All Chapters of Bound by the Cursed Moon: Chapter 161 - Chapter 170

Male Lead POV: Kieran Ashveil"If you order me to fall back one more time, I am going to pretend I did not hear you, and we both know I have never once disobeyed you before today." Dorian's voice came sharp over the clash of steel, and for the first time in years, I let it.The eastern wall was holding, barely, a thin line of Ashveil and Thornwolf fighters pressed shoulder to shoulder against a force that had clearly come prepared for exactly this kind of fight. Garrick's riders broke against the gate in waves, and behind them, wolves I did not recognize moved with a discipline that told me this had been planned for weeks, not decided overnight. I could feel the ache in my ribs from the night before flaring with every swing of my arm, but there was no room left in me for pain, only calculation."Report," I said, catching my breath against the stone as Dorian dropped beside me, blood on his knuckles that was not entirely his own."He is not leading from the front," Dorian said. "Garric

Male Lead POV: Kieran Ashveil"You raised hunters onto pack soil, Garrick, and you expect me to believe you still have a single claim left to honorable leadership." My own voice sounded foreign to me, flat with a fury I had spent my whole life being trained to hide.The fighting had stalled into an uneasy standoff along the second wall, both sides bloodied and breathing hard, and in the space between them Garrick Duskmoor finally rode forward alone, close enough for parley, close enough that I could see the exhaustion under his composed mask, the fine cracks starting to show at its edges."I expect you to understand that I did what any Alpha would do to protect his territory's future," he said. "Your father let a Thornwolf girl unravel a treaty two generations in the making. I am simply correcting a mistake before it costs both our packs everything.""You are lying to yourself if that is truly what you believe," Alaric said, arriving at my side with the wall of fighters parting for hi

Male Lead POV: Kieran Ashveil"If you can feel her through whatever this bloodline is doing to you, then trust it, Rhen, because right now it is the only map we have." I said it with more confidence than I actually felt, watching her close her eyes against the wind, her hands gripping the reins so tight her knuckles had gone white.We rode hard toward the old border crossing, five of us cutting through territory that grew wilder and more unfamiliar with every mile, the comfortable boundaries of Ashveil land giving way to the kind of forest hunters had always preferred, thick enough to hide an ambush in every shadow, the light thinning as the canopy closed overhead."There," Rhen said suddenly, opening her eyes and pointing toward a ridge barely visible through the trees. "That way. I do not know how I know, but I know."Dorian exchanged a glance with me, the same silent question passing between us that had passed a hundred times since Rhen's bloodline had first revealed itself, whethe

Male Lead POV: Kieran Ashveil"Before I say anything else, I need every wolf in this hall to understand that what I am about to announce cannot be undone once it is spoken, and I am done being a man who lets fear decide what his pack deserves." My father's voice carried to every corner of the packed hall, steady and clear in a way I had not heard from him in years.The council chamber had never held this many wolves at once, Ashveil and Thornwolf standing shoulder to shoulder in a way that would have been unthinkable only days earlier, and I stood at my father's side with Rhen's hand steady in mine, watching a century of careful hierarchy prepare to bend under the weight of everything it had cost us."Two nights ago, a bond that our law called forbidden broke a curse that has haunted both our bloodlines for a hundred years," Alaric said. "Yesterday, an Alpha who claimed to be protecting his territory brought hunters onto pack land rather than accept that the old order was already endi

Male Lead POV: Kieran Ashveil"There is something you should see before the night ends, and I think you already know it cannot wait until morning, because some truths do not get gentler with time." Alaric's voice found me quietly near the edge of the celebration, pulling me away from the warmth of the fire and the sound of laughter I had not realized I still knew how to hear.He led me to the old records hall, dust settled thick over shelves that predated even the curse itself, the air close and still in a way that made the celebration outside feel impossibly distant, and unrolled a map I had never once been shown in all my years of training to lead this territory, borders drawn in ink faded nearly to nothing."This was drawn the year the curse was spoken," he said. "I want you to look closely at the border it marks, Kieran, because I do not believe it was ever meant to divide Ashveil from Thornwolf alone."I studied the fading lines, and slowly understood what he meant, a third terri