The Alpha's Unclaimed Mate novel Chapter 604

Chapter 604: Wrong Dead King, Gavriel

"The instinct, for both the host and the wolf, is to pull away from it," Maelor continued. "Her wolf is probably doing exactly that and doesn’t realize it. But the more her wolf pulls, the tighter it constricts. It’s a trap designed to punish resistance. The fighting is what feeds it."

Serena’s stomach dropped.

"The roots you’re feeling." Maelor’s eyes landed on Gavriel. "Are latched around her soul. You cannot extract it in pieces. It’s a puzzle. All or nothing. You pull one root and leave another, the remaining root reattaches everything you removed and it comes back worse. Stronger. More entrenched."

"How do you solve it?" Gavriel asked.

"You get to the bottom."

Everyone looked at Dexmon. The dragon king’s voice had come out calm, measured, the answer delivered with the certainty of a man who had seen this before and remembered exactly how it worked.

Maelor’s eyebrows rose. He had expected brilliance from Gavriel. He had not budgeted for it from Dexmon. His budget was now overdrawn.

"Yes. Correct." He recovered quickly. "There is more than one bottom. So the key is identifying how many bottoms exist before you pull. You must map the entire root system first. Every anchor point. Every attachment. If you miss one, even one, the tether regenerates from whatever remains. And the regenerated version will be more aggressive than the original."

He paused. Something shifted in his expression.

"The cloak I placed on it slows the growth, but it does not stop it. It is still feeding. Still expanding. Still wrapping itself deeper into her soul, her wolf, and her magic." His gaze moved to Gavriel. Stayed there. "That is likely why your magic is behaving the way it is. It senses hers is not filling properly and it’s trying to compensate. Your magic is pouring into the gaps the tether is creating."

Gavriel looked down at the green light still curling around Serena without his permission. His magic, filling holes he hadn’t known existed, patching a system that was leaking from the inside.

"How long does she have?" Gavriel asked.

Maelor didn’t answer immediately. The pause was worse than any answer would have been.

Maelor’s hands started glowing green.

Serena knew what was coming. She’d been through this before. The diagnostic knockout, the magical equivalent of being put under so a mage could root around in her system without her body fighting back. She knew it was necessary. She knew it didn’t hurt. She also knew that knowing those things didn’t stop her lungs from tightening or her fingers from gripping the edge of the infirmary bed hard enough to turn her knuckles white.

Then calm hit her through the matebond.

Steady. Measured. Warm. The exact frequency Fin always used when he could feel her spiraling, the precise emotional tone he’d perfected over months of reading her panic before it peaked and meeting it with a stillness so practiced it felt like a hand on her chest telling her heart to slow down.

It was perfect.

For a moment, it worked. Then it didn’t. It was Fin’s calm in every way except for the man sending it.

VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABELVerify