Alle Kapitel von THE REJECTED LUNA: FROM OUTCAST TO MOON QUEEN : Kapitel 81 – Kapitel 90

Valtherion almost died because of me.I kept coming back to that thought like a tongue pressing against a broken tooth.Three days of sitting beside his bed in the Meridian's medical wing, watching the rise and fall of his chest, counting breaths like they were currency I couldn't afford to lose.My moonlight had healed the wound.Burned through the corruption thread by thread, sealed the torn muscle, coaxed his heart back into rhythm.But the damage had been catastrophic.A concentrated lance of ancient dark energy straight through the chest of the man I loved.And even wolf healing couldn't erase that in an afternoon.So he slept. I watched.The first day was the worst.His breathing would go shallow without warning. I'd lunge forward, hands already glowing silver before I'd made the conscious decision to heal.Tina found me like that at dawn.Palms pressed to his chest, pouring moonlight into him, sweat running down my temples."Aurelia." She pulled my hands away. Gentle but firm.

The warriors started arriving on the second day. They came in trucks and on foot, in packs of ten and twenty, from territories I'd only seen as names on Zoe's maps. Silvermoon's contingent was first. Sixty fighters in matching grey, led by Freya's Beta, a woman named Astrid who moved like a blade wrapped in silk. Nightrunner sent forty five, lean and fast, scouts and strikers who communicated in hand signals I didn't recognize. Ironhide brought seventy, every one of them built like Remus. Broad, heavy, designed for absorbing punishment and hitting back harder. Within a week, eight hundred wolves filled the Meridian and the surrounding blocks that Valtherion had requisitioned for housing. Eight hundred fighters from fifteen packs, eating together, training together, learning each other's rhythms. The largest wolf army assembled in generations. And I was in charge of all of them. Zoe ran the logistics like she was conducting an orchestra. Housing assignments. M

Two weeks until the battle. That was the estimate. Azrael’s scouts tracking the cult’s gathering pace, Zoe’s models projecting force readiness. Two weeks until Malachar came for me with everything he had. Valtherion chose that moment to propose a wedding. We were in the war room. Just the two of us, the last ones remaining after a three-hour strategy session that had ground through defensive formations and evacuation protocols. The maps were spread across the table like a paper battlefield, red markers clustering in the wilderness to the northwest. I was studying the terrain around the Ancient Battleground, calculating sight lines, when he said it. “We should get married.” I looked up. “What?” “Married.” He said it the way he said everything. Like a fact, like gravity, like something that simply was. “This week.” “Valtherion, we’re in the middle of…” “I know what we’re in the middle of.” He came around the table. His expression was the one I couldn’t argue with

“I woke to the press of Valtherion's palm against my stomach. His hand was splayed wide, covering the space below my navel with a gentleness that didn't match the size of it. His eyes were open. Ice blue in the grey pre dawn light, fixed on the place where his hand rested with an expression I'd never seen on him before. Soft. Terrified. Awed. "Still feels like a dream," he murmured. I covered his hand with mine. "It's real." "I know. I just..." He breathed. Slow, measured, the way he breathed before a fight. Steadying himself against something too big for steadiness. "There's a person in there. Half you and half me." "Mostly the size of a sesame seed, according to Tina." "A sesame seed." His thumb traced a slow arc across my skin. "Our sesame seed." I laughed. It came out watery. "That's not what we're calling the baby." "Temporary name." The corner of his mouth twitched. Not quite a smile, more like the ghost of one, already haunted by everything that could go w

The emergency council meeting dragged on until dawn. A dozen or so Alphas, a war room, and the news that Malachar knew about our timeline. But one question ate at me more than any other. "How does he know?" I said it to Freya the next morning, walking the perimeter of the training compound while eight hundred wolves drilled in the yard below. "The pregnancy I can explain. Blood connection, energy signatures, the things Zane described. But Malachar's scouts responded to our false patrol routes three days before we even publicized them." "His cultists repositioned away from the eastern corridor within hours of us discussing it as an attack vector." Freya's expression hardened. "You think we have a spy." "I think we have a spy." She was quiet for ten steps. The morning was cold, the air sharp with the promise of a long day. Below us, Torres was running the striker division through formation changes, his bark carrying across the field. "Who knows your full battle