Chapter 2The Black Vein

The ladder groaned as Sable climbed, the communicator still clutched in her sweat-slicked hand. Below, the enforcers' boots hammered concrete. Above, Kestrin's silhouette waited against the moon-washed sky.

She reached the rooftop and he grabbed her arm, pulling her over the edge. "Run."

They ran.

The rooftop stretched ahead, a maze of rusted vents and satellite dishes. Sable's lungs burned as she followed Kestrin's lead, jumping gaps between buildings, landing hard on gravel and tar. Behind them, the factory door shattered open. Howls split the night.

Kestrin vaulted a low wall, then stumbled. Something metal clattered across the concrete.

A medal. Silver and enamel, catching the moonlight.

He stopped. Turned back.

"Leave it!" Sable hissed.

But he was already scooping it up, and in that moment, the first enforcer crested the wall. A woman, tall and scarred, her eyes gleaming amber. She launched herself at Kestrin.

He sidestepped, caught her arm, and threw her off balance. She rolled and came up snarling. Kestrin drew a knife from his boot, but two more enforcers had joined her, spreading out to flank them.

Sable grabbed a loose pipe from the rooftop. It felt heavier than the wrench.

"Go," Kestrin said, not looking at her.

"I'm not leaving you—"

"You're not helping me get killed either." He charged the scarred enforcer, feinting left, then driving his blade into her shoulder. She howled, but the others closed in.

A gunshot cracked.

Kestrin's body jerked. He clutched his shoulder, blood seeping between his fingers. The shot had come from below—a fourth enforcer on the fire escape.

Sable moved before she thought.

She grabbed Kestrin's collar and dragged him toward the roof's edge, where a rusted ladder led down to an alley. He was too heavy, too slow. The enforcers closed the distance.

*Heal him.*

The thought came like instinct, like breath. She pressed her palm to his wound, and warmth bloomed in her chest, spreading down her arm, into her fingers. Kestrin gasped as the flesh knitted beneath her hand.

He stared at her. "You're a healer."

"Move."

They dropped onto the ladder, descended two rungs, then three. The enforcer on the fire escape took another shot, but the angle was wrong. The bullet sparked off the brick wall.

They hit the alley running.

The sewer grate was twenty feet away. Kestrin reached it first, hooking his fingers through the slots and heaving. It gave with a screech of rusted metal. He dropped into the darkness below and held up his arms for her.

Sable jumped.

The stench hit her first—wet rot and chemicals. The sewer tunnel was narrow, barely shoulder-width, with slimy water rushing past her ankles. Kestrin pulled the grate back into place above them. Footsteps pounded overhead, fading, then gone.

They stood in the dark, breathing hard.

"Your shoulder," Sable said.

"It's fine." His voice was tight. "You healed it."

"I didn't know I could do that."

"Most healers don't develop their gift until they bond. You've been exposed to the serum long enough for it to manifest." He paused. "I'm sorry."

She didn't ask what he meant.

---

They walked for forty minutes through the tunnels, emerging through a broken grate into the basement of a condemned apartment building. The place smelled of mold and abandonment. Kestrin led her up three flights of stairs to a room with boarded windows and a single cot.

He lit a candle.

"Safehouse," he said, dropping onto the cot. "Used to belong to a friend."

Sable didn't sit. She stood in the center of the room, arms crossed, watching him. The candlelight carved shadows into his face, making him look older than he was.

"You said you took the job for intel," she said. "That you knew about the serum. But you didn't tell me you were exposed."

"I didn't think it mattered."

"It matters." She grabbed his bag from the floor and upended it. Clothes, a first aid kit, a folded photograph. She picked up the photo.

It showed a group of soldiers in combat gear, standing in front of a chain-link fence. In the center, a woman with dark hair and Sable's eyes looked straight at the camera.

Her mother.

Sable's hands trembled. "This was taken five years before she died. She said she'd been doing research, but she never told me—"

"She was a test subject," Kestrin said quietly. "I was her guard."

Sable looked up. The candle flickered.

"I was a soldier in the Pack Defense Corps," he continued. "My unit was assigned to a research facility. The scientist running the project was my commanding officer, Colonel Vance. He was developing the serum as a weapon. Your mother volunteered for the trials. She believed the mate bond could be replicated artificially. She wanted to prove it was biological, not mystical."

"Did she know the risks?"

"She knew." Kestrin's voice dropped. "She also knew the serum was killing her. She asked me to get her out. I refused. I followed orders."

Sable's grip tightened on the photo. "You were there when she died."

"No." He met her eyes. "I was there when she was injected. I held her hand while she convulsed. I watched her heart stop on a monitor." He unbuttoned his shirt, revealing the scarred plane of his chest. A black vein, like a crack in marble, ran from his collarbone to his sternum.

"The serum exposure," he said. "I carried her out of the lab after she flatlined. She was still breathing. Barely. Vance injected me with a sedative to stop me from taking her further. The needle was contaminated."

Sable touched her own chest, where she'd felt a strange warmth during the healing. She'd seen the mark in the mirror that morning, thin and dark, like a thread of ink.

"You carry it too," Kestrin said. "We're both bonded. To each other."

The word hung in the air like a blade.

"I don't feel it," she said.

"You will. By the full moon, the bond will be complete. Your wolf will recognize mine as its mate. You won't be able to fight it."

"Then we break it."

"The artifact is in Rourke's vault. It's the only thing that can sever the connection." He pulled his shirt closed. "But the person who activates it loses their wolf. Permanently."

Sable stared at him. "You'd let me use it."

"I'd use it myself." His jaw tightened. "You don't deserve to lose your wolf because of my mistakes."

Before she could answer, the communicator on the cot buzzed. Kestrin picked it up. A video call.

He answered.

Rourke's face filled the screen, smiling. "Kestrin. I was beginning to think you'd run."

The camera shifted, revealing a room with white walls and a metal table. Tamsin was strapped to it, her face pale, her eyes glassy with fever. A syringe hovered near her neck, held by a gloved hand.

"Your sister is sicker than you know," Rourke said. "The serum is eating her from the inside. She has maybe a week."

Kestrin's hand tightened on the communicator. "Touch her and I'll—"

"You'll bring me the artifact. That's what you'll do." Rourke's smile didn't waver. "You have forty-eight hours. After that, I'll inject her with a fresh dose. She'll be my personal weapon. Or she'll die. Either way, you lose."

The call ended.

The screen went dark.

Sable watched Kestrin's reflection in the candle flame, his face hollow, his hands shaking.

"Forty-eight hours," she said.

He didn't answer.