Chapter 81

CORALINA'S POV The hours leading up to midnight pass in a tense, suspended animation. Clyde keeps me hidden deep within the dark architecture of the timber, far away from the prying eyes of the Council and the lingering scent of Diana’s entourage. He doesn't offer me a silk robe, and I don't ask for one; the tattered remnants of my white gown are tied securely around my waist, my bare arms and legs exposed to the biting mountain frost. I like the cold. It keeps the feral edges of my mind sharp. It keeps the fire inside me hungry.We don't speak of the city. We don't speak of the past that remains locked behind a wall of white mist in my head. Instead, we spend the hours in a silent, physical communion. Clyde sits on a mossy log, and I sit between his massive thighs, leaning my back against his chest while his large, calloused hands slowly braid my silver hair back from my face. He weaves thick, tight plaits—not the delicate, crown-like loops Diana wears to look like nobility, but a w

Chapter 82

CORALINA'S POV The volcanic ash feels like cold velvet beneath my bare feet as I step out of the center of the pit.The silence of the High Council is absolute, a heavy, suffocating weight that hangs over the amphitheater like the smoke from the twelve dying bonfires. Diana is still on her knees, her high-born forehead pressed against the soot-stained rock, her shoulders shaking with the silent, ragged sobs of a broken pureblood. Further away, Brielle is being dragged into the shadows by two tight-lipped acolytes, her unconscious human form leaving a dark, smeary trail of crimson across the volcanic stone.None of the Elders move. Hakan remains standing, his iron-ringed staff lowered to the ground in a gesture of permanent capitulation, his sightless grey eyes fixed on the empty air right above my head. They are waiting for me to speak. They are waiting for the newly crowned Grand Luna to issue her first decree, to claim the basalt pillars of the North in the name of the Southern Fir

Chapter 83

CORALINA'S POVThe morning light that filters through the dense canopy of the pines is thin, sharp, and cold. It shatters the private darkness of our clearing, turning the heavy, lingering mist into a pale shroud of silver and grey. I don't move. I lie on the bed of damp moss, listening to the synchronized rhythm of the forest waking up around us. Behind me, Clyde is a mountain of solid, immovable heat. His chest rises and falls against my shoulder blades, his breath a slow, rhythmic current that stirs the silver strands of my unraveled hair. His long, scarred arm remains locked across my waist like an iron bolt, his heavy fingers splayed over my stomach, pressing me so close to his body that there isn't a single inch of air between us. The mark on my neck has finally stopped its frantic, violent throbbing. It hums now—a deep, low-frequency vibration of molten lavender that runs straight down into my core, echoing the golden, shadow-soaked pulse of his own blood. We are whole. The

Chapter 84

CORALINA'S POV The smell of cold ash and charred pine needles follows us all the way down the mountain. The sun is fully up now, a bright, blinding disk that bleeds through the mist without bringing any real warmth to the stone stairs. I walk a half-step ahead of Clyde, my bare feet unbothered by the sharp shale. The tattered rags of my white gown are still tied around my hips, but I do not feel exposed. The thick, dark weight of Clyde’s shadow-energy wraps around my shoulders like a living cloak, shielding my skin from the biting wind. Every time my palm brushes the side of my thigh, I see the faint grey smears of charcoal on my skin. The mark of the Stag. The price of the crown. Behind us, the forest is quiet, but as we reach the lower ridge overlooking the Council’s main camp, the scent of the pack hits my nostrils—a dense, suffocating wave of fear, old blood, and a desperate, shifting allegiance. They know I am coming. They can feel the frequency of the High Priestess descend

Chapter 85

CORALINA'S POV The roaring of the Southern vanguard does not fade so much as it sinks into the stone, becoming a permanent, low-frequency tremor beneath my feet. I stand at the edge of the obsidian pit, the cold wind whipping the tattered silk of my ruined gown against my bare thighs. Before me, the twelve Elders of the High Council remain with their foreheads inclined toward the ash, their white-and-gold robes trailing in the soot like molted skin. Diana is a broken, silent heap at the base of the Voron pillar, her hands trembling where they rest against the black volcanic rock. They are waiting for a gesture. A sign of mercy. A traditional blessing from the newly crowned Grand Luna to seal the transition of power. Instead, I feel Clyde’s broad, calloused hand slide down from my shoulder, his fingers tracing a burning line along the curve of my waist before hooking into the tattered fabric at my hip. He pulls me back against his chest, his torso a solid wall of furnace-heat that

Chapter 86

CORALINA'S POV The iron shields stop their rhythmic thunder, but the silence that replaces them is far from empty. It is heavy, thick with the scent of pine sap, wet stone, and the distant, metallic tang of the lowlands where the great packs wait. We walk away from the black volcanic ring of the Ancestral Hearth, leaving the twelve Elders and the broken remnants of the Northern nobility behind us in the ash. Clyde does not take me back to the cavern under the sequoia. Instead, he guides me along a narrow, hidden ridge path that cuts through the spine of the mountain, leading toward a stone fortress that looks as if it grew directly out of the mountain itself. It is the ancient seat of the Southern vanguard—a fortress of rough-hewn granite and ironwood, built long before the world learned to hide its teeth behind corporate glass and satellite uplinks. Clyde’s hand remains locked around mine, his broad palm a steady, burning anchor against my skin. The lavender light at my throat ha