Read Chapter 26: Broken Vows

The fire in the library hearth had burned low, casting long shadows across the room. Iona sat on the rug before it, knees drawn to her chest, the locket cold and heavy in her palm. Outside, wind battered the old stone walls. Inside, the house was quieter than she had ever known it.

She had not been alone with Lachlan since they returned from the chapel. The family had descended upon them within the hour, hollow-eyed and armed, demanding answers. Lachlan had given them only what was necessary: Meghan Ross had the missing men. A treaty was demanded. The locket was central. The rest—her mother, the assassination, the quiet horror of everything she had learned—she had kept locked behind her teeth.

Now the others had gone to the cellar to relieve the guard watching Angus. Duncan had pressed her shoulder before leaving, a rare gesture of warmth, but it had done little to thaw the cold spreading through her chest.

Behind her, Lachlan stirred on the sofa. His breathing had been ragged for the past hour, worsening by the minute. The wound in his side, torn open again during the confrontation at the chapel, had been stitched and dressed. But the silver in the Ross alpha's blade had done more than cut. Lachlan's wolf was fighting the poison, and losing.

Iona turned and watched him. His face was flushed, sweat darkening his hairline. His fingers twitched against the blanket she had draped over him, claws half-extending, retracting. He was slipping.

She had done everything conventional. Antibiotics, saline, wound care. Her veterinary training was useless here. This was not an animal in distress. This was a man caught between skin and fur, burning from the inside out.

The locket warmed against her palm, and she looked down at it.

Since the chapel, she had felt it differently. Not as an object, but as a current. A low, humming pulse that answered her heartbeat. When she held it close to Lachlan's chest, his breathing had eased, just slightly, for a few minutes. But it was not enough. It was never enough.

She had read about this. Somewhere in the library's oldest shelves, in a ledger no one had opened for a century, there was a passage about the locket's original purpose. It was not merely a token. It was a vessel, designed to carry a burden too heavy for any single wolf. The Ross bride who had first worn it—the one her mother had been tasked to emulate—had used it to absorb the curse of her own pack, drawing the taint of silver sickness into the pendant and leaving her bloodline clean.

Iona had memorized the words. She had copied the necessary herbs onto a scrap of paper now tucked into her pocket. Feverfew. Rowan bark. A pinch of iron shavings, which the script said must be taken from a horseshoe laid by a smith who had never seen a wolf.

She had all of it.

What the script did not say was what happened to the one who performed the transfer. But Iona had read between the lines. The Ross bride had died young. The locket had passed to her sister, then to another, each woman carrying the weight of the pack's affliction until the bloodline failed entirely.

That was why the Rosses wanted it. Not for sentiment. For survival.

Iona's hand closed around the locket. The metal was warm, almost alive. She had watched it glow in the dark of her room the night after the chapel, soft and pulsing, like a heartbeat of its own.

She could not watch Lachlan die. Not when she had a choice.

The herbs sat in a small muslin pouch on the table beside her, tied with red thread as the script instructed. She had ground them into a fine powder that afternoon, hidden between the stacks of a bookcase, while Lachlan slept. The ritual required three things: the locket, the powder, and a willing vessel. The vessel was meant to be a wolf, a sacrifice of one to save many.

But Iona was not a wolf.

She did not know if it would work. She did not know if it would kill her. But the alternative—sitting here, holding his hand, watching the light drain from his eyes—was unbearable.

She rose. Her joints protested; she had been sitting still too long. She crossed to the sofa and knelt beside him, pressing the locket to his sternum. His body arched slightly, a low sound escaping his throat. Then he relaxed, breath steadying for a moment.

"I'm here," she whispered. "I'm going to fix this."

His eyes cracked open, glassy and unfocused. "Iona."

"Shh. Rest."

"Don't—" He tried to lift a hand, but it fell back. "Don't do anything stupid."

She smiled, though it hurt. "When have I ever?"

His breath hitched, almost a laugh. Then his eyes rolled back and he slid into unconsciousness.

She stayed there a moment longer, letting the locket pulse against his skin. Then she pulled it away, and his breathing grew labored again. It would not be long.

She moved to the table, hands steady as she tipped the powder into a cup of cold water from the pitcher. The mixture hissed, turning a deep amber. She did not know if she was meant to drink it or apply it. The script had been vague on the physical details—perhaps deliberately, to keep the power away from those who would misuse it.

She chose to drink.

The bitter liquid coated her throat, metallic and sharp. She gagged but forced it down. A warmth spread through her chest, not unpleasant. Then she took the locket from where she had set it on the table and pressed it flat against her own sternum, just over her heart.

The metal burned cold. She gasped, but did not let go.

Nothing else happened.

She stood there, waiting, heart pounding. Perhaps she had done it wrong. Perhaps the script required a wolf, as she had suspected. Perhaps she was about to die for nothing.

A soft creak behind her.

She turned.

Lachlan was standing, swaying on his feet, one hand braced against the back of the sofa. His face was ashen, his eyes fever-bright. He was looking at her, then at the locket against her chest, then at the cup on the table.

"What did you do?" His voice was raw, barely a whisper.

"Lachlan, you need to lie down—"

"What did you do?"

She opened her mouth, but the words would not come. The heat in her chest was growing, spreading down her arms, into her fingers. She looked at her hands. The locket was glowing, a soft violet light pulsing in time with her heartbeat.

"I read the script," she said. "The one about the Ross bride. I did the transfer."

He crossed the room in two strides, grabbing her shoulders. His grip was fierce, almost painful. "You did *what*?"

"It's the only way. You're dying, Lachlan. The silver is killing you. The locket can take it—can take all of it, from your blood and from the Ross pack—"

"No." He shook her, once. "No. Do you know what that does to the vessel? Do you know why no one has used it in a century?"

"I know it saves the pack."

"It *kills* the vessel." His voice cracked. "It burns through the host. That Ross bride—she was dead within a month. Her sister lasted three. They gave their lives so their pack could walk in the sun without agony. And you—" He stopped, staring at her. "You are not a wolf, Iona. The curse would devour you."

"Then we're even." She met his eyes, defiant. "Because I was not about to watch the curse devour *you*. Not when I had the means to stop it. Not when I—"

She stopped.

The word hung in the air between them.

Lachlan's grip loosened, his hands sliding down her arms to take her hands instead. His palms were hot, feverish. "When you what?"

She shook her head, blinking hard. "It doesn't matter."

"It matters to me." His voice was quiet, almost gentled. "Everything you have done—everything you have risked—it matters. You came into this village to heal animals. You did not sign up for war. For curses. For a family that turns into wolves and a blood feud older than anyone can remember. And yet you stayed. You stayed, Iona."

"Because I couldn't leave."

Her voice was barely audible. She felt the locket burning against her chest, felt the cold spreading inward despite the warmth of his hands.

"Couldn't leave?" he repeated.

"Because I love you." The words came out broken, raw, dragged from somewhere deep. "Because the thought of a world without you in it—of this house without your voice in the halls, of the moors without your wolf running them—I could not bear it. I would rather take every curse this locket holds than watch that world come to pass."

He stared at her. The fever-brightness in his eyes softened, and for a moment he looked almost whole.

"Iona." He lifted a hand, cupping her face. His palm was still hot, trembling. "I would rather die than turn you. Do you understand? I would rather burn. I would rather fade into nothing on this sofa, silver in my blood, than spend even one hour knowing I was the reason your light went out of the world."

"Lachlan—"

"No." His thumb traced her cheekbone, wiping away a tear she had not realized she was shedding. "You are the first person in a very long time who has looked at me—truly looked at me—and seen more than the wolf. The first person who stayed. I do not know what the fates intended when they sent you to this village, but I know this: I will not be the one who extinguishes you."

The locket grew hotter. Iona gasped, clutching at it. The violet glow was blinding now, light spilling through her fingers, through the gaps between her ribs.

"Lachlan," she breathed. "I am not going to let you die."

"Then don't." He grabbed her hands, covering the locket with his own. "Stay with me. Fight with me. But do not sacrifice yourself for me."

The heat was unbearable. She felt the curse inside her—whatever dark, heavy thing the transfer had begun to pull from his blood into hers—thrash against the light. And she understood, suddenly, what the script had not said.

The locket was not meant to be worn. It was meant to be broken.

A vessel sealed holds the curse inside. A vessel opened releases it.

She looked at Lachlan. His eyes were wide, watching her. He knew. She saw it in his face—the dawning understanding, the dread.

"Iona. Don't."

But she had already made her choice. She had made it the moment she read the first line of that crumbling script.

She pulled the locket from her neck, chain snapping, and held it in both hands. The light pulsed, blinding, a small sun contained in warm metal. The heat seared her palms, but she did not let go.

"Lachlan." Her voice was steady, clear. "Whatever happens after this—I need you to know that I do not regret a single moment."

He lunged for her, but she was faster.

She brought the locket down on the stone hearth with all her strength.

It shattered.

Light exploded outward—white, gold, violet—engulfing the room, the fire, the two of them. Iona felt it pass through her like a wave, burning away the cold, the poison, the weight of centuries. She heard Lachlan cry out, felt his arms come around her, holding her as the light consumed them both.

And then, silence.