Masuk~Valeria~Alerion's car sat in the driveway like some kind of dark omen with its engine already running.He was leaning against the driver's side door in a crisp black suit that made him look less like my stepbrother and more like someone about to attend a funeral. Or cause one."Ready?" he asked when he saw me approaching.
~Valeria~I gave up trying to sleep around two in the morning because apparently my brain had decided that rest was for people who weren't about to face potential death in less than twenty-four hours.So here I was, curled up on the living room couch in my pajamas, reading my dad's diary by lamplight like some kind of Victorian princess having an emotional crisis. Which, honestly, wasn't that far off from reality.
~Valeria~The night before you're potentially going to die hits different when your mom shows up at your door holding a box that smells like the father you barely remember.I was packing my bag for tomorrow, extra clothes, the notebook from Caius, Lysander's teddy bear because apparently I needed emotional support animals now when Mom knocked softly and let herself in without waiting for an answer.
~Caius~Observing Valeria master something I taught her might be one of the most satisfying experiences of my life, and the fact that I'm having this thought while we're literally preparing for a life-or-death situation says a lot about how far gone I am.We'd been at this tutoring session for three hours, working through power control exercises in the library after school. The setting sun through the windows caught her hair, and I'd spent at least fifteen minutes of our session just watching the way she concentrated, the way her eyebrows scrunched up when she was thinking, the way she bit her lip when she was about to figure something out."Okay, try it again," I said, forcing myself to focus on the actual lesson instead of the way her shirt had ridden up slightly when she'd reached for a book earlier.She closed her eyes, and I watched the golden marks spread across her skin like liquid sunlight. They moved slower this time, more controlled, responding to her will instead of her emo
~Valeria~The weirdest part about knowing you might die in two days is that you still have to show up for the last day of school and pretend like finals and graduation actually matter.I was at my locker shoving textbooks into my bag when I heard footsteps behind me. The kind of careful, hesitant footsteps that meant someone was about to either apologize or ask me for something awkward.I turned around to find Lily standing there, and my first instinct was to check for escape routes because this girl had made my life hell for months.But she wasn't flanked by her usual crew of mean girls. She was alone, holding something in her hands, looking genuinely uncomfortable."Valeria," she said, and her voice was small in a way I'd never heard before. "I need to give you something."She held out a photo, and my heart stopped when I recognized it. My father. The picture she'd torn in half during that hallway confrontation that felt like it happened a million years ago.Someone had taped it bac
~Valeria~My stepfather just announced to an entire pack of werewolves that he's planning to use me in three days, and somehow I have to stand here smiling like this is totally normal and not the most messed up thing that's ever happened to me.The pack square was absolutely packed with wolves from all over the territory. Cassian stood on the raised platform looking like he owned the world, his voice carrying across the crowd in that way that made everyone shut up and listen whether they wanted to or not."Brothers and sisters," he said, and I wanted to throw up at how fake he sounded. "On the next full moon, we will perform a royal ritual that hasn't been done in generations. A ceremony that will restore our pack to its rightful place among the ancient bloodlines."The crowd murmured with excitement, and I stood there in the back trying not to hyperventilate.He was really doing this. Announcing it publicly, making it official, ensuring that everyone would show up to witness what he







