The Forgotten Pulse of the Bond-Chapter 65: The Boy’s Fire

"Camille!" Beckett’s voice tore through the thick curtain of trees, echoing against the craggy hills that bordered the estate’s northern edge. His boots crunched over frostbitten roots as he moved faster, eyes scanning every twisted shadow that dared to shift in the underbrush.

No answer. Just wind, cold and cruel, whispering through the pines like a warning.

His chest heaved as he stopped on a ridge, snow melting on his skin beneath the layers. "Camille, if you can hear me, say something!" The sharp mountain air cut at his throat, but he didn’t care. Hours had passed since she vanished. Hours since Savannah had placed the torn journal page in his hand and whispered, She didn’t leave. She was taken.

He’d known where to look. He’d traced the small path Camille used to walk when no one else was watching , the same trail she’d once shown him as her "thinking spot." The one that led nowhere and everywhere at once. But this time, it felt different. The silence wasn’t peaceful. It was loaded. Laced with something that made the hairs on his arms rise and his wolf claw beneath his skin.

Branches snapped. Low, to his right. Instinct moved faster than thought. He dropped into a crouch, pulling the blade from his boot just as the figure lunged.

A blur of black and gray, no scent until it was too late.

Claws slashed across his shoulder, burning through coat and flesh alike. Beckett roared and rolled, landing a boot to the attacker’s side, sending them crashing into the snow-dusted brush. He rose instantly, blood soaking through the wool at his collarbone.

Not a rogue. Too fast. Too quiet.

Syndicate.

The figure stood. The mask slipped, revealing a male face painted in white ash, eyes pupil-less, gleaming like polished bone. "You shouldn’t have come alone," he hissed, flexing clawed fingers dripping with something green.

Poison.

"I didn’t come for you," Beckett growled.

"But you found me," the man replied, grinning. "And now... you bleed for her."

The scout moved like smoke , too quick for human eyes, but Beckett wasn’t only human anymore. He parried with the blade, caught an elbow to the jaw, staggered, then swung wide and drove his dagger into the man’s ribs.

But the Syndicate scout didn’t scream. He smiled as black blood oozed.

Then he said it , too soft to be casual, too clear to be random.

"Magnolia."

Beckett’s blood ran cold. ƒreeωebnovel.ƈom

"What did you say?"

The scout leaned in, voice rotting with glee. "She’s next."

Beckett didn’t hesitate. He drove the blade higher, into the neck. The man choked, gargled laughter, and fell. But not before dragging his claws across Beckett’s abdomen in a final strike.

He stumbled back, hands to his stomach, warm fluid soaking him fast.

Pain exploded, hot and nauseating. He dropped to one knee.

The poison burned like fire through his veins.

"No," he rasped. "No, not here."

He forced himself up, staggering down the ridge, vision blurring as trees tilted around him.

He made it ten paces before collapsing.

Darkness pressed in. Not like sleep. Like drowning. Like earth piling on a coffin lid.

The snow beneath him melted with his blood, steam rising.

Beckett blinked slowly. The sky fractured above him. Cold stars spinning.

Camille’s laugh echoed in his ears, but it was memory, not magic.

Then , another sound.

A low growl.

Soft steps in the snow.

Something wild moved toward him.

"Who..." he gasped.

The air trembled.

And then, from the fog , silver eyes. Bright. Furious. Familiar.

"Magnolia..." he whispered.

She was barefoot. Barely dressed. Her shift half-torn. Her hair unbound, dancing like wildfire. Her skin shimmered with heat as the frost curled back from her steps. She wasn’t running.

She was changing.

Her wolf surged from her like lightning , not a smooth transition but a storm. Bones cracked, tendons split and reformed. The scream she released was inhuman , pain and rage in a single cry that split the trees. Her body shimmered gold, then deep crimson.

Where a girl had stood, now stood a beast.

Twice the size of any normal wolf. Not lean, but powerful. Muscles rippling. Eyes still hers. And on her back , glowing runes. Burning symbols of a bloodline no one had spoken of in a century.

Hollowfang.

The trees bent as she charged the next figure that emerged , another scout, drawn by Beckett’s cries. He didn’t last seconds. She tore him apart in a fury that turned the ground to mud and the trees to splinters.

When silence returned, she turned to Beckett, who lay on his back, coughing.

His fingers reached toward her. "Mags... your eyes..."

She shifted back slowly, collapsing to her knees beside him, naked and sobbing, hands glowing faintly. "Don’t talk. Don’t, just breathe."

"I saw you," he whispered. "You were... fire."

She pressed both hands to his wounds. "Don’t die. Not for me."

"I’d do it again," he murmured.

A glow erupted from her palms , warm, golden, pulsing. The wounds hissed. The poison sizzled. His body jerked as the heat surged through him.

He gasped.

Then, stillness.

Her sobs broke again. "Beckett..."

He opened his eyes.

Alive.

But afraid.

She pulled back, shaking. "I didn’t mean to, "

"Your back," he whispered, staring at her. "The symbols..."

She looked down, turning slightly , and froze.

There they were.

Clear as ink on paper. Glowing across her spine.

Three interlocking crescents. The mark of Hollowfang.

She backed away. "No. No, this isn’t real. I’m not, "

"You shifted," he said. "You saved me. But Mags, those marks, "

She stood, panicking. "Don’t tell anyone. Please, Beckett. Don’t."

He tried to sit up. "Why? They need to know. You could be, "

"No," she said firmly, eyes wild. "If they find out what I am, they’ll fear me. They’ll hate me."

He reached for her. "I don’t fear you."

"You should," she whispered. "Because I’m not just part Hollowfang. I think I’m the last one."

Before he could answer, she turned and ran , disappearing into the woods, her bare feet silent, the snow melting wherever she touched.

Beckett stared after her.

Alive.

Shaking.

And utterly unsure what she’d just become.