Moonstone Warning

The Moonstone wouldn’t stop burning.

It had been 3 hours since the battle ended and the crystal was still glowing, pulsing in time with Aria’s heartbeat as I held her in the Throne Room. The air around it shimmered with heat, and anyone who got within 3 feet of it felt like they were standing too close to a forge.

“The old Moonstone never did this,” Lyra said, keeping her distance. She was one of the new Council members, and her hands shook as she looked at the relic. “It was cold. Dead. This one is… alive.”

“Because of her,” Darius said, nodding at Aria. She’d woken up fully now and was staring at the stone with those ancient gold eyes, completely unafraid of the heat that made grown Lycans flinch.

I held her tighter. “What is it trying to tell us?”

The answer came in the form of sound.

Not words. Not exactly. More like a vibration in my bones, in my blood, in the Moonblood that connected me to this stone and to my daughter.

_Danger._

The word hit me so hard I staggered.

Darius caught me before I fell. “Elara? What is it?”

I looked down at Aria, and the Moonstone’s light reflected in her eyes. “It’s warning us. Something’s coming. Something worse than Thorne. Worse than the combined realms.”

Kade stepped forward, frowning. “What kind of something?”

The Moonstone pulsed again, and this time the vision hit me like a physical blow.

I saw darkness. Absolute, consuming darkness that swallowed entire cities. I saw Lycan bodies on the ground. I saw Elias, older, standing alone in front of that darkness with a silver blade in his hand. I saw Aria, maybe 10 years old, her eyes glowing white and tears streaming down her face as power poured out of her in waves.

And I heard a voice. Cold. Ancient. Wrong.

_“The blade must be claimed before it claims the world.”_

The vision cut off as fast as it came.

I was on my knees, gasping, with Darius and Kade both reaching for me.

“What did you see?” Darius demanded, panic in his voice for the first time since I’d met him.

“A darkness,” I whispered. “Ancient. It called Aria ‘the blade’. It wants her. And it said… it said the blade must be claimed before it claims the world.”

Elias, who’d been silent this whole time, stepped forward. “Then I won’t let it,” he said fiercely. “I’m the shield. I’ll stand in front of it. I’ll stand in front of her.”

The Moonstone pulsed one more time, softer now.

And this time the message was clear. Not a vision. Just words, ringing in my head like they were carved there.

_“The shield must be willing. The blade must be willing. Or all is lost.”_

The light faded.

The heat died.

The Moonstone went dark and cold again, looking like ordinary crystal.

Silence fell over the Throne Room.

Kade was the first to speak. “What does that mean? ‘The shield must be willing’?”

I looked at Elias. He was only 5, but he stood tall and met my gaze without flinching.

“It means we have a choice,” I said slowly. “Aria and Elias. They have to choose this. Choose to be the blade and the shield. We can’t force them. We can’t make them.”

“And if they don’t choose it?” Darius asked, voice rough.

The Prophecy’s words echoed in my head: _Or all is lost._

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But I know this - that darkness I saw? It’s been waiting 300 years since Lyra. It knows about Aria. And it’s coming for her.”

Lyra stepped forward, pale but determined. “Then we prepare. We find everything the Council hid about Moonblood. We train Aria, and we train Elias. We make sure when that darkness comes… they’re ready.”

Aria reached up and touched my face with her tiny hand.

And the Moonstone gave one final, faint pulse, like a heartbeat settling into rhythm.

The warning had been given.

Now we had to decide what to do about it.