The hand around Elara’s throat didn't feel like the hand that had held her with such tenderness only an hour ago. It was a block of ice, a dead weight that radiated a cold so absolute it seemed to freeze the very air in her lungs. "Kaelen... please..." Elara gasped, her fingers clawing at the King’s iron wrist. The thing wearing Kaelen’s face tilted its head, a jerky, unnatural movement. The purple fire in its eyes flared, and for a second, the regal features of the Black Winter distorted, showing a glimpse of a hollow, screaming skull beneath the skin. "Kaelen is a whisper in a storm, little Luna," the Feral King rasped, using Kaelen’s beautiful baritone to utter words of pure malice. "He fought well. He offered his soul to save yours. A foolish, romantic bargain. Now, he sits in the dark, watching through these eyes as I take everything he ever loved." The creature’s grip tightened. Elara’s vision began to swim with black spots. Behind her, in the corner of the tilted carria
Last Updated : 2026-02-23 Read more