Semua Bab Ashbound Moon : Bab 11 - Bab 20

CHAPTER 11 The tracker’s claw speared into the chamber, scraping stone, reaching for my throat like it remembered the taste of my fear.Rowan stepped aside as if inviting it in.“Aria!” Kieran shouted, voice raw, but he was pinned against the wall by pain and blood loss, one hand shaking as it tried to push him upright.Dax sagged under the moon-silver chain, jaw clenched so hard I heard his teeth grind. The links glowed brighter where they touched his skin, smoking faintly. It wasn’t just restraint. It was punishment.My stomach flipped. If I panicked, Rowan won. If I froze, the tracker fed.So I chose.“BACK,” I said, and the word dropped heavy as stone.Ash surged upward, slamming into the claw and forcing it back through the crack. The tracker roared—pure hatred—scraping at the doorway again.Rowan’s smile thinned. “Pretty,” he murmured. “But you can’t hold it forever.”“I don’t need forev

CHAPTER 13Selah Dorne stepped out of the shadow like she’d been standing there the whole time—like the chamber had been built for her entrance.Her dress was pack-white, the kind worn at ceremonies and funerals. Her hair was pinned with silver. And her hand rested on her stomach with practiced tenderness.She smiled at me.Not a friendly smile. Not even a victorious one.A smile that said: you’re late.“Aria,” Selah purred. “You always did walk into rooms like you owned the air.”Kieran made a sound—half shock, half rage—and tried to step forward. His body betrayed him. His knees dipped, breath catching, blood still soaking his shirt.“Selah,” he rasped. “How did you—”Vesper didn’t move, but the temperature in the chamber dropped. “You weren’t invited,” she said to Selah.Selah’s gaze flicked to Vesper, amused. “Invite? Please. Doors open for those with the right keys.”Dax’s posture

CHAPTER 15 The cracking sound wasn’t stone settling.It was something chewing.Slow. Certain. Like it knew time was on its side.Vesper’s knives flashed again, but she didn’t rush Selah. She watched the wall, reading the rhythm of the cracks.“That’s not the tracker,” Vesper murmured. “Tracker claws scrape. That is… drilling.”Selah’s smile didn’t falter. “Good. You’re catching up.”Kieran swayed, gripping his ribs, eyes locked on the glowing tether between me and Dax. “What did you do to her?”Selah finally looked at him like he was background noise. “I didn’t do that. She did.”My stomach twisted. The tether between Dax and me pulsed once, like a heartbeat. Not romantic. Not gentle.A claim.A lock.Dax’s jaw flexed as if he felt it too. “This isn’t a mate bond,” he said quietly.Vesper’s eyes glittered. “It’s covenant binding.”Selah nodded. “Exactly.”

CHAPTER 17 The chamber smelled like smoke and wet rock—until it didn’t.Until the air shifted and my lungs filled with something familiar, something that didn’t belong in covenant tunnels at all.My mother.Not her perfume. Not her soap. Her blood.It slid into the room like a hand around my throat, sweet and metallic and wrong. The kind of scent that didn’t mean “nearby.” It meant “opened.”The cageborn turned its coal-bright eyes toward the same direction I did. It twitched, eager, like a dog hearing its name.Mara’s smile deepened. “There it is,” she murmured. “The Marrow thread.”Kieran hunched on the stone floor, shaking, the black tendrils still crawling faintly over his chest like bruises trying to become roots. His gaze snapped to me, raw and panicked.“Aria,” he rasped. “I can feel… something pulling.”My stomach tightened. I could feel it too—two separate tugs, two separate hooks in

CHAPTER 19 The seam didn’t open like stone.It opened like a throat.Darkness peeled back, and a corridor beyond it breathed out cold air and bloodscent so thick it made my eyes water. The runes on our walls flared copper-white, reacting like animals sensing a predator nearby.Mara stepped forward as if she owned the door.Dax moved with her, blocking, but the tether yanked so hard it made my wrist scream. I gasped and nearly fell.Vesper caught my elbow. Her grip was firm, real. “Don’t let her see you break,” she murmured, close enough that only I could hear.I swallowed hard. “My mother is in there.”Vesper’s eyes sharpened. “I know.”That hit me like a punch. “How?”Vesper’s jaw flexed. “Because my people have been tracking that bloodscent for weeks. Because Rowan has been bleeding her into vials like she’s a tool. Because Mara’s been building this opening for a long time.”My stom