Mated to Her Alpha Instructor Chapter 154

Regis

The world narrowed to a single point: Eileen, crumpled in a pool of blood at the center of that cursed ritual circle.

Valdor didn't ask permission. He *erupted*.

My human skin split away like paper as silver-black fur exploded across my frame. Bones cracked and reformed, muscle mass doubling in heartbeats. The transformation hurt—it always did when rage drove it this fast—but I welcomed the pain. Channeled it into speed.

I hit the ground on four massive paws and *launched*.

Trees blurred past. The forest floor shook with each bound. Through the bond I felt her terror, her pain, the awful pulling sensation as that bastard's ritual tried to drain her life away—

A figure stepped into my path.

Cornelius.

He should have run. Should have begged. Instead, the old bastard *smiled* and raised one hand. Moonlight caught on something dark clutched in his palm—a black medallion carved with a wolf's head, its eyes set with chips of obsidian.

The medallion *shrieked*.

Not a sound. Worse. A pulse of dark energy that rippled through the air like a shockwave, and suddenly the shadows around the ravine were *moving*.

Wolves poured from the rocks. Ten, twelve, fifteen—massive brutes with fur the color of smoke and eyes that glowed sulfur-yellow. Shadow wolves. But wrong, somehow. Too fast. Too coordinated.

"You think I relied solely on the Council's protection?" Cornelius's voice carried over the snarls. "I've been preparing for this day for *decades*."

One of the shadow wolves lunged.

I caught it mid-leap, jaws clamping around its throat. Bone crunched. Hot blood flooded my mouth—tasted of ash and corruption. I flung the corpse aside and kept moving, but three more were already on me.

Claws raked my shoulder. Teeth snapped at my hindquarters. I spun, using my greater mass to bowl two of them over, but the sheer *number*—

Another came from my blind side. Its claws found purchase along my ribs, tearing through fur and flesh. Pain lanced white-hot down my flank.

I roared and twisted, catching the attacker's skull between my jaws. Crushed it. But in that split second of distraction, two more hit me from opposite sides.

*Eileen.*

Through the bond: fading. Weakening. The ritual was *still active*, still draining her even as I fought.

I had to get to her. Had to—

A shadow wolf clamped onto my hind leg. Another tore at my shoulder. I shook them off, lunged forward—

And that's when Cornelius moved.

He was fast for an old man. Inhumanly fast. In his good hand—the one I *hadn't* severed during our last encounter—he held a dagger. Not silver. Something worse. The blade shimmered with sick purple light, runes crawling along its surface like living things.

"Courtesy of the witch," he hissed.

The dagger punched between my ribs.

White-hot agony exploded through my chest. Not just the wound—though that was bad enough, the blade scraping bone as it sank deep—but something *else*. Something that burned like liquid fire spreading through my veins.

Poison.

My legs buckled. I tried to stay upright, tried to keep myself between Cornelius and Eileen, but my muscles weren't responding right. The world tilted sideways.

Valdor snarled in my head: *GET UP. GET UP, YOU FOOL—*

I snapped at Cornelius's arm. Felt bone break between my teeth. Heard him scream. But the damage was done. The poison was spreading, turning my blood to sludge, my strength to water.

The shadow wolves backed off, waiting. Watching.

Cornelius stumbled away, cradling his mangled arm, but his eyes were *triumphant*. "You're too late, Vane. You're always too late."

*No.*

I forced the shift. Poured every ounce of remaining strength into dragging my human form back to the surface. Fur receded. Bones cracked. When I finally collapsed onto the blood-soaked ground, I was man-shaped again—naked, bleeding, the dagger still buried in my chest.

But I was between Cornelius and Eileen.

I reached back, found her hand. So cold. Her pulse fluttered against my palm like a dying bird.

*I'm sorry,* I sent through the bond. *I'm sorry I wasn't fast enough.*

Her pain flooded back through the connection. Not just physical—though there was plenty of that—but *soul-deep* terror. For me. For our daughter. For everyone.

And underneath it all, a spark. Stubborn. Furious.

*Alive.*

"Touching," Cornelius spat. Blood poured from the stump where his hand used to be, but he didn't seem to care. He fumbled in his robes with his remaining hand and pulled out something that made my stomach drop.

A runestone. Purple-black, covered in symbols that hurt to look at. The same sick energy that pulsed from the dagger.

"If I can't have the power," he whispered, "then *no one will*."

He slammed the stone into the center of the ritual circle.

The ground *screamed*.

---

**Nina**

The chains had snapped minutes ago—I didn't know how, didn't care. All that mattered was crawling to Mother.

She lay crumpled at the circle's edge, silver manacles still locked around her wrists even though the connecting chains had shattered. Her face was gray. Bruised. Dried blood caked her temple.

But her eyes were open. Fixed on me.

"Nina." Her voice was barely a whisper. "You need to run."

"I'm not leaving you." My hands shook as I tried to lift her. She weighed almost nothing—when had she gotten so *light*? "Come on, we can—"

The ground convulsed.

I looked up just in time to see Cornelius slam that horrible runestone into the ritual circle's center. Purple-black light exploded outward like shockwaves, and suddenly the runes carved into the earth weren't just glowing—they were *burning*.

The air turned thick. Hot. Wrong.

"No." Mother's hand locked around my wrist with surprising strength. "Nina, listen to me—"

"The circle's collapsing!" I could feel it—some instinct I didn't understand screaming danger. "We have to—"

"There's no time." She pulled me close, her breath rattling. "He built a fail-safe. If the ritual is interrupted, the whole array will detonate."

My blood turned to ice. "What?"

"Three minutes." Her eyes were too calm. Too resigned. "Maybe less."

Around us, the purple light intensified. Cracks spread through the ground, glowing from within. The air tasted like ozone and ash.

Owen was slumped against a boulder twenty feet away, poison arrows jutting from his back. Eileen and Regis lay in the circle's heart, both barely breathing. If this thing exploded—

"We'll die." The words came out flat. Emotionless. Some part of me had already accepted it.

"You won't." Mother's hand moved to my face, cupping my cheek. "My brave girl. You won't."

Something in her tone made me look at her—really *look*. Her eyes weren't resigned.

They were *determined*.

"Mother, no—"

"I sealed your power when you were born." She spoke quickly now, urgently. "To protect you. To hide you from people like him." A glance toward where Cornelius was laughing, mad and triumphant. "But you're not a child anymore."

"What are you talking about?" My voice cracked. "I don't have power, I'm just—"

"You are the daughter of a moon-blessed wolf and an ancient witch bloodline." Her grip tightened. "You were *never* powerless, Nina. I just... I couldn't let them use you the way they used me."

Tears blurred my vision. "Please don't—"

She bit down on her own finger. Blood welled, dark and thick. Before I could stop her, she pressed her bleeding hand to my forehead.

"*By blood I bound you.*" Her voice changed—took on a resonance that made the air vibrate. Ancient words in a language I shouldn't understand but somehow *did*. "*By blood I free you.*"

Heat.

It started where her blood touched my skin and spread like wildfire. Down my face, into my skull, racing along my spine. Every nerve ending lit up at once.

I screamed.

"*Let the seal break. Let the power wake.*" Mother's voice was fading, growing distant even though she was right in front of me. "*Let my daughter be whole.*".

Something inside me *shattered*.

It felt like being ripped in half. Like a door I'd never known existed suddenly bursting open. Power—raw, chaotic, *hungry*—flooded through every cell.

Purple light exploded from my skin.

And then—

*Nina.*

Thea's voice. But different. *Stronger*. No longer the timid, half-formed presence I'd felt when I'd shifted before Adrian.

*The seal,* she breathed in wonder. *She didn't just bind your magic. She bound half of ME.*

I gasped as the truth hit. All those years I'd thought my wolf was weak, incomplete—it wasn't natural. Mother had *split* Thea's power to hide the witch blood from detection.

*We're whole now,* Thea growled. *Feel it.*

The purple light intensified. I looked down and watched in shock as my hands began to shift—not fully into wolf form, but something between. Claws lengthened, dark and gleaming. Fur rippled across my forearms, but it wasn't the pale gray I'd seen in the forest.

It was *purple*. Deep amethyst shot through with silver, shimmering like starlight on water.

The witch magic and wolf magic *merged*. Spiraled together in my chest like twin flames becoming one inferno.

When I opened my eyes, the world looked different. Sharper. I could *see* the magic now—purple threads of power bleeding from the collapsing ritual circle, silver moonlight pooling around Eileen's unconscious form. I could *smell* the wrongness of Cornelius's corruption, taste the death magic coating the air.

And I could feel Mother's life force, guttering like a candle in a storm.

"No." I reached for her, but she was already pulling away. "Mother, please—"

"You're free now." She smiled—actually *smiled*—even as her skin began to turn translucent. "That's all I ever wanted."

"Mother—"

"You were never a mistake, Nina." Her voice was barely a whisper now. "You are my greatest blessing. Live. *Live* for both of us."

Her hand fell away.

Her body dissolved into silver light.

And she was *gone*.