LOGINTHE ALPHA'S NIGHTMAREEIRA'S POVCassian signals the formation to slow.He gestures two unit leaders forward. They materialize from the formation smoothly, the practiced response of people who watch for signals without being told to watch for them. A man named Cade who commands the eastern flank and Senna, the woman who questioned Cassian's choice to lead northeast himself.He speaks to them in a voice pitched for the four of us only."Reece's count puts them at fifty minimum, split across multiple flanks. They have high ground advantage and preparation time. They've also had hours to identify our likely approach angles." He pauses. "Which are the same approach angles Japheth designed our search protocols around."Cade's jaw tightens. "He told them where we'd come from.""He told them where we'd come from," Cassian confirms. "So we don't come from there."Senna looks at the trees. Calculating. "The eastern ridge. It's rough ground, takes longer, but it comes out above their most likel
TRACKS IN THE DARKEIRA'S POVI have never been in this part of the forest at night.I've walked the southern edges in daylight. Learned the pack territory in pieces over the past two weeks the way you learn anything when you're trying to look like you belong somewhere, carefully, quietly, without drawing attention to the fact that you're mapping exits.But this part of the forest, the northeastern stretch that bleeds toward the neutral territory between packs, is different at night. The trees grow closer together here. The canopy thickens until the moonlight comes through in broken pieces, scattered across the ground like something dropped and not yet collected. The undergrowth is dense and dark and full of sounds that have nothing to do with us.My eyes adjusted quickly once we passed the tree line.Faster than I expected.Faster, I think, than they used to.I file that away and keep moving.The unit moves in a formation I don't know the name of but understand instinctively, a loo
THE SEARCH CONTINUES CASSIAN'S POVThe hall is still moving around me when I feel Eira at my peripheral before I see her.I've been aware of her since we came down from the tower. It's the bond that pulls my attention toward her without asking permission, the same way it always has, even when I was spending five years pretending otherwise. Right now it's telling me she's behind me and to my left and that the quality of her stillness is the kind that costs a great deal to maintain.I turn.She's watching the room. Standing just inside the entrance with her arms crossed, not in anger but in the way of someone holding their own ribcage together. The emerald dress. Still the emerald dress. Her hair coming loose from whatever arrangement it had earlier. Her eyes moving across every warrior and every weapon and every unit forming up with the systematic attention of someone cataloging, processing, preparing.She's building a picture. Making sense of the machinery. Understanding what's being
SEARCH PARTYCASSIAN'S POVI have led men into danger before.More times than I can count. Border disputes. Rogue wolves. Pack challenges that turned violent before diplomacy had a chance to breathe. I know what it looks like to stand in front of warriors and send them toward something that might kill them. I know the specific weight of that responsibility. The way it settles in your chest and stays there until everyone comes back.Or doesn't.But I have never stood in the middle of my own great hall, surrounded by flowers from a celebration that ended an hour ago, and given orders with this particular quality of desperation underneath them.Because this time it isn't pack duty driving me into the dark.It's something I don't have five years of practice managing.I push it down.Lock it somewhere below the part of me that needs to function.And I start giving orders."Every unit mobilized. Full capacity. No one stays behind except essential palace staff and the healers." I move throug
THE FEAREIRA'S POV"I wasn't going to say…""You were going to say something meant to help." I finally looked at him. "And I appreciate it. I do. But right now I need to be angry instead of scared because anger is something I can use and scared is just a feeling and feelings don't find missing children."He looks at me for a long moment."Okay," he says."So tell me something useful. How long do we have before whatever they're planning to do to him actually happens?"Cassian's jaw tightens. "They need him alive to prove the prophecy. They need him to use his powers in front of witnesses. Which means they won't hurt him…""Yet.""Yet," he agrees. "They need an audience first. Which takes time to gather.""So they're not running. They're waiting.""Most likely.""Then we still have a window.""Yes."I turn toward the door."He left without his boots, Cassian."I don't mean to say it. It comes out on its own, quiet and completely unguarded, and my voice does something on the last word t
THE MISSING GUARDEIRA'S POVSomething is wrong.I feel it before Reece finishes his sentence. Before the words fully arrange themselves into meaning inside my head.A guard posted at the west tower is missing.The west tower.Where Kael is.Where Kael was."Eira." Cassian's voice comes from somewhere distant. Like he's speaking through water. "Eira, look at me."I look at him.His face is controlled. Careful. The face he puts on when he's managing a crisis and can't afford to feel it yet. I've seen that expression on him twice tonight already. Both times something terrible was happening and he needed everyone around him to believe it wasn't.I know that face. I've worn it myself for five years."We don't know anything yet," he says. "We need to go check.""Then stop talking and move," I say.I'm already out the door.The corridors feel endless tonight.I've walked them a hundred times in the past two weeks. Memorized every turn, every staircase, every window that lets the cold night
Thirty-One: The Elder And The NewsCASSIANThe exit door barges open and shut. Eira stumbles in, leaning on it with her hands over her chest.“Momma?” Kael calls from his position on top of me. We were playing and wrestling around, until I faked a fall and he was on me in a minute.I grab him, sitt
Thirty-four: Crossed LinesEIRAMy breath hitches. “Oh.”“Yea.” He nods. “There’s rumors about an upcoming war, and it’s edging closer and closer to the palace.”“And…what if you can’t find her?”His eyes darken. “That is not an option.”He moves toward the door, then pauses. “By the way, who is Ka
Thirty-Two: Nighttime WhispersEIRAIs it foolishness to assume that this child of prophecy is not Kael? That there’s other pups born of royal blood with white hair?Cassian frowns. “I would argue that one cannot possibly have white hair but…my former mate had white hair.”Gaza’s eyes briefly cut t
Thirty-Three: Healers And OmensEIRACassian and I hurry out of the basement and into the palace.“Oh goddess,” I whimper, tears falling from my eyes. “Please, let me take him to Esme.”His jaw tightens. “That’s a two-day journey.”My lips wobble, limbs nearly giving out. “You don’t think it’s wort







