INICIAR SESIÓNMerry Christmas to those who celebrate and Happy Holidays to those who don't. Tomorrow, there will be no update as I celebrate with my family.
Hello, My Lovely Readers,I want to say thank you to everyone who saw this book to the end. I know it is very different from the other stories that can be found on this app. I enjoyed creating the world around Nyxara's nightmares, and I hope you enjoyed it as well. Thanks again for reading. Solange Daye
AriaThe stones are warm beneath my fingers.The sun has just crested the eastern towers, spilling gold across the courtyard in long, lazy streaks that catch on carved edges and softened corners. Ten stones stand in a half circle at the center of the garden, smooth, pale granite hauled in from the river cliffs and shaped by hand.By our hands.Each one bears a name.I trace them slowly, one by one, the way I always do.Corran. Loira. Therin. Renna. Maeven. Silen. Nyra. Garrin. The others who never reached the end.Ten.Only ten this time.The Game took more in other lives. More in other cycles. Sometimes, whole crowds. Sometimes, only Kael and I, standing alone in the aftermath, surrounded by ghosts.The other names will come to me, I will remember them in time, and when I do, I will add them, but for now, this is a start.I kneel in the grass, tucking a wildflower between two of the stones. It’s ridiculous how soft the courtyard is now. The grass is thick beneath my knees, c
Aria“We live.”The words are barely out of my mouth before Kael’s hand tightens around mine.Not gently or carefully, he tugs me forward with a sudden urgency that steals my breath and sends me stumbling half a step as he pulls me toward the castle doors.“Kael, ” I laugh, startled. “Where are we going?”“Home,” he says simply.The doors swing open before we reach them. Not with magic. Not with ceremony. Just… doors opening.Warm light spills out across the stone steps, and sound rushes toward us, voices, movement, life. The smell of food, smoke, and bodies packed together hits me all at once.I freeze in the doorway. The great hall is full. Not with contestants or nightmares, but people.Men and women in travel-worn clothes, warriors with dented armor, healers clutching satchels, children clinging to parents who look just as confused as they do. Creatures too, fae with dulled wings, horned beings I don’t have names for, shifters half-shifted and blinking like they’ve just woken
AriaI’m yanked upward with brutal force, my body tearing free from the crushing weight of nightmares as the world around me screams. Shadows peel away like rotting skin, ripping back from my limbs as I gasp, sucking in air so sharp it burns.I collapse forward, straight into Kael. His arms lock around me instantly, crushing me against his chest as the illusion shatters.The Jasper Pack dissolves into fragments of light and ash. Faces melt away mid-scream. The ground splits, the forest tearing itself apart as if the lie can no longer sustain its own weight.The nightmares shriek as they are dragged backward into nothing, unraveling thread by thread until there is only silence.And then there is stillness. It is just us, holding one another like we are each other’s lifelines, and it is because we are. Without him, there is no me. Kael and I stand alone in the void where the Game once pretended to be a life. There is nothing around us, only darkness, but it doesn’t feel empty. It
AriaI run. The altar vanishes behind me as I plunge into the crowd, boots slipping on grass that suddenly feels too soft, too wet beneath my feet. Voices rise in confusion; my name, my title, my duty, but they blur together into a single roar that pounds against my skull.“Aria!”“Stop!”“Come back!”I don’t look back. I weave between bodies, shoving shoulders aside, ducking under outstretched arms. Panic claws up my throat, sharp and relentless, because something is wrong. So wrong.The first hand grazes my arm. I flinch instinctively and glance sideways, and my stomach drops.The arm is too long.Not grotesque at first glance, not obviously monstrous, but wrong. The elbow bends a second time where it shouldn’t. The skin stretches thin and gray, pulled tight over bones that shift beneath it like something alive.I yank away with a gasp.“No,” I whisper. “No, no…”Another hand reaches for me. Then another.I shove harder now, my breath coming in ragged bursts as the pack closes
AriaThe first thing I notice is the moon and the warm summer air. It blasts against my skin bringing me back to reality. Bringing me back to what is real. The moonlight spills through the clearing in silver ribbons, filtering through the towering pines of Jasper Pack land like it has every night of my life. The scent of pine and earth fills my lungs, familiar enough that my chest tightens with something dangerously close to relief.I’m standing at the altar. A place that I get the feeling I have been before. The pack is gathered before me; hundreds of wolves, faces lifted, eyes shining with approval and pride. They’re smiling. All of them.My heart stutters. This is right. Isn’t it?I look down at my hands. They’re steady. No blood beneath my nails. No marks crawling up my arms. No pain humming beneath my skin. The ache I’ve carried for so long is… gone. But it feels strange, as if I can remember the ache but I don’t remember why it was there to begin with. “Aria.”Riven’s







