Page 72 of Fated Wolf's Redemption

There’s something like awe in his voice. It makes my shoulders tense.

“Lina is gone. The gate is closed. The threat is over. For now,” I reply. “You’re not here to congratulate me. Say what you came to say.”

He sighs. “Sophia. The Windriders need you. You saw the fault lines in the old glyph structures. You’ve walked through what none of us ever dared approach. With your power… your bloodline… we could rebuild. Stronger. Wiser.”

I turn. He flinches—not visibly, not for anyone else—but I see it. The way his gaze flicks to the mark at my throat. He stares at me like he can’t quite recognize what I’ve become.

“I’m not coming back,” I say quietly.

“This is your legacy?—”

“No. It was yours. And you tried to protect it by locking it in tradition and half-truths. You taught me how to wield the wind, Father. But you never taught me how to stand against it.” He says nothing. I step closer, my voice steady. “The wind doesn’t lead me anymore. I do.”

My father’s eyes are older than I remember.

“You were never meant to be bound to one place,” he says. “We trained you to walk between the lines. Not burn through them.”

I let the silence stretch between us. Then I smile. “Then it’s good I learned how to burn.”

Lucas appears in the doorway. He doesn’t speak. Just watches—his expression unreadable. But I feel the fury simmering beneath his skin. Not jealousy. Not possessiveness. Just a relentless instinct to protect.

He doesn’t have to. Not this time.

“I choose Nightshade,” I say. “I choose my pack. I choose the man who stood beside me when the mountain tried to swallow us whole.”

“You could be so much more…”

“I am. And it’s not because of what you gave me. It’s because of what I took back.” I nod toward the door. “You can go.”

My father hesitates, then bows. It’s stiff. Formal. A recognition, not a reconciliation. I think that’s all we’ll ever get. Before he steps through the door, he glances at Lucas.

“She wasn’t meant for you,” he says.

Lucas doesn’t blink. “No. She was meant for herself. She just chose me anyway.”

That ends it. My father leaves in silence.

Lucas steps in and closes the door behind him, then walks straight to me. No fanfare. No questions. I reach for his hand.

“Was that hard?” he asks.

“Yes,” I admit. “But not for the reasons he thinks.”

He doesn’t push. Just pulls me into his chest and holds me there. His chin rests on top of my head. My arms circle his waist. We stay like that, breathing together.

The storm is gone outside. But not from us. Never from us.

He kisses the bite at my throat. “We’re still standing.”

I smile into his shirt. “For now.”

He pulls back, looks down at me. “Want to take a walk?”

“In the rain?”

He raises an eyebrow. “Afraid of getting wet?”

I laugh, soft and sharp. “Lead the way.”

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