로그인Lycan’s POV“You should still be resting.”I looked up from the table. Cassian stood in the doorway with his arms crossed.Entirely too comfortable in other people’s business.“You sound like Laura.”“That’s because Laura is usually right.”A voice immediately answered from behind him.“I heard that.”Cassian smirked.“Good.”Laura appeared beside him. Neither bothered leaving. Neither bothered pretending they weren’t checking on me.“I’ve survived worse,” I said.Laura glanced toward the bandages wrapped around my side.“You’ve said that six times today.”“Seven,” Cassian corrected.She sighed.“Of course you’re counting.”“It’s important.”“No.”“It absolutely is.”I ignored both of them.The wound still hurt. Not enough to stop me. Enough to be irritating.Three days had passed since the battle inside the council chamber. Three days since Seraphine’s attack.Three days since Kaelira knelt beside me and instinctively poured Crescent power into my body.Even thinking about it felt st
Seraphine’s POVThe cell was smaller than I expected.For years I dreamed about standing inside Ironfang’s council chamber while everyone listened to me.Now I sat inside a stone cell beneath that same council hall.Hands restrained. Guards outside the door.Waiting for judgment, punishment and waiting for the damn end. I laughed quietly. The sound echoed off the walls.Everything about this was pathetic. The mighty Seraphine.The woman who spent years manipulating an entire pack.Reduced to this??A prisoner.A failure.A secret nobody wanted anymore.The laugh died.Silence settled.And for the first time in years, there was nobody left to perform for.No audience.No mask.No carefully chosen words.Just me! I hated being alone with myself.The memories always came then. The old house. The hidden one. The place dad paid for but never visited. The place where my mother spent years teaching me exactly who I was.And exactly who I wasn’t.I closed my eyes.Immediately I was eight yea
Darius POVThe council chamber had never been this quiet.Not even after wars, after Magnus’s funeral.The silence now felt heavier.Blood still stained the stone floor. Broken tables remained where they had fallen during the attack. Several injured wolves sat against the walls while healers moved between them.And at the center of everything..Kaelira remained beside the Lycan Commander.The image stayed in my mind no matter where I looked.The silver glow, visible bond, the way she hadn’t hesitated to kneel beside him.The way he had looked at her when he woke.Not Luna or crescent but Kaelira.Just Kaelira. For some reason, that had affected me more than anything else.Maybe because he saw her before her title. Before her power.Before her position.Just her.A luxury I had denied her for far too long.“Darius.”Lucian approached quietly.“The pack is waiting.”I looked toward the upper gallery.He was right.News had spread.Far faster than expected. The council members were gather
Kaelira’s POVThe bond pulled again. Harder this time. Nothing else mattered. Not the council. Not Seraphine being dragged away. Not the elders arguing quietly near the shattered council table.Not the wounded being carried from the chamber.Just him.I was moving before I realized it. The distance between us disappeared quickly. His back rested against the broken pillar where I’d left him. The bolt was gone now.Someone had snapped the shaft and removed what they could.Blood still stained his side. Too much blood. My stomach tightened.Cassian noticed me approaching and immediately stepped aside.“He’s conscious.”“Was conscious,” Laura corrected quietly.Neither sounded happy.I dropped to my knees beside him.His eyes were closed. His breathing was shallow.The moment my hand touched his arm, the bond surged violently.The connection felt different now.Stronger.Like something had shifted permanently the moment he’d called me mate.His jaw tightened.Pain.I could feel it.No gue
Kaelira’s POV“Mate.”The word hit harder than the battle. Harder than the screams. Harder than the blood staining the council floor. For one impossible second, everything else disappeared.The fighting.The traitors.The chaos.All of it.There was only him.Still gripping my wrist despite the bolt lodged in his side. Still thinking about me instead of himself.Still telling me to finish what he started.The bond surged so violently that my chest hurt.Not pain.Something deeper.Something terrifying.Something is right.“Kaelira.”His voice snapped me back.I looked up.Seraphine was running. Not toward the exits. Toward the eastern corridor that connected to the lower tunnels beneath the council hall.Coward.Always keeping an escape route.Always planning for failure.Not this time.I slowly rose to my feet.The Lycan released my wrist. His eyes never left mine.Go.I felt the command without him saying it.Around me, the battle still raged. Cassian was fighting two traitors near
Lycan’s POV“Do it now.”The words had barely left Seraphine’s mouth before the chamber exploded. Steel flashed.A council guard drove a blade toward Elder Marrow. Laura intercepted him first.The crack of breaking bone echoed across the room. The traitor hit the floor hard. Three more warriors attacked immediately.Not outsiders. Ironfang wolves.They had been standing among us the entire time.“TRAITORS!” Lucian roared.Chaos erupted. Council members scrambled away from the central floor. Guards rushed toward the elders.The sound of steel striking steel filled the chamber. And through all of it my eyes found Kaelira.She had already moved of course.One of Seraphine’s loyalists lunged toward her from the western side of the chamber. The fool never got close. Silver light burst from Kaelira’s hand.The force threw him across the room. His body smashed into a stone pillar.The room gasped.People still weren’t used to seeing her power.I was.And gods help anyone foolish enough to st
Kaelira’s POVThe morning air bit sharp against my cheeks as I moved through the corridors of the Ironfang estate. My steps were measured, careful, though the hollow ache in my chest weighed heavier than any exhaustion my body could feel. Seven years of being tethered, bound, contained and now, f
Lycan POVI should have killed her. The thought followed me long after I left the gates. Through the forest, silence and the sharp pull in my chest that refused to fade.I stopped abruptly, boots grinding against dirt as the wind cut through the trees. My jaw tightened, fingers curling into fists a
Kaelira POVI woke up with the taste of smoke in my throat. My body jerked upright before I could stop it, breath coming in sharp, uneven pulls. The room was dark. Quiet. But my heart refused to slow, pounding like I was still trapped inside it…The fire. The screams and him.That boy. I dragged a
Darius POVI got there just in time to hear him say“Your bloodline was believed extinct… until you.”My steps slowed.Not because I wanted to.Because something in my chest… reacted.Sharp and wrong.Kaelira stood in front of him, unmoving.Facing a Lycan like she’d done it a hundred times before.







