Jax felt her urgency through the matebond before her hand even closed around his. He already knew she was coming to get him.
The moment her fingers gripped his, she was already dragging him with her at alpha speed down the spiral stairs.
They flew across the marble bridge spanning the underground river, the sound of rushing water echoing around them. By the time they reached the lake, the others were arriving—Fin, Rex, Aeron, Hyran, Alpha Redmoon, and Beta Fang.
Nova didn't pause.
She strode straight to the water's edge. Jax felt her draw power from him so instinctual and intimate it made his chest tighten.
She lifted her hand and moved it in a clean, flat sweep across the surface of the lake.
Gold magic burst outward forming a bridge that stretched from their shore all the way to the island at the center of the lake.
Without a word, Nova stepped onto it and crossed at alpha speed.
Jax followed close behind— no hesitation, no doubt. Just the bond pulling him forward as surely as gravity.
They stood before the stone pedestal—the ancient one carved directly into the island rock—its metal basin cradling a soft, dim, ethereal flame that breathed like a living thing.
Gold shimmered to life in Nova's palm. A dagger forged from pure light and magic.
Without hesitation, she drew the blade across her palm. Silver blood slid down her wrist and into the basin, hissing on contact.
She handed the dagger to Jax. He mirrored her without flinching, crimson blood joining hers in the fire.
Nova's eyes flickered back to their original green.
She blinked, confused and stared down at her hand. She looked at Jax, a memory trying to surface. Jax felt it through their matebond and took her hand in his, steady, grounding, refusing to let her pull away.
He wordlessly guided both their hands into the fire. The flame didn't burn. The basin erupted—a burst of sapphire fire shooting up to the ceiling, illuminating the entire lake in blue-white light.
Jax wrapped his fingers tighter around hers, eyes on her, love steady in every line of his face.
Nova looked back at him, green eyes, breath caught but unbroken.
And then the whispers rose—ancient, layered voices speaking from the basin, or the stone, or the very air around them.
A third bonded.
Dragon King.
Incarnate of the First Ice-Flame Sovereigns.
The fire surged—first ruby red, then molten gold, before collapsing inward and settling back into its soft, original glow.
A deep rumble vibrated beneath their feet.
From the stone, a second pedestal rose, ancient and perfectly smooth, as if it had been waiting ten thousand years for this very moment. Upon it rested two white-gold rings, one larger, one smaller—each carved with runes so fine they shimmered like breath on glass.
Nova's eyes flashed silver, bright enough to reflect the flame.
She stepped toward the rings, drawn by instinct older than memory. The moment her fingers brushed the larger ring, a blinding column of light erupted upward, so brilliant that everyone on the lakeshore shielded their eyes.
No one—not even Fin or Rex—could see what was happening on the island.
Inside the blast of light, suspended in its glow, Nova found Jax's hand. She lifted it, slid the larger ring onto his finger.
The metal flared white.
Jax's eyes flashed sapphire, as if the ring recognized him, as if it had once belonged to him in another lifetime.
He remembered.
He knew she had given it to him before.
In another life.
Another era.
And he knew exactly what came next.
Jax's hand hovered over the smaller ring, and the moment his fingertips touched it—Another flash. Blinding. Fiercer. White-gold.
Jax took her hand—her left hand—the mirror to the ring Rex had given her on her right.
With steady reverence, he slid the smaller ring onto her finger.
A perfect counterpart to his.
A perfect match to the destiny she carried.
On the shore, no one could see through the light.
But Rex—eyes narrowed, breath caught—had a very good idea what had just happened.
She walked to the pedestal with the lever embedded in it. Her eyes flickered green—a sharp, involuntary warning—just before her fingers touched the metal. She froze, pulling her hand back, blinking as if shaking off a memory that wasn't fully her own.
Jax was beside her in an instant.
He felt it too—that wrongness, that thin ribbon of darkness coiled around the lever like a parasite. Without hesitation, he reached out and pulled the black magic free. It writhed for a heartbeat before disintegrating mid-air the moment it touched his sapphire magic.
He exhaled, surprised. Fin had done this last time already and he hadn't expected for it to have returned.
"You can touch it now," he said softly.
Nova looked at him—green-eyed, grateful, steady—as if to say thank you without speaking.
But before the words could leave her lips, her eyes flashed silver, and she gripped the lever, pulling it down in one swift.
The mechanism answered her like it had been waiting.
The giant doors on the far side of the lake groaned open—the same doors that had denied her entry the last time she stood here.
Beyond them shimmered a portal—an open threshold onto a windswept cliffside, ancient and waiting.
Nova reached for Jax's magic again, drawing it through her with instinctive precision. She swept her hand through the air, and a second golden bridge erupted across the lake, vibrating into existence.
She moved across it at alpha speed, Jax right behind her.
At the same time, Hyran opened a portal for the others. One by one, they stepped through and converged beside Nova and Jax at the foot of the opened doors— the entire party assembled, standing before whatever waited beyond.
Her eyes flickered from silver to green, then back again as she blinked several times, disoriented, scanning the cliffside as if waking from a dream.
"You were in a trance again," Aeron said evenly.
Rex stepped forward and lifted the quiver of arrows she'd uncovered, offering it to her. Nova slid it over her shoulder, the strap settling against her armor.
"I genuinely don't know why you'd need those. I've seen you make arrows from the sky… and underwater," he said grinning.
"These are not regular arrows." Nova said grinning back at him. She knew they'd do something none of them expected, but no memory surfaced.
Jax and Fin looked at one another feeling that sensation, both wondering as well what the arrows did.
Her eyes flashed silver again, sharp and lucid for a heartbeat, and she turned to Hyran, speaking in low, fluid Draken-Vorah.
Hyran inclined his head, then translated for the others:
"Through these cuffs, we will be able to speak within one another's minds—regardless of pack, rank, or distance. They will hold for most of the task. Information may matter more than strength."
Before anyone could react, Nova lifted her hand.
Channeling Fin's magic, gold light flared from her palm—bright, controlled, deliberate. She drew a symbol onto the stone, strokes swift and precise, an ancient rune none recognized.
She didn't explain.
But the moment the final line connected, the three white-gold cuffs she'd given to Jax, Rex, and Fin ignited in the same golden light, pulsing once—twice—before settling into a steady glow that mirrored the rune beneath her hand.
All three men exchanged the same subtle frown—each of them feeling it through their bonds, through instinct, through the way her eyes had gone too calm.
Nova was withholding something specifically about them and her and whatever it was, they wouldn't like the answer.
She took her bow from Fin, steady and unhurried.
Then, without looking at him, she placed her dagger in Fin's hand.
But she did not take his sword.
Fin stiffened. His wolf bristled. He hoped—gods, he hoped—it was because she trusted he'd be beside her in every fight.
But there was a cold, sinking weight in his gut that told him it was something else.
Something she wasn't saying.
Before any of them could press her—Nova turned, gathered her magic, and sprinted through the portal without a single moment of hesitation.
Like she was running toward a fate she'd already accepted.