LOGINSelene POV
The food sat in front of me. Untouched. I didn’t even remember what day it was anymore. How long had I been in this room? Three days? Four? Time had lost all meaning in this beautiful cage. The plate was beautifully arranged. Roasted chicken.Vegetables. Fresh bread that still steamed slightly. My stomach growled. Betraying me. But I didn’t move, I didn’t reach for the fork. Didn’t acknowledge the food’s existence. If I ate, I was accepting this. Accepting him. Accepting that this was my life now. So I choose to starve instead. The door opened. I didn’t look up. “You haven’t touched your breakfast.” Sylvester’s voice. Controlled. Carefully pleasant. “Or your lunch yesterday. Or your dinner the night before.” I said nothing. “Selene.” The pleasantness was starting to crack. “You need to eat.” Still nothing.Selene POV The food sat in front of me. Untouched. I didn’t even remember what day it was anymore. How long had I been in this room? Three days? Four? Time had lost all meaning in this beautiful cage. The plate was beautifully arranged. Roasted chicken.Vegetables. Fresh bread that still steamed slightly. My stomach growled. Betraying me. But I didn’t move, I didn’t reach for the fork. Didn’t acknowledge the food’s existence. If I ate, I was accepting this. Accepting him. Accepting that this was my life now. So I choose to starve instead. The door opened. I didn’t look up. “You haven’t touched your breakfast.” Sylvester’s voice. Controlled. Carefully pleasant. “Or your lunch yesterday. Or your dinner the night before.” I said nothing. “Selene.” The pleasantness was starting to crack. “You need to eat.” Still nothing.
Sylvester POVThe door to my private chambers closed behind me with a satisfying click.Finally.Finally alone.Finally able to drop the mask.The laughter started low. A chuckle that bubbled up from deep in my chest.Then it grew.And grew.Until I was laughing so hard I had to brace myself against the wall. Great, cackling peals of laughter that echoed off the stone walls.“I did it,” I gasped between fits of laughter. “I actually fucking did it.”Five hundred years.Five hundred years of planning. Scheming. Manipulating. Watching her die over and over. Watching Kael steal her away over and over.And now…NOW…she was mine.Trapped in my territory. Marked by my hand. Her blood literally on my fingers from where I’d struck her.I looked down at my right hand. At the faint smear of red still visible across my knuckles.Her blood.My Selene’s b
Selene POVThe room was beautiful.That was the worst part.Sylvester had put me in a room that looked like something from a fairy tale. High ceilings with intricate moldings. A massive four-poster bed draped in silk. Windows that overlooked the forest…windows that didn’t open, I’d already checked. A bathroom with a tub big enough to swim in.A beautiful cage.I’d tried the door first. Locked from the outside, of course.Then the windows. Spelled shut. My power bounced off them uselessly.I’d thrown everything I had at the walls. At the door. At anything that might break.Nothing worked.Sylvester’s magic was woven through every inch of this place.So I’d finally stopped trying.And now I was sitting on the floor with my back against the bed, staring at nothing.How had everything fallen apart so quickly?Just days ago…was it days? Weeks? Time felt meaningless now…I’d
Marcus’s POV“Will be rescued. We will find a way. We will bring her home.” I cupped her face gently. “But not if you kill yourself trying to do everything alone.”“I’m not alone because I have you.”“Exactly.” I kissed her forehead, smiling proudly. “So let me help. I want to help. Not just stand beside you in meetings but actually share the burden.”“You already do so much…”“And I’ll do more. Whatever it takes.” I looked into her eyes. “I’m going to make this right, Lydia. All of it. I’m going to find a way to wake Kael. I’m going to help you rescue Selene. I’m going to help rebuild this pack. Whatever it takes. However long it takes. I promise you.”“You can’t promise that.”“Watch me.” I kissed her softly. “You’re not alone in this. You’ve never been alone. And I’m not going anywhere.”She clung to me, her body still shaking with silent sobs.“I’m so tired,” she whispered.“I know.”
Marcus POVThe emergency council meeting had been going for six hours straight.Six long Fucking hours.And we were no closer to a solution than when we had started.“We need to send scouts to Moonveil,” Alpha knox of shadow hill was saying. Again. For the third time. “Get eyes on the situation. Assess Sylvester’s defenses…”“And get them all killed, that plan is a waste of time and resources,” Luna Nyx interrupted. “Sylvester will see them coming from miles away. Shadow magic gives him awareness of his entire territory.”“Then what do you suggest?” knox snapped. “We just sit here with our thumbs up our asses while he completes whatever ritual he’s planning?”“I suggest we think before we act. Something this council seems incapable of.”“How dare you…”“ENOUGH.” Lydia’s voice cut through the argument like a blade. “Both of you. This bickering accomplishes nothing, absolutely nothing.”She stood
Selene POVThe shadow transport ended abruptly.I stumbled as solid ground appeared beneath my feet. Sylvester’s arm tightened around my waist, keeping me upright.“Welcome home, my love ,” he said softly.I opened my eyes and we were back to the Moonveil Pack territory.I recognized it from descriptions. The elegant buildings. The carefully maintained streets. The sense of old magic permeating everything.But it was empty.Completely empty.“Where is everyone?” I demanded, pulling away from him.“Sent away. I needed privacy for what comes next.”Dread coiled in my stomach. “What comes next?”“The completion of the ritual, of course.” He smiled. “Five hundred years I’ve been working toward this moment. Every lifetime. Every iteration. All leading here, to this same moment.”“The ritual to bind us permanently.”“To bind us properly and permanently this time.” He circle







