My Sister Stole My Mate, And I Let Her-Chapter 350 ASH AND BLOOD

SERAPHINA’S POV

One moment, Kieran’s body was braced over mine, muscles trembling, breath ragged against my shoulder. His teeth hovered at the curve of my neck, just above the pulse point where a mark would root itself deep and permanent.

The next, the world shifted.

Not a full vision. Not like the psychic dives I was learning to navigate. This was something else—an intrusion of sensation.

I wasn’t in my bedroom anymore. I wasn’t underneath Kieran anymore.

I was standing in a clearing I did not recognize, the air thick with smoke. The ground was scorched black, and ash coated my bare feet.

The sky overhead was bruised red, as if wounded.

And at the center of it—

Kieran. On his knees.

Blood from a wound I couldn’t see poured from him in a steady spill, spreading fast and dark, soaking the blackened earth beneath him as if it were drinking him in.

His shoulders sagged with a heaviness I had never seen in him before, not in battle, not in grief, not in fury.

When his eyes lifted to find me, they were dimming, the fierce gold-rimmed obsidian I knew so well fading into something distant and unreachable.

I tried to move toward him, tried to call his name, but my body would not obey. My limbs felt anchored to the ash beneath my feet, my voice trapped behind my teeth. Helplessness and terror clamped around my ribs, sharper than any wound.

I could see him slipping away, could feel the inevitability of it rushing toward me like a tide, and I could do nothing.

I could not reach him. I could not shield him. I could not save him.

And then the image shattered, dropping me back into the heat of my bedroom with his breath hot against my skin and his fangs poised at my throat.

‘If he marks you now, he dies.’

The certainty was absolute.

“Don’t,” I panted, fear twisting with the hunger gnawing at my insides.

But Kieran wasn’t hearing me. I could feel Ashar’s dominance flooding the room, pressing against my skin like heat before a storm.

“Kieran,” I pleaded, tightening my grip in his hair in a bid to bring him back to himself.

But he’d already crossed that razor-thin edge where restraint tipped into instinct.

I’d been the one to tell him to lose control, after all.

My power reacted before my conscious mind did.

The psychic hold surged outward from me like a pulse of lightning, threading through his muscles, his spine, even the wolf inside him.

He stopped as though his pause button had been pressed.

His jaw remained parted, fangs bared inches from my throat. His hands still wrapped around my wrists, but they no longer tightened. His body was suspended, breath caught halfway through an inhale.

Ashar roared in fury against the barrier, slamming into my power.

But he could not break it.

For a moment, I simply stared at him, stunned as deja vu went through me.

It was the same unyielding force that had once frozen Lucian mid-stride on the OTS mats when pressure became too much.

But this was deliberate. Controlled.

“Kieran,” I breathed, though he could not respond.

His eyes were still gold at the edges, burning with instinct and frustration. I saw the struggle there—the war between man and wolf, control and claim.

I did not release him immediately.

I needed to be certain the vision had not lied.

I needed to feel that edge again, to confirm that what surged through me was not just my own fear masquerading as prophecy.

The wrongness still hummed beneath my skin, an ache that clawed for recognition. I didn’t know how or when, but if Kieran marked me tonight, I would lose him. The dread was absolute, trembling beneath every breath I took.

My heart pounded, but my mind was clear.

I released Kieran carefully. The psychic threads loosened and retracted into me like drawn silk.

The second he could move, he did.

Away.

He rolled off me in one smooth motion, landing on his back beside me. His chest rose and fell hard as he forced air back into his lungs.

For a moment, neither of us spoke.

The room still hummed with the aftermath of what had nearly happened.

After what felt like an eternity, he dragged a hand over his face, then sat up, elbows braced on his knees.

“You said you weren’t angry at me,” he said through clenched teeth, not looking at me.

My stomach twisted.

“I’m not.”

The muscles in his back tensed.

“Then...why?”

I pushed myself up, pulling the sheet around me more from instinct than modesty.

“Kieran...you can’t mark me,” I said softly. “Not now.”

He turned to me then, frustration sparking in his eyes.

"Is it because the bond was severed?"

"I—"

“Sera, we don’t need the mate bond for me to mark you. It would deepen our connection. You wouldn’t have to walk into a room and wonder what you’re seeing. I wouldn’t have to guess what you’re feeling.”

His voice softened at the end.

“We wouldn’t have to worry about anyone manipulating optics again.”

The words hit somewhere tender.

He wasn’t wrong.

A mark would deepen everything. It would fuse us in ways that couldn’t be staged or falsified.

But the image of ash and blood refused to fade.

“I didn’t stop you because I’m angry at you, Kieran,” I repeated, forcing him to hear that first.

“Then why?” he demanded again.

Because if you mark me tonight, you die.

The words sounded insane even in my own head. The last thing I wanted to do was tell him. But if I kept it to myself, he would run with the narrative that I still held a grudge.

“I...saw something,” I admitted.

He went still.

“What?”

“It wasn’t clear,” I said, my hands curling in the sheet. “And I didn’t understand it or the details or—”

“Sera.”

He turned fully toward me now, skepticism sharpening his features.

I sighed, forcing myself to look him in the eyes. “If you mark me tonight, you’ll die.”

Silence dropped heavy between us.

Kieran stared at me as if waiting for me to laugh.

I didn’t.

“If I mark you,” he repeated slowly. “I die.”

I exhaled, shaking my head. “I know it sounds crazy.”

“Okay, so I don’t have to point that out.”

“Hey, it’s not like we’re strangers to crazy,” I snapped.

He stood abruptly and began pacing, running a hand through his hair.

“Sera, you’re basing a life-altering decision on a vague intuition.”

“It wasn’t vague.”

“It wasn’t concrete either. You said it yourself—you don’t understand the details.”

I hesitated.

He wasn’t wrong about that. It hadn’t been a fully formed prophecy. There had been no date, no enemy named, no sequence of events, not even a proper location.

Just certainty.

“I don’t care how vague it was,” I said softly. “I can’t risk you.”

He stopped pacing.

“I am an Alpha,” he said matter-of-factly. “I face risk every day. You can’t shield me from all of it.”

“If I can, I damn well will,” I shot back. I reached out and took his hand. “You don’t have to understand—goddess knows I don’t—but I need you to trust me, Kieran.”

The words hung between us, heavy and aching. He softened ever so slightly, pain shadowing his expression.

He did trust me, I knew that. But this touched something primal in him—his right to claim, to seal.

“You froze me,” he said suddenly, quieter now.

I blinked, a little surprised by the topic change.

“Are you mad?”

His lips twitched. “That was pretty fucking incredible.”

A small breath escaped me. “I guess.”

Slowly, the anger drained from his face.

For a long moment, we simply looked at each other, breathing in the aftermath of everything we had unleashed tonight.

“I don’t like this,” he admitted.

“I know.”

“I don’t like the idea that something out there can dictate whether I mark you.”

“It’s not dictating,” I said. “It’s warning.”

He sank back into the bed, eyes never leaving mine.

“You realize what this does to Ashar,” he murmured.

“Yes.”

“You realize he won’t stop wanting it.”

I bit my lower lip, shrugging. “I don’t expect him to.”

He leaned forward, and his hands framed my face.

“I will not die because I marked you,” he said, his voice steady. “If anything, it would make me stronger.”

“I’m not gambling with your life,” I whispered.

Frustration flared in his eyes again, but this time he didn’t pull away.

He leaned in and kissed me.

His mouth claimed mine with certainty, slow and controlled. There was no desperation in it, no loss of restraint—only intention.

When he broke the kiss, his hands slid down my body, slower this time, but no less heated. He pulled the sheet away and tossed it onto the floor. A shiver that had nothing to do with the sudden cold ran through me.

“If I can’t mark you,” he said quietly, mouth brushing my collarbone, “then I will remind you exactly what you’re postponing.” 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

His frustration didn’t disappear; it changed shape, and what had been reckless instead turned precise, every touch intentional, every movement measured.

The heat between us was no less intense, but it no longer felt like instinct straining at its leash.

He pulled me closer—not to bite, not to seal, but to claim in every other way. As if proving that a mark wasn’t the only way to bind two souls.

And beneath the heat that rose again between us, beneath the friction and the breathless tension, the vision lingered like smoke at the edge of my mind.