Filed to story: Mated and Hated by My Brother’s Best Friend Book PDF Free by Anna Campbell
I staggered back a step. “You don’t understand. I didn’t ask for this. I didn’t want any o
“But the flame did,” Serina said. “It doesn’t need permission. Only space.”
I looked at the runes circling the camp now-etched into the stone, mirrored in the dirt, glowing softly in time with the veil-fire.
“You’ve known all along,” I said. “You’ve been waiting.”
The Gatekeeper nodded. “Not for you. For what follows you.”
I swallowed. “And what is that?”.
Serina lifted her palm again. The disc had begun to dissolve, turning into faint streams of light that spun around her wrist.
“What comes after the threshold,” she said, “is not fire. It is choice.”
Something in my chest cracked then.
A realization I couldn’t name.
I met her eyes one more time.
And asked, “Are you going to help me?”
She paused.
Then said, “That depends.”
“On what?”
She stepped closer.
Until our breaths mingled.
Until I could see the faint scars at her temple. The ones I hadn’t noticed before. The ones that looked like mine.
“On whether you’re here to seal the Gate again…”
She touched my chest-right over the scar.
“…or to open it.”
The wind howled through the canyon like an answer.
And somewhere deep beneath our feet-
The Gate pulsed.
Still closed.
But listening.
*Jiselle
The fire in the Gatekeeper camp didn’t crackle. It pulsed.
Each flicker moved with purpose, as if responding to unseen rhythms I couldn’t hear. The flames were violet-tinged like my own but quieter-measured, ancient. They didn’t threaten. They watched.
So did the people.
Dozens of eyes followed my every step through the stone-etched corridor behind the veiled leader’s tent. No one spoke. Not one finger twitched toward a blade, but still, I felt the weight of a thousand unspoken warnings. I wasn’t welcome.
I wasn’t unwelcome either.
I was something else entirely.
At the end of the corridor, a tall arch awaited-etched with more of the sigils that had begun appearing everywhere since my awakening, I recognized a few now: balance, threshold, origin, memory. But others were still a mystery. Symbols not drawn from the academy’s texts, nor even the rogue scrolls Bastain had shown me. Older.
The veiled man who had declared me “threshold” gestured without speaking. The flap beside the arch lifted.
She stepped through it.
Serina.
She looked almost exactly as I remembered her from the visions-tall, angular, ethereal in that quiet, unshakable way. Her cloak brushed the floor like smoke, and her hair was loose, woven with starlight strands that shimmered when she moved.
But her eyes-those were the same. Familiar. Too familiar.
She didn’t smile. Didn’t rush to embrace me.
“Hello, Jiselle,” she said.
Her voice was low. Fluid. A current hidden beneath calm waters.
“I-I thought you died,” I managed.
She tilted her head. “I did. In some ways.”
“I saw you burn,” I whispered. “In the memory. On the cliff. I felt it.”
“You felt a moment,” she said. “Not an ending.”
That was when I realized the truth.
This wasn’t resurrection.
It was return.
“You’re not just some echo,” I said slowly. “You’re alive.”
Her gaze didn’t shift. “Alive enough.”
The silence between us stretched, threaded with something neither of us wanted to name.
“I thought you’d be glad,” I said after a moment. “To see me. To see that I lived.”
“I am,” she said. “But you misunderstand. I didn’t shape your path. I didn’t leave you clues. You were never meant to follow me
“Then why am I here?”
She walked closer, slow and deliberate. “Because you are what I could not be.”
I took a step back. “What does that mean?”
She didn’t answer directly.
Instead, she extended a hand. “Walk with me.”
Thesitated-but followed.
The path twisted beneath the mountain. No torches. Just veins of glowing violet running through the stone, like the leyline itself had curled into the earth here to sleep.
“Why did you let them think you were dead?” I asked.
“Because being Serina is dangerous,” she said. “Even now. Especially now.”
“But if they knew you lived-“
“They would try to use me. The same way they’ll try to use you.”
Her words hung heavy.
“I’m not theirs to use.”
She glanced at me. “A tool rarely knows it’s a tool until it’s already broken.”
We stopped in front of a sealed door. No lock. No handle. Just a smooth slab of star-metal and sigils etched deep into its surface. She placed her palm over one of them.
The door hissed open.
The air that poured out was colder than I expected-old air, untouched by time.
Inside was a chamber carved into raw obsidian. The walls glowed with embedded runes-each one distinct, but each one part of a pattern. Circles. Spirals. Flame. Chains. Memory. Echo. Veil. Origin.
And names.
So many names.
Some were smudged. Some burned into the wall. Some still glowed with fresh light.
My eyes scanned until I saw it.
JISELLE.
Etched beside names I couldn’t pronounce, names I hadn’t heard. Some repeated. Some circled. All tied together.
“What is this?” I asked, voice hoarse.
“This is where they record the ones they think matter,” Serina said.
“They?” I whispered.
“The ones who pretend to guard balance,” she replied. “The Gatekeepers.”
My chest tightened. “They knew about me? Before I was born?”
She turned toward the wall. “They’ve always know
They care that you open the door.”
My pulse echoed in my throat. someone would come. Someone whose flame would not burn alone. They don’t care if you survive
“You said I was never meant to follow you,” I said. “But here I am.”
She turned back to me, eyes shadowed. “You’re not my descendant, Jiselle. You’re my continuation.”
The words didn’t make sense at first.
“Continuation?”
She nodded. “I wasn’t meant to carry the flame to its final reckoning. I was the first breath. You are the second.”
“So I’m not a new Sovereign,” I whispered. “I’m the same.”
“Not the same,” she said. “The next.”
I reeled back, hand hitting the wall for balance.
It pulsed beneath my touch.
I ripped my hand away.
“This is why the Gatekeepers follow me,” I said. “Because they think I’ll finish what you started.”
“No,” she said. “Because they think you’ll open the gate.”
“Didn’t you try to stop it?” I demanded. “Didn’t you burn yourself to stop what was behind it?”
She stared at me.
New Book: Veiled Desires of the Alpha King Novel
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