My Second Chance Mate is a Barbarian (Sera and Fenris) novel Chapter 7

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Sera

"The pack needs an heir, Sera."

Kane’s voice was a ghost in my ear, vibrating with that same reasonable, clinical tone he’d used to tell me he’d been fucking Elara for a year. "I did what was necessary," he whispered in the dark.

I jerked awake.

The air didn’t smell like Blackwater’s damp pine or the palace’s suffocating roses. It smelled like wet dog, woodsmoke, and a man I didn’t know. I was lying on a hard wooden floor that bounced and rattled, wrapped in a fur so heavy it felt like a lead blanket.

For a second, I didn't know which nightmare I was in. Then the wagon hit a rut, and my shoulder slammed against the sideboards. The pain was real. I wasn't in the palace, and I wasn't in Blackwater. I was in a cage on wheels.

I remembered the cabin. I remembered Fenris Volkov filling the doorway, stripping off his armor, and the sheer, terrifying size of him. I remembered screaming until my throat felt like I’d swallowed broken glass. Then... nothing. The transition from being hoisted over his shoulder to this freezing wagon was a blur of exhaustion and shock.

My body felt like it belonged to someone else. The second mate bond had settled into a low, rhythmic hum, a vibration in my marrow that made my skin feel two sizes too small. The scar on my collarbone—the one Kane had left me with—wasn’t burning anymore. It was warm.

Pain I could deal with. I’d lived with pain for three years. But this warmth was intrusive. It felt like a hand resting on my neck, steady and unmoving.

The wagon slowed, then lurched to a halt. Outside, the world was a cacophony of heavy boots, horses snorting, and men shouting. I stayed still, listening. Their voices were different—thicker, the vowels dragged out and the consonants hitting like stones. Northern dialect.

I pushed the heavy canvas flap open an inch.

The South was green and gold. This was a graveyard of color. Everything was a shade of bruised grey or bone white. The trees weren’t lush; they were jagged black spikes, their branches looking like teeth against a sky that felt too low, too heavy. The air hit me like a physical blow, so cold it turned the moisture in my nose to ice instantly.