Let Them Kneel (kaelani and Julian) novel Chapter 42

Her hand brushed absently across the bench beside her, fingertips tracing the small cracks in the stone. “So here I am,” she finished softly, turning her gaze toward the gardens that stretched in full, immaculate bloom. “Luna of the Blackthorn pack. I have everything I could ever want.”

“Do you?” He asked gently.

Her brow furrowed just slightly.

He leaned forward, voice low. “You’re bonded to Father. You don’t feel anything for your fated mate anymore, right? Isn’t that… how it works?”

She smiled, wistful and sad all at once. “I love your father,” she said softly. “With all my heart.”

She turned to him then, and he could see it—the flicker of something ancient in her eyes, something she’d buried long ago. “But the soul,” she murmured, “the soul will always remember who it truly belonged to.”

The breeze stirred the garden around them, carrying the faint scent of roses and something older—like memory itself. She reached out and brushed a hand through his hair, the gesture tender, almost aching, before pressing a kiss to his forehead.

She rose to her feet, her skirt whispering against the stone as she walked away, quiet and graceful, leaving him alone in the hush of the garden and the echo of words he couldn’t unhear.

Julian stayed seated, elbows braced on his knees, head bowed. The imprint of her kiss lingered cool against his forehead.

The soul always remembers who it truly belonged to.

The words wouldn’t leave him. They looped through his mind, quiet and merciless, until his chest felt too tight to breathe.

He raked a hand through his hair, leaning back against the bench, eyes fixed on nothing. The breeze carried the faint scent of roses and damp earth, but all he could smell was her—honey, cinnamon, and something he still couldn’t name. Something that made his wolf stir restlessly beneath his skin.

Maybe his mother was right—maybe the soul remembered—but what if the soul was wrong? What if what he wanted and what was expected of him could never exist in the same world?

His wolf didn’t care for logic. It only cared that every beat of his heart still echoed her name.

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