جميع فصول : الفصل -الفصل 8

“This is the Moon Goddess’s will, Nora. Don’t blame us.”Adrian spoke gently, but he still moved in front of Ivy as if he expected me to attack her.I looked past him at our parents’ portraits.My father had been Alpha of the Silvercrest Pack. My mother had been his Luna. They had been dead for twelve years.In three days, I would be dead too.The healer’s report was folded inside my coat pocket.Three days left to live. That was the healer’s final verdict. There was no cure.No one in the room knew.I had come to Moon Hall to say goodbye to my parents. Instead, my brothers had placed an old silver urn on the altar and asked Ivy and me to draw for our future mates.One token was supposed to be silver, with Noah Hale’s name engraved on it. The other was supposed to be black, with Alpha Kieran Blackwood’s name.Ivy had drawn the silver token.She held it against her chest, her eyes wet. Noah stood beside her. Adrian looked relieved. So did Cole, the commander of Silvercrest’s elite guard

Every eye in the room turned toward me.Adrian looked at the guard. “Who came from Blackridge?”“Former Luna Evelyn Blackwood.”Kieran’s mother.The room went silent.No one had expected her to come in person.Adrian’s expression tightened. He followed me into the hall, then stopped before we reached the sunroom.“Evelyn Blackwood is fiercely protective of her son,” he said under his breath. “Choose your words carefully. Don’t complain about the arrangement or say anything that could offend her.”“I won’t.”Evelyn Blackwood was waiting in the glass-walled sunroom.She wore a charcoal-gray suit beneath a long black coat. Silver threaded through her dark hair, but age had done nothing to soften the authority in her face.Even after stepping down as Luna, she carried herself as if the entire room belonged to her.She dismissed the Blackridge guards when I entered.“You’re Nora Vale?”“Yes.”She studied me in silence.“Your brother says you accepted the bonding ceremony willingly.”“I did.

When I opened my eyes again, I was standing beside my own coffin.For a few seconds, I did not understand what I was seeing.Then I noticed my body inside it.Someone had changed me out of the plain bonding dress and wrapped me in a heavy Blackridge cloak. Kieran’s obsidian pendant rested over my heart.Evelyn stood beside me, one hand gripping the edge of the coffin.Kieran’s coffin was only a few feet away.He had died shortly before dawn.I had followed less than an hour later.The healer had told me I had three days. In the end, he had been almost exactly right.I tried to speak to Evelyn, but no sound came out. When I reached for her, my fingers passed through her sleeve.That was when I understood.I had died, and all that remained of me was a spirit.No one could see me.The Blackridge convoy left Silvercrest before sunrise.As it crossed the border, I saw a familiar vehicle pulled over on the other side of the road. A Silvercrest scout stood beside it, staring at the two coffin

Evelyn turned to leave, then noticed the envelope in Mason’s hand.“Before you demand anything else from Blackridge, read what Nora left you.”The doors closed behind her.Mason stared at my name on the envelope.He had carried the letter all the way from Silvercrest, yet the seal remained unbroken.“I didn’t know what it was,” he said. “She handed it to me while everyone was upset. I thought it was another attempt to stop the draw.”“You signed it without reading it,” Cole said.“Ivy was having trouble breathing.”“That doesn’t explain why you never read it afterward.”Mason had no answer.Adrian took the envelope from him and broke the seal.The first pages contained everything I had once been too embarrassed to say aloud.I thanked Adrian for raising us after our parents died. I thanked Cole for giving up his military career to protect Silvercrest. I thanked Mason for holding my hand through the nightmares after I returned.Those memories had once convinced me that no matter how oft