The attack comes without warning.
She materializes from shadow itself—an older woman with steel-gray hair and obsidian eyes. Power radiates from her in waves that make my newly awakened abilities recoil.
"Hello, little princess," she says, smile sharp as blades. "I've been waiting such a very long time."
"Who are you?" But I already know. The witch who stole me.
"Sage. Though you wouldn't remember—you were hours old when I took you from that nursery."
Nathan and Luca flank me immediately, but Sage just laughs like breaking glass.
"Such protective mates. How utterly useless against what I am."
"You stole me. Gave me to Marcus and Elisabeth."
"Your adoptive parents made a bargain—they wanted another, biological daughter. I needed somewhere to hide you until you came of age."
She circles us slowly. "The last direct descendant of Selena's bloodline. Do you know what that blood is worth? I've been tracking your signature since last night's ceremony. It lit up the magical realm like a beacon."
"Why hide me? Why not—"
"Kill you? Drain you immediately? Infant magic is weak. I needed you to mature, come into full power." Her eyes glitter darkly. "I planned to use your bloodline to break the royal curse myself. Kings would pay anything for that service. I'd become the most powerful witch in history."
"But I disappeared."
"You ruined everything!" Her mask cracks, revealing fury. "Twenty years of planning, destroyed because those fools lost track of one child. But now you've awakened your power, completed the ceremony, activated three mate bonds. Perfect for extraction."
"Over my dead body," Nathan growls.
"That can be arranged. Though I'd prefer keeping you alive. Three Alpha mates fetch impressive prices at slave markets."
"You're insane if—"
"Like I knew exactly where to position that branch to knock one of you unconscious. You think it was an accident?"
Rage floods through me. "That was you?"
"Collateral damage. I needed you vulnerable while I prepared. Though your healing surprised me—more powerful than anticipated." She raises both hands, shadows writhing around her fingers. "No matter. Everything led to this."
"Run!" Nathan shouts, but it's too late.
Sage strikes like a hurricane. Dark magic slams into us. Our horses scream as they're thrown aside. Nathan and Luca shift mid-air, landing as wolves, but shadow barriers block every attack.
She flicks her wrist. Both wolves are thrown back, slamming into trees. Shadow-chains wrap around their limbs, pinning them.
"Now then," she turns to me, "let's discuss what matters."
"Let them go!"
"After my careful planning? No." She approaches slowly. "Your bloodline isn't just valuable for breaking curses. It's the key to controlling fate itself. With your power harvested, I can alter destiny, rewrite the Moon Goddess's own laws."
"Impossible."
"You're living proof impossible things happen. Three mates? Unheard of."
She raises her hands. Blood magic, old and terrible, reaches for me.
"Blood calls to blood," she chants in the Old Language. Pain explodes through my scar. "By the bargain made, by the price paid—you are mine!"
The binding spell wraps around me like ice chains—blood magic from the original bargain. It should be unbreakable.
I fight, but chains tighten with every struggle. Nathan and Luca howl, thrashing against their bonds, but Sage's magic holds.
"The binding is absolute," Sage circles me. "Your adoptive parents' bargain, sealed in blood. You belong to me by right."
"They had no right to bargain with what wasn't theirs!"
"They thought you were. An orphan, a gift." Her laugh is bitter. "They never questioned why a witch would give them a child."
Through our bonds, I feel my mates' desperation. Nathan's cold rage. Luca's overwhelming fear. And Ryder—distant but present—feels my terror without understanding.
"Now," Sage pulls items from her cloak—crystals, vials pulsing with unnatural light. "The extraction ritual is complex. I'll separate your bloodline magic from your wolf, then fragment your mate bonds."
"No!" I struggle harder, chains tightening.
"The process is excruciating. But you'll survive. Hollow afterward, but alive enough as proof."
She draws symbols around me, each burning purple as completed. Air grows thick. My wolf whimpers, unable to surface through magical suppression.
"Your mates will watch. Emotional trauma enhances extraction. Their pain makes bonds more volatile, easier to harvest."
"Please. There has to be another way—"
"Another way?" She pauses. "I waited twenty years. Twenty years of failure, mockery from witches who said I chased fantasies. I sacrificed everything—my coven, family, humanity—for ultimate power. Finally, it's within reach."
She completes the circle. Symbols blaze brighter. My bloodline magic responds against my will.
"By blood and bone, by moon and shadow—I claim what was promised!"
The draining ritual begins.
Pain tears through me—being turned inside out, every cell systematically destroyed. I hear screaming. It's me.
Nathan and Luca thrash with renewed fury, howls echoing. Through our bonds, their agony mixes with mine—they're experiencing this torture through our connections.
"Perfect," Sage says, eyes glowing purple. "Three power sources instead of one."
But something else happens. As the ritual tears at my bloodline, I see the spell's structure—not just surface, but deep framework. My transformed healing abilities let me perceive magic differently now.
There—buried in complex weaving—a flaw. Where blood bargain connects to extraction ritual.
The binding was made for an infant with dormant power.
I'm neither anymore.
But knowledge isn't enough. The ritual continues, draining me faster than I can think. My vision blurs, darkening at edges. I taste copper in my mouth—blood from where I've bitten through my lip trying not to scream. Nathan and Luca's struggles weaken as the spell drains them too through our bonds.
"Almost there," Sage murmurs, hands glowing with stolen power.
She suddenly staggers, frowning. Through my fading consciousness, I watch confusion cross her face.
"What? The resonance is wrong. Your power doesn't match infant parameters."
The flaw I spotted—she's finally noticed. But instead of stopping, she pours more power in.
"No matter. I'll adjust the extraction matrix."
She chants faster, desperately. The symbols flicker unstably. The ritual is fighting itself—trying to drain adult power through infant-designed channels.
This is my chance. But I'm so weak, vision almost gone. My mates have gone silent, bodies limp.
"Hold on," I whisper through our connections, though I don't know if they hear me.
Sage's chanting grows frantic. Sweat beads on her forehead as she fights the destabilizing ritual. Purple fire sparks wildly.
"Why won't you comply?" she hisses. "The bargain was sealed!"
"The bargain," I gasp, "was for someone who never existed. An orphan infant. I'm the lost princess, awakened and bonded to three mates."
"Shut up!" Fresh pain tears through me. "I'll make this work!"
The ritual circle cracks, fractures spreading through symbols. Sage's eyes widen.
"No! Twenty years of preparation!"
She drops to her knees, pressing hands to failing symbols, feeding her own essence into them. Purple fire turns almost black.
"I gave up everything," her voice breaks. "My coven, my mother said I was chasing shadows. But I knew you were the key."
Through pain, I feel the spell's flaw widening. The more power Sage pours in, the more unstable it becomes. She's making it worse.
If I don't act now, we all die when the ritual explodes.
But I don't know if I have enough strength left.