Chapter 4: Left

Chapter 4: Left

I wake to the golden light of dawn filtering through the trees, the gentle warmth brushing against my bare skin. The forest is quiet, peaceful in the way that only the early morning allows. For a moment, I don’t move, basking in the stillness, in the lingering traces of the bond humming inside me. My body aches, sore in ways that make my face flush, but the pain is good. It is a reminder. A mark of completion.

I stretch, my limbs heavy with exhaustion but tingling with something else—satisfaction, fulfillment. The damp grass beneath me is cold against my bare back, an uncomfortable contrast to the heat still simmering under my skin. I hate the feeling of it, the wet earth clinging to my body, but it hardly matters. Not when my mate is here. Not when he is—

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