Page 40 of Fated Wolf's Redemption

Max grunts behind us as he tugs off the oversized hoodie we found in Cain’s bunker. He’s weaker than both of us, but there’s a steel in him that didn’t break under Cain’s experiments. That means something. He strips slower, wincing as he steps out of his pants, one leg stiff with a healing fracture, but he doesn’t stop. Doesn’t complain.

Lucas crouches by the pack and rolls each of our clothes tight, stuffing them in with practiced hands. “Keep close. If you fall behind, I’ll drag your ass the rest of the way.”

He says it to Max, but his eyes sweep over me as well. He means both of us.

The wind picks up, carrying pine and frost through the trees, and my wolf stirs under my skin, restless. Ready.

Lucas steps back, his body already thrumming with power. The mist answers him first, curling low around his feet, streaked with gray and blue. Thunder rolls deep and low as lightning threads through the fog, swallowing him whole in a sudden, electrified surge. When the storm peels away, the man is gone.

In his place stands a massive wolf, broad-shouldered and coal-dark, eyes glowing gold in the moonlight.

I drop to one knee, pressing my palm to the dirt. The wind comes fast this time, as if it’s been waiting. It wraps around me like a command, pulling at my skin, dragging the storm from deep inside my chest. Mist slithers up my arms, silver streaked with violet, and then it breaks with a single bolt of light.

And I am wolf. Silver-coated. Breath steady. Muscles primed.

Max stumbles as the shift takes him—less graceful, more pain—but he lands on all fours, panting, his wolf form lean and marked with old scars. Tired, but still standing.

Lucas lets out one sharp bark. A signal as he picks up the pack with our clothes.

We run.

It takes hours, and every step back toward the lodge feels like dragging fire through my bones, but we make it. Just outside the compound, we shift back, pulling on our clothes. The second we step through the gates, wolves flood the yard—guards, scouts, even some of the Nightshade elite. I see Isabella. I see Kylie. But it’s Ryder who steps forward first.

He takes one look at us—bloodied, bruised, clothes torn, faces drawn tight with the kind of pain that doesn’t fade quickly—and says the last thing I expect.

“Kylie reached out to your father. We need to talk,” Ryder says. His voice is quiet, but sharp enough to cut steel. “All of us.”

Lucas guides Max gently onto the stairs and straightens. His posture is relaxed, but I know that look in his eyes. It's the calm before something dangerous.

“Kylie, can you look after Max?” I ask.

“Take him down to the infirmary. Ask them to make sure he’s okay.”

Kylie nods, and I turn back to Ryder. “Talk about what?”

Ryder doesn't blink. “Everything. Cain. The Deep Below. The mutants. Your wind. My beta. What happens next.”

Behind him, someone closes the lodge door slowly. Just like that, I know. We’re not done, and it’s going to be a long night.

CHAPTER 11

LUCAS

“You look like hell,” Ryder says as I drop into the seat across from him. His tone is flat, but his eyes are tracking everything—my torn shirt, the dried blood at my collar, the subtle tremor in my right knee. I can’t stop it, not yet. Not until I know what the hell is happening to me.

Sophia takes the seat beside me without asking, legs crossed, arms folded. She doesn’t say a word, but her presence is sharp as a blade at my back. Solid. Unflinching.

She came for Cain, but she stayed for me. Whether or not she admits it.

Isabella closes the lodge door behind her and locks it, a subtle click that silences the room. Only four of us are here now—Ryder, Isabella, Sophia, and me. The Nightshade inner circle doesn’t include anyone else tonight. Not with what we’re about to say.

“What the hell happened out there?” Ryder asks.

I meet his gaze. “You’re going to want to sit down for this.”

He’s already sitting. Doesn’t flinch. Just gestures for me to begin.

“We tracked Cain to the ruins near Ash Creek. He’s not just hiding—he’s building. Or experimenting. Possibly both. There was an underground facility beneath the estate, reinforced. Steel, not stone. Hidden chambers with suppressed energy signatures. The whole place was designed to stay off any known magical or elemental grid.”

---