Page 30 of Fated Wolf's Redemption

“We went to see Marjorie,” I say, brushing past him. “You said you wanted answers.”

“I said I wanted us to move together,” he bites out. “Not have you disappear off the map and leave me scrambling when Blackwood comes sniffing around again.”

“I can handle Blackwood.”

He grabs my wrist—not hard, but firm enough to stop me. “It’s not Blackwood I’m worried about. You keep acting like the Windriders are still a solo act, but you’re not. Not anymore.”

Kylie’s already halfway up the steps to the lodge, clearly deciding this is one argument she’s not getting in the middle of. Probably smart.

I meet Lucas’s gaze head-on. “Don’t pull the mate card right now.”

His jaw clenches. “That’s not what I’m doing.”

I lower my voice. “Then stop acting like I’m yours to manage.”

His eyes flick over my face. The air charged between us. He doesn’t release my wrist. Doesn’t step back. “You’re not mine to manage,” he says evenly. “But I’ll be damned if I stand here and watch you get yourself killed because you think needing backup makes you weak.”

We stand there a beat too long, breaths uneven, the air thick with everything we’re not saying.

Finally, I tug my hand free. “Marjorie gave us a name.”

Lucas’s eyes narrow. “Go on.”

“Dr. Everett Cain. Former geneticist. Obsessed with shifters. Hybridization. He’s off-grid, possibly near Ash Creek.”

Lucas straightens. “Ash Creek?” His whole body stills in that predatory way he has when he senses danger—or prey. “That’s practically on the fault line. If he’s doing experiments near there…”

“Then he’s not just playing with biology. He’s tapping into something deeper.”

Lucas mutters a curse under his breath, heading up the stairs to the lodge. “We need to bring this to Ryder. Now.”

But I hesitate, because something else happened on the way back. Something I haven’t told him.

The wind called me. Not literally—not at first. But as soon as we crossed the pass, I felt it coil in my gut like a whisper waiting to unfurl. I’d only ever felt it once before—years ago, during the Rite of Passage, when the elders placed the Windwoven tether into my spirit.

It’s how Windriders reach out across distances, across bloodlines. A sacred bond that only kin or the alpha of the Windriders can invoke… my father.

I excuse myself and step away under the guise of needing air. Once I’m alone near the edge of the training grounds, I drop to my knees and press my palms into the earth. The wind stirs immediately, circling me like it recognizes something in my pulse.

“Show me.”

The wind answers—not in words, but in memory.

I’m suddenly not in the Nightshade territory anymore. I’m back in the canyon where the elders marked my skin with storm-oil and braided the wind into my spine. A flicker of heat pulses against my chest, and I know he’s here—my father.

The air bends, and his voice slips through like smoke over stone.

“You found Cain.”

“I found his name. Marjorie confirmed he was real. And close.”

“Then you need to stop. Now.”

The words hit like a slap. I sit back on my heels, the connection humming in my ears.

“Why? You’ve always taught me to follow the truth wherever it led.”

“Not to the threshold of things better left buried.”

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