Luna's Alive. Zoey's Back.

~Elena

"Can I ask for a last wish?" she asked, her voice barely a whisper, eyes fluttering open like they weighed more than her strength could carry.

I stiffened. “And what is that?” I asked coldly, trying not to let the crack in my voice betray me.

She inhaled slowly, then exhaled as if releasing years of weight. “The child in my tummy... at least let me give that to Thorne. Please. Let me bring this child to life before you kill me.”

For a moment, I said nothing. Her words echoed in my mind like a detonated grenade, silent at first, then devastating.

The child. Thorne’s child. That was what she wanted to protect with her final breath.

I clenched my fists, jaw tightening. I didn’t want to say yes. I didn’t want to give her that mercy. But something deep, something primal and uninvited, crept into my chest and made it hard to breathe.

She looked at me then, not with fear, not with defiance but with quiet resolve. A mother’s resolve.

And damn it… against every brutal bone in my body,