Chapter 5: The Bite

The sky was already dark when I returned—river-soaked, heart pounding, skin still tingling where Kael’s hands had hovered, where his voice had wrapped around me like heat. I’d tied the ceremonial wrap around myself hastily, but it clung to me now, damp and nearly transparent. It didn’t hide the flush on my skin, or the tremble in my limbs, or the way my pulse throbbed in places I didn’t want to acknowledge.

It didn’t hide what I was becoming.

His.

The village glowed with firelight, the sacred grove pulsing with energy. Laughter still echoed faintly from the feast tables, but here—inside the circle of stone and ash, where ceremony held weight—there was only silence.

Until I stepped in.

Every head turned. Conversations died. The air thickened around me. They could feel it—Kael’s bond wrapping around me like smoke, like a storm rolling in from the east.

He was already waiting.

Kael stood at the far end of the grove, shirtless, golden skin slick with oil and ritual ash. His body glinted like a weapon under torchlight. His eyes were locked on mine, and the second they met, my wolf surged to the surface, snarling in possession.

The seer raised her staff, a long shaft of dark ashwood crowned with glowing moonstone. Her voice cut through the hush.

“Lyra Fenwyn,” she intoned, gaze steady. “Daughter of Nightfall. Do you accept what fate has stirred in you?”

My knees wanted to give. My skin prickled with awareness, not from the cold, but from the weight of a hundred wolves watching and the even heavier weight of one wolf—Kael—wanting.

But I didn’t hesitate.

“Yes,” I said. My voice didn’t crack.

A collective breath exhaled from the crowd, hushed and reverent.

The seer stepped back. “Then step forward.”

Kael didn’t wait. He strode toward me, command in every step, his energy a heatwave curling around my body. When he reached me, he didn’t touch me—not yet—but I felt the restraint it took.

“I feel you in my blood,” he said, voice low and thick with need. “In every breath. Every instinct. I claim you… if you allow it.”

He held out his hand.

It was just ceremony. The hand was a symbol.

What he was really offering me was everything.

I stepped forward, heartbeat drumming.

And placed my hand in his.

The second our skin touched, the air snapped.

Energy surged between us like lightning arcing from bone to bone. My wolf howled inside me. A visible flicker of silver light pulsed at the point where our palms met. Gasps echoed through the circle.

“I accept,” I said, and I meant every word.

Kael’s eyes darkened, his jaw flexing as he visibly restrained himself. Then, in one fluid motion, he lifted me off the ground.

The crowd parted without a word.

No one dared stop him.

No one could.

The Alpha’s den was dimly lit with dozens of candles casting flickering gold across thick furs and carved stone. Kael carried me through the threshold like I was already his mate, already his Luna, and laid me gently at the edge of the bed.

He stepped back only to undo the knot at my hip. The wrap loosened, clung for a moment, then slid to the floor in a whisper.

He inhaled, sharp and low.

His eyes moved over me slowly—neck to breast to thigh—like he was memorizing me.

Then he began to undress.

One piece at a time.

He didn’t rush. His eyes never left mine. His body was everything I’d imagined—powerful, scarred, honed—but it wasn’t the muscles that made my mouth go dry.

It was the hunger on his face.

The reverence.

“You’re sure?” he asked, voice rough. “Because once I mark you, there’s no going back.”

I didn’t hesitate. “I’m yours.”

The sound he made was part groan, part growl.

He was on me in a breath, dragging me into his arms. His mouth crashed onto mine—hot, unrelenting. He kissed like he was starving. Like he’d waited a lifetime. My fingers sank into his shoulders, my thighs wrapping around his waist.

He laid me back against the furs, covering me with his body—but he didn’t take me.

Not yet.

Instead, he kissed down my neck, his breath scorching my skin. His lips found my collarbone, then the delicate space just beneath it—where every she-wolf was marked, if she accepted her mate.

He hovered there, breath hitching.

“This is where the mark goes,” he whispered, his voice cracking like he was barely holding himself together. “So every wolf who sees you knows who you belong to.”

I arched up, offering him more.

“Do it,” I whispered. “Mark me.”

His body shuddered.

And then his teeth sank into my flesh.

Pain flared—sharp, bright, exquisite. A gasp tore from my throat as the bite pulsed with light, a white-hot burn that ignited everything inside me.

But it wasn’t just pain.

It was power.

The mark seared into me like a brand and a blessing. My wolf howled in answer—her voice rising to the moon, wild and triumphant.

Kael’s tongue licked over the wound, sealing it. His growl vibrated through my body, low and possessive.

“You’re marked,” he rasped. “You’re mine now. Forever.”

And something in me howled back—not just in submission, but in hunger.

“Then take me,” I whispered.

He looked into my eyes for a long second, like he needed to be sure again.

Then he moved.

His fingers slid between my thighs, finding me already soaked. He groaned against my skin. “Fuck, Lyra… you’re dripping for me.”

“Don’t make me wait,” I breathed.

He didn’t.

His body pressed against mine, thick and hard and bare, and when he finally thrust into me—slow, deep, claiming—I cried out, not in pain, but in something close to awe.

He filled me completely.

My body opened for him like it had been made for this.

His hands locked under my hips, pulling me tighter as he began to move—slow and punishing, each thrust deliberate, every stroke a vow.

We didn’t speak.

There was only the sound of breath and skin and the sharp slap of our bodies meeting, over and over. The scent of sex and moonlight wrapped around us like a spell.

My nails raked down his back. He growled into my throat. We moved together, faster now, and when I came—shaking, gasping, eyes wide open—it felt like something sacred had broken loose inside me.

Kael followed with a snarl, his hips jerking as he spilled into me, burying himself as deep as he could go.

He collapsed onto me, breathless.

Neither of us moved for a long time.

Then he kissed my throat, right over the mark he’d given me.

And whispered, “Now the whole world knows who you belong to.”

But what he didn’t say—what he didn’t need to say—was that I owned him too.

Because the bond wasn’t just a chain.

It was a flame.

And we were already burning.