LOGINLyraThe moment the guards brought me into the council chamber, I knew something terrible had happened. The elders sat around the long table with the ancient prophecy book open before them, while the royal priestess stood beside it with an expression that made my stomach tighten. My mother was waiting near the wall, twisting her fingers together as though she had been praying for a way to escape whatever was about to happen. Nobody explained why I had been summoned, but when I noticed Rowan sitting among the elders, watching me with a strange confidence, I felt the familiar fear that had followed me since the day he first called me the Curse Bearer."Why have you brought me here?" I asked, looking from one face to another.The oldest elder cleared his throat and motioned for the guards to stand beside the door."Lyra, we have examined the prophecy again, and a new understanding has come to light. Before the sacrifice can take place, the Curse Bearer must conceive a child who will pre
KyonThe emergency council meeting had barely begun when I realized that the truth we had been searching for might be more dangerous than the lies we had already uncovered. I sat at the head of the long table, listening to the elders argue about the spreading curse, while the unfamiliar high priestess stood before them with the calm expression of someone who knew exactly how much trouble her words would cause. She was the same woman who had entered Lyra's chamber, and although I did not yet know what she had told my mate, I could see that she had come prepared to challenge everything the royal priestess had been telling us. For the first time in days, I felt we might finally learn something useful, but the fear in the royal priestess's eyes warned me that whatever came next would not be simple."You have called this council together to question the royal priesthood," the unfamiliar woman began, her voice steady as it carried across the room. "Then you must be willing to hear the trut
LyraBy the morning after our return, I had become the person everyone blamed for everything that had gone wrong in the kingdom. Servants lowered their voices whenever I passed, guards watched me as though I might suddenly grow claws and attack them, and the people outside the palace continued to call for my death. The worst part was that nobody seemed to care whether Damien was truly dead, because his disappearance had already become another reason to hate me. I could still hear his final words in my mind, and the thought that I might never learn whether he had survived made it difficult to sleep or even breathe without feeling a weight pressing against my chest.I was sitting beside the window when Kyon's mother entered my chamber without knocking, her face set in the cold expression I had come to recognize whenever she wanted to remind me that I did not belong in her family. She looked at me for a long moment before closing the door, and I knew from the way her mouth tightened tha
KyonI had seen men die on battlefields, watched blood soak into the ground beneath my feet, and carried the weight of decisions that haunted me long after the fighting ended, but I had never been so unwilling to accept a death report as I was that night. Damien was my brother, and although our relationship had become tangled in secrets, lies, and our shared feelings for Lyra, I knew him well enough to doubt that he would simply fall and disappear without leaving a trace. The soldiers insisted they had seen him go down during the fight, yet nobody had found his body, and the small amount of blood near the broken wall did not match the injuries they claimed he had suffered. Something had happened at that settlement, and until I understood what it was, I refused to believe Damien was dead.I summoned the commander who had led the final charge and ordered him to stand before me in the war room. He looked exhausted, with dirt on his uniform and a bandage wrapped around his left hand, but
LyraI could still hear the sound of swords clashing behind me as the royal soldiers dragged me away from the abandoned settlement, and no matter how hard I tried, I could not stop looking over my shoulder. Damien's final words kept repeating inside my head, making my chest ache with a pain I could neither understand nor escape. ‘Whatever happens next, Lyra, remember that I was the only person who tried to save you.’ I did not know whether he had said those words because he truly cared about me or because he wanted me to believe his lies until the very end, but the thought that he might have died trying to protect me made my eyes burn with tears."Let me go!" I cried, pulling against the soldiers holding my arms. "I need to know what happened to Damien!""His Majesty's orders are to take you back to the palace safely," one of them answered, tightening his grip when I tried to turn around again."I did not ask you about the king's orders! I asked you what happened to Damien!"Neither
KyonThe first thing I heard as we approached the abandoned settlement was the sound of steel striking steel, followed by angry shouts that echoed between the broken houses. Smoke rose above the rooftops, and frightened horses pulled against their reins while soldiers struggled to control the road leading into the settlement. I could feel my wolf fighting beneath my skin, desperate to find Lyra, and every second we spent outside the fighting made the fear inside me grow stronger. I had spent seven days pretending I could control this search, but now that I was finally close to her, I was terrified that I might arrive too late."Secure the outer road!" I shouted as we entered the settlement. "Nobody leaves without being searched, and nobody touches Lyra unless I give the order!"Anderson rode beside me, drawing his sword as our warriors spread out along the road and moved to block the paths between the abandoned buildings. The fighting was worse than I had expected, with Damien's sold







