Prologue

In the beginning, there was not one world, but many.

They were born together in the first breath of the Moon and the Sun, realms spun from chaos into order. Each rose with its own element, its own rulers, its own laws. Yet even as they stood apart, they were bound by a covenant older than language itself—the Great Accord, woven into the stars and sealed in blood and magic.

Lycandra was the realm of the wolves. Here, silver moons never waned, hanging heavy and eternal in the sky. Forests stretched endlessly, their canopies glowing with moonlit moss; rivers cut through wild valleys, glittering with dust of crushed moonstone. Wolves ruled here, born of instinct and devotion to the Moon Goddess. They lived, hunted, and fought on four legs, shifting with the pulse of magic in their blood. Pack law was everything, and Alphas rose as leaders, their authority absolute in the glades and plains where wolf-song echoed through the night.

But wolves did not stand alone.

Beside them rose Lycan’Dra, the seat of the crown. If Lycandra was instinct, Lycan’Dra was discipline and dominion. Its cities were carved of white marble and black obsidian, towers glittering with runes that bled silver under the moons. Here lived the Lycans—stronger, faster, sharper than any wolf born beyond its borders. Unlike their kin, they shifted onto two legs, towering beasts with fangs and claws yet minds unbroken by the frenzy of their animal. They were the generals, the tacticians, the rulers. And from the High Seat of Lycan’Dra, the Lycan Kings traced their bloodlines back to the First Shift, governing both their own and the wolves of Lycandra with an iron hand. Between the two realms, wolves had their wild heart, and Lycans their unshakable crown.

Beyond the wolves’ dominion lay Valoria, the Land of Magic. Eternal twilight bathed its skies, where rivers of starlight cut across horizons, and forests glimmered with living enchantments. It was here the fae ruled—High, Shadow, Dawn, and Dusk Courts bound in fragile peace. Their magic flowed into every realm, threading through borders like veins of gold. Valoria’s power sealed fated bonds, forged the wards that protected the borders, and upheld the balance of the Accord. From Valoria came the sigils—symbols carved by every race, regardless of origin. Wolves, Lycans, dragons, even humans could channel their magic into them, weaving wards of protection, fire, healing, or war. But while everyone could write them, the nature of their power always bent to their species. Shifters wielded shifting strength. Fae bent glamour and enchantment. Dragons wielded fire, storm, and sky. And so each race remained distinct, even as they mingled.

Farther still, across storm-choked seas, lay Drakonis. The realm of scaled kings, where volcanoes bled rivers of fire and mountains cracked with ancient thunder. Dragons ruled the skies, their wings blotting out the sun as their roars shook the world. Beneath, basilisks slithered in molten tunnels, and hydras waited in icy cliffs, patient as stone. Fire was the heartbeat of Drakonis, and its rulers claimed dominion not through treaties, but through fear. Yet even the dragons bowed to the Accord, for without it, their realm’s rage would have consumed the rest.

And beyond them all stretched The Obsidian Wilds—a realm with no crown, no borders, no law. Manticores prowled blood-soaked plains, krakens churned in black seas, and the land itself shifted like a living beast, devouring those who strayed. The Wilds belonged to no one. Yet it touched all, for when the wards weakened, its monsters crossed into the other realms. Some were hunted. Some were caged. Some never returned.

For centuries, the realms lived bound yet separate. The Great Accord allowed their people to travel freely, to settle in lands not their own, to love across races and borders. Interspecies marriage was permitted, even blessed, and so was the rare, untamable pull of fated mates. Yet no hybrids were ever born of these unions. A child was always one or the other—wolf or fae, dragon or human—but never both. The Moon, the Sun, and the stars themselves seemed to guard the lines between races, even as love blurred them.

And so, balance was kept. Wolves and Lycans shifted, fae enchanted, dragons burned, humans built. Each magic was tied to its race, yet all could carve sigils—warding their homes, blessing their packs, guarding their bloodlines.

But the balance was fragile.

When magic faltered, the wards cracked. Shadows seeped from the Wilds, crossing borders once thought unbreakable. Prophecies rose again, whispering of a choice, a war, and a wolf unlike any other. One not bound by the Moon’s choosing. One the goddess herself had overlooked.

And like all endings worth telling, this story does not begin with a king, or a war, or even a crown.

It begins with a girl.

A girl who believed she had never been chosen.