My Sister Stole My Mate, And I Let Her

Chapter 498 LOCKED INTO PLACE

SERAPHINA’S POVI didn’t understand how Alina did it.

One moment, I was beneath the open sky, my new body trembling with unfamiliar instincts, the ocean roaring against the shore.

The next, everything around me shifted in a way that defied distance and logic.

There was a tightening sensation deep inside my chest, as though something invisible had gripped the thread of my existence and pulled.

The world blurred.

Sand dissolved into shadow.

Salt air collapsed into cold, familiar earth.

And when my vision steadied again, I was standing upright, human again.

Barefoot on stone pavement that I instantly recognized.

The air was colder here. Heavier. Real in a way the Maldives had started to feel less and less like.

I stumbled, my hands instinctively pressing against my own arms as if to confirm I was truly back inside myself.

My breath came unevenly, and for a moment I thought I might fall again, caught between two versions of existence that refused to settle.

“Where...” My voice broke as I looked around. “Where am I?”

Alina’s presence was still there, but quieter now, like an echo settling after a storm.

‘Close your eyes,’ she said softly inside my mind. ‘Ground yourself.’

I did not fully understand why I obeyed her, but I did anyway.

And when I opened my eyes again, I saw it.

The Lockwood Manor.

It stood before me like a memory carved into stone, tall and imposing, its lights warm against the night as though nothing in the world inside it had ever fractured.

Windows glowed softly, golden and steady, the kind of light that suggested laughter, warmth, and lives that continued without interruption.

My chest tightened.

The family who had rejected me without hesitation lived here.

The Lockwoods.

A lump formed in my throat as I took a hesitant step forward, drawn and repelled at the same time.

Something inside me wanted to turn away, to run again, to disappear back into whatever unstable reality I had just escaped.

But another part of me, deeper and more primal, refused.

It pulled me forward.

I reached the edge of the courtyard slowly, pressing myself behind the low stone wall bordering the garden. From here, I could see inside through the large windows.

What I saw made my breath catch painfully.

Inside, the room was warm with life.

Some sort of gathering was happening.

Glasses clinked softly. Laughter rose and fell in natural rhythm. People moved with ease, with harmony, with familiarity, with the kind of comfort that came from belonging.

My fingers dug into the cold stone as I watched, grief swelling until my heart ached and my eyes burned.

I had always been on the outside of moments like this. I didn’t know what it was like to laugh and live in harmony with my own family.

“This is them?” I whispered under my breath.

‘Yes,’ Alina replied quietly. ‘But not as they really are. This is an illusion woven from the fabric of twisted memories.’

I didn’t know what I was supposed to do with that information. I still wasn’t fully convinced I wasn’t losing my mind.

My eyes moved through the room again, slower this time, as though I might find something that would make this easier to understand.

Ethan stood slightly apart from the others, his expression carrying the kind of quiet authority that did not need to announce itself to be understood.

Margaret Lockwood sat gracefully nearby, her posture perfect, her presence calm in a way that felt almost untouchable.

There was warmth in her expression as she spoke to someone across from her, but it did not quite reach the edges of her eyes, as though it had been carefully chosen rather than freely given.

And beside her stood Edward Lockwood, composed and dignified, his attention moving across the room with measured detachment, the kind of man who observed everything but revealed little.

Even his laughter, when it came, felt controlled—polished rather than spontaneous.

And then there was her.

Celeste.

She looked exactly as I remembered.

Beautiful in a sharp, deliberate way. Confident in a manner that suggested she had never once been made to question her place in the world.

And around her—

My breath stopped completely.

My chest seized with a wild, consuming ache that stole my breath and hammered through my chest.

My gaze locked onto him without permission, as though something inside me had been waiting for this exact moment without my awareness.

It was the face I kept seeing but couldn’t place.

The man stood close to Celeste, her body nestled comfortably against him as if she belonged there without question.

His posture was steady, protective in a quiet way, his expression unreadable from this distance.

But it was not his face that struck me.

It was the feeling.

A pressure deep in my chest, like some invisible weight was pressing down on me.

And then he turned.

Slowly. Deliberately.

As if he had felt it too.

The moment his eyes met mine, the world around me fell away.

No sound, no movement, no distance—only him.

Something inside me ripped open with a ferocity that was blinding, undeniable.

It was not thought. Not logic. Not memory.

It was instinct. Recognition.

My body knew him before I did.

My breath caught sharply as I stepped back half a pace without realizing it, my hand pressing against my chest as if I could physically hold myself together.

Across the courtyard, his expression shifted sharply, as if something in him had just snapped into place.

Even from this distance, I felt it.

The pull.

The bond.

It hit me like a physical force, tightening around my ribs, my throat, my entire being until I could barely stand still.

Alina’s voice went completely silent.

For the first time since I had woken up in that wolf form, there was nothing guiding me. Nothing explaining. Nothing interpreting.

Just me.

And him.

“Mate,” I whispered, though I did not understand where the word came from.

His hand shifted against Celeste’s arm, and his gaze darkened. I saw it then—the exact moment he understood what I was.

Celeste noticed the change immediately.

She followed his line of sight, her expression twisting the moment she saw me standing beyond the window.

Her face hardened instantly.

“No,” she said sharply, pulling away from him. I flinched at her voice. “What is she doing here?”

The door to the manor opened abruptly, and Celeste stormed out into the courtyard, her heels striking stone furiously.

Her expression was no longer composed; it had fractured into something far more volatile.

“You,” she snapped, pointing directly at me. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing here?”

I took a step back instinctively.

“I didn’t—” My voice faltered. “I don’t even know how I got here.”

“That’s a lie,” she hissed, her eyes narrowing. “You always show up when you want to ruin things.”

Behind her, I could see figures moving closer inside the manor. Not intervening. Observing. Judging.

“I didn’t come here to ruin anything,” I said quietly, though even to myself, my voice sounded uncertain.

Celeste laughed sharply.

“You always say that,” she snapped. “And yet here you are. Again. At the exact moment when things are finally going right.”

Something inside me stirred at her words, but I could not name it.

A memory? A feeling? A pattern I did not understand?

Before I could respond, movement behind her caught my attention.

The man had stepped out.

The moment he appeared, the air shifted again.

Not as sharply as before.

But deeper. More final. As if something was being locked into place.

His obsidian gaze locked on mine and didn’t waver.

Celeste noticed immediately and moved closer to him, almost possessively, as if trying to reclaim something that had shifted without her permission.

“Don’t look at her,” she said quickly, her voice tightening. “She’s here to destabilize everything. She always does this.”

But he did not respond.

His eyes stayed on me, and I couldn’t tear mine away from him.

Like something inside me had finally found its missing half and refused to lose it again.

"I don’t know you," I whispered, though even as I said it, my heart pounded with conflicted recognition and denial.

His expression shifted faintly at that—his brows furrowed as if confused why I would say that.

Without warning, Celeste charged towards me, her hand raised high.

“Stay the fuck away from him!”

The motion came too quickly for me to fully process, and instinct made me freeze.

But I never felt the impact.

Because a hand caught her wrist mid-air.

The sound of it stopping echoed through the courtyard more loudly than the slap would have.

Celeste gasped sharply, turning her head in shock.

The man held her wrist firmly, his grip controlled but absolute, his attention never leaving mine, even as he restrained her.

“Enough,” he said quietly.

The word was not loud, but it silenced everything.