تسجيل الدخول“Don’t come any closer,” Sienna said, her voice low, steady, and trembling all at once as Ryder stepped deeper into the throne hall, the flames from outside casting violent shadows across the stone pillars.He didn’t stop walking.He didn’t look away.He didn’t even blink.“Sienna,” he answered, and her name left his mouth like a wound he couldn’t hide. His voice was rough, scraped raw by smoke, rage, and everything he had been forced to swallow since the night she’d been taken from him. “Move.”Rowan stepped in front of her with his blade raised, jaw clenched tight. “If you want her, you go through me.” Ryder didn’t raise his sword; he didn’t need to. His presence alone shook Rowan where he stood. “Move,” he repeated, voice weighted with a command that wasn’t authority but something deeper, something old and feral and tied to her very bones.Sienna placed a hand on Rowan’s arm. “Stand down.”Rowan stared at her, confused, horrified. “He’s not himself.”“I know,” she whispered. “That’
“Sienna, don’t move,” Rowan hissed as he shoved her against the stone wall, his voice breaking under the weight of the flames tearing through the lower city. She tasted the smoke before she saw the fire, and the heat rolled over them in waves strong enough to blister stone. The sky above had turned a violent shade of crimson, the Moon Gate fracturing in the heavens like glass being punched from the inside. Every sound around her was a chorus of chaos, wolves howling in fear and rage, steel striking steel, buildings collapsing, children crying, warriors shouting orders that vanished into the storm of war. She pushed Rowan aside and stepped forward, her voice steady even though her pulse thundered like a trapped animal. “If I hide now, the city burns faster.”Rowan caught her arm again, desperation flashing in his eyes. “You are the Queen. If you fall, everything falls with you.” His words trembled with truth, but she shook him off because hesitation was a luxury she could no longer aff
“Move!” Sienna shouted, her voice cracking through the roar of collapsing stone as she dragged a wounded sentinel away from a burning archway.He groaned, clutching his ribs. “They breached the lower wall, Renna’s witches, something’s wrong with the flames, my Queen. They don’t die.”“They will,” she snapped, even as heat blistered the air around them. “Just keep breathing.”Behind her, the Citadel groaned like a living creature in pain. Walls that had stood for centuries bowed inward. The tiles beneath her boots split from the pressure of warring powers colliding like storms. Smoke curled through the hallways, thick enough to coat her tongue in bitterness. Every breath tasted of ash and betrayal.“Where’s the next unit?” she demanded.“Dead… or scattered,” the sentinel choked. “They came with shadows. Not wolves. Not even men. Things Renna called from the archives. We weren’t ready.”“We never are when she’s involved.” Sienna hauled him to the stairwell. “Go. Join the medical line. K
“Get him away from her!” Zane shouted, the words ripping from his throat like a man already losing the war he swore he’d win.He didn’t realize he was moving until Renna grabbed his arm, nails digging into his skin. “Stop. You can’t take him head-on. Not like this. He isn’t the man you fought before.”“He’s never been a man,” Zane growled, wrenching his arm free. “He’s a curse wearing skin.”Renna hissed, “A curse you can’t defeat.”Zane ignored her, forcing his way through the chaos as if brute strength alone could bend the night to his will. But the battlefield obeyed no one. Not tonight. Bodies slammed against him, some friend, some foe, all swallowed by the roar of war. Steel screeched. Wolves snarled. The snow turned black with blood. And through it all, a single figure refused to slow.Ryder.Every step he took left a trail of devastation. Not loud devastation. Not flamboyant or explosive. Quiet, efficient, merciless devastation. A throat cut in silence. A blade redirected so sm
“Open the gates,” Zane ordered, his voice slicing through the choking fog that clung to the ruins of the outer fortress.No one moved.His soldiers, wolves loyal by fear and desperation, shifted uneasily beside the rusted portcullis. The iron chains rattled in the wind like warning bones. The torches flickered along the wall, staining the night with dirty gold. Every man knew what breaching the Citadel meant. Every man also knew Zane was no longer the commander they once followed. He was hungrier now. Sharper. Driven by something stranger than ambition.Renna stood slightly behind him, her cloak pulled tight, her pale hair braided back like a crown she wished she didn’t have to wait for. “They’re hesitating,” she murmured, leaning close enough for only him to hear. “Do something memorable. Men obey power.”“They obey victory,” Zane replied, eyes fixed on the mountain path that led straight to the Citadel’s heart. His jaw clenched. “Tonight we take it.”Renna’s smile sharpened. “Then s
“Where did he go?” Sienna demanded as she shoved aside the low branches and stepped into the deeper part of the pines, her voice cutting through the cold morning light.Torin hurried behind her, breath uneven, boots sinking into the damp needles blanketing the forest floor. “Majesty, slow down, no one can keep up with him. He moves like, ”“Don’t say ‘ghost.’” Sienna didn’t stop walking. “He’s still a man.”“Barely,” Lysa muttered, keeping pace with them, though her eyes kept darting toward the shadows. “We’re lucky he didn’t kill us by accident last night.”“He saved you,” Sienna shot back.“True,” Lysa said. “But he didn’t look at us like people.”“And how did he look at you?” Sienna snapped.Lysa swallowed. “Like prey he chose not to eat.”Sienna exhaled, long and slow, trying not to let the words sink too deep. The forest felt too alive, branches whispering above them, the wind shifting directions too quickly, the silence stretching in odd ways as if holding its breath. Ryder’s pr







