All Chapters of Marked From Birth: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

The courtyard of Kharos was no longer a place of stone and ice; it was a battlefield of light and shadow. While Lucas and the Silver Pack warriors engaged the Vampire horde in a cacophony of steel and snarls, a deadly circle had formed in the center.Audrey and Samantha stood twenty paces apart. The air between them hissed, the temperature fluctuating wildly."You always were the lucky one, Audrey," Samantha spat. Her skin had turned a translucent, sickly marble, and the purple veins from her dark ritual had spread up to her temples. "Born with a prophecy. Born with the 'Origin Flame.' While I had to beg for every scrap of power, you were born a goddess and didn't even know it.""I wasn't lucky, Samantha," Audrey replied, her silver blade glowing so brightly it was difficult to look at. "I was a slave in my own home. You watched me bleed. You laughed while I starved. You didn't beg for power—you stole it from the dark.""And the dark provides!" Samantha screamed.She threw her hands f

Three days later, the sun rose over a different world. The fortress of Kharos was being rebuilt, not with stone alone, but with the combined magic of the Silver and Moon Shadow packs. The atmosphere was no longer one of suspicion or the heavy, suffocating scent of fear; it was one of frantic, hopeful industry. Wolves who had been enemies a week ago now hauled timber together, their shared sweat and labor washing away the bitter remnants of the old regime.In the Great Hall, the air smelled of crushed lavender, expensive beeswax, and the sharp, clean scent of ozone that always followed Audrey’s presence. The high windows had been thrown open, allowing the mountain air to sweep away the dust of battle. Before the eyes of the entire united pack and the grumbling, defeated remnants of the Great Council, Audrey stood beside Lucas on the raised dais. The Council members sat like stone gargoyles in the front row, their faces pinched and pale. They were the men and women who had whispered tha

The journey to the Iron Ridge took three days. Audrey traveled light, accompanied only by Elara and a small contingent of the White Wolf’s personal guard—wolves who had been omegas in the Moon Shadow pack but had discovered a fierce, untapped power under Audrey’s mentorship.As they crossed into the jagged, metallic canyons of the Iron Ridge, the air changed. It smelled of sulfur and hot forge-fire. The wolves here were larger, their fur thick and matted with the dust of the mines."They’re watching us," Elara whispered, her ears flattened against her head.From the ridges above, snipers with silver-tipped crossbows tracked their movement. The Iron Ridge was the primary weapons-supplier for the five kingdoms. If they turned against Audrey, the Silver Pack wouldn't have enough steel to last a month.They reached the gates of the Iron Fortress—a massive structure of black iron built directly into a volcano."State your business!" a guard bellowed from the ramparts.Audrey stepped forwar

In Audrey’s absence, Lucas had become a ghost in his own halls. He moved through the shadows of the fortress, his silver eyes never settling, his nose catching every errant scent. The "Heresy" decree had done more than freeze trade; it had planted seeds of doubt in the younger warriors who feared the wrath of the Great Council. Lucas stood in the archival vaults, deep beneath the High Hall. The air was cool and smelled of parchment and ancient wax. He was looking for a discrepancy—not in the books, but in the Scent-Logs. Every wolf who entered or exited the fortress left a trace, a chemical signature recorded by the omegas at the gates. "You’re brooding again, Alpha." Vane stepped out from behind a stack of stone tablets. She looked exhausted, her armor scuffed from double-patrol shifts. "I'm not brooding, Vane. I’m hunting," Lucas replied, his voice a low vibration. "The Gold-Fang mercenaries knew exactly when Audrey left. They knew her route. That information didn't leak thro

The air in the basement of Kharos didn't just feel hot; it felt heavy, as if the oxygen had been replaced by molten lead. The Solar Heart—a massive, pulsating crystal of pure celestial energy—was no longer glowing with its usual steady, golden radiance. Instead, it was fractured, its core invaded by the oily, violet veins of the Sleeper’s Fire.Every pulse of the Heart sent a shockwave through the stone floor, a rhythmic thrum that Audrey felt in her very teeth."Let him go, Vargos," Audrey said. Her voice was low, but it carried the weight of the mountain.She stood at the entrance of the chamber, her white silk dress singed at the edges, her skin shimmering with a fine layer of sweat and golden light. She didn't look like a girl anymore; she looked like a celestial event.Vargos, the High Executioner, didn't flinch. He was a mountain of a man, clad in armor that seemed to swallow the light around it. The Void-Iron spear in his hand was a jagged thing, forged from the cold spaces bet