Chapter five

They Found the Last Royal  

Nora

The cracked black stone didn’t just split. It detonated.

Blinding gold light ripped through my shirt. Every stained-glass pane in the chapel shattered. The shockwave tore across the courtyard, blowing out windows in the dormitories, armory, and towers until the night air screamed with falling glass.

The light sank beneath my collarbone, burning away the surface to reveal an intricate glowing crest—not the simple silver crescent, but a crown of twin wolves snarling beneath an eclipse.

A suffocating ancient pressure flooded the grounds.

Behind me Sebastian dropped to one knee, stone cracking under his weight. Zane stumbled back, fangs bared, bracing both hands against the chapel steps just to stay upright. Across campus every student, guard, and instructor collapsed, forced down by a raw sovereign force that allowed no defiance.

*Run, my sweet girl. Run before the shadows see your face.*

A woman’s voice whispered into my skull—warm, terrified, smelling of lavender and old smoke.

My mother.

The sky turned blood-red.

The protective wards hummed, strained, then shattered.

They poured through the breach.

Dozens of masked warriors in dark plate vaulted the rubble. Every head snapped toward the chapel steps.

They looked right at me.

“Target confirmed!” a voice roared. “Secure the bloodline!”

A bone-chilling roar ripped from Sebastian’s throat.

His clothes tore as his body contorted. A colossal midnight-black wolf with glowing amber eyes surged where the man had been. He lunged down the steps, tearing through three armored intruders at once, jaws snapping through steel and bone.

Beside him Zane dropped every scrap of restraint. He vanished into black mist and flashing silver. Frost crawled over the stones as shadows rose like living spears, impaling attackers where they stood. His crimson eyes burned with slaughter.

An intruder slipped past the carnage, blade raised, lunging for my chest.

On instinct I threw my arm up. My bare palm slammed into the side of his helmet.

A violent shock blasted into my brain.

Memories that weren’t mine flashed behind my eyelids. A candlelit war room. A map of Ravenholm circled in red. A tall man with grey-streaked dark hair sliding a chest of gold across a table, whispering, *Bring me the girl alive, or leave her in pieces.*

I gasped, stumbling back as the attacker dropped limp.

I knew that face. I knew that voice.

“Sebastian!” I screamed. “It was—”

A gauntleted hand clamped down on my shoulder and yanked me backward into the chapel archway.

“You’re coming with me, girl,” Frederick Moon Flame snarled, golden eyes cold as he dragged me toward the rear tunnels.

A black blur slammed into his ribs.

Sebastian’s wolf hit his own cousin hard enough to shatter the stone pillar. Frederick went flying, then sprang up, blue flames roaring around his fists.

“You dare turn on your own blood for a nameless stray?” Frederick roared.

Sebastian shifted back in a fraction of a second, chest heaving, blood dripping from his claws. “Touch her again and I’ll rip your heart out of your chest, Frederick!”

The two wolves circled each other.

“Nora! Help me!”

A pathetic sob broke through the ringing.

Alexandra was crawling through the rubble, clutching her stomach, face smeared with dirt and tears.

“Alexandra?” I stepped forward, lowering my guard.

Her tear-streaked face twisted. The terror vanished, replaced by malice.

From beneath her torn sleeve she whipped out a curved obsidian blade and leapt, aiming straight between my shoulder blades.

“Die, you filthy mutt!”

I threw both hands out to shield my face.

A wave of blinding golden fire exploded from my palms.

The blast hit Alexandra square in the chest, lifted her clean off the ground, and launched her twenty feet into the chapel doors. She slumped to the stones, motionless.

Silence swallowed the room.

Frederick stopped. Sebastian froze. Even Zane halted mid-kill.

I stared down at my trembling palms. Wisps of golden smoke curled from my fingertips.

At my feet a surviving intruder looked up at the glow still radiating from my skin. His weapon clattered to the floor.

His eyes went wide with reverent horror.

“The Moon Queen…” he whispered.

“Silence!” Zane’s blade flashed, cutting the man’s throat before another word could leave his lips.

My head snapped toward the vampire prince.

“You knew,” I breathed, taking a furious step toward him. The golden light under my skin flared hotter. “You knew what that symbol meant. You’ve been lying to me since the moment you saw me in the dining hall!”

Zane wiped the blood from his blade, refusing to meet my eyes. “Nora, you don’t understand—”

“Understand what?”

A slow, mocking clap echoed from the dark colonnade.

Another figure stepped out—tall, unmasked, dressed in the royal crimson of the high imperial court. He stepped over the bodies of his fallen men and stopped five paces away. He bowed low, hand pressed over his heart.

“Your Majesty,” the man said, voice smooth as silk. “We have spent eighteen years searching the world for you.”

Sebastian’s gaze snapped to mine, blue eyes wide with shock. Zane’s face drained of color.

The man straightened, smile widening as his eyes fixed on my glowing crest.

“And now that the entire world knows the last royal is alive,” he purred, glancing up at the night sky, “the people who murdered your family will finally come to finish the job themselves.”