Page 60 of Fated Wolf's Redemption

He doesn’t speak. Doesn’t move. But I feel it—the way his body goes impossibly still. His silence is sharper than shouting. His hands tighten on me, anchoring me.

“We’re too late,” I say. “The anchor’s already been dropped. That gate is tethered to her blood, Lucas. Lina’s made herself part of it. The glyphs—she’s carving them into herself. That’s the final seal.”

Lucas’s breath leaves him in a quick burst, and then he’s moving. He takes the broken blade from my hands, studies it once, and tucks it carefully into the strap of his belt.

“Then we destroy the anchor,” he says.

My vision is still fuzzy around the edges, but his voice cuts through the fog. Steady. Relentless. His fury isn’t loud—it never is—but it’s a force all its own. The kind of fury that makes things obey.

“The glyphs on her body are the ritual,” I tell him. “They’ve tied her into the gate. She’s not opening it. She’s becoming it.”

Lucas hauls me to my feet, one arm braced around my waist. “Then we cut her out.”

The chamber around us answers before I can speak. The walls quake. Glyphs ignite in order—one by one, a clockwise burn lighting up the room in a golden-red spiral. It’s not a trap. It’s an alarm. The gate has recognized us.

Lucas grabs his comm. “Oscar, report.”

The line crackles. Then Oscar’s voice, distorted by static: “Something’s happening. Glyphs on the outer hall just flared. We’re locked in.”

Lucas swears under his breath and clicks over to the next frequency. “Kylie. Max. Report.”

Kylie’s voice comes fast and clipped. “We’re backtracking to your last known position. The glyphs in the tunnel just activated. Some kind of containment net. Max thinks it’s ritual-primed, not electronic.”

Max’s voice cuts in behind hers. “They’re trying to isolate the gate chamber. Keep everything else outside.”

I grab the comm from Lucas. “Then don’t come here. Find the outer runes and disrupt the pattern. We’ll meet you at the central junction once the perimeter glyphs fall.”

A momentary pause, and then Kylie says, “You better still be breathing when we do.”

Lucas is already moving, dragging me with him. The floor underfoot rumbles again, then steadies. But I can feel it—something massive just woke up beneath us. Not a metaphor. Not paranoia. A real, live being and it’s hungry.

As we cross back through the corridor, Lucas’s hand doesn’t leave me. Even when he stops to scan the walls or check the glyphs, his grip stays locked on my wrist, like he’s afraid I’ll vanish if he lets go.

I squeeze his hand once, trying to steady myself.

He glances at me sideways. “You good?”

“No,” I admit, “but I’m not broken. Let’s move.”

We cross the threshold of the altar chamber just as another glyph bursts into flame along the far wall. It’s red-hot, casting long shadows that seem to stretch too far for how narrow the room is.

Lucas stops short. “This isn’t just warding. It’s calling.”

“To her,” I say. “To the gate.”

“No,” he growls. “To us.”

Lucas steps past me with determined intent, plunging into the heart of the altar space. The blood on the floor has turned into a dark, sticky layer, silently recounting the story of a recent, brutal sacrifice. The air is thick with an oppressive fog of raw elemental power, heavy and cloying, much like the acrid smoke that trails in the wake of a devastating lightning strike. Such intense reverberations of power should not linger unless someone has intentionally infused the space with their own essence.

In the center of the shadowy room, beneath the wavering luminescence of ancient glyphs etched into the walls, Lucas points to a jagged line of scorched stone. The charred path snakes across the floor like an ominous, deep wound carved into the earth. I approach it cautiously, lowering myself beside it, my fingers hesitantly skimming its edge. The energy retaliates,a sharp, biting force that slices through me with a chilling familiarity that sends shivers down my spine.

“It’s her work,” I murmur.

Lucas crouches behind me. “You’re sure?”

“Absolutely.”

He leans in, voice low against my ear. “Then this is the last place she stood.”

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