I looked up and watched the sky split apart. Lightning tore through the clouds and surged straight down into my body.
A power unlike anything I’d ever felt before roared through my veins, wild and untamed, like a storm given flesh.
My stomach twisted, my chest burned as though fire and thunder had been poured into me, and my heartbeat pounded in sync with the lightning cracking above.
The force of the lightning exploded outward, throwing Finn and everyone nearby into the air. The ground trembled beneath my feet, stones cracking as a shockwave rippled. Dust and debris whirled in every direction.
Below the dais, the crowd screamed, shielding their eyes from the blinding light, then fell silent as the impact of the power pressed down on them, forcing them to their knees.
I stood slowly. When I lifted my hands, arcs of lightning curled across my skin, wrapping around my fingers in mesmerizing patterns. They didn’t hurt, they crawled along my arms like living threads of light.
What was happening to me?
That lightning strike should have killed me. No one could survive a hit like that. And yet, I wasn’t only alive. I felt awake. More alive than I had ever been.
Then I felt it, my bond with Leika. It pulsed through me. Stronger than ever before, as if she were waiting just beneath my skin, ready to break free with a single thought.
"What did you do?" Finn snarled from several feet away, his golden eyes blazing as his wolf stirred beneath his skin. His voice was laced with both fury and fear.
I didn’t know what had just happened, but I wasn’t going to waste the chance it gave me.
’Leika,’ I called, and the power at my fingertips trembled, wild and unrestrained, begging to be released.
In the next heartbeat, my body began to change. The energy inside me surged, too much to contain, and it burst outward in a wave of light and heat. My wolf broke free, her form spilling from within me, wrapped in the faint, shimmering glow of lightning.
We became one. The air hummed as the power surrounded us, running along our fur like threads of silver fire. It wasn’t violent or harsh. It was alive, steady, pulsing with the same rhythm as our heartbeat. The light wrapped around our body like a second skin, tracing our shape as if the moon itself was protecting us.
I stood in the center of the dais. My wolf and I, one being, one heartbeat.
Finn’s expression shifted from rage to disbelief.
His eyes widened, his face drained of color, and for the first time, he looked afraid.
When I caught my reflection in his eyes, I understood why.
My wolf was no longer the soft white creature she once was. She shimmered with light, her fur glowing silver, her eyes bright as twin moons.
The Celestial Wolf.
It was exactly as the old sages had described in their tales: silver light incarnate, the mark of divine power reborn.
"She... she is the Celestial Wolf!" someone screamed. "The Celestial Wolf has awakened in the body of this girl!"
The people didn’t seem to know what to do. Not even Finn. How could they? The very girl they had just condemned as a traitor now stood before them as the Celestial Wolf, the being of legend they worshipped in myths and stories.
I was the traitor they loathed... and now they couldn’t comprehend what they were seeing.
A glowing silver wolf with silver eyes, something that was supposed to exist only in myth, was standing before them.
"She can summon lightning! That means she really is the Celestial Wolf!" someone shouted from the crowd.
The power of lightning was said to belong only to the Celestial Wolf, a divine gift never seen before.
I could hardly believe it myself. I didn’t understand what was happening. How it was happening.
"How is this... possible?" Finn muttered, stumbling back a few steps, his voice trembling with disbelief.
I looked down from the dais. A sea of faces stared up at me. Wide-eyed, slack-jawed, and silent. Then, one man in the front dropped to his knees and bowed deeply.
"I welcome the Celestial Wolf!" he shouted, voice shaking with reverence.
Soon, others followed. One by one, they fell to their knees until nearly everyone was kneeling.
Their faces were caught between awe and terror at seeing a legend made flesh, and fear for the sin they had committed in wishing for the Celestial Wolf’s death.
While the crowd bowed, Finn remained frozen a few steps away, his expression twisted between fear and denial.
Then, a scent reached me. Strong, familiar, intoxicating. It rolled through the air sharp with dominance yet warm enough to make my chest tighten.
My breath hitched before I even realized why. I would know that scent anywhere.
I lifted my gaze beyond the kneeling masses. From the far edge of the square, where the mist and dust still lingered from the lightning’s wake, shadows began to move.
And then he appeared.
A massive black wolf stepped forward, his fur swallowing the light around him.
His crimson eyes glowed faintly, twin embers cutting through the haze, and when they locked onto mine, I felt the bond between us pulsing violently, thrumming in my veins.
It screamed through my blood, undeniable and fierce. His scent wrapped around me like fire and thunder, stirring emotions too raw to name.
I hadn’t felt it this strongly before, but now, the bond sang between us, alive and powerful.
He is mine.
Rion’s low growl of satisfaction echoed inside my mind as our eyes met. He knew I was claiming him, and through the bond, I could feel his answer. He was elated, burning with the same desire. He wanted to mark me, to make me his completely.
But he didn’t move closer. He only stared at me from across the chaos, power radiating from him.
"Complete what you started, love," he whispered sweetly in my mind.