Chapter 40

Elara's POV

Nyra emerged from the archive two days later with dark circles under her eyes and a stack of brittle pages balanced carefully in her arms, and the moment she set them down on the library table, I could tell from her expression that whatever she'd found wasn't going to make any of us feel more settled about the wedding drawing closer.

"I found it," she said, smoothing the oldest page flat with careful fingers. "Buried behind the same false panel where I first found Wren's records. Someone clearly didn't want this discovered easily, which tells me it's exactly as significant as I feared."

Kael leaned over the table, and I moved to stand beside him, both of us studying the faded script while Nyra explained what she'd pieced together.

"The old cause didn't kill Wren's Lycan lord to end the bond," she said. "They didn't need to.

According to this, a mate bond can be severed before the vows complete through a ritual requiring the blood of someone from the heir's own bloodline, spoken against her will, during the specific window between the marking and the marriage.

It doesn't require killing anyone. It only requires forcing her into a position where the words are spoken over her, whether she consents or not."

"Forcing her how," I asked, dread coiling tight in my stomach.

"The text isn't specific," Nyra admitted. "But it implies capture, rather than assassination. They'd need you alive, and cooperative enough, or subdued enough, to complete the ritual properly.

That's likely why Wren was hunted for years rather than simply killed outright the moment she was identified. They needed her present, not dead."

The realization settled colder than anything else we'd discovered so far, because a threat aimed at killing me felt almost simpler to prepare against than a threat aimed at taking me, using my own blood and my own body against the bond I'd chosen freely, twisting something sacred into a weapon meant to unmake it entirely.

"They'll try to take her," Kael said, his voice gone hard and flat in a way that told me exactly how much effort it took him to keep his composure. "Not kill her. Take her, during the ceremony itself, in whatever window exists between the marking rite and the vows."

"That would explain the timing," Soren said, coming to look over the pages himself. "If they need that specific window, waiting for the wedding makes considerably more sense than any earlier attempt.

Every other opportunity, the courtyard attack included, may have simply been testing our defenses, gathering information for the moment that actually matters to them."

I sat down slowly, the weight of it pressing heavier than I expected, and Kael's hand found mine immediately, steady despite the tension I could feel radiating through him.

"Then we change the ceremony," I said, working through the problem the way Freya had taught me to work through every other challenge since arriving in Nightfall Hollow, carefully, without letting fear crowd out clear thinking.

"If the danger exists specifically in the window between the marking and the vows, we close that window. We have Nyra perform both parts of the ceremony together, without the gap they're counting on."

Nyra considered this, flipping back through the pages with renewed focus. "It's possible. The rites aren't traditionally combined, but I don't see anything here suggesting it can't be done.

If we eliminate the vulnerable window entirely, whatever ritual they're planning simply has no opportunity to be performed."

"That still leaves the matter of them attempting to take her at all," Kael said. "Closing the window doesn't stop them from trying to capture her beforehand, or during the ceremony itself, regardless of whether the ritual would actually work once they succeeded."

"No," I agreed. "But it does mean we're not simply waiting for a vague, unknown threat anymore. We know what they need. We know roughly when they'll try. That's considerably more than we had a week ago."

Kael turned to look at me, something fierce and proud settling into his expression despite the fear still evident underneath it. "You're remarkably steady, considering what we just learned."

"I'm terrified," I admitted honestly. "But I've spent too many months learning how to face things that terrify me to let this be the moment I stop. We know what's coming now. That means we can actually prepare for it, instead of simply hoping it doesn't happen."

The rest of the evening passed in careful planning, Soren mapping out security positions around the garden where the ceremony would take place, Nyra beginning the work of adjusting the ritual structure to eliminate the vulnerable window, and Kael, once the practical discussions had finally quieted, pulling me aside into the hallway outside the library, his expression softer now, more personal than the careful strategist he'd been all evening.

"I need you to know," he said quietly, "that whatever happens on that night, whatever they attempt, I will not let them take you. I don't care what it costs me to stop it."

"I know," I said, reaching up to cup his face gently. "But I need you to know something too. I'm not simply someone you need to protect, Kael.

I'm someone standing beside you in this, the same way I stood beside you during the full moon, the same way I stood in that council chamber against Mathis. Whatever comes on our wedding night, we face it together. Not you protecting me from a distance while I wait safely somewhere else."

Something in his expression softened further, understanding settling into place alongside the fierce protectiveness still evident in his eyes. "Together, then," he agreed. "Though I reserve the right to still worry considerably, regardless of how capable I know you are."

I smiled despite everything, leaning into him, grateful for the solid warmth of his arms around me even with danger drawing steadily closer with every passing day toward the wedding. "That's fair. I reserve the same right, for what it's worth."

We stood together in the quiet hallway for a long moment, and it wasn't until Soren's voice carried faintly from the library, calling Kael back to finalize the security arrangements, that either of us moved again, though as Kael pressed one last soft kiss to my forehead before returning to the planning, I found myself wondering, with a fresh chill settling low in my stomach, exactly how the old cause intended to get close enough to attempt a capture at all, surrounded as we'd be by every guard Nightfall Hollow could muster.

The answer came sooner than I expected, and considerably closer to home than any of us had prepared for.