Elena pov After Lykan helped me sit up and sip some warm tea, we returned to the others at the base camp near the ridge. The fire was burning low, casting gold light against the snow, and everyone looked up the moment we arrived—relief breaking across their faces in waves. Aurora, Scarlet, Sylvester, Dominic, and all of them stopped what they were doing. “She’s awake,” Lykan announced. Aurora stood quickly, brushing snow from her sleeves. “Goddess, we thought—” “I’m fine,” I said gently, though my voice was still soft, still frayed. “Just… a lot happened.” They gathered around quickly. Concerned faces. Tension still hangs in the air like frost. I sat on a thick fur near the fire, Lykan beside me, close but silent. Watching. “I need to tell you all what I saw.” And I did. I told them everything. From the moment I followed the voice through the forest to the clearing… the blooming lotus… the smoke that swallowed me whole… and Ethereal. I told them about the temple the way i
Elena pov When the white faded, I wasn’t in the forest anymore. The cold was gone. The wind. The snow. The tension is humming in the air. All of it had been replaced by a stillness so deep it felt like the world had exhaled for the first time in centuries. I stood barefoot in a place that defied reality. It looked like a ruined temple, ancient and carved from silver stone that shimmered like starlight. Vines of crystal threaded through cracked pillars. Flowers bloomed in the air—not on the ground, in the air—suspended as if gravity was merely a suggestion. A shallow pool of glowing water stretched ahead of me, reflecting a night sky that wasn’t above but within it. And silence. A silence that wasn’t empty. It was full. Of memory. Of waiting. And in the centre, just as before, stood her. Ethereal. The same silhouette I’d seen in the smoke—only now fully formed. She was taller than I expected, towering yet graceful, with skin like moonstone and eyes like the void between
Elena pov The wind was a bit sharper that night. Even beneath my cloak and layers, I felt it like the forest itself had inhaled and forgotten how to exhale. We stood just at the edge of the northern ridge, the mountains casting long shadows across the snow-blanketed woods. Lykan was a silent figure beside me, tall and unreadable, his eyes fixed toward the east His jaw was tight. His hands were gloved but clenched. Something was wrong. Very wrong. I didn’t need Eira’s whispers to feel it now. The air itself vibrated with tension, like invisible threads were being pulled too tight somewhere far away, and the pull echoed inside my bones. “Kairos is moving,” Lykan said at last, voice low, gravelled. I turned my gaze to him. “You feel it too.” He nodded once. “There was a shift an hour ago. Something old entered the southern courts. Something I haven’t felt in decades.” Alpha Kairos. The name rang in my mind like a warning bell. Not because I feared him. But because I knew h
James POV It used to be simple. I wanted Elena. Not for politics. Not even for power. I wanted her. The way her eyes lit was like something ancient lived behind them. The way she moved, like she didn’t belong to anyone. Like she didn’t even belong to this world. She was untouchable. And yet, I almost had her. Until Lykan. That mutt stole what was mine. He didn’t deserve her. He never would. He touched her like she was fragile when she was fire. He held her like she needed protecting, when what she needed was someone who could stand in the fire with her—and own it. And now? He walks beside her like some perfect Alpha, like her knight, her sword, her mate. It made me sick. She should’ve bled for leaving me. She should’ve crawled back. Instead, I was left with Sophia. A pale echo. A cracked mirror. A woman made of poison and desperation. I used to enjoy her. The vanity. The hunger. She reminded me of myself once. But now? She was nothing but a vessel. A means to an end. P
Sophia pov Blood.Again.It stained the silk handkerchief in my hand, the delicate lace at the edges soaked in crimson. I dropped it to the floor, watching it land atop two others already discarded there like shameful secrets.My chest burned. My throat felt like fire and rot. But worst of all My reflection was cracking.I stood in front of the mirror, trembling fingers tracing the faint dark lines that coiled beneath the surface of my skin. Veins black and spidering webbed up my arms like cursed ink. I had tried to cover it. Concealer. Powder. Magic glamours.But it was getting harder.It was spreading.That bastard.“Elena,” I hissed, fury curling deep in my belly like acid. “She knew this would happen.”I dug my nails into the table’s edge until I felt splinters. My lip curled, breath ragged.“She left with him. With Lykan. She stole him, stole the power, stole everything.”I paced, dragging my fingers through my once-flawless hair—hair that no longer gleamed the same way it used
Elena pov.I stared at the glowing sigil in the bark, the Starbloom pulsing above it like a slow, magical heartbeat.It felt… important.But something inside me twisted uneasily.“I don’t think this is it,” I said finally, my voice barely louder than the whispering trees.Aurora looked at me, her eyes thoughtful. “You feel it too?”I nodded. “It’s old. Powerful. Sealed. But it feels… wrong." Or maybe too obvious.”“Agreed,” Aurora murmured. “Kairos is clever. He wouldn’t be after something so easily found. Breaking this might just wake something we were never meant to find.”Dominic rubbed the back of his neck. “So, not our magical murder flower?”“Not today,” I muttered.And then I felt her stir.Eira.Her voice slid like cool silk through my mind."Not it," she said firmly. "But close. So close. I can feel it. That flower isn’t feeding from this tree… the roots run deep. They’re anchored somewhere far beneath. Hidden."Buried magic, I realized. Something sleeping deeper than we coul