Let Them Kneel (kaelani and Julian) novel Chapter 104

“You don’t want me, Julian,” she said softly. “You made that perfectly clear from the start.”

Julian shot to his feet, his chair scraping against the floor, and dropped to his knees beside her. His hands reached for hers, trembling as he took them into his own—and the bond surged between them like a living thing. It roared through his veins, cracked through her ribcage. Her wolf stirred violently, pressing against her chest, longing, begging—but Kaelani held it back with everything she had.

Julian’s voice broke.

“I was an idiot,” he said, his forehead touching her hand. “God, I was such a fucking idiot for making you feel like I didn’t want you. I want you more than you know. I always did. I was just… confused. There was so much pressure. Everything was pulling me in a thousand directions and I—” He looked up, eyes burning. “None of it matters now. Not compared to this. Not compared to you.”

He searched her face, desperate, raw.

“All those dreams,” he continued. “Those were real, Kaelani. That was me. Everything I said—every word—I meant it. I wasn’t pretending. I wasn’t hiding. That was the only place I ever felt like I could be honest.”

She swallowed hard, blinking against the storm in her chest. “And yet… you can claim me in the privacy of our dreams, but not in waking life.”

Julian’s grip tightened around her fingers. His chest tightened.

“No,” he growled. “That’s not true. I’ll claim you in wake, in sleep. In front of everyone. I’ll tell the whole fucking world that you’re mine—and I’m yours.”

Kaelani opened her mouth to respond—but the words caught in her throat.

A strange stillness rippled through the air, so quiet it felt wrong.

The scent of warm pastries and sugar vanished, replaced by something familiar. Something powerful. Something uninvited.

Kaelani stiffened, her gaze drawn toward the window like a thread pulled taut.

Outside, dawn was unraveling.

The clouds didn’t roll in—they bled. Ink-black, unnatural, seeping across the sky in pulsing waves that devoured the light. They moved like something alive, curling with purpose, choking the color from the air until even the sun seemed to recoil behind the veil.

She rose from her seat—slow, unblinking—her chair vanishing beneath her as if it had never existed.

Julian stood too, gaze darting to the windows, then back to her. “What the hell is happening?”

The bakery trembled, a low hum vibrating through the floorboards—as if the dream itself was straining to hold form. Cracks splintered across the walls, oozing shadows like oil. The warm lightbulbs above flickered—then popped, one by one, until only darkness remained.

The windows burst inward—without sound, without glass—becoming voids. Not darkness, but absence.

Then—silence.

When the world reformed, it was no longer the one she had molded.

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