Chapter Fourteen: Kade’s Reckoning

~Karla's Pov~ 

The night had a different weight when I spoke my truth. The one I had buried beneath orders, beneath scars, beneath the walls I'd built to survive. But with Elara, the walls crumbled—fragile, dangerous, and necessary.

I never wanted her to see the darkness inside me.

My name is Kade Blackfang, and I am a soldier born into betrayal.

Before the Tribunal, before the covens, before Elara, I belonged to a pack ruled by blood and iron—the Valen Wolves. My father was their Alpha, ruthless and unforgiving. A man who believed strength was the only law, and weakness was a sentence.

I was his son, trained to be a weapon, molded to serve his vision of power.

But power breeds enemies.

When the Tribunal declared the Valen pack a threat to order, they sent hunters to cleanse us. The night they came, I was ordered to betray my own blood, my mother and sister. The choice was a knife twisting in my gut. Obedience or family.

I chose obedience.

I led the hunters to their doorstep.

The flames that night still haunt me—the screams, the burning wood, and the betrayal etched into every scar on my skin. My mother's eyes were wide with disbelief as she looked at me, her own son. My sister's final cry ripped through the night like a curse.

I was branded a traitor by my pack, hunted by those I once called kin, and shunned by the Tribunal for my failure.

I became a ghost—an exile cloaked in regret.

When I joined the Tribunal's enforcers, I thought it was a chance for redemption. To control the chaos within me. But every life I took, every order I followed, only deepened the darkness.

Then I met Elara.

She wasn't like the others. She wasn't just another mission. She was fire and shadow, broken and fierce. She reminded me of the girl I lost—stronger and yet vulnerable.

Protecting her is not just duty. It's penance. It's salvation.

But salvation doesn't come without a price.

Because my past is a cage.

Because I fear the day she'll see me for what I truly am, a man who built his empire on betrayal and blood.

And because I know, deep down, that my darkest secret could destroy us both.

The night air hung heavy with rain and regret, seeping into every corner of my mind like the ghosts I couldn't outrun. I sat alone in the small room Nyssa had granted me, far from the reach of pack politics, tribunal whispers, and the ever-watchful eyes of the rival factions. But no distance could hide me from the past.

I was born into a legacy of iron and blood, raised on the belief that survival meant sacrifice, often of those you loved most. My father, Aldric Blackfang, was a tyrant cloaked in the Alpha's mantle. His rule was absolute; his law brutal. He taught me how to hunt, how to kill without hesitation, and how to bury the man I was beneath the wolf I had to become. I obeyed because I had to—because I feared what disobedience meant. Not just punishment, but death.

My mother, Lyria, was the heart I barely knew. Soft-spoken and fierce in her own way, she was the only one who dared challenge Aldric's iron grip. And my sister, Mira—wild, fearless, the spark that kept me human in a world designed to break us.

When the Tribunal's hunters came, they brought death with them. Flames swallowed our village; screams tore the night apart. The wolves I called family turned on each other, desperate to survive the purge. But the cruelest blow was the order given to me: betray my own blood.

It was a nightmare I lived a thousand times over.

I remember the moment I led the hunters to my mother's cabin. The moon was a cold silver sickle in the sky. The door creaked open, and there she stood, eyes wide with disbelief and heartbreak. I saw her lips tremble as she whispered my name.

"Why?" she asked.

I didn't answer.

The hunters struck first. I watched the flames devour her and my sister. I could hear Mira's last cry—the raw, shattered howl of a soul ripped apart. I felt the world die around me.

But I stayed.

Because running would have been admitting my guilt.

Because I was still a son, even if I was a traitor.

I ran through the ashes that night with blood on my hands and a wolf's howl tearing from my throat a sound of pain and betrayal that echoed into the dark forests and beyond.

The Tribunal branded me a traitor and an exile. The wolves I survived with despised me as a monster. I became a shadow, moving between worlds, fighting the war inside as much as the one outside.

When I was recruited by the Tribunal enforcers, I thought it was my chance to make things right. To be more than the boy who failed his family. But every kill I made, every order I followed, left another scar on my soul.

Then came Elara.

She is the reckoning. I never saw the light coming; I thought I lost.

I should hate her for what she carries. The curse she embodies. But instead, I feel drawn to her, compelled to protect her at all costs.

It terrifies me.

Because protecting her means facing the darkness I've tried to bury forever.

And because I know the moment she looks into my eyes and sees the truth, everything could fall apart.