Where The Ice Gives Way (Charlotte and Blake) novel Chapter 263

Chapter 263 The Last Season

Charlotte

The season does not end all at once.

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It ends in pieces.

In the sound of skates against ice. In the roar of a crowd. In the smell of cold air, sweat, coffee, and snow-damp coats. In Charlie laughing

with his head tipped back after a win, not because hockey is the only place he can breathe, but because he loves and enjoys it.

Yesterday, the boys played their last game of the year.

Blake, Theo, and Charlie moved onto the frozen surface beneath the bright white lights with their jerseys stretched across their shoulders,

and their wolves settled underneath their skin. The whole rink appeared alive before the puck even dropped. Parents filled the seats, pack

members lined the glass, and Jess sat next to me wearing Charlie’s jersey with the sleeves bunched over her hands and a look on her face

that made my chest ache.

She looked so proud, and completely gone for him.

Emily took a seat on my other side with Annabelle, both of them yelling like they could control the game.

“Hit him with your feelings, Theo!” Emily hollered at one point.

Theo, halfway across the ice, somehow heard her and grinned so wide he nearly missed a pass.

Annabelle leaned forward, hands cupped around her mouth. “Get it together!”

Jess and I both laughed together.

She was getting better at holding both parts of herself now. Human and wolf. Jess and Shakti. Some days it still overwhelmed her, but she

was learning.

We both were.

Every morning, Jess and I started sitting together in the calm before breakfast, barefoot on the floor or outside in the now-melting snow when we were feeling brave enough. We breathed. We listened. We let Shanti and Shakti settle close without becoming too much.

And we had learned something strange.

Together, we were stronger.

Shanti was stillness. Shakti was movement. One held the air steady, and the other knew when it needed to change. When we sat close

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Chapter 263 The Last Season

enough, the world intensified around us in a way that made every hidden thing feel less hidden.

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More rogues had started finding their way toward Wellington.

Drawn by something they did not understand, or want, limping out of trees, standing at roadsides, watching from the far edges of our

borders with vacant gazes and broken scents.

But we felt them now.

Jess and I.

Blake and Charlie too.

Since Jess and Charlie had marked each other, something in Charlie had settled and expanded all at once. Titan remained still Titan,

fierce and protective, but there was more in him now. A command in his howl that matched Blake’s in a way that caused even Gareth to

go quiet the first time he heard it.

Charlie had become a Howler too.

Not the same as Blake. Charlie had something rougher around the edges, sharper with insight, but powerful enough that when he and

Blake stood on either side of Jess and me, they became an unbreakable force.

The four of us had become something that could hold the world at bay, find its broken pieces, and put them back together.

Theo and Emily saw the spaces between us better than anyone. Together, they caught the moments that slipped through the rest of us.

And yesterday, for one whole game, we got to be teenagers anyway.

The boys won.

Charlie scored in the final period, and Jess screamed so loudly that so many people turned around to stare. She didn’t care, though. She

jumped to her feet with me, both hands in the air, laughing and crying at the same time while Charlie looked up from the ice and found

her immediately.

Blake scored the final goal, and I know I’ll never hear the end of it between them.

He turned after the puck hit the net and looked straight at me through the glass, grin bright, eyes beaming, and Lex pressed against my

chest from across the rink like he had reached for me through Blake’s skin.

Mate.

I placed my hand on the glass.

Mine.

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Chapter 263 The Last Season

Today, it is my turn.

The skating rink looks different when I am not sneaking onto a frozen lake before anyone can stop me.

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The ice is smooth and polished beneath the lights. Music hums through the speakers while judges sit in a neat row near the boards, pens

ready, features unreadable. Around me, girls stretch, laugh, whisper, check their costumes, and pretend they are less nervous than they

are.

My dress is pale blue and silver, the skirt light around my thighs, crystals catching every movement like tiny pieces of winter sun. My hair

is pinned back with more care than usual, and Mara cried when she saw me, which made Gareth pretend he had something in his eye.

Blake stands near the barrier with Charlie, Theo, Emily, Jess, Annabelle, John, Gareth, and Mara.

My people.

My pack.

Blake watches me with both hands curled over the railing, and there is so much pride in his face that I almost forget how to breathe.

Charlie points two fingers at his eyes, then at me, making sure I’m locked in on the win.

Jess grins beside him, nestled beneath his arm.

Theo gives me two thumbs up.

Emily mouths, You look beautiful.

Then my name is called.

My partner meets me at the edge of the ice, offering his hand with a steady smile, I take it, and together we glide to the centre.

For a moment, everything goes quiet.

The judges fade.

The crowd fades.

Even the cold fades.

Then the music begins.

And I remember who I am.

I move.

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Chapter 263 The Last Season

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