Rejected Mate (Feral Shifters 1)

I sway on my feet and my vision goes blurry. I catch myself on Kian’s arm and pinch the bridge of my nose, fighting through the wave of pain.

Malix taps me on the shoulder. “Your turn, kitty.”

Gathering my wits about me, I straighten and take the jar from his fingertips. I don’t hesitate—I just toss back every last drop.

It’s thick and gelatinous, with the slight taste of sulfur. I fight the urge to retch and close my eyes, clenching my fists at my sides.

Waiting.

For something.

Anything.

Then, slowly, a cool sensation slides through my veins, washing away the pain. My vision clears, and the throbbing behind my eyelids vanishes. I glance at Frost to see if it’s helping him too, and I notice a little bit of black smoke that’s wafting from his body. On second glance, I realize it’s happening to me, too, as if the poison is seeping out from under my skin.

I glance around at the three shifters and grin. “I think it worked.”

But even as I finish speaking the words, a new kind of pain clutches me.

It’s not the same as before, with the poison and the cramps and seizing. This is like a vise-grip in my chest, as if my heart’s being squeezed right out of me. I press my hand to my chest, fighting for breath, but I can’t get enough air in my lungs. My head goes woozy, and I drop to my knees in the grass.

All three men move closer, looming over me. I struggle to look up at them through the pained tears in my eyes.

Kian stares at me coldly for a moment before he says, “I sever our mate bond.”

Agony rips through my chest like he’s stabbed me in the heart.

Frost speaks up. “I sever our mate bond,” he says in his smooth, even voice, his face as enigmatic as always.

Another stab of pain makes me cry out. I collapse to my side, breathing hard, blackness pressing in on the edges of my vision.

Then Malix tosses something on the ground in front of me as he takes a step closer. “I sever our mate bond.”

It’s a… a vial. I clutch at the grass and try to sit up, but I fall back to the ground, staring at the little glass tube. Something dark clings to the sides of the glass, though it’s otherwise empty.

Oh god.

A sharp, painful realization burns through me as I stare at it, shaking my head as if denying the truth will somehow make it not real.

They did this on purpose.

They had a second potion, and they must’ve added it to the antidote before I drank the fucking thing.

A potion to break our mate bond.

Fury chases away the pain, and I snarl at them. “You motherfuckers. Why?”

Kian crosses his arms over his chest and stares down at me, a strange, unreadable expression on his face. “We have a purpose, Amora. You cannot stop us. And you cannot be a part of it.”

Then all three of them shift into their monstrous shadow wolf forms and sprint away.

Leaving me behind.

Our bonds broken.

Shattered.

Destroyed.