Filed to story: Mated and Hated by My Brother’s Best Friend Book PDF Free by Anna Campbell
“He wants you up,” the girl said. She didn’t offer her name. Her voice held no warmth, but no cruelty either.
They unlocked the chains, though the silver still clung to my skin in the form of bracelets etched with smaller, pulsing runes. A compromise. I was free enough to walk. Not enough to run.
I followed them through a narrow passage lit by flickering torches, the walls damp and dark with age. We moved in silence. The longer I walked, the more I noticed-scents not just of rogues, but of nature. Fresh moss. Riverwater. Smoke from cooked meat. I’d expected a dungeon. This place was something else entirely.
The tunnel opened onto a wide cavern. Sunlight poured in from a hole above, lighting the space like a spotlight. Around the edges, I saw wolves training-sparring with weapons and claws alike. Some practiced rune work on thick stones, others meditated near softly humming crystals. It wasn’t a prison.
It was a sanctuary.
Kael waited near the center. He wasn’t alone. Four wolves stood behind him in a loose arc-older than me, different in build and expression, but every one of them held power like a second skin. Gifted. I could feel it in the air, the low thrum of magic that hadn’t been filtered or suppressed. It was raw and wild and real.
He turned as I approached, and though he said nothing at first, the others parted for me like a wave breaking.
“I wanted you to see it,” he said finally. “The others. The ones like you.”
I eyed them. “You mean wolves the Council didn’t break?”
“Or kill,” the tall woman to his left added coolly.
Her eyes glinted gold, like molten metal. Something flickered behind them-recognition or curiosity-I couldn’t tell. Kael stepped closer, but not enough to crowd me. “You’re not a prisoner here, Jiselle. Not anymore. The cuffs stay, for now, but that’s all. Today, I offer you a choice.”
My eyes narrowed. “Another speech?”
He didn’t smile. “A challenge.”
Kael raised his hand and the others stepped back.
“I want you to try something,” he said. “Forget what the Council taught you. The controlled channels. The meditation rituals. The breath-work and obedience. I want you to find what’s left of your gift-and pull.”
I stared at him, unsure if he was serious.
“You suppressed it with that rune disc.”
He nodded. “And yet, you’re still alive. Still breathing. Still dangerous.”
My jaw clenched. “You don’t know that.”
“Yes,” he said simply, “I do.”
Kael motioned to a stone basin near the center of the room. It was filled with water, though the surface shimmered oddly- as though touched by power.
“Step in,” he said.
I hesitated, then moved. Every eye in the chamber followed me. The water was warm, surprisingly, and as my bare feet touched it, something deep within me stirred. A flicker of recognition.
“Now,” he said. “Close your eyes. Reach.”
I wanted to laugh, to scoff, to call it nonsense. But I didn’t. I closed my eyes. The silence of the chamber settled over me like a second skin, cool and weightless.
And I reached.
Not with the precision the Academy had demanded, not with the fear of being punished for stepping too far. I reached with instinct, with memory, with fury.
The world didn’t explode. There was no brilliant blast of power.
Just… a spark.
It flared to life inside me like a match catching wind. Tiny. Fragile. But unmistakably mine.
I gasped.
Light shimmered beneath the water, curling around my ankles like silver mist. Not fire. Not lightning. Something else-fluid and pulsing.
I opened my eyes and met Kael’s.
“Told you,” he murmured.
The others exchanged glances-some surprised, some… afraid.
The woman with gold eyes stepped forward. “She’s not supposed to recover that fast. Not after a full suppression rune.” “Unless she’s more than they thought,” said the man beside her-tall, scarred, wary.
Kael nodded. “She is.”
I stepped out of the basin, breath shallow, the energy still flickering beneath my skin like candlelight. It was small, but it was real. Mine.
He offered me a cloth to dry my feet. I didn’t take it. I wasn’t ready to be grateful.
“What is this place?” I asked instead.
“Some call it the Hollow,” he said. “Some call it a lie. I call it the beginning.”
“The beginning of what?”
“Freedom.”
He looked around the chamber. “Every wolf here is gifted. Every wolf here was hunted. The Council used fear to control us. You were just the first to push back in public.”
A girl stepped forward then. Younger than me, freckles dusting her cheeks, her arms crossed tightly over her chest.
“I thought you’d be taller,” she said, blunt and unblinking.
I blinked. “Excuse me?”
“You’re the one who fought the binding circle at the Academy, right?”
I nodded slowly.
“Badass,” she said, then turned and walked away.
A few chuckles followed, but the tension remained. Not everyone was amused.
“She’s dangerous,” one muttered.
“She’s what we’ve been waiting for,” another countered.
Kael raised a hand and the murmurs died.
“She’s one of us now. Train with her. Watch her. Learn.”
He turned to me again. “And you-learn who you are without them.”
I wanted to argue, to push back, but the warmth still curling through my veins held me in place.
I didn’t know who I was anymore.
But I intended to find out.
And I would start here.
Even if it meant playing the rogue’s game.
*Max*
The fire had burned low by the time the messenger arrived.
I stood at the edge of what used to be the Council’s southern watchpost-now little more than charred beams and blood- soaked mud. The sky above was overcast, casting everything in dull grey. It had rained earlier. The kind of rain that couldn’t wash anything clean. Not the stench of ash. Not the blood staining the soil. And definitely not the guilt sitting heavy on my chest like a second skin.
Jiselle was gone.
And whatever temporary truce I had with Nathaniel wouldn’t last. Not really. Not after what I’d done.
I hadn’t lied. Not completely. Everything I said in that courtyard was true-Carrow had planned to bind Jiselle with a rune- dagger. The Council wanted her controlled or killed. And I stopped it. But truth twisted just right still felt like betrayal. And I couldn’t pretend otherwise.
I’d spent years learning to play both sides-Academy golden boy, rogue sympathizer, half-savior, half-spy. But somewhere along the way, the lines blurred. I stopped knowing which side was right. All I knew now was that Jiselle had been taken, and the ones who took her weren’t working alone.
I was still studying the broken runes etched into the foundation stone when the man arrived-hooded, cautious, flanked by two younger wolves who looked like they hadn’t slept in days.
“Laker,” he said without preamble. “You’re late.”
I didn’t bother with small talk. “You got the list?”
He handed over a worn parchment, edges singed. I unfolded it, eyes scanning the names. Some I recognized. Former Council guards. Rune engineers. Suppression artists. All marked as deceased.
Except one.
I tapped the last name. “She’s alive?”
“Far as we know,” he replied. “Went underground six months ago. Last seen in the northern research base-before it went dark.”
I folded the list. “Then that’s where I’m going.”
The man hesitated. “You sure about this, Max? These weren’t just Council rejects. They were the ones who helped build the rogue units.”
I paused. “What do you mean?”
“The rogue army,” he said. “Not all of them turned by choice. The Council created some of them. Black-ops stuff. Test subjects. Rune-linked wolves designed to obey commands. When the experiments got too messy, they buried the evidence. Only some of it didn’t stay buried.”
I felt the blood drain from my face.
“They made them?” I whispered.
–
“They bred them. Engineered them. Then called them enemies when it suited them.”
“And the Alpha?”
The man’s mouth twisted. “He was the first. Prototype.”
I didn’t speak for a long moment. The wind stirred the ashes around us, whistling low through the trees. That meant Kael- whoever he truly was-wasn’t born rogue. He was created. Forged. Trained. Maybe even programmed.
No wonder he knew how to use suppression runes. No wonder he moved like a soldier.
No wonder Jiselle had been taken.
“She’s not just a prisoner,” I said aloud. “She’s part of the plan.”
The man gave me a look. “You think they want to kill her?”
“No,” murmured. “I think they want to make her into one of them.”
And that was worse.
I left not long after, riding hard through the mountain trails. My horse-borrowed, tired, and stubborn-did! ke the pace, but I didn’t care. Every mile brought more questions, more weight pressing down on me. Was she already enged? Had Kael broken through her defenses the way the Council had tried to? What if she stopped fighting?
By the time I reached the remnants of the research base, the sky had gone full black. No moon tonight. Just cold wind and silence.
The base had been buried into the cliffs, a network of tunnels and wards once hidden by illusion spells. Now the main entrance lay open-clearly breached, the wards long since burned away.
I crept inside, blade in hand.
The scent of dust and dried magic clung to everything. Old blood stained the floor in patterns that didn’t match any ritual! knew. Shelves lined the walls, most broken, their contents scattered-rune fragments, cracked crystals, half-written glyphs.
Notes.
I moved quickly, scanning what I could. Most of the papers were beyond saving. But near the back, tucked into the wall, was a terminal-still glowing faintly with residual power. Council tech. Locked behind layers of security.
I fed a drop of my blood into the reader.
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