The Alpha's Mafia Luna novel Chapter 129

My eyes flew open.

My lungs forgot how to breathe.

I shot upright, gasping as if I’d been underwater for hours, choking on nothing but air and memory. Sweat clung to my skin, and my heart hammered so violently it echoed in my ears.

Candles flickered at each corner of the room, their light casting long shadows that danced across the stone walls. The air smelled of wax, damp wood, and something older–like rosemary, blood, and ash. A figure stood silently in the far corner. Not moving. Just watching.

“Damian!” I cried, voice raw.

I barely registered the thud of footsteps before he was there, kneeling beside the bed in a heartbeat, his hand brushing my clammy cheek. “Serene?”

I didn’t think I just threw my arms around him and sobbed into his shoulder. I didn’t even know when the tears started, but they wouldn’t stop.

“I thought you left me,” I whispered brokenly. “I thought you were dead.”

“Hey, hey…” Damian’s arms tightened around me. “You’re okay. I’m here. You’re safe.”

“What happened?” Mira’s voice cut in, rushing to my other side. “Serene, you were unconscious. 1–Damian, I swear, this was more than a fever.”

I pulled away from his shoulder just enough to look between them both. “How… how did I survive?”

Damian blinked, eyebrows furrowing. “What?”

“The fight,” I said, my voice low, “The wardens… the valley… the Gate of Aleoria. You died, Damian. You died right in front of me.”

“What?” Mira exchanged a wide–eyed look with him. “Serene, slow down. What fight? What valley?”

“I was there.” My voice cracked. “We found the map in the pendant. We traveled through the woods–it was glowing, guiding us. Then the wardens appeared. They let me through. And then… the Elders attacked. You were poisoned, Damian. You-“I cut myself off, trembling.

Mira reached for my hand. “Serene, you never left the house.”

I stared at her, my heart still racing. “That’s not true”

“You didn’t move from this bed, she said gently. “The last 1 saw you awake was when Damian took you out for a date.”

I blinked. “The wine. The car

Damian rubbed the back of his neck. “We had a long night, yeah. And… you didn’t wake up again after that.”

My chest tightened. “What are you talking about?”

“You’ve been unconscious for two days,” Mira said, “I was worried. That’s why I called someone” Her eyes flicked toward the figure in the shadows

I followed her gaze.

1/4

06 pm P la.

Chapter 129

That figure the one who’d been watching–finally stepped forward. A woman. Old. Ancient, even. Her body curved like a question mark, back bent under the weight of years. A gnarled walking stick supported her every step, and her robes whispered against the stone like dry leaves in the wind. Her face was fined

with age, ranken, pale, but her eyes

Gods, her eyes,

Amber Glowing faintly. Inhuman

“Damian,” I whispered. “Who is she?”

He stood and walked toward the woman, his jaw tight. “She’s a healer. Old blood, I… I called her when Mira said you weren’t waking up. She’s helped my

family before.”

The woman’s lips parted into something that almost resembled a smile. “Your bond is strong,” she said, her voice like wind through bones. “Stronger than

you understand.”

My breath hitched.

“Demian,” I said again, softer this time. “Is it true?”

He nodded once, “Yeah. It’s true.”

The old woman’s voice rasped through the room. “The reason your mind wandered into visions so deep, child, is because your body was undergoing a shift. Bot of the flesh, but of the soul. Your Crimson blood was unlocking remembering”

I stared at her, my pulse pounding “So it wasn’t a dream?”

She tilted her head. “It was a memory. A warning. A promise. All at once. The band you share with this male- her eyes flicked to Damian, “-is not ordinary. The first step of your legacy has been triggered. And so has its cost.”

Damian returned to my side, his face troubled, “You kept crying out in your sleep. Saying my name. Saying I was dead.”

“Because you were,” I said bitterly, “I watched you fall.”

“And yet I’m here,” he whispered. “Alive. Right here.”

1 pressed a hand over my chest. Then why does it still feel like I’m grieving you?”

The Ad women duftied forward, extending one bony finger toward the rune still glowing faintly on my wrist. “This mark,” she said, “was never fist a syed. It was a sext. tion that it’s awake… everything will try to find you.”

“Everything?” Mits extre

“The Crimson Line is now myth, the work went on. It is hunted Fested. Desired. When Serene awakened it, the world felt it. The Gate of Alsatia y

tot here opened in reality yet, but the sealm remembers her. The earth reusembers ber

“Then what do we do now?” I asked, my voice low.

“You prepare the women said, “You ready your bond. You ready your ponet.”

214

7:06 pm

Chapter 129

Damian’s hand slid into mine instinctively, and I clung to it like an anchor.

“Your bloodline can no longer wait,” the woman added. “They are calling you. And they will not stop.”

I stared down at my hand. The mark was pulsing softly beneath my skin.

Mira cleared her throat. “Sorry, but… you said her bloodline wants to meet her?”

The old woman’s smile grew ceric. “They sleep beneath the veil still. But not for long.”

I looked between them all, something settling heavy in my chest. “So this isn’t over.”

“No,” the woman said. “This is only the beginning.”

She raised her hand, muttering something beneath her breath–not an incantation, not a spell. It sounded more like an oath. An old one. The candles flickered wildly, casting her shadow long and twisted across the walls.

Then… she turned, and slowly began to limp from the room.

None of us stopped her.

Not even Mira, who usually had a thousand questions.

When the door shut behind her, silence flooded the space.

“I’m losing my mind,” I said quietly.

“No,” Damian whispered, wrapping his arms around me again. “You’re waking up.”

Mira cleared her throat. “So… what happens if the dreams start again?”

I looked her in the eye. “Then next time, I won’t wake up here–I’ll wake up there.”

Damian rested his chin on my head. “Then next time, I’m going with you.”

I buried my face in his shoulder again, heart still thudding, mind still spinning. I didn’t understand it all yet. I wasn’t even sure what was real and

what wasn’t.

But one thing was clear-

Whatever I had seen… whatever I had felt…

It was coming.

And nothing could stop it.