FORBIDDEN

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 14

Zhan lay wide awake in the dark, his eyes fixed on the shifting shadows cast by the streetlight filtering through the window blinds. Yibo’s slow and steady breathing beside him was the only sound in the room, a rhythm so calm and steady it almost hurt.

There was no threat here, no alarms, no coded messages. Just warmth. Just skin brushing skin beneath shared covers.

And yet Zhan’s heart beats like a war drum. Slow. Steady. Inevitable.

He turned slightly, careful not to disturb Yibo, and studied the peaceful expression of the boy he had grown far too used to sleeping beside. Yibo's brow was smooth in sleep, his lips parted just slightly. Vulnerable in a way Zhan was never allowed to be.

'I was made for this. For getting close.'

But now that he was here—this close—it felt like he was standing on a ledge with no clear line between sky and ground.

'Don’t fall.'

He closed his eyes. And with that darkness came memory.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

FLASHBACK

It had rained that night, years ago, the sort of heavy, unrelenting downpour that soaked the trees to their roots and turned the forest floor into a swamp of shadows. The moon was veiled behind thick clouds, and the howling wind carried with it something foreign. Something wrong.

That was the night Zhou Cheng’s father found him.

A patrol through the boundary—a routine security check. One that led him to the hollowed roots of an old ash tree, half-buried in moss and mud.

There, a child.

Barely breathing.

Wrapped in nothing but a torn cloth and quiet. Not crying. Not moving. Not asking for anything. Just waiting.

Zhou Cheng’s father—a tall, quiet man known for his sharp instincts and unflinching loyalty to the Alpha—knelt before the child with furrowed brows.

He could smell it immediately.

Omega.

But there was something off.

No scent of fear. No pheromonal imprint to latch onto. This child had no identifying markers, no pack signature, nothing.

Neutral.

He took the boy without hesitation. Carried him back through the storm and into the deeper forest, where the shadows thickened and the trees whispered secrets only the loyal could understand.

He brought the boy to the Alpha.

The den of the Dark Pack was a fortress of stone and shadow, nestled in the oldest part of the forest where even light feared to tread. And in its center, the Alpha waited.

The moment Zhan—though he had no name then—was placed before him, the Alpha leaned forward, a breath of something ancient curling around his lips.

"This one," he murmured, voice like gravel and smoke, "was not abandoned. He was placed."

A statement, not a guess.

Zhou Cheng's father bowed his head. "He was found at the boundary. No signs of pursuit. No scent trails."

The Alpha stared into the boy's vacant eyes. "This child has been chosen by time. The threads are tangled around him already."