My Greate Husband 193_Mated and Hated by My Brother’s Best Friend

Chapter 193 

 Chapter 193 

 *Jiselle* 

 I didn’t remember walking to the ridge.

 I didn’t remember waking at all.

 But the sun was already high when I blinked, my fingers stained red, my chest heaving with uneven breaths. The smell of ash clung to my skin. I stared down at my hands, heart thudding, trying to piece together why the copper tang in the air was too familiar- why my nails were crusted with blood.

 Not dried.

 Not old.

 Fresh.

 It wasn’t mine.

 I turned them over slowly, every heartbeat thudding in my ears like thunder behind ss. There were w marks in the dirt. A gash on the tree stump beside me. Scorched grass.

 What the hell had I done?

 I stood too fast, the world tilting sideways. Heat rolled off my skin in waves, my palms twitching like they were ready to ignite again. I reached out to steady myself, but even the bark recoiled from my touch. Or maybe I imagined that, Lately, I wasn’t sure.

 I’d been losing time again.

 Hours. Minutes. Whole pieces of conversation slipping away like water through a sieve. And it wasn’t like before–not like the visions or the dreams. This was different.

 Like I was slipping into someone else entirely.

 Or something else was slipping into me.

 I pressed a shaking hand to my stomach, seeking something familiar.

 And then I felt it.

 ???

 A flutter. A stretch.

 Not pain. Not fear.

 Just motion.

 Then again.

 The baby kicked.

 My breath caught in my throat. For a second, everything froze–the blood, the heat, the confusion–and all that remained was that small, undeniable movement.

 Sept 

 The child was alive.

 And they were stronger than I realized.

 My knees buckled and I dropped to the earth, hands syed against the dirt. The pulse beneath me was different now–less like a teyline, more like a warning. I closed my eyes, heart racing.

 And then I saw it.

 Not the child, but the vision.

 I stood in a cavern of stone and smoke, Wolves lined the edges–hundreds of them. Blindfolded. Kneeling. Their fur scorched. Muzzles tilted toward the floor like they weren’t bowing by choice.

 They were kneeling for me.

 And I hated it.

 Because I wasn’t standing alone.

 Behind me–just behind me–was a presence I couldn’t see. But I felt it. Felt them. Not just growing inside me now, but standing upright. A shadow made of fire, bones carved of light, gaze sharper than any Alpha I’d ever known.

 The child.

 Mine. And not mine.

 The wolves didn’t speak.

 They screamed.

 One by one, their throats tore open with soundless cries. And I stood there–immobile. Cold and hot all at once. The mes behind me licked at the ceiling of the dream, casting shapes on the stone.

 One rune. Then another. Then a third.

 Until the fire twisted, and formed a fourth.

 That symbol again.

 The one I didn’t understand.

 The one I could feel now, beneath

 my

 skin.

 I screamed.

 And woke to the smell of burning.

 Scorched earth surrounded me, the circle at my feet ckened and cracked. The trees nearby were untouched–but everything within ten feet of where I stood was charred like the aftermath of a lightning strike.

 Then a voice.

 “Jiselle.”

 I turned. 

 Nate.

 His eyes were wide, jaw clenched, the bond humming between us like an overstrung wire. His shirt stuck to his chest, sweat trailing down his temples. He looked furious–and scared.

 “You said you’d stop practicing alone.”

 I opened my mouth, but I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t even remembering here.

 “I didn’t-”

 “You didn’t what?” he snapped, stepping closer. “Didn’t mean to set the leyline aze again? Didn’t notice the blood? You could’ve copsed again, or worse–lost time and nevere back!”

 “It wasn’t like that-”

 “It’s always like that.”

 His voice cracked on thest word.

 And that did something worse than the yelling.

 It made the ache behind my ribs deepen.

 He was scared. Again.

 Of me.

 I wrapped my arms around myself, the baby still shifting gently within, as if sensing the storm that hovered just beyond my skin. “I wasn’t trying to hide. I didn’t mean toe here. I woke up and I was already here.”

 He stopped. Jaw tight. “Then what’s happening to you?”

 I didn’t know how to answer that.

 I didn’t know what was happening to me.

 “I don’t know,” I whispered. “And neither do you. So stop pretending that pulling away is going to protect me.”

 His breath caught, and he didn’t answer.

 I stepped forward. “You’re shutting me out. Again. I feel it. You’ve been dimming the bond, Nate. Why? Because I might break? Because the child might be something you can’t save?”

 “I’m trying to keep you safe.”

 “No,” I said quietly. “You’re trying to keep yourself from falling apart when I finally stop pretending everything is okay.”

 Here is the fleshed–out version of that scene, keeping the tone immersive, emotional, and continuous as per your story’s style:

 Silence stretched between us, thick and suffocating. Not the kind that invites peace–but the kind that presses against your chest and makes your lungs forget how to work. I waited for him to say something. Anything. Even if it was anger. Even if it was another

 Chapter 193

 attempt to wrap me in fear disguised as protection. But all I got was the tension in his shoulders, the fare of his nostrils, and the slight tremble in his jaw.

 Then, without a word, Nate turned.

 Each step he took away from mended like a stone inside my stomach.

 I didn’t stop him.

 I couldn’t.

 The bond didn’t break. No snap. No finality. It remained.

 But it dimmed–quiet, dull, like someone

 2.Wrapped it in wool and buried it beneath too much grief to breathe. It pulsed faintly,

 like a heartbeat underwater, fading further with each foot of distance he put between us. I felt it retreat into the shell he used to wear when we were first reunited–before the fire, before the veil, before the child.

 And now I was here.

 Alone.

 In the middle of a circle I didn’t remember drawing, surrounded by ckened grass and smoking earth that hadn’t yet decided whether to heal or burn again. The air around me was still hot, but the warmth didn’tfort–it suffocated. My legs trembled, not from fatigue, but from the weight of what was slipping away. Not just Nate. Not just the bond.

 Something inside me.

 Something I couldn’t name.

 I tilted my head back, eyes catching on the sky overhead, streaked with crimson clouds that didn’t belong to dusk or dawn. Just rupture. The kind of sky that made you think the world might never breathe clean again..

 I wanted to call him back.

 To scream his name. To run after him and force him to look at me–to see me, not as a burden or a risk, but as the girl he once stood beside in moonlit halls and promised to protect, not from herself, but with her.

 But I didn’t move.

 Because something deeper than pride held me in ce.

 Something ancient. Cold.

 Something watching.

 My breath caught. Slowly, I turned my head toward the edge of the canyon where the leyline sliced the world open like a vein. Below, its shimmer flickered unsteadily–still shaken, still bruised from whatever I’d stirred. It pulsed in colors that weren’t natural. Violet. Red. Gold. Alive. Almost angry.

 And across the canyon, framed by scorched wind and distorted heat, was a figure.

 Still.

 Almost perfectly still.

 ΔΙΕ

 Chapter 193 

 They stood at the highest ridge, shadowed by the crumbling spires of an old watchtower, too far for me to see their face but de enough that I felt them. 

 My heart thudded once. Then again..

 Not in fear.

 In recognition.

 They were cloaked, hooded, the folds of fabric hanging loose like it was sewn from dusk and ash. Their hands weren’t visible. Their feet didn’t shift. But the air around them rippled subtly, like heat over fire or water bending backward. The shadows at their feet didn’t obey the sun–they curled inward, wrapping around their ankles like loyal dogs.

 Not wolf.

 Not human.

 Something else entirely.

 My lips parted, breath shallow, as I squinted against the haze. I told myself it was just a hallucination, just my frayed mind trying to make sense of the fractures opening inside me. But the bond pulsed again–faint, not Nate’s.

 Not Ethan’s.

 Something other.

 The figure’s head tilted slightly, like they were listening. Or responding. Not to movement. But to me.

 To thought.

 To recognition.

 It was like they knew what I was about to say before I could form the words.

 Like they were waiting.

 And I didn’t know what terrified me more-

 That they might cross the leyline ande for me.

 Or that some part of me wanted them to.

 Some part of me remembered them.

 Already belonged to them.

 Because the longer I stared, the more the heat curled at my spine, the more the mark on my wrist began to burn–not with pain, but with familiarity. A name brushed the edge of my consciousness. Not Aedric. Not Kael.

 Not even Nate.

 Just… a name I hadn’t been given yet. But one I knew was mine.

 Not spoken by anyone.

 Not read in any book.

 Just known.

 The shadows shifted. The figure raised one hand–slowly, deliberately and pressed their palm to their chest. Not a threst Notmand.

 A pledge.

 To me. 

 And that’s when I realized-

 I wasn’t just the me.

 I wasn’t just the bearer of the Triad.

 I was the one it had been waiting for.

 And whatever was rising through the leyline, whatever had scorched that symbol into bark, whatever had whispered Your me is not your own…

 It had just found its way to me.

 And it wasn’t letting go.

 AD

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My Greate Husband 193