LOGINELIRA POV"Hold still. If you keep fidgeting, this veil is going to end up somewhere near your left ear instead of where it belongs."Priya's voice carried equal parts affection and exasperation as she adjusted the delicate fabric, and I forced myself to still despite the nervous energy thrumming beneath my skin."I've faced assassins, conspiracies, and an entire pack council without this much anxiety," I admitted, studying my reflection in the mirror of the small dressing room adjoining the ceremony hall."Assassins don't require small talk with in laws," Priya said, deadpan enough that I laughed despite myself. "There's a reason weddings terrify grown adults who've survived actual warfare."Selene entered a moment later, elegant in deep blue, carrying herself with a composure that still occasionally slipped to reveal the depth of everything she'd survived to stand here at all. "Security's confirmed. Marcus's aerial coverage is in place. Silas has doubled the ground perimeter." She s
KIAN POV"Renar's intelligence checks out. Isolde's been meeting with delegations from at least three territories in the last ten days."Silas spread a fresh set of documents across the war table, and I felt the familiar cold weight of dread settle over the room as everyone absorbed the implications."Which territories," I asked."Vask, unsurprisingly, given Dorian's history with us. Kestrel Hollow, further north. And one I didn't expect." Silas hesitated. "Ren Achara's own extended family holdings, on her mother's side. Not the King's direct territory, but close enough to raise uncomfortable questions."I felt something twist sharply in my chest. "You think Ren's compromised.""I think we need to ask her directly, rather than assume either way," Silas said. "She's earned trust the hard way this past month. I'm not willing to throw that away on a family connection she may have no control over. But I'm also not willing to ignore it."Elira, seated across the table with a fierce concent
ELIRA POV"You're getting married. In two weeks. In the middle of an active conflict with a woman who kidnapped your son three days ago."Dmitri said it with his eyebrows raised so high they nearly disappeared into his hairline, though the smile tugging at his mouth told me his concern was more theatrical than genuine."When you put it that way, it does sound reckless," I admitted, watching Wren and Rhys chase each other around Dmitri's small garden, laughter finally returning to both of them after three days of careful, gentle healing."It sounds exactly like you, actually," Dmitri said. "You've never once waited for the convenient moment to do anything important. Why start now."I laughed, surprising myself with how easily it came after everything the last few weeks had cost us. "I want you there, Dmitri. Whatever this is between us, whatever we could have been in another version of my life, you've been the steadiest thing I've had for four years. I'm not walking down any aisle with
KIAN POV"Torren's trial concludes today. The council wants your verdict before noon."Silas said it quietly, setting a tablet on the small table beside my cot, and I felt the weight of the decision settle over me even before I'd fully processed being asked to make it."What does the council recommend," I asked."Exile, at minimum. Some want execution, given what nearly happened at that compound." Silas's expression stayed carefully neutral. "He's still your Beta of twenty years, Kian. Whatever he did, that history doesn't disappear because of one catastrophic year."I thought of Torren's face in the war room, the genuine grief buried underneath his justification, the twenty years of loyalty that had curdled into something he'd convinced himself was still protection."Bring him to me," I said. "Alone. I want to hear it from him one more time before I decide anything."Torren arrived an hour later, thinner than I remembered, whatever confidence he'd carried into our last conversation e
ELIRA POV"He's lost a lot of blood, but the wound missed anything vital. He's going to survive this."The healer said it with the particular exhausted certainty of someone who had spent the last hour fighting to make that sentence true, and the relief that broke through me was so sudden and total that my knees nearly gave out entirely.I sat beside Kian's cot in the same medical tent where I'd once used my own blood to burn silver poison out of his shoulder, watching his chest rise and fall steadily, Rhys and Wren both curled asleep against my sides, exhausted past the point of nightmares for at least a few hours.Priya appeared at the tent flap quietly, careful not to wake the twins. "Marisol and Robert weren't apprehended. Isolde's vehicle disappeared onto a private airstrip twelve miles out. They're gone, all three of them, at least for now.""I expected that," I said, and found, to my own surprise, that I meant it without the crushing despair I might have felt a month ago. "Tonig
ELIRA POV"Let him go, or so help me, I will finish what I started in that council chamber weeks ago."I said it with Rhys pressed tight against my hip, my whole body angled between my son and the three people who had spent eighteen years trying to erase everything my mother had been."There's nothing left to let go of," Isolde said, calm despite the chaos still raging around the compound's edges. "You already have him. This was never really about the boy, Elira. It was about proving exactly how far you'd go once the choice became personal instead of theoretical.""A test," I said, fury burning hot enough to steady my voice instead of breaking it. "You kidnapped my son as a test.""I needed to know whether you'd fight or flee when it actually cost you something," Isolde said. "Now I know."Robert stepped forward slightly, and something in his expression stopped me cold, an unfamiliar rawness I'd never once seen from him in twenty two years of trying to earn his approval."Elira," he s







