Page 37 of Fated Wolf's Redemption

The words hang there between us.

"What?"

"I tried. Three times. The first felt wrong. The second... something cracked inside. Like I was being ripped in two."

Panic ripples through me. Lucas is one of the strongest wolves I’ve ever known. If he can’t shift from man to wolf or wolf to man... something is very wrong.

"They did something," he says. "To us. To the air, maybe. Or something in our systems. I feel my wolf, but he’s trapped. Like he’s bound and there’s a wall between us."

I close my eyes. Think. Focus.

I’m a Windrider. We don’t just fight storms. We listen to them. We belong to them. And right now, the wind is still speaking to me—soft, low, like a forgotten current beneath the world.

I press both palms to the wall.

"Sophia? Are you all right? What are you doing?" Lucas asks.

"Listening."

“To what?”

“To the storm.”

He doesn’t argue. Just waits.

The Windwoven bond hums inside me, old and quiet. I call to it—not in words, but in memory. The canyon. The rites. The day the elders placed the storm in my bones. I remember the taste of lightning on my tongue, the feeling of becoming more than blood and muscle.

I push deeper. Past the pain. Past the fear. The metal under my hands thrums. Not much. But enough. A weak point. Not in the wall itself—but in the frequency. A flaw in the design.

"I think I can break it," I whisper.

"You think, or you know?" Lucas’s voice is sharp.

"Does it matter?"

He huffs. "No. Do it."

I inhale sharply, drawing in the tempest with a fierce determination—not with raw power, but with the sheer force of memory and the relentless beat of my pulse that calls the storm. Within me, the bond ignites like wildfire, a deep primal connection, and the wind answers with a ferocious eagerness. It rages through me—swift and precise, eternal, a force both untamed and intimately known.

The sturdy walls stand firm, defiant, but the glass is not so lucky. A fragile hairline fracture races across its surface, a subtle yet glaring sign of impending doom. Another line follows, a chaotic web of cracks spreading like wildfire. The air reverberates with the high-pitched shriek of pressure finally succumbing, the glass bending and straining under the relentless, invisible weight of the storm.

Max howls from the other cell. Lucas slams his hand against his own wall. "Do it again. Harder."

I unleash a primal scream—not born of fear, but as an unstoppable force—and the storm erupts with savage ferocity. Lightning crackles violently in the air, illuminating nothing but chaos, while the wind's relentless howl echoes through the unseen sky. The power of the Windwoven surges through me with the force of a tsunami slamming into jagged cliffs, and the glass around me shatters outward in a dazzling explosion of razor-sharp shards. I collapse to my knees, breathless and quaking, my heart thundering in the aftermath of the untamed power that ripped through my very being.

Lucas is through the wall in seconds, hauling me up.

"Can you walk?"

"Yes."

His grip tightens. "Then run."

Behind us, Max begins to laugh again. "You won’t make it far. He sees you now."

“That’s nice. He can see you too, and you’re coming with us,” I say.

“Sophia…”

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