LOGINHe spoke first, his tone low but firm enough to carry. “We can wait,” he said. “Children will come when they’re meant to. The Pack already has its heart.” The room stilled for a breath. Mara looked over her shoulder, her hands still sunk in flour, her eyes soft and startled. “You mean me?” she asked
LILAThe house woke before dawn. Old wood shifted, the hearth whispered, and the air felt different—alive again. I stood at the foot of the stairs when I heard them coming. Two sets of steps, uneven from the road, but in rhythm all the same. When the door opened, cold air rushed through the hall. Ga
“I thought I had to be perfect,” she said. “Every step, every word. Like one mistake would make them lose faith in me.”“Then let them,” I said. “Let them see we bleed too. Let them see what real looks like.”Her eyes lifted toward the sky, catching the first streaks of gold between the branches. “T
GAVINHer breath came out in bursts, sharp enough to cut. She pressed her palm to her mouth, like the words might spill if she didn’t hold them in. I moved before I thought, closing the space, catching her hands in mine. Her fingers were cold and damp, her pulse racing under my thumb.“I can’t be wh
GAVINThe scent hit me before I saw the gate—hers, faint and fading, scattered by wind. I caught it the second I stepped into the hall, and everything in me snapped to attention. The council chamber still echoed in my head, the droning voices, the talk of territory lines and alliance disputes. I had
MARAI knelt beside a pool fed by a narrow stream. Moonlight rippled across its surface, silver on black. My reflection flickered there, the same face that wore the Luna’s mask every day, only softer now—bare, unsure, alive. I cupped my hands in the water and let it run down my wrists. The cold snap
COWRIEI started with the blacksmith’s daughter. Her name was Yeri, and she always stared too long when I passed, always lingered too close when she brought metals for the palace forge.I found her behind the training barracks, hands coated in soot and sleeves rolled. She glanced at the guards flank
COWRIEWe left before dawn with no breakfast and no carriage. Just two women in hunter’s boots, blades hidden beneath embroidered shawls, skirts tucked into belts and teeth bared against the chill.Solenne matched my stride, we crossed the first rise and saw the stone buildings scattered like broken
GAVINThe guards had whispered, stupid with fear, that she was gone again. I followed her scent through the outer paths behind the storage barns, past the sleeping den, into the low woods that bordered the old stone fence where the Nightbloods used to keep their silent watch.The trees were thick wi
LILA“She’s going to have your temper too,” I added, pulling the sheet up to my waist, too tired to sit, too full to sleep. “And probably your refusal to listen.”He smiled at that, the first real one I’d seen since the pain started, and turned to me with something brighter in his eyes. “Then we’ll







