The Forgotten Pulse of the Bond-Chapter 77: The Pulse Between Worlds

Night carved the sky into ink, but the broken moon glared like a wounded eye, casting pale light across the Callahan estate’s sacred hilltop. Winds murmured over grass, and the trees surrounding the ceremonial stone circle stood stiff as if holding their breath.

Savannah stood first, arms crossed beneath her black leather jacket, the collar upturned against the chill. Her eyes, rimmed with fatigue, flicked between Rhett and Celeste.

"She said the prophecy’s voice would come tonight," Savannah murmured. "But I didn’t expect the sky to bleed first."

Celeste, her robes swaying, stepped forward and traced her fingers along the rune-carved stones. Her silver hair was bound tightly, like a crown, and the golden feather pendant at her throat vibrated faintly with a humming energy.

"The moon breaking wasn’t part of the prophecy," she said, voice low and precise. "Something’s waking. Something old."

Rhett stood apart, the wind tugging at the hem of his coat. He said nothing. His gaze, glassed over with memory and warning, remained fixed on the horizon where the black mountains curved into the edge of night.

"She’s late," Savannah said. Her voice faltered.

Rhett’s lips parted. "She’s never late."

Then the silence shattered.

Footsteps crunched over the path behind them. Every head turned. Camille emerged, her steps slow but sure, barefoot despite the frost, her ivory gown damp at the hem. Her hair flowed down her back in wild auburn waves, tangled and wind-kissed. But it was her eyes that froze them all.

They glowed, not with light, but with presence. Layered. Dual.

"Camille," Celeste began, but the woman raised one hand.

"Not just Camille," the voice replied. It was her voice, and it wasn’t. Lower, ancient, as if spoken through a veil.

Magnolia stepped from the trees last, her breath ragged, scrolls clutched tight in her arms. She stopped short at the sight of Camille.

"What happened to her?"

Camille smiled, but it was a strange, slow curve.

"The prophecy didn’t awaken. It remembered."

Savannah stepped closer, tension in every line of her body. "What do you mean?"

Camille’s eyes flicked toward her. "It was never just words on a scroll. It’s a bond forged in blood and dust, older than your father, older than the Syndicate."

Rhett’s voice, steel-laced, finally broke through. "Who speaks through you now?"

Camille turned her head slowly toward him. For a moment, no one breathed. freēnovelkiss.com

"The Hollow Crown. The Throne of Bone. The First Alpha."

Celeste’s pendant cracked audibly.

"That can’t be. That line was ended. Buried."

Camille’s eyes shimmered, and for a breath, she looked like a ghost. "Buried, yes. But not broken."

Magnolia edged forward. Her voice trembled. "Then why come now? What does it want?"

Camille looked at her, and the other presence behind her eyes blinked.

"To finish what was started."

Savannah took Rhett’s hand. It was an instinct, but one that grounded her. He didn’t flinch. Didn’t pull away.

"Camille," she said again, gentler, human. "Are you still in there?"

Camille’s gaze met hers. And in that fraction of a second, the layers fell.

"I’m still here. But I’m not alone."

The wind picked up. The trees creaked. The moon, broken and bleeding light, flared.

Suddenly, the ground beneath their feet vibrated.

Celeste stumbled. "She’s acting as a vessel, no, an anchor. If this entity stabilizes inside her..."

"...it can cross," Rhett finished.

Camille tilted her head. Her smile was sad.

"It already has."

The stone circle lit from beneath. Glowing veins of gold and black spidered through the cracks, pulsing with a heartbeat none of them wanted to hear.

Magnolia threw the scrolls to the ground. "These don’t tell how to stop it, just how it ends."

Camille took a step forward. "You’ve all seen glimpses. The vision under the Crimson Moon. Savannah in chains. Rhett on his knees. Sterling crowned beside me."

"It’s not fate," Savannah spat. "It’s manipulation."

"It’s both," Camille replied. "Because the prophecy never predicts, it remembers."

Celeste drew a blade from her robe. It shimmered green with moonmetal. "If she’s been breached, we may have to sever the connection. Even if it means, "

"No," Magnolia snapped.

Rhett moved fast, placing himself between Camille and Celeste. "No one harms her. Not while she’s still fighting."

Camille’s eyes flared. "And if I stop fighting?"

Rhett didn’t blink. "Then we fight for you."

Camille stared at him, and for a moment, her lips quivered. Her eyes dimmed.

"Rhett... if this gets worse, if I become her completely, "

"You won’t."

"But if, "

"Then I’ll burn down the world to bring you back."

A breath. A stillness.

Magnolia crouched by the scrolls. "There’s something here. A line... hidden in the border. Not ink. Blood."

Celeste leaned over. "Read it. Quickly."

Magnolia’s voice trembled. "To break the tie, the true heir must bleed beneath the moon’s eye, watched by the bonded three."

"Three?" Savannah asked.

Camille’s breath caught. Her hand clutched her abdomen.

"I’m pregnant," she whispered.

Everything stopped.

Celeste gasped. Magnolia fell back. Rhett’s mouth parted, but no sound came.

Camille looked up, haunted. "It’s his. Sterling’s."

Savannah moved forward, fury igniting her. "You carry the Hollowfang heir?"

Camille nodded. "That’s why he kept me alive. That’s why he..."

Rhett clenched his fists. "And now you’re the vessel for a dead Alpha and carrying the heir of the current one."

Camille exhaled. Her voice cracked. "I’m more than a vessel. I’m a war."

Celeste turned. "Then we make our stand here."

Camille’s eyes lifted. "Not here. In the ruins. Where it all began."

Magnolia nodded slowly. "The temple."

Rhett turned to Savannah. "Then we end this before the prophecy chooses for us."

Savannah gripped his arm. "We end it on our terms."

Behind them, the cracked moon began to weep light again. And Camille’s gaze lifted to it, glowing, wild.

"She’s waking again," she whispered. "And she’s hungry."

Then, the wind howled.

Something answered back.

And the stones bled.

"Did you hear that?"

Magnolia stilled, the cold night air catching in her throat like a swallowed scream. Her feet, bare against the dew-soaked grass, twitched as another whisper floated past her ears, just soft enough to be mistaken for wind.

"Who’s there?" she asked, though she already knew the garden held no answer. Not one born of reason.

The moon hung shattered above her, fragments of red caught in the clouds like blood frozen in a storm. Her silk robe clung to her skin, but it wasn’t the breeze that sent shivers along her spine.

It was the voice.

She moved deeper into the gardens behind the estate. Vines curled like serpents around wrought-iron arches. Statues leaned in from the dark, their blank faces deformed by moss and memory. Nocturnal blooms opened their pale petals to the broken moonlight.

"Magnolia..."

This time, it whispered her name.

Her breath hitched. The voice didn’t come from around her, it came from beneath.

Following instinct more than logic, she passed the neglected rose terrace, past the bronze sundial she’d never seen move. Her bare toes found a hidden path, half-buried in mud and old leaves.

She stopped before a tree unlike any she had ever seen.

It was massive, its bark blackened like scorched earth. Luna symbols were carved deep into its trunk, ancient markings she recognized from the scrolls Celeste had once shown her in hushed secrecy. Symbols forbidden in every known pack.

She lifted a trembling hand.

The bark was warm.

The moment her fingertips brushed one of the symbols, a crescent moon coiled in flame, her veins lit up in red.

She gasped.

Her blood glowed, pulsing in rhythm with a sound, no, a heartbeat. The tree responded. Roots twisted with a deep groan, pulling back like doors. The earth trembled beneath her, and a spiral staircase of stone descended into blackness.

Magnolia didn’t hesitate.

Something deeper than thought moved her legs. She stepped down.

Each step she took echoed, as if the stairwell remembered every visitor who had ever dared enter. The stone was slick with moss, yet somehow it felt warm beneath her feet. As she descended, the whispers returned, now stronger, now clearer.

"Blood of the first moon..."

"She who dares..."

"...Awaken the Pact..."

The chamber at the bottom opened suddenly. She stepped into a dome carved from obsidian, with ancient murals etched into the walls, wolves shifting under eclipses, women with fire in their hands and sorrow in their eyes. A fountain trickled in the center, its water crimson.

Magnolia approached it. Her reflection shimmered across the surface.

Only it wasn’t just her.

Behind her reflection stood a figure robed in gray. Its face hidden.

She spun around.

Nothing.

But when she turned back to the fountain, the figure remained.

"This is your bloodline," the whisper came again, echoing from the walls now. "Spellbinder. Daughter of Luna. Betrayer of Chains."

"No," Magnolia said, even as her voice shook. "I’m not a spellbinder. I’m not... them."

"You carry her mark."

"That means nothing."

The walls responded. The entire chamber pulsed.

Images swirled around her, Savannah in chains, Rhett kneeling before a burning throne, Camille standing beside Sterling with dead eyes. Her hands trembled as light surged beneath her skin, illuminating her bones.

"What do you want from me?" she cried out.

"To remember. To choose. To awaken."

"Choose what?"

"What side you stand on... when the moon breaks a second time."

Suddenly the chamber darkened. The fountain stopped. Everything froze,

Until the voice changed.

It was no longer ancient. It was no longer distant.

It was her own.

"Run."

Magnolia turned just as the roots above began to seal again. She scrambled up the stairs, heartbeat drumming like war. As she reached the top, the tree groaned and split further. Its trunk cracked open, and for a split second, she saw something moving inside, something pale, with her eyes.

She stumbled back onto the grass, panting.

But the voice followed.

"We are not done, Magnolia."

She collapsed on the lawn, and as her vision blurred, Rhett’s voice came crashing through the trees.

"Magnolia!"

She turned her face toward him.

"It spoke to me," she whispered.

"What did?"

She didn’t answer. She just raised her hand.

Her palm was marked.

Burned into her skin was the same crescent moon, coiled in flame.

And from the tree behind her, the whisper returned, but now it sounded like a cry.

A baby’s cry.

The moon cracked further above them