LOGINSAPHRA’S POVThe doors to Lucien’s study slam open hard enough to echo down the corridor, the sound cracking through the quiet like a warning.He looks up immediately.Lucien is not a man who startles easily but I still catch the flicker of surprise in his eyes before it’s gone, replaced by that familiar, controlled stillness.“Saphra,” he says, his voice low, measured. “To what do I owe...”I cut him off by slamming the books onto his desk. Dust rises in a faint cloud between us.His gaze drops briefly to the scattered texts, then lifts back to me, something darker settling into his expression.“This had better be important,” he says.“It is,” I snap.My heart is pounding fast and hard, my entire body still buzzing from the truth I’ve spent the night uncovering.“Tell me about your grandmother.”The words hang in the air.Lucien goes still.Something flickers across his face. Pain flickering across his features.“Be careful, Saphra,” he says quietly. “You’re walking into territory yo
SAPHRA’S POVThe palace feels stranger when I return. Every corridor I walk through, every flickering torch and every guard I pass are all the same and yet....nothing feels the same anymore.Eira’s words echo in my mind with every step I take."Prophesied mates"The phrase feels so heavy, a cruel joke played by fate.I slip through the eastern passage, keeping to the shadows. The guards are predictable at this hour half-alert or half-bored, their routines ingrained and easy to avoid if you know them well enough.And I do.Tonight, I don’t want questions I wants to get answers myself.I move towards the library and pushed open the heavy wooden door to the library.It creaks softly.I freeze and wait to listen for footsteps.No footsteps.Great.I slip inside, closing the door behind me with careful precision.The library is vast, dimly lit by a few dying candles and the faint silver glow of moonlight filtering through tall windows. Dust clings to everything—the shelves, the tables, the
SAPHRA'S POV“I didn’t bring you here just to tell you this,” Eira says quietly.I turn toward her.She’s kneeling now, her movements deliberate, careful. From within the folds of her cloak, she pulls something free.A scroll, old and worn.The edges are frayed, the parchment aged to a deep, uneven gold. Even from where I stand, I can feel the weight of it, like it carries more than ink and memory.“This,” she says, her voice lowering slightly, “is the last record I have.”My pulse quickens.“The most important one.”I step closer despite myself.“What is it?”Her gaze lifts to meet mine.“The truth you’ve been circling since the moment you were born.”A chill slides down my spine.“Unroll it,” I say.She studies me for a moment, measuring perhaps, whether I’m ready.I’m not but that doesn’t matter anymore.Nothing does except the truth.Slowly, she unrolls the scroll.The parchment crackles softly as it opens, revealing lines of ink that have somehow survived time, war, and silence.
SAPHRA’S POVI can still feel it.The vision clings to me like smoke in my lungs. My chest rises and falls fast, t and the forest around us feels wrong, it's too quiet and normal, like the world hasn’t just been ripped open and stitched back together in a way that makes no sense.My father’s face.Lucien’s grief.The shadow.I drag a hand through my hair, now pacing without realising it. My boots crunch against dry leaves, grounding me in something real, something solid, but it doesn’t help. Nothing helps.“They were victims…” I whisper, the words cracking apart as they leave me. “Both of them.”Eira doesn’t respond immediately. She watches me patiently, knowing there’s nothing to do.“Yes, that’s what you saw,” she says at last.I stop pacing, turning to face her sharply. “That’s not just what I saw. That’s what it was, isn’t it?”Her silence is answer enough.“What does it actually want?”Eira’s expression changes.Something darker settles into her gaze, something grim and unyieldin
SAPHRA’S POV“I need to show you something else.”Eira’s voice is quieter now, but it carries a weight that makes my chest tighten. The fire between us has burned low, reduced to glowing embers, and the forest feels too still.I don’t like it.I don’t like the way her eyes hold mine, steady and unflinching, as if she’s already decided something for me.“What kind of something?” I ask, my voice sharper than I intend.“A truth you may not accept unless you see it yourself. Something you may have suspected for a while.”My stomach twists.“I think I have seen enough,” I say. “You’ve told me what that thing is. That’s....”“It’s not enough,” she cuts in, not harshly, but firmly. “Not for what you carry. Not for what you believe.”Her words land harder than they should but she’s right.I fold my arms, more to ground myself than anything else. “What are you planning to do?”“A vision ritual,” she says simply.My pulse spikes.“Again.”The word leaves me instantly, instinctively.I take a st
EIRA’S POV“I wasn’t always this…” I tell Saphra, my voice steady even as the past rises like a storm beneath my ribs. The fire between us crackles softly, but it does nothing to warm the cold memory curling through me. “I was once a High Seer of the inner court. I was trusted, revered and respected.”Saphra doesn’t interrupt. She watches me with those sharp, searching eyes of hers.“Back then,” I continue, “the elders spoke of the Noctrya as myth. A cautionary tale told to keep young wolves obedient. A shadow used to explain why peace never lasted between packs.”I let out a quiet breath, shaking my head.“But I saw patterns they refused to see.”Wars that ignited too easily. Alliances that crumbled overnight. Hatred that burned hotter than it should, as if… encouraged.Cultivated.“I spent years studying old texts,” I say, my gaze drifting past the fire, seeing stone walls and flickering torchlight instead of trees. “Scrolls buried so deep in the archives even the council had forgo
SAPHRA'S POV By the third day, I know the exact sound Lucien makes when pain wakes him.It’s not a cry. It’s a breath, so sharp, pulled too fast into lungs that refuse weakness. I hear it through the door before I enter his chambers, the sound threading straight through my bones as if the bond its
LUCIEN’S POVI should not still be standing.Every step from the outer gate to my chambers is an act of will, my vision tunnelling, the world narrowing to blood and iron, and the taste of copper on my tongue. My shirt is ruined, shredded by claws that were not meant to leave witnesses alive. Warmth
MARCUS’S POVI tell myself the excuse is sufficient.Security protocols are always sufficient. No one questions them openly, not when they come from me. Still, even as I walk the familiar corridor toward Saphra’s quarters, the words feel thin in my mouth, like a poorly forged document that might cr
SAPHRA'S POV Lucien had barely been healed before the members of the council called a meeting. The throne room always feels colder during council meetings.Not because of the stone, those walls have held winter for centuries but because of the people inside it. Power gathers here like a storm clo







