” I shout, reaching for him, but my hand goes through him.

I stare at my fingers.

“They can’t hear or see you. We’re travellers to this timeline, but we won’t be able to interact with it beyond our task,” Magdalene explains, examining… herself. Or a woman who looks exactly like her. Past Magdalene? “I should have checked my hair before going out in public.” Her gaze strays across the scene and she asks, “Do you know where we are?”

“I think we’ve gone back in time to the night Vanessa died and was resurrected, but why are we here?” I look at my brother’s face, my twin, and I feel his gut-wrenching agony to my soul. I was relieved I missed this. Re-living it with him is brutal.

“Someone here needs the gift of immortality.” Magdalene points at Vanessa where she lay dying in Keenan’s arms. “I saved Vanessa by giving her your immortality, I just didn’t realize it until tonight.”

“If it saves her then of course I give her my immortality.” I never again want to see Keenan the way he is right now.

It isn’t Magdalene who answers, but Destiny, who must’ve followed us here. “Your wish is granted. You may proceed.” Her voice is eerie as it whispers around us on the breeze.

Magdalene takes my hand. “I don’t know how the spell works, but it doesn’t matter. I’ve done it before, which means somewhere inside me I know how.” She looks at me. “Are you ready?”

My eyes are on Keenan and Vanessa as I nod. “I’m ready.”

Magdalene begins chanting beside me in sync with her past self, both of their lips moving at the same time.

A flash of light and the opening of a portal heralds the arrival of… “My God, is that…?”

“Lyra Guardian Witch,” Magdalene confirms. “Fallon’s mate and the witch who cast the original spell.”

Lyra’s fearful gaze touches the faces of those gathered on the mountainside, then flickers to Magdalene and me, widening in surprise. A slight smile curves her lips as she drifts past us.

“Can she see us?” I ask.

“I don’t know,” Magdalene admits. “Magic is nebulous at the best of times.”

I want to talk to Lyra, to find out more about her; this woman who caused such damage to my family. I don’t blame her for cursing us as it was done in self-defense. At the time, Fallon was forcing her into an unwanted mating and her magic was the only thing she had to fight back with. It wasn’t her intent to cause as much damage as she did.

As Magdalene of the past speaks to Lyra, the Magdalene beside me explains, “She’s going to suspend the original spell so the past me can call forth Vanessa’s latent shifter blood, activating the shifter inside her. The missing piece was immortality, and that’s why we’re here.”

“What do I need to do?”

She squeezes my hand. “Hang on to me and I’ll do the work. This might get a little uncomfortable.”

“Whatever it takes, just save Vanessa.” I can no longer bear my brother’s pain and look away from him as the spark of life slips from his beloved.

Closing my eyes against it, I’m forced to hear his roar of pain as it shatters the night. The Magdalene beside me chants in unison with past Magdalene, then they break away from each other and I can only hear what the Magdalene beside me is saying, her words echoing through my head.

“Through ancient paths, this ageless soul did soar yet now he chooses to walk where earthbound hearts explore.

Eternal light, exchanged for fleeting grace, in mortal hands, time's sands find new embrace.

For what is endless life without the kiss, of time's sweet gift, of transient, fleeting bliss?

Immortal soul, into the natural order you go, returned into the breast of another, a deserving recipient, you shall flow.”

The noise around me fades and something bites into my scalp, like fingernails being raked over me. I strike out at my invisible enemy, but Magdalene squeezes my hand. “Don’t worry, it’s just Destiny rummaging around for your immortality.”

Destiny rummaging around inside me? Fuck that. But I don’t have long to contemplate the horrible thought when suddenly I feel as though I’m being lifted. No, not lifted, but like something inside me is departing, freeing itself from my physical body. Like a kind of heaviness floating away, leaving me light as air.

At first, I fear it’s my wolf leaving my body and I struggle against it, but he assures me he’s still nestled inside me, watching the proceedings with interest, but not fear.

Then I hear another voice, a precious voice.I’m with you, my love.

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