Fury Bound
Author: Sable Sorensen
Date: 2026-05-05 07:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Fantasy; Romance; Vampires; Adult
Description: Revenge demands sacrifice. Don’t miss this action-packed, jaw-dropping, dark and romantic sequel to Dire Bound. CROWNED BY DESTINY. CONSUMED BY VENGEANCE. Against all odds, Meryn Cooper has inherited the crown—and a deadly war. As the Kingdom of Nocturna splinters under the weight of generations of lies, it is up to Meryn, her bonded direwolf Anassa, and their allies to bring the country back from the brink. But the commoners, the Bonded, and the nobles are distrustful of their new queen and Meryn is caught in a deadly game of politics. Meanwhile, Meryn’s beloved younger sister, Saela, is more

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2026 by Sable Sorensen

Map copyright © 2025 by Andrés Aguirre Jurado

Cover art © 2026 by Sasha Vinogradova. Lettering by David Coulson. Original series design by Ivy Beautiful Books. Cover copyright © 2026 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

Hachette Book Group supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.

The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

Requited

Hachette Book Group

1290 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10104

Requited.com

First Edition: May 2026

Requited™ is an imprint of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

Requited books may be purchased in bulk for business, educational, or promotional use. For information, please contact your local bookseller or the Hachette Book Group Special Markets Department at special.markets@hbgusa.com.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

ISBNs: 978-0-316-60141-2 (deluxe hardcover), 978-0-316-60159-7 (standard hardcover), 978-0-316-60143-6 (ebook), 978-0-316-60809-1 (international), 978-0-316-60993-7 (signed deluxe edition), 978-0-316-61030-8 (Target edition)

E3-20260402-JV-NF-ORI

Contents

Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Map
1 Meryn
2 Meryn
3 Meryn
4 Stark
5 Meryn
6 Meryn
7 Meryn
8 Stark
9 Meryn
10 Meryn
11 Meryn
12 Stark
13 Meryn
14 Stark
15 Meryn
16 Meryn
17 Meryn
18 Meryn
19 Stark
20 Meryn
21 Stark
22 Meryn
23 Meryn
24 Meryn
25 Meryn
26 Meryn
27 Stark
28 Meryn
29 Meryn
30 Meryn
31 Stark
32 Meryn
33 Meryn
34 Meryn
35 Stark
36 Meryn
37 Meryn
38 Meryn
39 Stark
40 Meryn
41 Meryn
42 Meryn
43 Meryn
44 Meryn
45 Meryn
46 Meryn
47 Stark
48 Meryn
49 Meryn
50 Meryn
51 Meryn
52 Meryn
53 Meryn
54 Meryn
55 Meryn
56 Meryn
57 Meryn
58 Meryn
59 Meryn
60 Meryn
61 Stark
Acknowledgments
Discover More
By Sable Sorensen
A Guide to the Bonded Packs of Nocturna
Glossary of Terms
Character Guide
"Fury Bound" Playlist

1. Cover
2. Table of Contents
3. Dedication
4. Title Page
5. Start of Content
6. Start of Backmatter
7. Copyright

Page List
i
ii
iii
iv
v
vi
vii
viii
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316
317
318
319
320
321
322
323
324
325
326
327
328
329
330
331
332
333
334
335
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346
347
348
349
350
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359
360
361
362
363
364
365
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373
374
375
376
377
378
379
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398
399
400
401
402
403
404
405
406
407
408
409
410
411
412
413
414
415
416
417
418
419
420
421
422
423
424
425
426
427
428
429
430
431
432
433
434
435
436
437
438
439
440
441
442
443
444
445
446
447
448
449
450
451
452
453
454
455
456
457
458
459
460
461
462
463
464
465
466
467
468
469
470
471
472
473
474
475
476
477
478
479
480
481
482
483
484
485
486
487
488
489
490
491
492
493
494
495
496
497
498
499
500
501
502
503
504
505
506
507
508
509
510
511
512
513
514
515
516
517
518
519
520
521
522
523
524
525
526
527
528
529
530
531
532
533
534
535
536
537
538
539
540
541
542
543
544
545
546
547
548
549
550
551
552
553
554
555
556
557
558
559
560
561
562
563
564
565
566
567
568
569
570
571
572
573
574
575
576
577
578
579
580
581
582
583
584
585
586
587
588
589
590
591
592
593
594
595
596
597
598
599
600

For everyone whose strength is in survival.
It’s enough.

Explore book giveaways, sneak peeks, deals, and more.

Tap here to learn more.

CONTENT WARNING

This book contains mature and explicit subject matter that might be difficult for some readers, including on-page violence, adult situations, self-harm, and discussions of sexual assault and child abuse. For a full list of content flags and tropes, please visit the author’s website: sablesorensen.com

GUIDES AND ADDITIONAL MATERIALS

For a breakdown of the four Bonded packs of Nocturna, a glossary of terms used, a character list with pronunciations, and a playlist, please see the additional materials at the back of the book. Note that there may be light spoilers!

1

MERYN

Take a breath, Meryn.

Darkness writhes around me, moving in impossible ways. It parts in heartbeats, revealing images that tear me asunder.

Blood, in a viscous scarlet splatter.

Breathe.

Violent red streaks across the gray stone floor.

Breathe.

Across my little sister Saela’s snarling face—her lips and her… fangs.

Meryn, take a breath.

My chest aches painfully, and the shadows contract together again, bringing the room into pitch black once more. As they do, strong, comforting arms tighten around my middle.

But I can’t, I can’t, I can’t—

“Take a breath, Meryn!”

I gasp, breath stuttering. The growling voice in my head is not my own, I realize, but that of my bonded direwolf, Anassa. The towering silver-white wolf butts her nose into my side as air floods my lungs, and I come fully back into my body.

The shadows part again. It’s a strange new power, but I have some level of control over it. Clearly, it responds to my emotions.

To my shock. To my fury.

I’ve spent the past four months training to become one of the Bonded, all in hopes of getting to the front lines of the war to find Saela. She was kidnapped out of our home, stolen in the night to feed the Siphons in our neighboring country of Astreona.

Or so I thought.

Saela spasms on the floor before me, blood dripping from her chin. I flinch at the sight of her new fangs. After everything I went through to find her, to save her… my little sister has been turned into one of them. A Siphon herself.

With the uncontrollable bloodlust to prove it.

Helene, a member of the Daemos pack, stands to the side of Stark’s office. Her stunned eyes are wide, and she holds a hand over her bloodied neck—but she’s safe. Her bond with her direwolf has already healed the wound Saela inflicted.

Helene is fine, but my sister, my everything…

I lunge toward Saela, desperate to get to her, to help her, to stop her, to somehow change what’s happening.

But those arms around me hold me tight.

“Let me go, Stark!” I spit. The shadows surge toward us, responding to my aggravation.

Before I can free myself, Stark’s massive black direwolf, Cratos, lunges toward Saela with a violent growl.

My stomach drops, and I fight hopelessly against Stark’s strong hold. “No!”

Cratos is going to kill her. My sweet girl, my beautiful sister. He’s going to tear out her throat because she’s dangerous now.

Tears flood down my face in hot rivulets.

“Stop him,” I plead to both Stark and Anassa. “Cratos, stop!”

He pounces on her, and I scream. The room goes dark again.

Anassa nuzzles her nose into my side, harder this time. “Meryn, he is not killing her. He is restraining her for your protection, and for everyone else’s. Take another breath.”

I do as I’m told. The shadows part again.

Cratos holds Saela down, two huge paws pressing against her back, pushing her into the floor. Even so, she bucks back, nearly knocking him off her.

Nearly knocking a gigantic direwolf at least three times her size off with the flex of her spine.

My mouth falls open, and I can feel the color leave my face. All that strength in the body of an eleven-year-old girl.

Saela’s never been physically strong. She was the book-smart child. I was the strong one. She took to self-defense training well, but even still—she’s always fought with words, not muscles.

Her hazel eyes sharpen, and she moves her body again, and again, bouncing Cratos up and down. Anassa meets my gaze with her golden one, and I can tell what she’s thinking without her even communicating it.

Cratos alone won’t keep her down. Anassa bounds over to her mate, adding her paws to Saela’s back.

My blood runs hot with fear. Not just for my sister… but of her.

We spent classes here learning about Siphons, studying them, but there’s still so much I don’t know. Do Siphons maintain any ounce of who they were before they changed? How human are they still, after the fangs?

I want to run to her, to hold her in my arms as I did just moments ago. She was smiling and safe.

She was safe.

Is she even in there anymore? Or is she going to be like… this? Forever?

Saela screams, a bloodcurdling shriek that echoes through the room. This is hurting her.

My elbow slams into Stark’s side, and I slip free. But only for a moment. His hand closes around my wrist and yanks me back so hard that my shoulder nearly wrenches from its socket.

“Newly turned Siphons are at their most dangerous,” Stark hisses in my ear.

He secures me against his chest, his arms like iron restraints. His touch burns through me, and I hate it. I hate it and I cling to it, too.

“I’ve seen this at the front. Many times. It’s a game the Astreonans like to play. Please, listen.”

I still, momentarily shocked out of my panic by the urgency in his voice. Please, he said.

“They turn our soldiers into Siphons and set them on our forces. When the turning first takes place, new Siphons are consumed by bloodlust and will kill anything in sight. She doesn’t know you right now, and she could kill you,” Stark says quietly.

She could kill you. Saela, the little girl who would weep if I tied her plaits too tightly. Who would lock our door and lay her head in my lap on the nights our mother got violent. Who once caught a mouse in our home and instead of killing it or moving it outside, created a little bed for it inside a matchbox and named it Felix.

How is this real? But he’s right. Shockingly, terrifyingly right. My sweet baby sister is… gone.

My mind spins as I try to think of what to do next and ignore the churning, vengeful thoughts about why we’re in this situation. Of the man—no, the monster—who did this to my sister.

My betrothed.

Wrath slices through me, making my veins burn—and with it, the shadows streak toward the ceiling in a merciless wave.

Another breath, and the shadows slide down the walls.

This is what he would want: me, too distracted and weak to even deal with the crisis at hand.

He’s not allowed to manipulate my actions any longer. Saela needs me to be calm and levelheaded.

She comes first.

“Cratos and I cannot continue to hold her like this forever,” Anassa says, sensing my train of thought.

“Okay,” I say, mind clearing. “We need to restrain her.”

I straighten up against Stark, and he must be able to tell that I’m not going to bolt toward Saela again, because he loosens his grip on me.

“And then we have to take her somewhere secure,” I tell Stark. “Somewhere she can’t hurt herself or others while we figure out what to do.”

Blinking to clear my vision, I wipe my cheek with a shaky hand. The solution has come to me, and I hate it.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think we’ll need to move her back to the dungeons.”

The suggestion tastes wrong and foul on my tongue. Putting my sister back in that dark, nightmarish place. But what other choice do we have?

Turning, I look at Helene and Grigore. The color has returned to Helene’s cheeks, but Grigore still hovers over her worriedly, a hand on her shoulder.

“You two will keep this a secret. You are to tell absolutely no one what you witnessed here.”

Finally, hearing the icy tone of my voice, Stark releases me fully, and the loss of his touch is momentarily jarring. His long legs carry him across the room in only a few strides, and I watch numbly as he yanks a chest open and riffles through it for something. He’s back at my side quickly but passes me by to reach Saela.

Stark drags his hand along Cratos’s side before he kneels and seizes my sister’s legs, pulling them together to bind them tightly. Silver chains, I realize, strong enough to contain her. And a cloth to use as a gag.

He takes hold of her dark hair so that he can fasten the gag between her fangs. The sight enrages me, my fingers twitching with the need to hit him. Anassa bristles, too, a low growl rumbling through her. But Cratos leans forward and nudges his nose to hers to help her through the emotion.

Even as I’m pissed, I’m grateful, too, because it needs to be done and goddess knows I could never have done it myself.

I still can’t entirely admit to myself that this is really happening. That I’m about to lock my sister behind bars like she’s the enemy.

That, in fact, she’s become an enemy.

She would kill me. Saela would kill me if those chains weren’t around her limbs.

Stark nods Grigore over, and the two of them lift her together. She writhes in their arms, blood-streaked and struggling, but the chains have her bound tightly. I glance away, my throat tight.

I can’t watch her like this, so I do the only thing I can do: put one foot in front of the other and lead everyone to the dungeons. I take them to the primary ones, not the hidden place where Saela and the other children were kept.

It seems like only hours ago that Venna took me into the belly of the castle to discover my sister in captivity. Only hours ago we were plotting to get her out. I never dreamed I’d be imprisoning her again.

We move quietly, quickly, avoiding all notice. My surroundings are a cruel mimicry of my mental state as we spiral down deeper and deeper into darkness and disrepair.

The passageways that lead to the dungeons are damp and bleak, cracks running through the stones, meltwater seeping in here and there. The sconces on the walls are less and less frequent. Finally, we arrive at a row of relatively dry, well-lit cells.

The first has barbaric spikes and wall-mounted racks, and we quickly hustle past it. Stark and Grigore stop two doors down, peering into the space. I hover behind them, my eyes adjusting slowly to the ever-increasing darkness.

Stark looks to me for the decision, and I nod, almost imperceptibly. Approving my sister’s imprisonment. Reimprisonment.

“Helene,” I say hoarsely. She looks up at me, eyes wide. “Go find Leader Aldrich and send him to us.”

Leader Aldrich is the oldest Bonded at the castle and the most seasoned leader. He was in charge of our Bonding Trials.

He’ll have some idea of how to help us. How to fix this. He must.

Belatedly, I realize I could reach Aldrich in my mind if I wanted to. Anassa said we could reach all the Bonded now—and he’s Strategos pack anyway; I’m his Alpha. I don’t trust myself to communicate precisely at this moment, though.

Helene bows quickly and pivots, racing away from the dungeons. I watch her go, unsure if it’s the order from me or fear of my sister or the dismal surroundings that’s lending her such speed.

Grigore says something to Stark. He nods, braces, and lets go of Saela. My sister slams her bound fists against Stark’s chest, but he just winces and maneuvers her so that she can’t find any purchase.

Grigore yanks the cell door open with a screech, and Stark steps inside, lowering Saela onto a cot. He leaves her there still bound because removing her chains would risk lives.

Stark backs out of the cell, eyes warily trained on Saela as he moves. As soon as he’s out, Grigore slams the cell door shut again, grabbing the key to the door from a ring mounted on the wall opposite.

The sound of the key thudding the bolt into place echoes in my ears.

Saela fights to her feet and staggers over to the bars. Grigore jumps away as Saela throws her small body against them. Metal groans and clangs.

She slams herself against the bars again and again, and the sound yanks my heart from my chest. I wish I could hold her as I did when she was in the king’s prison.

But if I reached through, she’d rip into my arm and drain the blood from my veins.

“Stop,” I beg weakly, taking a half step forward. “You’ll hurt yourself.”

Saela’s eyes are wild and frantic, darting to and fro. Never meeting mine, not even acknowledging that I’ve spoken to her.

The girl I love isn’t there at all.

Anassa’s warmth is at my back, and I let myself lean into her. Her heat settles over me. She keeps me upright when my legs grow weak.

By the time Aldrich finally appears, I feel separated from myself.

The older man surveys the scene in front of him, his bearded jaw momentarily dropping open in shock before he composes himself. What a sight we must be.

Especially me, still wearing a ridiculous fucking gown, a crown atop my head.

Aldrich opens his mouth to speak, but I step forward, reaching out a hand to stop him. Anassa helps me shore up the energy that I have left.

“How do I do this?” I ask her quickly. Somehow, she had been the one to share the memories with Helene and Grigore before, but I know I need to do this now.

“Find the river in your mind that connects you to the Bonded, and search for him among the Strategos pack. Form the connection with Aldrich alone, and ensure you focus on him, then push your memories toward him, as if placing them on a boat down current.”

I do as she says, and simultaneously reach my hand out again, laying it on his weathered forearm. His concerned eyes meet mine, and I have to look away to stop myself from breaking down. The skin contact helps solidify our mental connection. Then I focus and push my memories toward him.

My head instantly aches, and sweat starts to bead across my scalp from the strain.

But it works.

I grant him knowledge of my royalty, of the curse, of what’s been done to us. How Alistair Brightbane stole the throne from my ancestors, how he’s used his line to stay in control all these centuries. How a Siphon blood curse locked away the truth. How Stark helped me uncover it all, and how Killian fled.

Leader Aldrich falls to his knees. His hands shake as he reaches for me wordlessly, taking my hand, pressing it to his forehead.

I swallow roughly. “Please stand. Please.” The words pour from me, pleading and pathetic. “Aldrich… this is my sister in the cell. We have to help her.”

Understanding dawns on his face, and his mouth twists in a mixture of pity and disgust. I have to look away.

“Surely there must be something we can do.” Even I can hear how desperate I sound. “Some way to fix this, to reverse it.”

I became Bonded, I became a queen to rescue her from the Nabbers—or from Killian and his father, it turned out. I’ll do anything for her.

It can’t have all been for nothing.

Aldrich doesn’t immediately respond. Instead, his eyes move to Stark. They linger there, and I’m not too lost in my grief to understand what that look means.

I know what they’re both thinking: They don’t believe we can reverse this.

“Please,” I beg again. “Tell me what to do.”

Aldrich swallows. He clasps his hands together, sympathy in his eyes. “The main thing that would help Saela is human blood. As much of it as possible. She has an unquenchable thirst, and if it’s not fulfilled soon, it will kill her.”

“Fine,” I say, gritting my teeth. “Then she’ll drink from me.”

Stark clicks his tongue in irritation. “Absolutely not. Saela can’t be trusted in this state not to drain you.”

And once more, hatred and disorienting gratitude mix within me.

“Maybe,” Aldrich says tentatively, “a large animal would suffice.”

I nod, desperate for anything we can try.

“Cratos and I will hunt. We will bring an elk for Saela,” Anassa tells me, and I shiver with relief.

“Let’s try that,” I respond. The wolves turn and sprint back the way we came, disappearing around the corner.

What’s next? My mind spirals through strings of logic to weave together a plan. What steps do I need to take to find a way out of this?

As a Strategos, my mind should be able to weave strategy easily. It’s one of the powers of our pack, after all. But right now, I’m too disoriented to even reach that part of myself.

Still, I know that controlling the narrative will be important.

I meet Leader Aldrich’s gaze. “Does anyone know yet that Killian has left?”

He shakes his head. “After you killed King Cyril, the nobles all fled back to their fiefdoms, but the Bonded are still here. They await their orders to the front. Only their new ruler can issue those commands, and they were expecting to hear from the young Valtiere in the morning.”

Morning. Oh goddess. It will be morning soon.

My body has been operating on adrenaline alone, and the sudden reminder that so much time has passed settles a heavy blanket of exhaustion over me. I rub my eyes, struggling to keep them open.

“I’ll…” I pause, trying to remember what I was going to say. “I’ll speak to everyone in the morning, then. You should get some rest.”

I don’t realize I’m tilting over until my foot snags on stone in a clumsy, futile attempt to catch myself. I thud into Stark’s chest, his calloused, tattooed hands closing around my arms.

His touch sears me back toward momentary wakefulness, and I push him off, blinking rapidly.

“Go to bed,” he says gruffly.

“Absolutely not.” I’m too tired to even glare. “I’m not leaving Saela’s side.”

Stark huffs and drags his hand through his hair. He marches past me, Aldrich and Helene trailing in his wake, and grumbles something that sounds an awful lot like “Stubborn woman.”

Saela has quieted down somewhat. She still thuds herself against the bars repeatedly, but she does it weakly now, her temple just barely tapping the iron. Her eyes settle on nothing, see nothing.

A few minutes later, a loud scraping sound jars me from my misery. Stark sets a sleeping pallet down on the dungeon floor. He swipes his hand over it to remove some dust, then pats it like he’s trying to convince me it’ll be comfortable.

I thud down onto it without argument, too weary to try to find something to fight him about. But I’m determined to stay awake to watch over Saela, so I lie on my side as Stark settles in beside me, back against the stone wall.

I can’t help it, though. My eyes are too heavy, and no matter how much I resist it, they close.

The familiar spiraling sensation of falling into a dream hits me. I open my eyes to try to stay awake.

But I’m not in the dungeons anymore.

I’m somewhere dark, a room of unending grays and shadows, with no floors or walls or ceilings. The shadows swirl around my feet like fog.

It’s too real to be a dream, and my breath catches in panic.

Turning, I look in every direction, but there’s nothing but the endless expanse.

“You’re finally here, my child,” says a deep, echoing, eerie male voice—the same voice that’s been speaking to me all along. The voice that told me to get the crown. Whose voice?

And where is it coming from? My gut churns; something is very wrong.

I whip around, looking for the source, but still nothing is there. The shadows trail upward like smoke. They drip downward like stalactites. I start to shiver.

Where am I, I open my mouth to ask, but no sound comes out.

“You’re here, but you’ve let open a door you cannot close… and so he’s here, too,” the voice tells me.

He’s angry with me, I can tell—whoever he is. A tremor of fear skitters through me.

The shadows start to swirl violently, spinning around me, closing in. The funnel of darkness tightens and tightens, until it starts to wrap around my throat and choke me.

I scream in my sleep and awake with a breathy gasp. My nails dig into the cot. I’m not sure how long I was out, but Anassa and Cratos must have returned and left again because there’s a dead elk in Saela’s cell.

And a gruesome sea of blood staining the stones.

My sister is asleep in a ball on the floor, her entire face and arms up to her elbows drenched in gore.

I swallow down the sobs as I sit up. Stark is still asleep, propped up against the wall, his head leaned against stone. It can’t be comfortable there.

Moving over, I kneel beside him. His thick, dark lashes twitch as he dreams. I reach out to touch him. Just to wake him, I tell myself.

But before I can, pain spikes through my head. I wince, my hand flying up to the spot of agony. It’s invasive, as if someone is slowly pressing a needle into my temple, deeper and deeper, inch by inch.

And once it’s lodged deep enough, I hear it.

Him.

“Good morning, Bonded,” Killian says.

I would recognize his voice anywhere. Once it whispered across the tender space of a pillow. It’s distorted now, but it’s still smooth and beautiful.

Somehow, even though he’s not Bonded, he’s accessing our silent river of communication. He’s communicating with me telepathically. What the actual fuck?

Stark’s eyes fly open immediately. The alarm on his face tells me he can hear it, too.

Killian’s voice speaks again in our heads.

“There is a usurper in your midst.”

2

MERYN

It’s almost impossible to reach out to all the Bonded at once.

Only two people have the power, as far as I know: the Sovereign Alpha, Siegrid Therion… and, apparently, me. But as Killian speaks, certainty forms in my bones: He’s reaching every Bonded throughout the entirety of Nocturna.

My eyes dart down to the engagement bracelet he clamped onto my wrist; the ruby still swirls with dark shadows. It’s been like that ever since he drew on my magic in his chambers. And there’s that lingering wrongness.

Part of my power is cut off from me, ensnared in whatever twisted spell is woven into this bracelet.

Whatever he’s doing—he’s doing this by using my powers, stealing my magic.

“The Faceless Goddess has blessed me with the ability to communicate through the wolf bonds as a reward for my fealty to the Bonded and to the kingdom,” Killian says smoothly.

I can’t help it—I laugh.

What absolute bullshit. And so totally predictable. He’s going to lie to every one of the Bonded in the same way he lied to me.

My face flushes with angry heat, and I claw at the bracelet on my wrist. But it once again tightens against my skin, making me wince in pain. Just then, images pulse through my mind.

With a shocked jolt, I realize he’s sharing memories down the bond, just as Anassa taught me to do.

There I am, my silver hair shining, my face covered in blood from the battle at graduation. Anassa looms behind me as I grab the Dire Blade, the king’s wolf-pommel sword that compels the direwolves. My face twisting in a fearsome scowl, I bring the sword down in a merciless strike across the king’s throat.

My true self felt pumping adrenaline and pride in this moment, but right now those feelings are overshadowed by Killian’s—or, at least, what he wants us to believe he experienced.

Cold horror runs through him. Pain, heartbreak, and terror.

The vision twists into the next memory. We’re in Killian’s room. I have him pinned, straddling him as he squirms below me, uncomfortable and terrified. My hazel eyes are wide and wild-looking, and I once again raise the wolf-pommel sword. I press it to his neck.

Killian projects a memory of stinging pain as the blade cuts into the delicate skin at his throat. His heart pounds in fear as he stares up at the monstrous woman before him, a woman he made a mistake to trust.

A woman who was not at all who she seemed, who has finally revealed her true, ugly self. It’s like he’s taken my own perspective toward him and flipped it on me.

In both memories, I am an indisputable villain.

I’d hate me, too, if this was all the context I had.

The vision ends, and I blink back into the dungeons. Stark catches my eyes. His gaze is murderous, his tattooed hands clenched into tight fists that demand action.

“Meryn Cooper has driven me from Sturmfrost and seized the throne,” Killian goes on.

My blood boils. He knows the truth as well as I do: I’m no Cooper. I’m a Sturmfrost Queen. And I will reclaim the birthright that his family stole from mine.

“She is dangerous, unstable, and the enemy of Nocturna. This delusional commoner is not to be trusted.”

A strangled choke escapes me. I want to believe that no one could possibly listen to him, but I believed him, once. And I can’t hide from the element of truth of those memories.

I did those things, and I looked terrifying doing them.

But he’s a fucking Siphon.

“I am establishing a stronghold in the west and will be rallying forces to retake my throne. I encourage anyone who believes in truth and justice to come join me. Together, we will return Nocturna to its rightful glory.”

With that, the connection ends, with a mental twist that violently ends the channel he’s opened.

“Truth and justice?!” I shout, my words echoing in the nearly empty dungeons. Unfurling my fists, I realize my nails have carved crescents into my palms, practically drawing blood.

My mind is intimately connected to the stream of Bonded emotions. Their reactions pour in from across Nocturna in a torrent of shock, disbelief, and confusion.

Fuck.

I lock eyes with Stark again. “I need to address them. Now.”

“Yes,” he says simply.

“But I…” I look down at myself. I’m still in the stupid fucking gown that Killian put me in. The same one that was in the memory he just showed everyone.

It’s the uniform of an unstable, delusional woman. I don’t want to feed into that lie.

“You look—” Stark says, then stops short, pressing his full lips into a tight line. Emotions swirl behind his eyes, dark and unreadable, as he studies me.

I lift my head. “What?”

“You’re presentable enough,” he says stiffly. He must’ve understood the reason for my hesitation. “Waiting any longer will leave room for doubt.”

I swallow roughly and nod. Then I force a deep breath in and out of my lungs. I just have to remind myself that the truth is on my side, not Killian’s. And I have some damning memories to show off, too.

“Anassa,” I mind-speak to my direwolf. “Can you reach all the wolves who are here at the castle, and make sure their riders come to the arena? Let them know that I’ll have answers for them.”

This is something I could probably do. But I’m not sure how to just reach the people who are physically here in Sturmfrost—and if I reached out too far, would Killian hear me?

There’s a beat of silence, and then Anassa responds, “It’s done.”

My gaze lingers on Saela’s sleeping, bloodied form. She looks so small and helpless, even with the truth of her existence splattered around the cell. Leaving her for even a moment is a dagger into my gut. It’s wrong.

And for the second time, Stark seems to read my mind. “Helene and Grigore will watch over her while you’re gone. Nothing will happen to her. I promise you.”

His voice is curt and businesslike, but his words are so gentle. All I can do is give him a tense nod.

It hurts to leave Saela’s side, but if I don’t go, Killian is going to corrupt the rest of my world, too.

The arena is quiet, but my heart is pounding. I swear the reverberations are rattling the walls with each pump of my blood.

Stark is to my left, standing resolutely as though the hundreds of eyes looking up at us don’t bother him in the slightest. Anassa and Cratos flank us, surveying the people gathered below.

Bonded are filing in, and I have to blink away the image of the final culling that King Cyril ordered. Ordered from the very platform where I stand now. The blood running from bite wounds, as Rawbonds turned on one another. Angry and red and wrong.

My stomach flips. “I want to end any unnecessary killing,” I think half to myself, half to Anassa. Her acknowledgment is a steadying hum in the back of my head.

It’s mostly newly graduated Rawbonds here, though some Bonded who had come in for the graduation have joined the crowd. Those seasoned soldiers stand in formation, but the young warriors mill about in groups, packs largely standing together.

From the corner of my eye, I spot Jonah’s red-streaked dark hair from where he stands with some of his weasel-faced friends, clustered together and speaking to one another in low voices. Every one of them has a hand rested on a sword hilt or the handle of a dagger.

He looks up, and there’s a sharp-edged glint to his gaze that makes me uneasy. We’ve been at odds ever since the morning of the Ascent, when he attacked Izabel, and he’s never turned down a chance to try to hurt me.

Anassa’s noticed his group, too, and her sides start to buzz with a low growl, but none of them makes a move toward us.

Around the perimeter of the arena, castle servants stand nervously, fidgeting. Stark ordered every servant in the castle to gather—ensuring maximum witnesses for whatever is about to happen—but some are still wandering in through the arena doors.

It’s difficult to wait here on the dais. I feel like an impostor. How could I not?

I thought I was a commoner only months ago. I still am a commoner in so many ways. My dress is filthy from the dungeons, my hair is a tangle of silver-white, my eyes are probably red-rimmed from sleep deprivation and endless crying.

Part commoner, part Bonded, part queen, but a mess the whole way through.

But I’m here. I have to be here. I have to be more than I am.

“You must, so you will,” Anassa tells me, reminding me of what she said on the day I unexpectedly became Alpha of the Strategos pack.

“I must, so I will,” I agree.

Stark steps forward and hands me a cone-shaped amplifier, and I take it with an only slightly shaking hand.

In the half hour since I left the dungeons, Anassa has been coaching me on how to reach all the Bonded. I need to send a complex message—including memories—to thousands all across Nocturna. I’m prepared for it to be taxing, but I know I can do it.

Because if Killian could reach everyone with my magic, then so can I.

Bitterness is a potent fuel, it turns out.

After several slow breaths, I shut my eyes and push my consciousness outward. My mind flows along familiar streams first. Anassa. My pack. My people. Stark, confusingly.

The channels I’ve used before are open, clear. I can sense more minds beyond them, though, as if through a low fog that hangs over water. I squeeze my eyes tighter and push. Then, after a brief moment of resistance, I burst forward.

I flow into the minds of the other Bonded below me, then spill beyond the walls of the arena. If Killian is somewhere here in this connection… I can’t sense him.

It’s almost too easy. There’s a vast sea of magic inside me, and each Bonded mind is a river flowing from its source. I need only to focus on my magic and follow the natural current to them.

Easy to make the connection, that is—but incredibly overwhelming to hold on to it, especially when it all starts to flow back to me, drowning me in connection. It’s dizzying, and as when I sent my memories to Aldrich, sweat starts to bead on my forehead.

Then come the minds of the Bonded at a farther distance, battle-hardened veterans on the front, weary and angry and impatient. I stagger slightly, trying to hold the channels open.

But instantly, a hand meets my back—steadying me, pushing me upright.

Stark.

I swallow and widen my stance to avoid any further dalliances with gravity. When I open my eyes and lift the amplifier to speak, Anassa’s mind surges forward, meeting my own. Words gather in my consciousness, and Anassa’s influence urges them outward like ships sailing down every Bonded tributary.

This is the kind of leader I want to be. Direct. Honest.

“I want to address what you all heard from Killian earlier. You deserve to know the truth, all of you. Yes, I killed King Cyril,” I tell them, speaking aloud so the servants can hear while I echo the words in my mind, projecting them to all the Bonded.

Immediately, the Bonded who weren’t at the graduation ceremony respond with further shock and confusion, their reactions rippling back through me.

“I killed him, but I had just cause. He was not the man we thought he was. In fact, he was not a man at all. My actions were not driven by insanity, but by my conscience.”

I gather up the images I know will prove me honest. Unlike Killian, I don’t need to twist and alter them to emphasize my point. The truth is enough.

I show them everything.

The children behind bars, terrified and neglected. Saela, crying and reaching for me from her cell. Killian’s confession of his and his father’s true nature as Siphons, vessels for Alistair Brightbane. The way Killian’s fangs glinted behind his sickening smile.

The memory of shadowy magic writhing around us, bending toward me then and back to him as he used my magic to escape.

The effect is immediate. Gasps and exclamations echo across the arena. The older Bonded erupt into motion, breaking formation to gather in small groups or go to their wolves. Warriors and wolves pull away into their own corners of the arena to process and to confer.

Their feelings detonate in my mind as I maintain the mental connection. Anger. Disbelief. Horror. Grief.

The castle’s servants, unable to see what I’m showing the rest, look around in confusion at the chaos. I speak quickly because I promised them answers.

“My name is Meryn Sturmfrost. I am a descendant of the Sturmfrost Queens, the original rulers of Nocturna. My family was stripped from their rightful place on the throne by a Siphon named Alistair Brightbane.”

More memories. The ancient crown, which now sits atop my head. The book from Stark’s collection, detailing the royal lineage. My mother’s journals, with their cryptic drawings.

“Alistair Brightbane has been body-jumping through generations of kings, using blood magic to maintain his rule and erasing the memory of the true royal line. Cyril and his son, Killian, are both Alistair’s descendants and his vessels, complicit in serving him.”

With that, the arena falls back into silence. Inside my head is nothing but noise, though. What the Bonded are feeling… it’s chaos. Even as they process my memories and my words, more than a few resist.

My hold on the communication channels flickers and sputters as some minds rebel against me, against my hold in their minds. Barriers go up as some Bonded instinctively reach to shut me out, just as I used to do with Anassa.

I gasp and strain against it. I manage to maintain the connection, though in places it’s whittled down, like just the tiniest thread. Bonded all around the kingdom are fighting me, rejecting the awful truth.

Can I blame them? Would I believe a single piece of this if I hadn’t seen it all with my own eyes? My gaze skirts over to Anassa, and she sends a pulse of reassurance through our bond.

“Do not worry. I am supporting your claims with the wolves,” she says.

I grit my teeth and focus hard on the river of communication inside me. My temples begin to pound again with the effort.

Drawing as much strength as I can from Anassa’s support, I try a different tactic. Something that will help them to understand that I’m not the madwoman Killian is portraying me as.

“We can have a better Nocturna,” I say out loud while also thinking it to all who are listening. “We don’t have to deal with so much death in the Bonding Trials. People can have enough to eat, can be able to feed their families. I want to… I want to fix all that.”

The words come out jumbled, unpracticed. Nobody ever said I was good at giving speeches.

“I want to be a fair queen, someone you can be proud to serve. I’ll… I’ll listen to what people need. And I’ll do my best to do right by you all.” Every word sounds more awkward than the last, echoing in the strained silence.

“Give me a chance, and I’ll prove myself loyal to Nocturna. Let me try to be the leader our country deserves.”

Exhausted and out of ideas, I release my connection to the Bonded with a dreadful mental pull, like a fraying rope suddenly snapping free. It’s draining and jolting. The other Bonded recoil from the inelegant use of my powers, and I wince and wait to see what the response will be.

Silence. Then quiet murmurs, Bonded to Bonded, human to human.

“To be clear,” comes Sovereign Alpha Siegrid’s stern voice, reaching out to all the Bonded in the same way that I did from somewhere leagues away, “my family and I are the sworn protectors of the crown, and we recognize Meryn Sturmfrost as the legitimate heir to the throne. As your Sovereign Alpha, I expect to see that same loyalty from all true Bonded.”

It loosens a breath from my chest.

She’s down at the front, but her words will carry weight for all the Bonded there and here. And as the Sovereign Alpha, she and her wolf could theoretically command all the Bonded to follow her lead.

I believe I could as well, in theory. King Cyril certainly could, using the Dire Blade.

But by putting this as an encouragement and not a direct command, Siegrid is giving our people something they haven’t had in far too long. Something that I want them to have, too: free will.

I can only hope it will be enough.

For a long, awkward moment, nobody in the arena moves. The sound of my own labored breath seems loud and pathetic as I look around, not sure what to expect next.

Leader Aldrich steps forward first, breaking away from a group of older Bonded, walking slowly, head held high until the moment he bows it. Standing apart from the crowd, he lowers to a knee. His wolf follows, bowing her head low, shutting her eyes.

Then Aldrich says, “I pledge my loyalty to you, Queen Meryn.”

Tears spring to my eyes at the acknowledgment, and I blink them back. Hearing his words spoken aloud, calling me queen… the moment freezes crystalline in my mind, and I know I’ll never forget it.

My friends Izabel and Venna step up next, their wolves flanking the twins. I bite my bottom lip, hard, to keep the tears from returning. They both salute me and then kneel next to Aldrich, their wolves lowering their heads in respect. Tomison and Nevah and their wolves join them.

It’s strange, at first, to see them like that. They taught me to fight. I got drunk with them. We survived together. And they’re bowing to me.

Their faith in me expands in my chest, painful and comforting at the same time.

The tension in the arena is thick as everyone waits to see what others will do. Anassa’s growl starts up again, and I sense her mind focusing, straining against something—having her own mental communication with the wolves, I assume.

Then the rest of the Strategos Rawbond class strides forward, one or two pairs at a time. Silver-white wolves kneel, their riders bowing or kneeling beside them.

Their mass support sends warmth shooting through me. Even Anassa stands a little straighter as we survey the line of Strategos wolves and riders, all acknowledging a truth I’ve barely digested myself.

I’m the rightful leader of the Bonded, and of all Nocturna.

After that, the rest of the Trials instructors step up, and a handful of Kryptos, followed by some Daemos and Phylax riders.

But it’s not the majority of the Bonded, I notice. Clutches of older Bonded riders still stand apart, speaking with one another in low voices or silently communicating with their wolves.

The castle staff all cluster close to the exits to the arena, watching the scene with wary eyes or edging quietly away. I can’t fault them for not wanting to get closer to this massive gathering of direwolves and riders, though, no matter their loyalties.

A number of Rawbonds hesitate, too. Many of them are people I’ve seen a dozen times, even fought next to in this very arena, but have never actually spoken with or had a real interaction with.

Fucking Killian. I spent so much time with that lying asshole, and less time than I could have getting to know my fellow Rawbonds. Now I’ll have to work extra hard to get them on my side.

“Now that you’ve decided they are even worth having on your side,” Anassa chides gently, and I realize I’ve been thinking toward her.

“You’re right,” I respond, sighing. “Though in my defense, maybe I would have paid more attention to building up support if I had known a little more about what was coming.”

Anassa gives a regal sniff and doesn’t respond.

“Please, rise,” I call, realizing that some of the Bonded are still bowing. “I know the truth about the Valtiere line is shocking. And this is all very new. To be honest, I’m still figuring out exactly what all this means. I hope that I can count on your help to make sure this transition is peaceful.”

There’s sudden movement to my right, and I spin in time to see Jonah push through a group of my Kryptos supporters, sitting astride his wolf.

“You should mount,” Anassa warns, but I shake my head.

“I don’t want to escalate anything,” I insist. “There doesn’t need to be any fighting here today.”

Anassa’s tail swishes, but she lets it rest.

“You’re nothing but a gutter-born liar,” Jonah snarls.

I open my mouth to defend myself, but he turns toward the crowd, a bully with an audience.

“Are you really all going to let this king-killer steal the throne of Nocturna? What of our sacred mission as Bonded to protect king and country?”

Jonah and his wolf pace back and forth, knowing all eyes are glued to him, clearly relishing the moment.

“She claims that our prince is a Siphon. That his father, King Cyril, was one, too. If that were true, why would they have poured everything into eliminating the Siphon threat to our south? We’ve been at war with Astreona for centuries, with the kings’ full support!”

Jonah swivels to face me directly, his expression hard and ugly.

“No. What makes more sense is that this upstart slut wanted to be queen, to live a life of luxury instead of fighting for her country. But Prince Killian wouldn’t have her after she’d lost her mind and killed our king. Like the spiteful whore she is, now she’s doing her best to steal what’s rightfully Prince Killian’s. King Killian’s.”

My breath leaves my body as I see people listening to him—believing him, or choosing to believe him. He’s inserted himself into a situation that does not concern him at all, crafted a discourse that is convenient to him, and to what end?

Because he’s a vindictive narcissist.

I look around myself in frustration, grasping at something, anything, I can do to make these people believe the truth.

What weight could my words or actions hold now, if they all think I’m a liar and a traitor? If they’re more convinced by the men who’ve held power here for centuries—and not willing to listen to a woman from the slums?

With a hiss of metal on metal, Jonah deftly draws his sword from his scabbard, raising it high.

My blood heats with panic as he opens his mouth and directs my people against me.

“True Nocturnans, to me! Death to the usurper!”

3

MERYN

A million things happen at once.

Instinctively, I fist my hands in Anassa’s fur, hauling myself up onto her back. My friends close ranks. Izabel and Tomison and the rest of the Strategos automatically join together into a defensive formation around the platform.

Venna peels off and circles around in a tight arc. Her wolf, Skaia, gathers on her haunches to spring up onto the platform beside me.

“Alpha Stark!” Venna yells, gesticulating wildly toward something behind me.

Stark and I both pivot.

An older Kryptos woman and her wolf have materialized behind us. Her snarling gray wolf lunges forward, and I quickly draw the Dire Blade, steeling myself for a blow.

But instead of engaging me in battle, the wolf and rider barrel in low and hard. The direwolf’s head slams against Anassa’s front legs, toppling us over.

I spring free from Anassa’s back as we go down so that I don’t find myself crushed beneath my wolf. The platform slams against me with a breath-snatching crunch, and the world spins, my hand letting go of the sword. I shield my face with my arms as I tumble once, twice.

And then there’s nothing underneath me at all. I fall through air, off the platform, and slam face-first into the dirt. With a groan, I push myself over and onto my back.

My head is light, spinning. I reach for those dark shadows that respond to my anger, but they’re nothing but a whisper. That fall weakened me.

The sky dims, and I blink, fighting unconsciousness. Then the sea of black materializes into snarling dark fur and violence incarnate: Cratos and Stark.

Cratos lands directly ahead of me, the two of them guarding my front.

Anassa is still up on the platform in a defensive crouch, one paw placed possessively on the Dire Blade’s hilt.

I’ve lost the Sturmfrost crown in my fall, I realize dazedly, hand at my temple—

“There!” Anassa’s mental snarl cuts off the thought.

The Kryptos woman and her wolf materialize in front of Stark and several paces off to the right. She uses her Kryptos power to obscure them from sight as they move.

Her control is astounding—I don’t understand how she stays so completely hidden in such a bright place. What is happening? Is it just because she’s older?

Or has something happened to make the magic… stronger?

Reaching for my sword, I drop into a fighting stance.

Once again, though, the Kryptos pair do something unexpected. Instead of coming for me, they swing wide. The woman draws a short lance and spears something glinting in the dirt.

Then they dash away.

My crown, I realize, stomach dropping. Fuck. There’s a whispering darkness in my veins, but once again, it’s only a whisper.

Stark and I lock eyes, and I nod, answering the question in his glance. “Get it back.”

“My queen,” he says. He and Cratos spring forward so quickly I barely see them move.

Anassa leaps down from the platform, and I remount, linking with the rest of the Strategos to assess the situation. I’m still weakened from the fall and shy away from the strain of trying to reach for those outside my pack again.

“Jonah had several teams planted around the perimeter,” Nevah says. “See there, there, and there.” She gestures with her dagger while also sharing pictures mentally. “They’re guarding the entrances and exits.”

The pack’s understanding of the field coalesces, ideas and updates flowing in from a dozen different minds.

“That group’s coming straight for us,” Izabel mind-shouts, and we all spot the cluster of wolves headed toward Jonah: mostly former Rawbonds who trailed around after him during training. Disturbingly, a few older Bonded are in the group, too.

“And from the left!” Nevah adds, leading a group around that side of the platform. All of us use the wooden structure at our backs as an extra defense.

“Form up!” I call, snapping back into battle mode. Our group is a little larger than Jonah’s, but not by much.

What the fuck? How is this a nearly even battle?

Many of the Bonded in the arena are still hanging back, I realize. Possibly waiting to see the outcome of this fight before picking sides.

My mouth twists.

There’s a familiar tension in the air, the sick hum of energy that happens just before bloodshed. From where I sit on Anassa’s back, I watch as the castle servants clock it, too. Their eyes dart between the two separate factions of Bonded. They know what’s going to happen here.

They quickly scurry back into the castle, away from the messiness that’s brewing. Jonah’s forces let them pass through the exits without an issue. Good. No one else needs to bear witness to this insanity.

The Strategos riders and other loyal Bonded close ranks around me. My gaze seeks out Stark and Cratos. They’ve almost caught the Kryptos woman, but she’s still a length ahead of them and making hard for an exit guarded by Jonah’s people.

Stark’s heading straight into the waiting line of the enemy.

“Don’t worry about them,” Anassa snaps at me. “They’ve been doing this since you were a pup. Sword up!”

The first group of attackers hits us, several armed with long spears they must’ve brought with them, anticipating this would happen. Assholes. We break ranks slightly to avoid the vicious weapons spearing our wolves.

Anassa darts in and snaps her teeth down on one of the spears, sending splinters flying as she shakes her snout. The rider wisely lets go but pulls out his sword.

I don’t think so.

I swing the Dire Blade toward him. Metal hits metal, and I grit my teeth as I press forward, forcing him back inch by inch.

Then Anassa clamps her jaws viciously and comes away with a chunk of fur between her teeth. There’s a hole where his wolf’s left ear was.

Blood showers us and the ground, the open wound pulsing. Vicious satisfaction lashes through Anassa.

The rider’s control of his sword wavers as his direwolf’s pain slams into him. I slash in under his guard, scoring a long wound along his side.

He yells in agony and falls back, but another wolf and rider take his place just as quickly.

Izabel appears beside me, and we bear down on the enemy pair together. Our swords flash bright as we maneuver in, trying to land a blow.

The rider is a Daemos I recognize from the Trials, younger than me. His hands come up to throw a blast of Daemos power our way. Izabel and her wolf, Asteio, swerve to the side, escaping the brunt of it.

It hits me and Anassa full on, like a stone wall, harder than should be possible.

But weirdly, it also seems to rebound, as if the power had an equal reflection onto the wielder. It knocks the Daemos boy off his wolf, leaving him sprawling on the ground.

“What was that?” I ask my wolf, muscles screaming as I fight to stay on her back. I’ve never seen power falter in that way.

But we don’t have time to discuss it.

Another Daemos rider has circled around fast. He nearly sideswipes Izabel with his dagger. Then he jumps—onto Izabel’s wolf behind her.

I look for an opening. Anassa swings us around until we’re right next to Izabel and Asteio—and the Daemos attacker. I lean forward, but he’s too close for me to bring my sword in without injuring Iz. He’s wrapped an arm around her throat, and she can’t get purchase with her sword at that distance.

She coolly whips a dagger from a thigh sheath, even while gasping for breath, and buries it in his leg.

He screams and tips to the side. His weight carries them both to the ground.

I leap down next to them and slash wildly at the man. His neck erupts in a fountain of blood, and the fight goes out of his wolf. They crumple as the life drains from them both. Anassa growls in pleasure at my action, but I can’t feel the same, watching this beautiful creature give up. It’s a sheer waste.

Asteio leans in with a snarl and rips out the Daemos wolf’s throat, her silver-white muzzle drenched in red.

I pant and circle around to anticipate the next attack, but Nevah and Tomison and the rest of the Strategos Bonded have drawn the bulk of the melee away from us.

“Thanks,” Izabel wheezes, rubbing her bruised throat before remounting.

“You’d have had him in pieces in another minute or two,” I reply with a tight smile, trying to cover how much that freaked me out, watching Iz in such a vulnerable position.

Briefly shielded from the fighting, I get a quick glimpse of the battles happening around the arena. My stomach churns. This is all so wrong. This was our moment for unity, and here we are, tearing one another apart.

My gaze drops to the Dire Blade in my hand.

King Cyril used it to control us. Control our wolves. I saw him do it, saw him create violence with a simple gesture.

I wonder…

“Yes,” Anassa urges from next to me.

“Cover me another minute,” I order Izabel, not waiting to hear her response.

In a queasy blending of past and present, I lift the Dire Blade above my head, just as I saw the dead king do at each of our Trials. I didn’t want it to come to this; wasn’t I just thinking how much our people deserve free will and the ability to make their own choices?

But we can’t turn on one another.

Taking a deep breath, I use both hands to plunge it into the dirt below.

“STOP THIS. LAY DOWN YOUR ARMS.” My mental shout echoes and reverberates along the bond, power rebounding and redoubling until my ears are pounding.

The arena seems to still, sound receding. I can sense the weight of a hundred wolves’ minds as the ancient magic begins to take hold.

It’s working. Thank the goddess. The wolves will stop their riders, will heed the call.

We’ll get through this—together, as Bonded.

And then the bracelet on my wrist heats, starting to burn. The bloodred ruby twists with dark shadows.

Suddenly, I know. I just know.

Whatever magic was used to compel the direwolves through this sword before—whatever magic links us all together—it’s all been corrupted. Tainted. Infiltrated. I can sense it, like a sickness lurking on the edges of my mind. My stomach lurches.

My powers are not my own; he’s cut off part of it. And he’s done it with his insidious blood magic.

The Siphon who once ruled still has his vicious fangs deep into this kingdom.

It’s not going to be enough.

The moment I think it, the heat from the bracelet surges from my wrist, through my fingers…

And into the sword itself.

Streaks of red race down the Dire Blade.

With a high, ringing note, the blade shatters into a thousand glittering silver pieces.

No.

I look at the fragments in shock.

That sword… that ancient, incredible thing that helped link the humans and the direwolves, that allowed for control…

It’s just gone.

“Move, Meryn,” Anassa urges, and as if time has slowed, images around me come together and coalesce.

Daemos warriors are closing in.

Shards of the Dire Blade are all around me, dull and useless in the dirt.

Asteio rears up to slash razor-sharp claws across the face of a Bonded warrior approaching on foot. His face is a bloody pulp as he falls backward.

My fingers are still wrapped tightly around the Dire Blade’s hilt, but the weapon is unusable, ending now in a ragged stump of iron just inches from the cross guard.

A painful roar rips from my throat. This is all his fault.

I jump onto Anassa’s back, mind clearing as I sheathe the hilt that remains. The memory of the rush of power the crown gave me is sharp.

If we’re going to have a chance of winning this, I need that crown.

“Let’s go,” I say to Anassa, and she doesn’t need to ask—she just races toward Stark and Cratos and that Kryptos bitch.

The Daemos Alpha and his wolf are across the arena, standing at the center of a circle of wolves. Holding them all off alone.

His movements are so fast they’re hard to follow. He parries and thrusts, somehow making five Bonded attackers and their wolves fight for their lives.

Their fight blocks the Kryptos woman from getting to the exit. I spy her shimmering form as she continues to blend into the shadows, holding tight to her prize: my crown. The symbol of my rightful authority.

Anger churns inside me, and I once again reach for the shadow magic that ran so effortlessly through my veins earlier. But the magic is slippery and elusive, evading my grasp.

I give a yell of frustration. We’re almost to Stark when Anassa suddenly pulls out of her run, stopping short.

“What—” I start, and then I see Jonah and a band of his followers cutting off my path.

“Goddess damn you, Jonah,” I mutter, and draw two of my throwing knives, taking careful aim.

The one meant for Jonah’s throat hits a wall of his Daemos magic. The dagger tumbles uselessly to the ground as Anassa and I dig in against the magic’s brutal push.

I try to deflect it, to push the power aside, and nothing happens.

I click my tongue in irritation. What is happening here? Stark tried to use his Daemos powers against Killian the other night, and Killian was able to deflect them; he said it was because the Daemos powers were rent from my own.

So how is Jonah able to attack me with them? And why is his power so strong? Is it because I’m not wearing my crown and my own magic feels… diminished?

My anger builds, and still, I get nothing from the shadows. They would be pretty useful right about now.

I toss my second dagger, and it hits home, burying itself with a sickening squelch in the rib cage of the woman to Jonah’s left. She falls from her wolf and is trampled by the rider behind her, her screams sharp and agonized.

Brutal pride surges into me from Anassa, but I ignore it—this is all such a waste.

Jonah slows, glancing back at his fallen comrade, and then advances toward me again, eyes flashing.

“I can’t wait to finally break your scrawny neck,” he spits.

I laugh, drawing another dagger. “Come and try it.” I ignore the way my muscles shake; exhaustion is setting in. Jonah is flanked by three more Bonded, and they fan out, closing in on my position.

“We need to finish this,” I think to Anassa grimly, and she howls in answer.

“Hold fast, Meryn,” comes Izabel’s voice with a note of desperation. I get a mental flash of her position—still fighting off another group. Even if I’m lucky, it will still be several minutes until she can back me up.

The man to Jonah’s right rushes in, his wolf snapping at Anassa’s flank as he slashes out with his sword. I just barely block him, Anassa’s sure-footed spin breaking us away and saving my tired arms from giving out.

Then she lunges to the side, and I lean in close to keep my seat. The rush of an arrow passes directly behind me, so close its shaft brushes against my hair.

Anassa cuts left and circles, giving me a second to recover before we reengage. I dig deep, trying again to summon my new shadow magic, but this time nothing comes, not even a trickle.

A massive clap! pulls all our attention toward Stark’s fight.

Except… he’s not there. Or I can’t see him. A thrum of panic rushes through me.

A cloud of dust explodes outward from where he last stood. Grit shatters across the arena, showering down on us, making my eyes water.

Ears ringing, I squint to try to see through the cloud. Please be there, please, please…

Then it clears, and I gasp. Stark has somehow used his Daemos power to destroy the entire archway of the door, bringing it down on top of his remaining opponents. They’re barely visible under the rubble.

I knew he was powerful, but this… ?

Fighting all across the arena has momentarily paused, everyone gawking at the sight.

Stark’s light brown skin is pale from the strain of wielding so much power, and yet he’s already moving again, chasing down the Kryptos woman. She is fully visible now, losing control over her magic in her terror.

It takes only two breaths, and then he’s cut her down, her broken body hitting the ground with a wet thud. Stark hurtles off Cratos after her and grabs the wolf crown still in her grip.

“Meryn!” he calls, and I raise my dagger so he can find me. “Catch!”

He sends the crown spinning into the air, the opal at its center glinting toward me as it arcs my way.

Anassa and I leap, her haunches stretching and stretching. For a moment, a disorienting sense of déjà vu passes through me, taking me back to the Voice Trial and our first leap of faith together.

How far we’ve come.

I reach out my free hand and pluck the crown from the air, settling it onto my head without thinking.

Magic courses through me in a flash, bringing darkness with it. My vision flickers.

The world loses all its color, bloodstains turned black.

And all around me, shadows wake.

The arena dims as if a storm were passing overhead. Every shadow in the vast space starts to stretch and distort, reaching for me. They move toward me in strange ways, crawling inside me, wrapping themselves up and around my arms like vines.

“Be careful,” Anassa urges. “This power—you don’t know how to control it. You don’t know where it starts. Or where it ends.”

The depth of my darkness is limitless. I can sense that.

Or it could be, if I had the courage to embrace it. But right now…

Right now, I know exactly where it ends. There’s a precise spot where my magic is choked out and throttled by Killian’s influence. Still, what I have access to is more than I ever could have imagined.

Holding a shadow-covered hand out, I stare briefly at it in fascination. There’s a pulse in my chest, like the magic is urging me to utilize it, to grasp it and free it.

“Watch out!” someone shrieks. I glance back up just in time to see three of Jonah’s comrades charging directly for me.

“Use your power, Meryn!” Stark bellows.

Anger roils through me, and for the first time since my crown was taken, the shadows respond.

I throw my hands up instinctively, protectively.

Stop, I think.

Stop, I command.

Force explodes from my palms—a huge, moving wave of shadow. The wave crests over the two riders in front of me and then swerves out in big looping arcs, reaching more of Jonah’s allies all around the arena. It reminds me of the Daemos blasts at first, air made solid, but on a larger scale and darkly visible.

I relish it, the darkness inside me now rising violently to the surface.

Stop them, I command the shadows again. They move at my instruction but of their own volition—of me but somehow outside of me, too.

The shadows wrap themselves around the wolves and their riders. Their bodies start to contort and lift into the air.

Screams echo around the arena, and I snap out of my satisfied stupor.

No. This isn’t me. I need to stop this—

There’s a suffocating pressure in my chest as the shadows pull tighter and tighter around them all. Around their necks. The shadows slither into their open mouths, stifling screams for mercy.

Stop, stop, STOP!

Then a loud echoing snap.

The riders and their wolves drop dead onto the arena floor. Not just the three charging for me, but a lot of their allies, too.

A dozen, at least. Dead.

The shadows retreat, and the reality of it washes over me, turning my stomach. I’m going to be sick.

My hands start shaking against Anassa’s fur at the horror—the horror of what I’ve done.

The arena stills. All combat ceases as everyone stares in shock at the mangled remains of the wolves and their riders. I watch the corpses as if waiting for them to get up again. Their twisted limbs make them look small and vulnerable in the vastness of the arena’s floor.

Darkness still slithers around my arms, cool against my skin, a visceral reminder of what I’m capable of.

I killed all these Bonded. With a flick of my wrist.

They may not have been ready to accept me as their queen, but they were my own people.

“See what she is!” Jonah’s voice violates the silence.

I flinch. Of everyone I killed, why did he have to survive? Anassa rumbles beneath me.

He hurls a finger toward me, his breaths ragged. “This is what Killian warned us about—an uncontrollable evil who will destroy us all!”

Jonah whips his wolf around, heading for an arena exit. His remaining followers flee with him.

A few people on my side start to pursue, but the thought of more violence makes me woozy. Over the bonds, I direct an order to let them go.

This is not how I wanted to persuade people to join my side, to put their faith in me as their leader.

Not through violence and fear.

The shadows start to recede, slinking back to where they belong. Cold shock is taking over my body, cooling the fury that drew them out.

Through our bond, Anassa projects soothing energy. A soft humming settles over my frayed nerves slowly, smoothly. Everyone is watching me; I can’t let them see me crumble.

Stark and Cratos step up next to me. Cratos nudges Anassa briefly with his nose before standing tall and menacing.

“Phylax, help move the wolves’ bodies,” Stark orders. My eyes linger on the corpses of the people I’ve killed.

I recognize the young woman closest to me. She usually wore her strawberry-blond hair in a spiraling braid.

“Meryn,” Anassa urges. “Follow Stark’s lead. They wait for your command.”

“Right.” I swallow hard.

“I swear that Jonah and his followers will answer for their treason,” I say, my voice containing a strength I do not feel.

A man lies close to her with shockingly blue eyes that now stare forward unseeing.

“What else?” My mind is blank.

“They were about to receive their first orders as Bonded,” Anassa prompts me.

I cough, mouth dry as chalk. “In the meantime, we still have our duty to the rest of the country. You will receive your orders regarding deployment to the front lines tomorrow, after… after I have consulted with military leadership.”

I watch numbly as the Bonded bow, then I turn on Anassa’s back to leave the arena. They listened to me, sure, and they bowed, but their fear emanates over the pack bonds.

A fear of me.

Of the devastating power that jumped from my veins.

Anassa and I slip out of the arena, so many eyes on me. I keep my head high, but the moment I know people can’t see me, my vision goes blurry. I let the tears come. I’m not even sure where she’s taking us, and I don’t care—I just need to be away.

Away from all those people whom I’ve let down and terrified.

Away from the ones whose lives I took.

“You should not be alone,” Anassa warns me. “Not when there are people who want your crown, and certainly not in your current condition.”

I startle when I realize she’s led me to Stark’s office. Slipping off her back, I let myself in. This is as good enough a place to fall apart as any.

Only once we’re inside, the door shut behind us, do I let myself fully break apart.

I collapse to my knees roughly, my palms smacking against the cold floor. The crown slips from my head and clatters against the stone. The full weight of what just happened, what I did, crashes over me.

I killed a dozen people without even touching them. With a strange power I don’t understand.

Am I becoming the very thing Killian accused me of being? Dangerous, unstable, and not to be trusted?

I can’t stop crying. It goes on and on. And the longer it lasts, the worse it gets.

Every ragged, painful inhale I manage to suck in leaves my lungs in sobs that sound like screams. I’m dimly aware that I’m losing more air than I’m taking in. I’ll suffocate from this.

Anassa tries to help. Her insistent care nudges at the edge of my mind. She’s trying to soothe me again. When her nose presses closer, I’m briefly tempted to cling to her and let her quiet humming lull me.

But then the horror strikes me all over again. I’m filthy for even wanting comfort. I don’t deserve it.

Saela’s transformation. Killian’s betrayal. The lives I just took. All these things are my failures. It’s pain I could have prevented if I was only better.

The spiral sucks me under and into the dark, and I push Anassa away. Hard.

She growls, her concern escalating. I try to ignore it. I don’t want it.

The spiraling builds in me, and my fist strikes out, knuckles cracking against the stone floor. Physical pain immediately overtakes my senses, blotting out the panic.

Relieving me.

I punch again, deliberately, harder this time. My skin splits.

Again, and I leave a bloody smear on the floor.

The pain clears pathways in my brain, freeing me from the thoughts pushing in from the outside. It grounds me, bringing me back to myself, my body, this moment—and into a sort of sharpness.

It feels awful, but less awful than the agonized twisting of my own mind.

I strike the ground again and again and again until all that’s left is me and the pain.

It consumes me so entirely that I don’t even hear the door when it slams open.

4

STARK

Well, that was a fucking disaster.

The arena is quiet after Meryn departs, people staring after her in shocked silence. I let them gape for a moment, two.

Then I get tired of looking at their ignorant, confused faces. Did they not understand their instructions?

“You heard your queen,” I snap loudly, my voice carrying across the crowd from where I still sit astride Cratos. “Phlyax, grab the perished wolves. Daemos, help the servants with the bodies. Any recent graduates of the Trials are still shipping out tomorrow, so Strategos and Kryptos, go prepare. If you’re not a recent graduate—”

Skimming the crowd, I pick out several older Bonded who were here for the ceremonies, making eye contact with them.

“Get the fuck out of here. Bonded instructors, to me.”

People startle on their wolves and break into motion. Through it all come the three instructors who oversaw the Trials with me and Aldrich: Elinor Gardiner, Phylax Gamma; Samson Whyte, Kryptos Gamma; and Daegan Prak, Strategos Gamma.

Samson reaches me and Cratos first, astride his sleek, dappled gray wolf. Daegan and Elinor are close behind him.

“Quite a way to wrap up the Trials this year.” He raises a pale eyebrow at me, nonplussed. How Kryptos of him. I’ve never liked this sly asshole much.

“You need to keep your packs in line,” I tell the three of them, my voice a low growl. “Everything she showed you was real.”

“I believe it,” Daegan responds immediately. “Alpha Meryn is many things, but a liar is not one of them.”

“Queen Meryn,” I correct him tersely.

Elinor’s lips are a tight line as the older woman surveys the arena. “Alpha Stark, I believe you—and Queen Meryn—but…” She cuts herself off, sighing, and then looks at me with trepidation. “I mean no disrespect, but how do you expect us to keep our packs in line?”

“She’s worried. She’s only a Gamma, and even you and I could not control Daemos,” Cratos chimes in. He bares his teeth, and Elinor recoils a bit, but I know he’s not directing it toward her.

He’s livid at the pack members who dared to disobey us. In the past, even if a human and I have not seen eye to eye, Cratos has always been able to bring their wolf to heel. That’s part of the power we have as an Alpha pair.

It’s supposed to be, at least.

“What was that, Cratos?” I ask him, vengeful rage burning in my veins. “When we hunt those fuckers down—and we will—I’m going to let you eat the riders slowly.”

Cratos shakes his large, lupine head. “I do not know. No one should be able to resist their Alpha. Perhaps it’s because of the corruption in the communication bonds from the Siphon, or perhaps it had something to do with the Dire Blade…”

That was certainly troubling, watching that powerful weapon shatter like glass.

But even before I was made Alpha, Cratos never had wolves disobey him; they knew to follow his orders. He was too powerful—always the largest, the most vicious. That some wolves would want to defy him is disturbing.

“Do your best,” I tell Elinor. “Make it known that if they do not follow your orders, they will have to answer to me.”

Cratos howls out a growling bark, and the wolves of the other three instructors skitter backward. From all around the arena, the fearful gazes of the recent graduates dart toward us.

Good. They clearly did not have enough terror beat into them over the past four months.

As the three instructors turn to go oversee their packs, Cratos stills underneath me, his ears pulling back.

“Meryn is not okay,” he says. “Anassa took her to your office.”

Shit.

“Show me.”

I’ve asked Cratos to keep a wall present ever since Anassa bonded to her. It never bothered me before, Cratos having a mate. His longing and lust for her would come through, but it felt entirely his own.

But then Anassa took Meryn.

Before, I could appreciate the ferocious glint in her hazel eyes from a distance. I could admire the swell of her hips while also keeping in mind that I fucking loathed her. It helped dull the aching attraction, reminding myself that my life was tied to hers and she was acting like an idiot.

That first day was torturous.

Cratos had no shield up. We crested the top of the summit, and the moment I saw Meryn standing next to Anassa, her hair turned that shining silver-white, something animalistic unleashed inside me.

I wanted to throw her over my shoulder and carry her back down the mountain myself.

No—I wanted to find a nearby cave and rip her clothes off with my teeth, teaching her how warm skin can keep you in the cold.

Cratos had to turn back around so I could throw myself into the snow, freezing out the pulsing, unreasonable desire that had taken over my every thought. It was painful, and it was a pain that could have no end.

She had a lover. She hated me. And I hated her, too—her undisciplined, chaotic lack of control drove me insane, even still. Cratos took sympathy on me and tossed up a wall on his mate connection to Anassa.

It’s stayed up. Her strongest emotions still burst through on occasion, but I’ve mostly kept my mind entirely my own.

Still, I carry the knowledge that this… feeling… is just a slim barrier away.

It’s helped that I’ve wanted to kill her half the time.

Now, heartache floods me, so intense that I almost double over on Cratos—a deep twisting in my stomach and chest.

Followed by physical pain. Jolts of anguish interspersed with short bursts of relief.

And I realize what she’s doing.

Not on my fucking watch.

“Go,” I command. Cratos doesn’t need to be told twice; he sprints out of the arena with little concern for the people still milling about, nearly trampling several Bonded.

Within moments, I’m at my office, and in the blink of an eye, I slide off Cratos’s wide back and slam the door open. The crack of the wood against the wall doesn’t mask the sound of Meryn crashing her fist onto the stone floor.

Her golden crown—the crown we fought so hard to find again—is discarded on the floor, forgotten. Meryn’s a puddle of fabric from that stupid gown she’s still wearing.

Her knuckles are split, and blood drips down her wrist as she raises her hand once again.

Frustrated helplessness bursts forth from my chest, just like at that inn back in Linsfall when I saw the crisscrossing silver scars on her thighs.

The scars she had given herself.

“Stop that. Now,” I snap. The compulsion to protect her is so ingrained—either from years of training to do it or from that fucking mate bond.

She glares up at me from the floor through tear-filled eyes and snarls, “Or what? You’re going to make me?”

It takes all of me not to snarl right back at her. She’s infuriating.

I’m used to being in command. I tell someone what to do, and they listen to me. And this headstrong, vicious woman might outrank me, but I’ve never let rank get in the way of doing what’s right.

“Yes,” I say, moving into the room.

As I near Meryn, the sweet scent of her washes over me so strongly that I almost stumble. My head spins, and I realize the walls between us are still down.

It takes every ounce of my control not to throw myself down next to her, pin her underneath me, and lick the blood from her wounds.

“Cratos,” I hiss, closing my eyes at another hot rush of desire and protectiveness. “You are killing me here.”

“Sorry, sorry.” There’s a hint of amusement in his tone, and I wonder how sorry he really is. But the wall goes back up, and I can breathe again.

Opening my eyes, I level Meryn with another glare. “It is my responsibility to protect you from harm, even if you are its cause.”

“Fuck off!” she screams at me, punching her fist down onto the stone floor again. Something in her hand cracks loudly.

For fuck’s sake.

Two steps forward and I’ve reached her. She dares to raise her hand again, but I catch her wrist. It’s so small in my grip, but there’s strength behind it as she tries to pull herself away.

“Stop!” I order again, jerking her to her feet. She fights back against me, her mouth set into a focused, petulant line. Meryn’s so fixated on causing herself pain that I don’t think I’m even getting through to her.

My grip only tightens further. If she’s so determined to hurt something, then fine.

“You want to hit something? Hurt someone?” I seethe. I yank her closer, and she stumbles into me. Then I take her hand—the one that’s not bloodied—and slap it onto my chest. “Hit me. Hurt me. I can take it.”

Her mouth falls open, and the fight goes out of her muscles. It’s like she’s finally been knocked right out of her own brain and back into her body. She relaxes against me, her surprisingly soft hand still trapped underneath my much larger one.

Heat burns right over my heart. Can she feel how hard it’s pounding?

My grip loosens, but I don’t let her go, concerned she’s going to collapse again. Meryn breathes shakily, the storm of emotion in her gradually subsiding.

I glance down to her bloodied, raw hand and watch as it heals. Anassa has used her magic on Meryn.

My eyes snap toward the direwolf’s knowing yellow-golden ones.

“Don’t do that again,” I say over the angry lump in my throat. “If she tries to hurt herself. She shouldn’t get the idea that your healing magic makes it okay.”

Meryn scoffs and finally pulls her arm out of my grip, a splotchy blush high on her cheekbones.

“I’m right here if there’s something you want to say to me,” she says, narrowing her hazel eyes. “You don’t need to give Anassa instructions like I’m some toddler who needs looking after.”

“Then don’t act like one. Are you done feeling sorry for yourself?” I growl, and her glower deepens. Good. She’s doing exactly what she needs to do—she’s getting mad again. Her fire is back. “You have a country to lead.”

“I’m done,” she says, wiping her bloody hand on her dress.

I watch her carefully for a moment, making sure she means it.

Then Meryn straightens her posture and presses her lips together in a way that looks slightly self-conscious.

“What do we do now?” She’s softened a bit. The fight is still in her, but she knows she doesn’t need to direct it at me.

I loosen a breath and scrub a hand through my hair. What a loaded question. Where do we even start? “We’ll need to figure out your coronation.”

She blinks, confused.

“You can’t just claim you’re queen,” I tell her, slightly exasperated. “You need to be crowned.”

A borderline bitter laugh rips out of Meryn. “And who will coronate me? I tore that crown out of a bloody gutter.” She points to where it rests on the stone, upside down. “The king I wrenched power from is no longer alive.”

I bend to pick up the crown, then set it carefully on the table beside us, atop a stack of books.

This, at least, I have an answer to. Siegrid reached out to me last night when she sensed tumult in the bonds.

“The Mother Priestess of the Faceless Goddess’s order will preside over the ceremony.”

Meryn huffs. “I thought you considered the Faceless Goddess to be ‘commoner nonsense,’” she says, reminding me of my words in Linsfall when we visited the famous statue of the goddess.

She’s right, I do. If there was truly some beneficent goddess, why would our world be so shit? No, the only gods up there are the kind that take joy from watching their human playthings kill one another.

Can’t fault anyone for hoping for something better, though.

I shrug. “Doesn’t matter what I think. It’s about making your coronation legitimate for the common people, and the head of the order has overseen every ceremony for every new royal throughout history. The Sovereign Alpha is traveling up from the front for the coronation, and she’ll escort the Mother Priestess here.”

Meryn’s brow furrows. “Sorry, the Sovereign Alpha? You mean, your mother?”

A tiny muscle twitches in my jaw. “Sure.”

Cratos snickers in my mind, but I ignore him.

“We’ll need to get nobles in attendance to make the coronation legitimate,” I continue. “It will be difficult to persuade them to come. We may not get all the fiefdoms on board, and you will need to prepare yourself for that possibility.”

Thankfully, Siegrid is bringing Noemi with her from the war front, who should be helpful. My chest warms at the thought. It’s been months since I’ve seen Noemi, held her in my arms.

Meryn nods stiffly. “And should I be worried about the other Bonded after what happened in the arena? With… Jonah?”

That festering piece of shit.

I should have culled him during the Trials when I had the chance. It’s frowned upon, instructors killing the Rawbonds, but if a rider isn’t suited to be in a pack, then someone needs to act. I’ll never forgive myself for that.

When I finally end him, I’ll take my time. Cratos can eat his entrails while graydoves peck out his eyes. We’ll leave his dick for the rats.

“I’m not sure,” I answer honestly. “What happened in the arena…”

“The Dire Blade.” Meryn sits back down on the ground and cradles her head in her hands. “I had that in my possession for all of a day before breaking it. No one is going to believe I’m legitimate now.”

She lifts her dirty, bloodied face toward me, and the devastation on it hits me in the gut. She quickly explains what happened when it shattered, the way she could feel her power corrupted and throttled.

“It’s the bracelet,” she says quietly. “Whatever kind of Siphon blood magic is in it… it’s fucking everything up. Will anyone listen to my commands without the Dire Blade?”

I shrug. “We know the Dire Blade existed during the reign of the Sturmfrost Queens, but we don’t know how it was used. Regardless, the people will follow your lead because they’ll come to accept that you’re the rightful regent.”

Her mouth twists in skepticism, and I don’t blame her.

“Things will be under control when the Sovereign Alpha arrives,” I continue. “No one can deny the power you hold, and no one would dare move against Siegrid. She’s too respected and feared by the Bonded.”

“Okay.” Meryn glances down at the ruined gown she’s still wearing. “Ugh, I need to clean up and find something else to wear.”

I sigh and reach down a hand to guide her up. “I know someone who can help us with that.”

Cratos and Anassa leave to deal with the rest of the wolves, and I lead Meryn through the twisting bowels of the castle. Eventually, we reach a huge wooden door, and I knock.

“Come in,” says an aged, elegant voice.

We enter an office that overlooks the snow-covered front gardens through a wall of ornate windows. It’s richly decorated but not ostentatious, and at the center of the room is a beautifully carved wooden desk. An older woman with a tight gray bun and a shrewd gaze stands behind it.

“Your Highness,” the woman says to Meryn, bowing deeply.

“This is the Castle Matron, Alienor Bernard,” I tell Meryn, gesturing for her to take one of the plush cobalt-blue chairs in front of the desk.

No one’s sure exactly how old Matron Alienor is; she’s been in charge for long enough that she must be in her eighties, but she looks like she might be in her early sixties. I’ve known her peripherally since I was a child.

She’s never been warm, but she’s always kind.

Meryn looks up, a little perplexed. “Castle… Matron?”

Matron Alienor tilts her head. “Yes. I am the head of staff and facilities here.”

I scoff, taking the chair next to Meryn’s and gesturing for Alienor to sit down, too. “That’s a very basic description of what you do. She’s in charge of everything that happens inside this place, from overseeing the castle servants to repairs to keeping the royals and nobles in line.”

“And now I serve at your pleasure,” she smoothly tells Meryn. She may have been the right hand of the Valtieres for decades, but Alienor is sharp enough to know how to keep her job and her head.

I quickly fill Alienor in on Meryn’s needs: rooms, clothes, attendants.

“Have you considered your Council?” Matron Alienor asks Meryn.

Meryn shakes her head. “I’m sorry; I’m not sure what that means.”

Alienor’s glance to me is so quick that I hope Meryn missed it. In that silent millisecond, she said everything that I know is true: This woman is to be queen, and she knows nothing about the role. Not even the very basics.

It’s one thing to have the crown call to you. Or to ride the most powerful direwolf in centuries. Or to have royal lineage coursing through your veins.

It’s another thing entirely to rule.

We all have our work cut out for us, most especially Meryn. I really fucking hope she’s ready to learn this time.

“The Council Palast are your royal advisors,” Matron Alienor says smoothly, no trace of judgment in her tone. “Former King Cyril’s Council comprised myself, the Councilor of Sturmfrost, Sovereign Alpha Siegrid Therion, and then several of his relatives.”

Meryn’s brow furrows. “What purpose did the relatives serve?”

“They advised on relations with commoners, relations with the Bonded, and oversaw the planning of any major events or ceremonies at the castle.”

“Okay,” Meryn says. She quiets, and it’s clear—to me, at least—that she’s getting advice from Anassa. “I’ll keep you and the Sovereign Alpha on the Council. The Councilor of Sturmfrost… well, I suppose I should keep him, too. Get rid of the Valtiere relatives; I’ll replace them with interim advisors.”

Matron Alienor folds her hands in front of herself on the desk. “Which method would you prefer? Beheading? Imprisonment? Dismemberment by wolves?”

Meryn blanches. “Goddess, no. I just meant—get them out of here. Send them back to whatever fiefdom they came from. I know how Cyril handled things, Matron Alienor, but I am different.”

A small smile graces the Matron’s face. “Understood.”

“Speaking of which,” Meryn continues, this conversation bringing her back to life finally, “the servants. Let them know that anybody who wants to leave is welcome to go. They’re not required to work for someone they don’t support or might be afraid of. Anyone who chooses to quit can have one month’s pay and a strong reference. There are too many people in Sturmfrost who would be willing to take their jobs; it doesn’t make sense to force those who are unwilling.”

The declaration loosens something in my chest. After that display in the arena, a part of me worried we unleashed another tyrant in the making.

But it seems Meryn truly does want to be a different type of regent.

If I’m going to stand by someone’s side and offer to be their weapon, I need to know I won’t be aimed in the wrong direction.

My thoughts trail to the way that Meryn let Jonah and the others leave when another ruler—Cyril, surely, or even the Sovereign Alpha—would have demanded their immediate executions. At her own horror over the deaths she’d caused; horror so vast that it manifested in injuring herself.

A regent who truly grieves when her people are harmed…

My heart thuds painfully in my chest as I look at her now, hazel eyes lit up with a righteous fervor, pink high on her cheekbones.

If she has people by her side who can encourage that empathy, if she’s not corrupted by the power she’s wielding… what could that mean for Nocturna?

“I’ll let them know immediately,” Matron Alienor responds, jotting down a note to herself. “From the willing servants, we’ll select one to be your primary attendant. She and the others will prepare the regent’s rooms for you.”

Meryn’s face pales. “King Cyril’s rooms?”

Matron Alienor raises a single gray brow. “Of course. They’re traditional royal chambers.”

“No,” Meryn says firmly. “I’ll stay on the royal side of the castle if that sends a necessary message, but not there. Not now. It’s too soon.”

“How about the Sovereign Alpha’s rooms?” I interject, and Alienor nods. Turning to Meryn, I explain, “The Sovereign Alpha has designated chambers on that side of the castle to keep her close to the royal family.”

“Why don’t you take her there now?” Matron Alienor suggests. “I’ll send someone to prepare a bath and clothes immediately.”

We all stand, and Matron Alienor’s lips purse in thought. She opens her mouth as if to say something and then stops herself, shaking her head.

“What?” I ask. “This is no time to stand on ceremony, Matron.”

She gives me a tight nod and turns to Meryn. “Your Highness, I hope this is taken as a kindness, as it’s meant as one. It seems there may be some… gaps in your knowledge about royal responsibilities and procedure.”

Meryn starts to laugh and can’t stop. She doubles over, tears streaming down her face as giggles continue to pour out of her.

Matron Alienor shoots me an alarmed look, and I grab Meryn’s arm, my fingertips tingling where our bodies make contact.

“Pull it together,” I mutter. “Your Highness.”

Meryn stands, wiping the tears from her face. “Forgive me, Matron Alienor. That was the politest way anyone’s ever told me I’m a know-nothing moron, and I’ve been told that a lot over the past few months.”

Alienor’s face reddens. “I meant no offense, truly—”

This poor woman. I didn’t know she could get flustered like this. But Meryn Sturmfrost brings out the unexpected in everyone, it seems.

Meryn waves a hand, cutting her off. “No offense taken. It’s true, the gaps in my knowledge are so large they could be called canyons. I’ll gratefully accept any instruction you might offer me, and if you have any books I should read in the meantime, please hand them over.”

A small smile now on her face, Matron Alienor walks quickly to the bookshelf that covers one entire wall and pulls a few leather-bound volumes from it. Then she hands the pile of books over to Meryn and sees us out the door, shutting it firmly behind us.

No doubt very happy to have survived that meeting with her head intact.

Back in the hall, I lead Meryn silently to the Sovereign Alpha’s rooms, then bow and turn to depart.

She blurts out a strangled “Stop.”

I freeze but don’t turn around.

“Thank you,” she says. “For everything.”

My hands flex at the words. I draw my shoulders back slightly, lift my head, and look at her.

The tears from her laughter have left new streaks in the dirt on her cheeks, but her shoulders are held high. She’s clutching the books tightly to her chest, pushing the swells of her breasts out of the top of her dress. She’s ruined and regal in the same breath.

Heat lashes through me, urgent and unyielding.

I can picture it, again, the type of ruler she could be. Unafraid to do the necessary for people at any level. Confident and fair. Demanding justice when required, but never cruelly. She could be all that, and more.

The thought comes quickly, entirely unwelcome: She belongs on a throne. She deserves to be worshipped.

And just as swiftly comes the knowledge that I need to keep my distance, even while watching her closely, protecting her. Because I know what happened in that arena today. She saw her own power, was rightfully afraid of it, and was going to set it aside.

Until I encouraged her to seize the darkness.

The blood is just as much on my hands as hers.

“I was serious about what I said,” I tell her, my voice a growl that I hope masks my aching need. “Next time it’s too much, you find me. We’ll find another outlet for your pain.”

Then I turn back on my heel and walk swiftly down the hall, trying very hard not to imagine just what kind of outlets we might find.

5

MERYN

The Sovereign Alpha’s chambers are practical, with minimal ornamentation and wide doors that take up one of the walls and lead directly out to the grounds. The less ornamentation, the less likely a vase or a chandelier will be shattered by a wolf’s tail. And the wide doors give Anassa easy access.

There are a few luxuries, though.

The first is a bedroom off the living area with a massive bed nearly big enough for Anassa to stretch out in. The second, a beautiful hearth with the four pack symbols carved above it, surrounded by well-cushioned armchairs. The third, a gigantic bathing room with a sunken bath that I spent an eternity in before changing into clean clothes. Finally, a huge wooden desk with a pack of running wolves carved along its edge in exquisite detail.

I run my fingertip over the divots in the wood as I sit down to study the books Matron Alienor gave me.

Before I can make too much sense of what I’m looking at, a tapping sound from outside makes me lift my head and rub my eyes. It’s Anassa; I can tell without looking.

Sliding the heavy bolt to the left, I shove the doors open with a grunt. They swing wide out toward the grassy space beyond and reveal my direwolf.

Anassa wastes no time entering. Her tail swishes, brushing up against me as she pads inside with a few clicks of her nails on the stone.

My chest tightens with anxiety even as my shoulders drop in relief at the sight of her. So much has happened in so little time, and we haven’t really had a chance to admit that to each other.

Yet, seeing her, I can breathe deeply. That’s how it’s been ever since the truth came out.

A cool breeze coasts through the open doors, stirring her fur and my hair, both silver-white but reflecting tones of copper from the firelight.

It’s time. We need to get this all out. “I realize that a lot of what happened over the past four months was my fault,” I tell her, taking the first step.

I speak the words out loud, not just over our mental bond. It makes them more permanent; they can’t be brushed away like a thought. I have to taste the weight of every single one on my tongue.

Anassa’s golden eyes widen. Her head lowers so she can look more directly at me.

It’s difficult, sometimes, speaking to her like this. Her expressions are so subtle, lost behind fur and canine features. If she isn’t willing to let me in on her emotions through the bond, the subtle indications in her eyes or her ears could mean anything from surprise to anger.

I swallow down my nerves and keep going. “It took me too long to accept our bond and even longer to figure out how to communicate with you properly. And maybe I still don’t…” I shake my head and pivot. “I’ve made mistakes, not being honest with myself and others. So I’m going to stop that. From now on, complete honesty between you and me, Anassa.”

Her eyes narrow. Fuck. Just keep going.

“And with that, I have to tell you…” I swallow. This is hard. But honesty, honesty. “I am really fucking hurt that you treated me the way you did. I know you couldn’t tell me anything because of the blood curse, but I often felt like you were working against me. And I don’t understand why you acted like that.”

There’s a long moment of silence. The hearth pops, sending a tiny coal scattering across the stones. I watch it slowly fade to soot until I sense Anassa’s movement.

She steps closer and then settles onto the floor at my feet. She lowers herself right to my level, and I swear there’s something solemn in her eyes.

Maybe she’s not as difficult to read as I thought.

“I have been alone for a very long time, Meryn,” Anassa tells me.

The words sink into my soul.

Alone.

I remember what the other recruits said when we reached the peak of the Ascent. Anassa had been atop that mountain for years upon years. And when I first saw her, she was separate from the rest of the direwolves.

She had a mate, but that mate was away from her, gone at the front with his rider.

“My mother was the direwolf bonded to Queen Chiara Sturmfrost,” Anassa tells me.

My lips part. Anassa’s mother, bonded to the last true queen of Nocturna. Something tugs in my chest. Something familiar and heavy and cold.

Grief—that deep cut that fades but never truly heals.

My heart opens up to Anassa like a neglected flower getting its first glimpse of sunlight.

“Direwolves have remarkably long lives, as you have learned. We can live up to a thousand years while searching for the right rider. We only choose once, and we tie our lives to our chosen, so we must pick correctly. And I…” She blinks slowly. “I waited centuries for you.”

For me.

Centuries on her own, waiting for someone she wasn’t even sure would ever come. I used to think Anassa was impatient, but she endured years and years of longing just so we could find each other.

“Were any other direwolves waiting?” I ask. “Any wolves your age or older?”

“No.”

My throat tightens. How lonely that must have been.

A cold wave of shame washes over me. I could have known any of this about her if I’d just asked sooner. If I’d been more interested in the history of the direwolves, if I had made a better effort to get to know the being I’d tied my life to.

It’s hard to leave room for curiosity or questioning when every moment is a battle for survival, but that’s not an excuse.

From now on, I need to do better—not just with Anassa, with everything.

“Stark and Cratos had informed me that you were coming, so I was prepared to bond with you. But after waiting all this time, I found myself attached to a resentful rider.”

Another failure. Stark said something similar. He spent his entire life waiting for the Sturmfrost royal to bond, and he got me, mess that I am.

“The hurt that caused me, Meryn…” Anassa lays her muzzle on the ground and closes her eyes, exhaling a hot breath in a huff. “My instincts took over. I would have done anything to stop the agony of your resentment and rejection. I needed to keep my distance or I would have ripped out your throat.”

My eyes start to burn, and I reach out, scratching the fur behind her ears. “Thanks for not killing me,” I say softly. “Even though I probably deserved it.”

“We are alike,” Anassa tells me. And I want to argue with her. I don’t know how she could compare her centuries of wisdom to my pathetic flailing. But then she says, “We are both hotheaded and strong-willed, qualities that each of us needs to work on.”

I let my grin take over. “Not always a great combination.”

“It is a powerful combination. But for it to work, yes, we both need to communicate better,” she replies. She brings her head closer to me, leaning into my ear scratches. “I am sorry if my actions caused you pain.”

“I’m sorry, too. I’m lucky to have you. I always have been.”

Anassa nudges closer still, and I bend forward to rest my face against her forehead, breathing in the familiar scent of her fur.

My direwolf.

I pull away gently and then say, somewhat reluctantly, “About Stark and Cratos.” I don’t want to have this part of the conversation, but I need to know. “What I felt in the dungeons, when you took down all your shields—”

“My love for Cratos,” she says. “The mate bond is strong. I will continue to shield you from that. We direwolves know that the mate bond can cause confusion for our riders, especially if the riders themselves are not romantically involved.”

I swallow. “And… Stark? Does Cratos shield his love toward you as well so that Stark is not affected?”

My assumption, when I was first hit with Anassa’s mate bond, was that Stark was grappling with that sensation the entire time I was bonded to her.

It would be a relief to know that he’s not.

I’m still not sure what to think about him. He’s obviously not an enemy as I so mistakenly believed, but I barely know him—aside from the deep intimacy I have with his scowls and his bossy commands.

I don’t want Stark to be secretly pining after me. I don’t even like him. He’s kind of a fucking asshole.

On the other hand, it would help certain moments between us make sense if he were.

Like the naked hunger I’ve seen in his eyes when he’s licked my tattoos, or the searing heat I felt between us this afternoon in his office when he held my hand to his chest.

Heat that now pools liquid in my belly at the mere thought of his touch.

Anassa huffs, her pungent wolf breath hitting my face. “I would not dare to pry about Stark and Cratos’s relationship. The bond between a direwolf and their rider is private, even for mated pairs. If you want to know the answer to that, you may ask Stark yourself.”

Yeah, that would go over well, I’m sure.

Hey Stark, just out of curiosity, do you have a deep, unending, overwhelming attraction toward me at all times? Are you so hot for me that you can barely function?

Might explain why he primarily speaks in grunts, though.

“How does it work on a technical level?” I ask, ignoring the heat in my own face. “Are Stark and I able to communicate mentally?”

Anassa gives a lupine nod. “Yes, you can reach Stark, and he can reach you. You may connect mentally to each other however you wish.”

That might be handy, I suppose. If I need immediate advice on the best way to disembowel someone.

“And what about talking to each other’s wolves, since you’re mated? Can you reach Stark? Can I reach Cratos?”

Anassa’s lips pull back from her fangs—she’s displeased. “Technically, yes, but I would not! As I said, the rider-and-wolf bond is sacred. To speak directly to another wolf’s Bonded rider… that’s a violation. Alpha wolves may reach out to their pack’s riders but only if absolutely necessary.”

My brows furrow. “You reached out to Helene and Grigore, though, when we needed to show them I was the rightful ruler.”

“That was a grave situation. You had not yet attempted to share memories across pack lines and were unsure of how to do it yourself, and they needed to be informed immediately. I will not reach out to other riders like that again, and I’ve already apologized to their direwolves. However, yes, you and I can both theoretically reach any rider or wolf since we are the royal pair.”

I’m almost scared to ask but… “And Stark’s feelings? His thoughts and emotions? Will those reach me the way that yours can?”

Anassa shakes her head. “Not in the same way. It is not an easy flow, like our connection, and you cannot hear his thoughts outside of intentional communication, nor can he hear yours. More intense emotions may reach you on occasion. The nature of the bond makes all our connections porous.”

I settle back in against her fur as I ponder that. At least that answers my question about whether he could read my thoughts during several recent moments. He must be able to guess what I’m thinking.

Frankly, that’s almost as disturbing. Am I that easy of a read? Or… does he know me better than I realized?

My eyes start to droop closed. What a long day it’s been. The first full day as queen, and an utter disaster from beginning to end.

“Anassa,” I say quietly. “Since your mother was the direwolf of the last queen, do you have any inherited wisdom for me? What do I need to know about being queen?”

Anassa snorts air through her nose. “I was just a pup when Queen Chiara died. I know nothing about ruling. We shall have to figure it out together.”

I sigh and scratch my fingers through her thick fur. “You and me, huh?”

Anassa’s ears twitch around, and she perks up. Her eyes land on the door. “Your friends are approaching.”

“Oh, finally,” I say lightly, and head to the door. I called for them hours ago. I hear Anassa stand and shake herself and then pad back outside.

I open the door just as someone knocks and am nearly knocked off my feet by the sheer force of Izabel throwing herself at me.

“I’ve been hit enough times today, Iz,” I say with a laugh, gently disentangling myself from her.

Pulling back, I survey my best friend, making sure she’s safe after the shit show earlier. Her long, black hair is in a tight ponytail, exposing the elegant line of her neck—not a scratch on it. She narrows her deep brown eyes, clearly doing the same thing I am.

“Are you okay?” we ask at the same time.

“Wow, you’re like twins,” Tomison says with a playful smirk as he enters the room. He throws an arm around Izabel’s shoulders that she quickly shrugs off, tossing him an irritated look.

Venna steps up, rolling her eyes. “Ha, ha.” She’s Izabel’s actual twin—an identical mirror image, except Venna’s sleek hair is cut in a short bob and streaked through with dark blue, marking her as a member of Kryptos, unlike the rest of us Strategos pack members.

“Here,” Nevah says, stepping through the threshold and thrusting a bottle of emberwine in my direction. “Figured we could all use this after today.” She glances around my room and lets out a low whistle. “They just keep upgrading you, huh, Cooper?”

I grab the bottle from her and lead my friends into the main sitting area of the room. While they loudly admire my new chambers, I uncork the bottle and pour us all glasses. Then we sit down on the rug by the fire.

The moment I’m settled, Izabel grips my shoulders, looks me in the eye, and says, “I’m going to execute Killian for what he did.” My eyes widen. “I’m serious. Blood everywhere. They won’t find his body.”

“You don’t want to send a message with it?” Tomison jokes.

“Okay, they’ll only find his head,” Izabel says, a disturbing expression on her face.

Maybe I shouldn’t be so warmed by an offer of brutal murder, but I am. “You’ll have to get in line,” I tell her with half a smile.

She rolls her eyes. “Fine, but at least leave me something to stab.”

“Noted, keep pieces of his body for target practice.”

Nevah crosses her arms, her face troubled. “How did he even get out of here, anyway?”

I fill them all in on what happened between us in his chambers, making sure to face Venna—who’s hard of hearing—so that she doesn’t miss a word. Then I remind them of the memory I shared to all the Bonded of him disappearing in a swirl of shadow.

Venna tilts her head, her hair just brushing her shoulder. “It sounds almost like rifting. You know, how we Kryptos manipulate light and shadow to mask our locations and hide ourselves.”

She’s right—just like in the arena, when the older Kryptos woman was disappearing and reappearing. “That’s what it’s called, rifting? But that’s just a cover, right? You can’t disappear and reappear in a different location?”

“No,” Venna says, her tone contemplative.

“Killian said…” His name tastes foul on my tongue. Shaking it off, I continue, “He said that the pack’s powers were ‘rent from my own.’ I wonder if this ability is like some heightened, extreme version of what Kryptos can do.”

Venna nods. “That would make sense.”

“Only one way to find out,” Tomison says. “Give it a go!”

Izabel smacks him in the chest. “You idiot. How can she use a power she doesn’t even understand?”

“I agree with Iz,” Nevah says. She bites her lip in concern and then continues, “After what happened in the arena, Mer—”

I raise a hand, cutting her off as I grow faint from the reminder. All that power, wielded so casually. All those deaths on my hands. I’ve barely let myself think about it since Stark found me in his office this morning.

Images of their bodies rise before my eyes, and I scrub my hands over my face, willing away the panic that quickly follows.

“I know,” I say, my pulse pounding. “My power—my strength—is dangerous. Fatal, even. And I don’t have control of it yet. I shouldn’t attempt anything too far outside of what we know the packs can do. I’d possibly risk my own life and others’.”

Nevah shoots me a tight, conciliatory smile. “You’ll get there.”

“Speaking of,” Tomison jumps in. “Did anyone else notice the pack powers acting a little… funny today?”

Izabel and Nevah look reflective. Venna nods. “It was easier to rift than usual. I wasn’t sure if it was just adrenaline or something, or all the time I’ve spent practicing?”

“One of the Daemos riders sent a blast of power toward me and Iz, and it almost looked like it rebounded on him somehow,” I add. “He was knocked off his wolf. I don’t know, maybe it’s the power of the crown, amplifying and changing Bonded magic or something?”

There’s an awkward pause, and I don’t think I’m the only one remembering just how many people were killed at once by my own increased powers. I clear my throat. “Look, I need to talk to you all about something.”

Tomison gives me a playful salute. “Yes, oh, queen?”

“Goddess, shut up,” I grumble, but it makes me smile.

They’re still treating me like me, and it only reaffirms my decision to raise this with them. Does that erase my nervousness? Not entirely.

“Listen, most of the former Rawbonds will ship out to the front tomorrow.” Out with it. “But I’d like the four of you to stay with me. At the castle. If you’re willing.”

They’re all silent, eyes wide.

The word vomit lurches up my throat. “You don’t have to. This isn’t an order. But I really need friends I can trust around me right now. Desperately, actually. And I trust you four with everything I—”

“Yes,” Izabel says. “We wouldn’t leave you to deal with all this royal bullshit alone.” What an Izabel way to put it.

“Obviously, yes,” Tomison adds.

Nevah nods. “There’s nowhere I’d rather be.”

Venna doesn’t have an immediate answer, but even still, my shoulders relax. “Oh good. I apparently have a group of advisors called the Council Palast that I’m supposed to fill. King Cyril staffed it with his relatives, so I thought perhaps you all could help me—at least as interim support, for now, until we find proper advisors.”

“Sounds highly important,” Izabel says. “Do tell, what kind of advising will you require?” She lifts her glass of emberwine, taking a large sip.

“Well, apparently one of the Council’s duties is arranging castle events and ceremonies.”

Izabel chokes on her drink. “Excuse me, party planning? You’re keeping us back from the front to plan parties? Having a queen for a friend really fucking rocks.”

Tomison and Nevah laugh, and my gaze drifts to Venna, who has been glaringly silent this entire time. She’s watching each of our faces as we talk, her expression unreadable.

“Ven?” I ask, knocking my shoulder into hers. “What are you thinking?”

She turns toward me and smiles faintly. It doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “It’ll be great, Meryn. I’ve been meaning to ask you, though, how’s Saela?”

Her concern slams into me. My jaw tightens. I don’t know how to answer her, but of course she’d ask. She helped Stark rescue Saela from the dungeons.

The truth is overwhelming. And worse, it’s dangerous.

I trust my friends, but Saela’s current state is sensitive information.

If the knowledge that my sister is a Siphon got out, even accidentally, it could put her life in danger. People would call for her head, not to mention the damage it would do to my reputation as a queen standing in opposition to the Siphons, to Killian.

I hesitate, feeling shaky. “Saela is resting, and it will probably be a while until she’s ready to be around people. The… trauma of her captivity affected her, and she needs time to recover.” I hope that didn’t sound too calculated.

Venna winces. “I’m sorry. Let us know if there’s anything we can do to help.”

“Whatever you need,” Nevah chimes in. And all I can do is nod.

The mood is dampened after that, and I’m not even surprised when Tomison—usually the one to keep a party going—says, “It’s getting late. We should probably let our regent here get her beauty sleep.”

We all hug goodbye, but as everyone is making their way out the door, I grab Venna’s elbow and hold her back. When she’s turned to fully face me, I ask, “Can we talk alone for a minute?”

She nods, shutting the door after Izabel.

This is a little awkward.

Izabel and I are closer friends, in part because we’re in the same pack. Venna’s always spent time with us Strategos, but she has her Kryptos packmates. Her own friends and mentors—not to mention lovers. I know she gained quite the reputation there during the Trials. It’s possible she’s attached to someone, someone heading to the front.

Venna and Izabel get lumped together so often by virtue of being twins, and that’s not fair to either of them.

Izabel is an open book, but Venna’s not. She’s never been.

And the truth is, I don’t know what she wants.

Taking a deep breath, I say, “Venna, if you want to go with everyone else to the front, I’ll understand. I’m aware that it’s kind of hard to say no to me now. So are you sure you want to stay?”

Venna fiddles with the hem of her shirt, not looking me in the eye. “I do. Honestly, the idea of being away from Izabel is awful, even though I’m sure it’s inevitable. But the four of you are all in Strategos, all natural leaders. Am I actually going to be helpful for you as a Kryptos, or are you just keeping me back because I’m Izabel’s twin?”

Relief courses through my body. “I asked you to stay because I want you. Of course you’ll be helpful. You’re the cleverest of all of us, by far. I’ll make sure you have things to do that are not just event planning.”

She laughs. “Thank you. Staring down a battalion of Siphons sounds preferable to being dragged along by Izabel as she figures out seating arrangements or whatever.”

“Actually,” I say, thinking out loud, “you can help me right away.” I hold up my wrist and the deadly bracelet glinting on it. “I need to figure out how to get this off. There’s some sort of magic to it, and I can’t remove it.”

Venna nods. “I’m on it. Also… I’m happy to spend some time with Saela once she’s better. Can I help you keep her busy? Maybe, I don’t know, teach her sign language or something?”

My throat tightens. I don’t know how soon I can take her up on that offer. “That sounds nice. I’ll—I’ll let you know when she’s ready.”

We hug and say good night, and I vow to use this extra time with my friends to get to know them better, now that we’re not all facing near certain death daily as we were in the Trials.

Left with my own thoughts, it’s impossible to avoid the heavy weight of grief that crowds back in. My chambers are thick with it, as if I’m breathing it in like air.

My mind is with Saela all the way until I’m climbing into bed and beginning to submit to the heavy drag of sleep.

The moment I close my eyes, unconsciousness takes me like a rolling blackout. It isn’t natural. Ice streaks over my brain.

I open my eyes, panic skittering through me.

My breath catches as I realize I’m not in the Sovereign Alpha’s rooms anymore. I’m in the same shadowy dreamscape that keeps taking me. The world is indistinct but immediate, indefinable but pressing in on me with a grip I recognize.

I look around, wary. Any moment, the deep, disembodied voice I’ve heard before will say something. I’ll hear his terrifying voice echo through the dark.

But another voice comes in its stead, one all too familiar.

“Hello, kitten.”

My blood goes cold. Nausea slinks up my throat.

Killian emerges from the shadows, his face as coldly beautiful as ever.

His golden hair is pushed back from his face, showing off his high cheekbones and his now unnaturally bright blue eyes—a color they took on when his ancestor, Alistair Brightbane, passed into Killian’s body through some Siphon body-transference magic.

His full lips tilt up into a loving smile, revealing the tips of his new fangs. He spreads his arms for an embrace.

Once, I’d have gone to him, fallen into his arms, begged him to hold me.

I’ve finally learned my fucking lesson.

“I’ve missed you,” he purrs.

6

MERYN

This is a dream,” I whisper to myself, staring in growing horror at the man who betrayed me so thoroughly.

Who stole my throne.

Destroyed my sister.

Not to mention everything he did to me…

My shoulders start to shake in anger.

Just a dream. People wake up from dreams.

Killian’s lips curve into a dangerously familiar smile, his fangs on display. “If this is a dream, why am I having it, too?”

My muscles strain so tightly that my joints hurt.

Killian takes a step and disappears into the shadows. He reappears several feet from where he vanished, eyes tracking me as he strides smoothly through the swirling black mist.

I suck in a sharp breath, staggering back, disgust flooding my veins.

Wake up. I scream the words in my head. If sheer force were enough, I would be free.

Killian pauses. Finally, his eyes leave me. They dart around the shadow-filled space we inhabit. He cocks his head, going unnaturally still. And then he turns to look at me.

“We’re alone.”

I don’t know what that means. Does he mean the voice I’ve heard in this place? He’s silent now, but—

Killian sighs in relief, some of the predatory tension leaving his body. “Wherever we are, Alistair isn’t here.”

Oh. Killian is alone in his mind.

He steps through the shadows and reappears closer to me. His gaze is soft and imploring. He looks so much like the man I thought I knew. The man who would take care of me after my fights, who looked after my mother.

The man who won my heart. Who kept it and then shattered it beyond repair.

I hate him. Rationally, I know that I hate him. But being this close to his intoxicating presence—to his beautiful face, to those lips that have traced every curve of my body…

My head is spinning.

“Hear me out, Mer, please,” he begs, reaching a hand toward me.

I swat it away. “Fuck off,” I seethe.

I fell for this shit once before. Not again. Especially not now.

He raises his hands in defeat. “I won’t touch you. I just need you to know—what happened today, with the pack communication. That wasn’t me. It was Alistair. He’s so strong, so powerful in his blood magic, and he has a millennia of knowledge about the Sturmfrost line’s powers. He knew your ancestors. His control over your magic is incomprehensible.”

I raise my wrist, face burning, and shake the engagement bracelet at him. “So that’s what this is, right? He’s taking my powers through it, corrupting the Bonded magic.”

Killian inches closer. “Yes. It’s not entirely working the way he expected, but still. You will never be able to defeat him.”

My stomach twists. I might be sick.

“But now that we’re alone, I can tell you that I’m on your side. If only you’d come back to me, give me a chance.”

It’s a fucked-up retread of a conversation we’ve already had. How many times does he expect I’ll fall for this? How many times does he believe I’ll forgive him?

Killian mistakes my disgust for contemplation and edges closer again. “I had no choice in this. I was raised for this role.”

My heart pounds in my ears. I can’t forgive him, but—this, an unwanted role… If he’s being earnest, I can sympathize with it.

“Together we can destroy him, kitten.”

The nickname snaps me back into myself.

No. I have no sympathy.

I shove him away from me hard, and he stumbles back. “Stop calling me that, you vile piece of shit.”

Killian blinks at me in confusion.

The shadows around me begin to writhe, slithering over my legs, my arms. It’s just as it was in the arena. The darkness hears the silent screams I normally keep buried deep in my chest, and it draws them out.

Gives them power.

“However you brought us to this place, stop,” I order. Each syllable sends shadows writhing and lashing, but Killian stands untouched.

The corner of his lips lift.

And there he is again. The Killian who came to my bed, my fingers tracing his cheekbone, his lips lifting just like that. And I kissed that little tug of amusement. It’s carving a hollow space in my chest that I don’t think I’ll ever fill.

Mere days ago, he was my whole world. It hurts; it hurts.

I want to slam my hand through his rib cage, pull out his beating heart, and feed it to Anassa.

“I’m not responsible for this shadow realm,” he says eventually. “An unintended side effect of your beautiful engagement bracelet, I think. I assumed you were drawing me into this space intentionally.”

Revulsion raises the hair on my arms.

His smile deepens, stretching into something cruel. “Perhaps your subconscious is telling you that you miss me, too.”

It’s like a freezing hand is stroking up my spine, wrapping around my throat from behind. I open my mouth to scream at him, but I can’t.

I don’t know what words I could use.

I can’t admit to what’s happened.

He was my whole future. It all seemed so real. I swallowed every lie greedily, desperately. The things he did to me.

The things I… begged him to do to me.

My hands start to shake. It’s a warning that I need to stop. I can’t let these thoughts free.

I can’t think about how deep his betrayal really goes, running like channels of rot through my bones. If I let it spread, I might never recover.

Stop, I command.

And once again, the shadows respond. They rise up like a tower of darkness, then lunge furiously for Killian.

For a moment, I’m triumphant. I didn’t want this in the arena, but here—good, fine. A worthy opponent. If I strangle him with shadow, so be it.

Then Killian lifts his hand, takes hold of the torrent of darkness, and wrenches it aside. He does it so easily, barely looking at it. His eyes are too busy swallowing me up and drowning me in a sea of cutting blue.

Chills race up my spine. It’s horrifying. The darkness is my power—my anger incarnate, it seems—and he manipulates it with little effort.

He always has manipulated me expertly, though, hasn’t he?

Killian’s smirk widens, and he steps closer. “I understand that you’re upset with me right now, Meryn, but it will pass, I’m sure. You’ll come back to me. You think you could be a queen without me ruling by your side? You’ll never be able to lead a whole country.”

Killian’s arm whips forward terrifyingly fast. He seizes my chin with the same easy ruthlessness he used to grip my magic.

I try to wrench away from him, and his long fingers tighten, squeezing painfully.

His face is so close to me now, his lips barely a breath away as he says, “You are mine. I’ll fight for us, forever. And I will never let you go.”

Once again, I shove him violently away, and then I turn, sprinting into the darkness. The shadows coalesce around me, tightening.

I’m spinning.

My head knocks backward against something violently, and I see black.

When I open my eyes again, the dreamworld is gone. I’m back in my room, back in my bed, tangled hopelessly in my sheets. I fight against them, twisting, my heart beating so fast that I can’t quite catch my breath. And then I look up and nearly scream.

Someone is standing over me, bathed in shadows.

“Meryn,” Stark says roughly. His expression is tight. Concerned, I think—lips drawn into a thin line.

My face is wet, and I taste salt. I’m crying. Goddess, why am I always crying these days? As my heart starts to calm, I realize I’m drenched in a cold sweat.

“What are you doing here?” I ask, not sure how I should feel. My stomach is a writhing mess from that encounter with Killian, and yet something about Stark’s stern presence in my room calms me. Instantly.

After everything we’ve been through together in the past couple of days, my body seems to recognize something my head struggles to understand: Stark makes me feel safe.

“Anassa felt fear through your bond, but she couldn’t get through to you. She told Cratos,” he says stiffly.

I wonder if that was all. If maybe my emotions were strong enough to leak through all the way to him, too.

Swallowing, I glide my hand over my hair. He’s breathing hard, too.

“And you came.” I eye him and lift a brow. “Running?”

He shifts his weight to his other side. His hands are in tight fists. “Are you all right?”

“It was just a bad dream,” I reply instantly, not wanting to talk about it or relive it. All the same, my blood warms. Can he tell I’m lying? Can he sense it through the bond?

He’s standing so close that his musky amber scent fills my senses, washing the foul sting of Killian’s memory out of my mind. I have the strangest urge—perhaps my own, perhaps from our wolves’ bond—to lean up toward him, to wrap my arms around him, and to accept his strength, his protection.

He’s here, and Killian is not.

Stark straightens. His fists don’t uncurl, though. He clearly doesn’t believe me.

“I see,” he finally says. He looks away, glancing around the darkened bedroom, and I see it through his eyes. This has been my space for all of twelve hours at most, but already the surfaces are covered in discarded clothes, maps, journals.

I didn’t bring much with me from the Rawbond quarters, but what I do have appears to have exploded into a mess everywhere.

I’ll clean it up in the morning. Or I won’t. Whatever.

Stark’s nostrils flare in obvious disapproval, and my momentary fondness for him evaporates. He would be a neat freak.

He clears his throat and says, “I apologize for disturbing your sleep. You should try to get more rest.”

I realize suddenly that my arm is warm. There’s a sensation of lingering sensitivity. I think Stark touched me to wake me.

“Right,” I say distractedly. “Well… good night?”

There’s no responding emotion on his face. He just turns on his heel and leaves quickly, like he can’t wait to flee my chaotic pit.

The room feels bizarrely empty without him in it.

After he’s gone, I stay there, sitting up in my bed and staring. I stare until my sweat cools and turns sticky. I stare until Stark’s presence fades and Killian’s returns, creeping closer along the edge of my bed and pooling in the shadows at the corners of my room.

I rub my arm and lie back down, but I refuse to let myself fall asleep again.

I never want to find myself trapped in that strange space with Killian again, vulnerable to his taunts and unable to escape.

Never.

The rest of the night passes fitfully. Every time the drowsiness starts to drag me down, I startle myself awake. Eventually, I decide that my bed is problematic—too tempting—and I get out of it entirely.

Then I dress myself in my leathers and pace. Sit down at the desk, study some maps. Stare out the window, waiting for the sunrise.

I’m still staring out the window when Anassa approaches the large glass doors, so I let her in. I’ve already filled her in this morning on what happened with Killian, the bizarre dream that wasn’t.

Now she takes one look at me and butts her nose pointedly into my side.

“Ouch.” I swat her away. “No assaulting me before breakfast.”

“I sense your emotions. Do not let fear subsume your anger. Remember your rage, your desire to destroy him. Complacency is how evil wins.”

I nod, knowing she’s right. Still, the lack of sleep and the lingering vision of Killian have both wormed their way under my skin.

“He said something that I can’t stop thinking about—that I can’t be a queen without him and that I’ll never be able to lead a country. And logically I know he was trying to make me self-conscious and weak, and that I shouldn’t let him get to me.”

I look up into her golden eyes, the words pouring out of me now.

“But isn’t he right, at least a bit? I haven’t trained for this. I don’t know how to oversee an entire nation. My only real qualification is that an ancestor of mine from five hundred years ago was the queen. I’ve always resented the upper classes for having everything handed to them by virtue of their bloodline, and here I am, doing the exact same thing.”

Anassa nuzzles her head closer to me, gently this time. I reach out, finding comfort in her fur.

“Yes,” she tells me bluntly. “It is hypocritical.”

I laugh.

“However, you cannot deny the magic that now thrums through your veins,” she continues. “Who should lead the country instead? Killian, who is entirely unfit? One of the nobles, who have been complicit in the royal family’s misdeeds? You can earn your crown by learning how to deserve it. Shut him out, and focus on becoming a good leader.”

“Okay,” I tell her. “I can do that. And can you please not tell Cratos about this? I am not ready for others to know about this mental connection that Killian and I appear to have. It’s too… fresh.”

“Fine,” Anassa says. “I will not share this information for now. But—” She cuts herself off and perks up, ears turning as if she can hear something that I cannot.

“What is it?”

“Saela is awake.”

7

MERYN

Who will Saela be now? The feral creature that ripped out Helene’s throat or the girl I know? The girl I’ve always known.

When I arrive at the dungeons, Leader Aldrich is already waiting. His wolf, Daphne, was the one who alerted Anassa. After the scene in the arena yesterday, Aldrich grabbed some of the historical texts he had about Siphons and came back down to the dungeons to observe Saela.

It seems he never left.

“She’s awake,” I say when I reach him. He knows it isn’t a question and doesn’t respond.

I approach her cell carefully. I’m not afraid she’ll hurt me, though maybe I should be. Certainly the sight of her, inhuman and strange, will.

Saela’s curled up on the small cot inside, her knees pulled tight to her chest, arms wrapped around them like she’s trying to make herself small enough to disappear.

My breath catches tightly in my throat. She won’t be comforted if I gasp at her appearance. But…

She looks so tiny and frail, but there’s still blood and gore staining her clothes and skin, matted in her dark hair. And her eyes are big and filled with tears, but the points of her fangs peek out and hide again when she sees me.

She’s sweet, and she’s sharp.

My world tilts a bit, and I fight to stay standing on both feet.

The future I imagined, that I fought so hard for—it’s gone. Snatched away from us, returned warped and distorted. Like ink that had water dropped onto it, spreading out and away until it’s nearly unrecognizable.

But her sobs sound the exact same, and that snaps me out of my stupor. Right now, that’s all that matters to me. She’s different, but it’s still my sister in that cell.

“Meryn,” she cries, her voice splintering.

“Let me in,” I say in a rush, pressing my body to the bars. When I look at Aldrich, who has the keys, his jaw is set.

“I don’t know that it’s a good idea to—”

“Let me in now!” I snap.

His lips press into a thin line beneath his beard, and he shakes his head. Still, he slides the key into the lock.

“Sae,” I choke out. “I’m sorry. I wanted to come sooner, but I—”

My sister throws up her bloody hands before I can reach her. “Stop! Stop.” She’s begging through her tears. “He’s right. You shouldn’t be near m-me. I’m evil.”

She’s trembling violently. Her fangs appear, disappear.

I shake my head and try to go to her, but she falls backward and scrambles to the back of the cot.

“You n-need to kill me, Meryn,” she says, and tears spring to my eyes. “P-please.”

She’s serious, and her words dig deeper into my gut than I ever thought possible, breaking some hidden piece of me that was somehow still whole.

“I’m dangerous. I bit that woman!” She’s breathing all wrong. She’s pale and twitching so hard that her skull smacks the stone wall. “D-did I kill her? Did I kill her?!”

I move more slowly toward her now, so afraid of startling her or making her worse. Something unfamiliar and painful courses through me, as if invisible hands are slowly pulling me apart in a thousand directions and I can’t do anything to stop them.

It’s fear, I realize—true fear, the likes of which I’ve never felt until this moment, with my sister dangling on the edge. A threat to her from the outside? Fine, I will figure it out.

But this, this—

She’s so fragile, and she’s serious. She wants to die; I can see it in the tilt of her mouth. More than that—she expects me to help her. It’s a fight to keep breathing, but I can’t let her see that.

And if I make one wrong move, those invisible hands will rip us both to shreds.

“Helene is fine, Saela.” My words are urgent but gentle. Maybe if I speak carefully to her, I can coax her into some calm, walk us both away from this treacherous breaking point. “She was healed by her wolf. No one is hurt.”

Saela doesn’t seem to hear me when I tell her she hasn’t harmed anyone. Perhaps the guilt is too powerful. I sit down slowly next to her, and she doesn’t dart away.

“Kill me.” She’s pleading with her eyes, and my heart shatters again at the words. “I need to go. I shouldn’t b-be…”

“Please,” I whisper. My voice is lost beneath her wails.

“I would rather die than be this!” Saela sobs. “Our enemy. Your enemy.”

And the horrible thing is, I understand it. It’s all we know: that the Siphons are evil. They killed our father. But if Killian and Cyril and all the kings before them could live undetected as Siphons for centuries, there must be a way for her to live safely among us.

I won’t let death come for her. We will find a way to reverse this, and until then, I’ll do what I’ve always done: protect her.

I seize her thin arm. Her eyes widen.

“Absolutely not, Saela,” I scold, my voice hard and stern. She needs to know with full confidence that I’m not going to let anything happen to her.

For the first time, she quiets as we fall back into our roles. Me, the older sister who takes care of her. Saela, the younger child who knows me as her only trustworthy authority figure.

“We will find a way to fix this. Together,” I tell her. I gesture back to Aldrich. “This is Leader Aldrich. He’s the smartest person in the castle, and he’s helping me find out everything there is to know about Siphons. You can trust him, too.”

Saela glances over my shoulder at him and then ducks her head, nodding shyly. Then she huffs a weak breath. Another tear streaks through the blood on her cheek. And she crumbles. Saela falls into my arms.

Relief floods me. I pull her close and wrap her up. I tug her halfway into my lap, rocking, kissing her hair.

She cries in my arms. This time, it isn’t manic and terrified. It’s softer. It’s the sound of a girl asking for comfort. I give it to her, stroking her hair, whispering to her that I love her. I’d love her no matter what.

My pocket is heavy, and I remember—our mother’s opal necklace. It caught my eye on my way out of my chambers, and it felt right to bring it down here. Fishing it out, I unhook the necklace and clasp it around Saela’s small neck.

My weariness seems to press in on me a little more once I give the necklace over. Interesting… perhaps it was surging my power, as the crown does? The opals look so similar. I file that away for thought.

The jewel glints against Saela’s chest, its rainbow colors dimmed in the darkness of the dungeons. Still, it’s warm against my hand as I press my palm against it.

“This was Mother’s,” I tell her quietly. “It was passed down through the women in our family all the way from Queen Chiara. She said it was for protection. She’d be happy to know that it was protecting you now.”

Saela nods, her fingers going to the jewel. “Thank you. It’s like keeping a part of her with me.”

I grab her other hand. “Sae, how did this happen?”

“I don’t remember.” She sniffs and clutches me tightly. “I was in the dungeons, and then Stark and Venna rescued me. Something must have happened but…” She shakes her head. “When I try to think about it, it’s just blackness.”

I look back to Aldrich. “I’ve heard of some level of mental manipulation, but can Siphons erase memories?”

Aldrich strokes his beard, looking thoughtful. “The older they are, the more powerful they become. We don’t know what the oldest Siphons are capable of because we rarely encounter them. So, yes, it’s possible. Anything is.”

Well, that’s comforting. I try very hard not to grimace so Saela won’t see how worried his words make me.

Quietly, I ask, “Is she going to be able to live on animal blood?”

“Yes, theoretically.” Aldrich turns around and grabs one of his dusty books off the floor. “I found a record here of a Siphon prisoner that our forces kept under observation several hundred years ago. They fed him exclusively animal blood, and he stayed alive for years, although he never quite recovered his Siphon strength and he appeared to age, unlike most Siphons.”

Interesting. But a weaker, aging version of Saela is fine—as long as she’s alive.

I take a deep breath that smells like blood and damp stone. “I’d like to move her out of the cells. She shouldn’t be here after months of imprisonment.”

Aldrich tenses. “I would advise caution. We should not risk proximity with other humans.” I hear the unspoken words… in case she loses control. “And there’s something else you should know.”

I raise an eyebrow at him. Aldrich looks uncomfortable.

“I have read there’s something called a sire bond,” he says, wincing. “We don’t teach about it because it doesn’t affect how we battle them. New Siphons have a bond with the one who turned them.”

A short, affronted gasp escapes me. “Like a bond bond? Similar to our bonds with our wolves or with one another?”

Aldrich’s wince deepens the lines on his face. “Yes, it sounds similar. There is a level of mental connection that allows the two bonded Siphons to communicate. It seems there may be some compulsion ability present as well. Like how a Bonded foot soldier cannot disobey their Alpha, a Siphon must follow the orders of its sire when compelled.”

I want to weep, but I hold it together. It wasn’t enough that Killian could get into my head—he has to be in hers, too. We don’t know for sure that he turned her, but it seems likely.

Turning to Saela, I ask, “Do you sense him? Killian? Or anyone else? Do you feel a connection to someone?”

She squints her eyes, as if seeking something out. “No. Nothing.”

My fingers lace with hers again. “Are you sure? This is really important, Sae.”

Saela’s fingers tremble against mine. “I swear, Meryn. I don’t feel anything.”

Would she know what to even look for? Is she being compelled right now and forced to lie about it?

For my own sanity, I need to believe that, no, he has no control over her. He can’t reach her and never will.

“You see,” Aldrich interjects. “It’s not just other humans at risk in the presence of a Siphon.” The way he’s speaking about her is so clinical that I’m starting to see red. The shadows in the dungeons begin to stir. “You are at a unique risk, Your Highness. If he’s able to get into her mind, to compel her while she’s in your presence—”

“Enough,” I snap, shadows whipping themselves against the floor at the tone in my voice. Even now, without my crown on, they’re responding to me—but in a way totally out of my control.

Aldrich startles at the display, and guilt twists. I understand why he’s saying all this, of course. But it’s so much more personal than he seems to understand.

It’s Saela we’re talking about, not some Siphon experiment.

Saela, whom I need to protect. Saela, whom I need to heal.

It’s my fault she’s like this in the first place.

Softening my tone and quelling the shadows, I continue, “Thank you for your counsel, Leader Aldrich, and for finding out all this information. Contrary to your belief, I think it would be best if Saela stays as close to me as possible, where she can be under constant supervision and where we can be alerted immediately if it feels like Killian is planning something.”

Aldrich nods tightly, then bows. “I understand, Your Highness. If that’s the case, then she needs to be somewhere that will limit her interactions with others and where we can keep an eye on her.”

Anassa speaks into my mind. “Bring Saela to our chambers. There is an additional bedroom attached, and I will watch over her. You can hold back Helene and Grigore from the front, as they know about her condition, and reassign them as watch. Cratos will speak to Stark about it.”

With this plan, Anassa can alert me right away if Saela’s control slips again. And beyond that, she can keep her fed when her hunger returns.

There’s something else there, too. Something warm and gentle. Anassa wants to watch over Saela.

We are family, the three of us.

I tell Leader Aldrich the plan and then say, “Please keep researching. I’m so grateful for everything you’ve done for us so far. I just… I need a cure. We need to find it.”

He flashes me a sad smile and then bows, departing the dungeons.

“Saela,” I say softly. She doesn’t look up at me. “Would you want to stay in my chambers?”

Saela’s gaze is vacant. Empty. The circles under her eyes darken when she weakly lifts her shoulders in a shrug. She’s tearing my heart out, but I don’t let it show. I don’t want Saela to know how afraid I am.

I’ll be strong for both of us. I always have been.

My mind returns to Saela over and over again throughout the course of the day. She’s with me through every task, an incessant hum.

Venna takes me to see the palace blacksmith while Saela settles into my quarters. He looks at my engagement bracelet and tries to get it off, but it once again tightens painfully on my wrist, cutting off my circulation. The blacksmith shakes his head, telling us he knows no magic like it.

And the Dire Blade? “This is no human-forged metal I’ve ever seen.” Ominous and totally fucking unhelpful.

At least the blacksmith provides me with a new sword to use in its place. Nothing as flashy as the Dire Blade, of course, or as laden with meaning… but it’s the perfect size for my frame and has better balance than my practice sword from the Trials.

Venna promises to dig into some Kryptos connections and keep looking for answers.

And I think—research, Saela would love that.

But, of course, my sister can’t help.

After, Stark marches me out to the courtyard to say goodbye to the newly Bonded forces deploying to the war front. I give them some completely milquetoast, barely rousing speech about bravery and war and duty.

And I think—Saela could have helped me figure out what to say.

She was always better with words than me. Will she ever use those skills again? Will she get to finish the education she so deserves?

Eventually, I end up back at my new chambers. Grigore and his large black direwolf are stationed outside the rooms, a minor comfort. He and Helene will split the days, with Anassa, Cratos, and Stark filling in when they can.

The attendants in my chambers will be instructed to keep away from her door. The official excuse is that Saela is ill from her months in captivity.

I murmur a greeting to Grigore and then head through my living area and into Saela’s room. It’s been stocked with books already—did Stark do that? The hearth is blazing. And she’s wrapped up in blankets on her bed, her back to the door.

She doesn’t stir when I sit down on the bed. Either she’s asleep or just pretending to be. My heart tears at the thought. I reach out a tentative hand and stroke her long brown hair—so similar to how mine used to look.

Everything has changed since my hair looked that way.

And still—this is what matters the most.

“I’m going to fix you, Sae,” I whisper.

Which one of us am I trying to convince?

8

STARK

If someone told me I’d one day lose sleep to keep a Siphon safe from harm, I’d have laughed in their face. And then probably snapped their neck for good measure because they were too stupid to live.

Yet, here I am, seated on the uncomfortable stone tile of the hallway, doing exactly that.

It’s only been a quarter of an hour or so since I relieved Grigore of his guard duty, taking his place outside Meryn’s chambers to ensure that nobody unwelcome goes in… and that Saela doesn’t come out for a midnight snack.

Cratos is curled up next to me, his pose lazy but his green eyes sharp and ready for action. He and I have been mentally reviewing the day’s events, talking through what must be done in the morning—specifically, the things we’ll be expected to help out with before the coronation.

With the newly Bonded finally departed for the front, it will be quiet around here tomorrow.

It was strange, watching them leave and not going with them. I’ve been away from the front—and from the rest of the Daemos pack—for far too long. Thankfully, my Beta is seasoned and stays in constant communication.

But somehow, even though I spent the past four months waiting impatiently for Meryn to get it the fuck together and reclaim her crown, I always assumed I’d head back to active duty.

Hanging my head, I take a deep breath, then crack my neck. An itchiness builds inside me. I don’t do well with sitting around or with feeling like I’m not in charge, and the past few months have been too much of both.

It’s enough to make a man lose control.

A soft, feminine cough comes from somewhere inside the room behind me, and I clench my jaw. If she’s not careful, I just might lose control on her.

Last night, when she had that dream, Cratos opened himself back up to me, that asshole. I felt her agony as if it were happening to me, too, and I’ve never moved through the halls so fast, desperate to just make it end.

And then there she was.

In a fucking silk nightgown hitched up to her hips, her nipples hard through the thin fabric, and that horrible mate bond on full blast. I slid a hand down her arm to wake her up and so nearly lost it, marveling in the sensation of her soft skin.

She let out a mewling moan at my touch, and it took every inch of my control to not keep going, to see what other sounds I could strum out of her with my hands.

Thankfully, she opened her eyes and lied to my face. Whatever was happening, it was far more than some bad dream, and I could tell. The lie was a splash of ice water on a freezing day.

By the time Cratos brought the shield back down, I got a good hard look at the utter pigpen she created out of her room in a matter of hours.

Who lives like that?

My disgust shook me out of any last lingering, insensible attraction.

I don’t know what I’m going to do about Meryn Sturmfrost. But since ripping her clothes off and bending her over the breakfast table isn’t a viable option, I might throw her irritating ass out a window the next time she tries my patience.

My head snaps up at the click of boots approaching from down the hall. The hour is late enough that anyone not on duty should be in bed. Cratos jumps to his paws, ready for anything.

Then the person turns the corner and comes into view. I groan internally as her face comes into focus—the Sovereign Alpha. Siegrid.

My mother.

Their traveling party must have just arrived.

She’s as immaculately turned out as always, her graying brown hair pulled back tightly into a knot at the top of her neck that’s both elegant and practical. She wears her formal uniform, and her ornate leathers are polished and gleaming from the pads at her shoulders down to the tips of her boots.

Siegrid’s skin is nearly the same shade of brown as mine, a light chestnut color, and only the slightest touch of worry lines creases her forehead despite her many years in command, as if she can order even her own skin to stay in fine form.

Her eyes light in recognition as she approaches. “Alpha,” she says coolly, setting her bags down in the hall. Her towering, sleek black direwolf, Genicos, approaches Cratos, and the two of them sniff each other in greeting.

I nod back. “Sovereign Alpha.”

“Careful now, all this tenderness is going to make you soft,” quips Cratos, and I try not to scowl.

“Get out of my head, and shut the fuck up,” I retort irritably, and I hear the wolf version of a snickering laugh.

Siegrid lifts a hand to gesture at the door behind me. “Is there a reason you’re camped out in front of my rooms at this hour? Something you needed to tell me in person?”

Of course—she’s only just arrived and doesn’t know about the change in sleeping arrangements.

“Queen Meryn sleeps in this suite now,” I say shortly, then grudgingly add some explanation: “She was uncomfortable taking over King Cyril’s quarters, given all that passed between her and his family. I’m sure you understand.”

“Hmm,” Siegrid replies, her neutral tone as good as a loud condemnation. “The queen should be in chambers fit for a queen. It sends a message for her to assume her rightful place. But no matter. If Meryn doesn’t want those rooms, I’ll take them.”

Siegrid grabs her bags and spins on her heel, heading toward the king’s old suite with Genicos at her heel before I have a chance to reply.

Watching her walk away, there’s a tightness in my chest. She might be right. It may have been a better move for Meryn to take over the king’s rooms, comfort or no.

Either way, I immediately wish we’d thought of another place for Siegrid to go, rather than installing the Sovereign Alpha in such a powerful position.

She’s powerful enough as it is.

Before she rounds the corner, Siegrid turns back and looks at me expectantly. “Alpha? You may as well come along. I’ll hear your report on the events of the past week. Since you’re here anyway.”

She’s higher ranked than I am. She’s always been higher ranked than I am. It still sets my teeth on edge the way she expects immediate obedience from everyone around her—but especially from me.

“Is there anything more heartwarming than a mother’s love?” Cratos’s amusement tips my annoyance over into resigned acceptance. He settles back down in front of the door.

“No, I should stay on guard with you here.”

“I think I can handle a rogue baby bloodsucker on my own. Go.”

Sighing, I stand and take off down the hall after Siegrid.

Thanks for the backup, Cratos.

Siegrid paces around the king’s lush chambers as I give her the rundown on events since Cyril’s death. She’s pulling portraits off the walls and piling them in a heap on the floor, rearranging the furniture to her liking.

It’s typical, Siegrid acting like she owns the place, and a familiar old resentment toward her starts to build in my chest. The world is not hers to control.

“Servants can deal with that in the morning,” she notes about the pile of dead king paintings as I wrap up my report.

She’s clearly assuming I’ll make the necessary arrangements. My teeth start to grind.

“What is your personal perspective on our new queen, since you’ve spent time training her?” Siegrid settles into a deep red armchair by the fireplace, finally coming to rest. She set one of her traveling bags on the chair directly across from her and makes no motion to move it so I can sit down, too.

Somehow I manage not to growl in frustration.

Classic Siegrid move, making me hunt for a way to put us on the same footing. I drag one of the spindly wooden chairs from the dining area over to sit across from her.

She’s tactical at all times. Often, I get the sense that she sees other people—me, especially—as nothing more than pieces to move around a strategy board. She would’ve made an excellent Strategos, if her astounding ruthlessness didn’t so clearly mark her as Daemos.

“Queen Meryn…” I consider what to share. I need to be honest, but I don’t want to give her too much, either. Siegrid is hard to trust. “She’s rough, vicious. She has a sharp tongue and only a bare minimum of self-control.”

And despite that, she has the potential to be a just and fair ruler, if I can keep her away from you.

Siegrid narrows her eyes, tipping her head back. “I know the type.”

If I’m vicious and rough, it’s only because that’s what she made me. But I ignore the cheap jab.

She reaches her arms above her head, knuckles cracking as she leans into the stretch. “Hmm. I suppose she’s young. Still…”

She pauses, thinking through something. It looks like she’s communicating with Genicos, although he’s seated in front of the fire, his eyes closed.

“Perhaps it’d be better to dispose of her and train the younger sister instead? We could do that if we wanted. The younger they are, the more you can mold them. Plus, the younger one’s been less in the public eye. We’d be more likely to create a persona from scratch, something that would go over well with the populace.”

Dispose of her? Violence tears through me at the suggestion, and I stand so quickly that my chair clatters to the floor. Before I can take so much as a step in her direction, though, the door to her chambers bursts open, wood splintering across the floor.

Cratos is crouched in an attack position, his fangs bared and dripping saliva. He lets out a fierce growling bark at Siegrid, who steps back, startled. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her this surprised before.

Good.

Genicos leaps to his paws, growls back, and lunges toward Cratos. The two start to wrestle, black fur flying as they nip at each other. They knock into a tea table, snapping it into pieces. Genicos is taller than Cratos, but my direwolf is thicker, more muscular.

Cratos pins Genicos, eyes wild, and clamps his jaw around the other wolf’s neck. Then he looks to Siegrid and lets out another low warning growl.

“What is the meaning of this?” Siegrid shouts shrilly. “Cratos, what are you doing!”

Her disheveled, shocked appearance is delightful. “You casually suggested killing his mate’s rider. He does not approve.”

If possible, her brows shoot even higher and her jaw drops open, just for a moment. Then she shuts her mouth, shakes her shoulders, and stands up straight again.

“My apologies, Cratos,” she says directly to my wolf. “I wasn’t aware, and I will change strategies. Your mate will not be harmed.”

Cratos gently gets off Genicos, who quickly butts him in the head and snarls, then retreats to the far side of the room. Still, I scoff.

Change strategies. Because that’s all she sees Meryn as: a strategy.

Heat creeps up my neck. I know only too well what happens to those Siegrid sees as a tool instead of as a person. After all, I’m her most carefully craftly instrument.

I might be worried about my own influence on Meryn, but the Sovereign Alpha would be so much worse.

Siegrid slides smoothly back down into her chair, and I right mine, sitting as well. “So Cratos is mated to Meryn’s direwolf, hmm? How interesting that you’ve neglected to tell me that piece of information.”

Cratos lies down at my side, his eyes still fixed on Siegrid as if waiting for another threat. Clearly, this is more important to him right now than guarding Saela, and I don’t blame him.

“Grigore,” I think, reaching out to my packmate. “Cratos had to leave his post, please get back on guard in front of the queen’s chambers immediately.”

Then I run a hand down Cratos’s back, trying to calm him. “Forgive me for thinking that the woman bonded to Cratos’s mate deserved to learn of it before anyone else. Since when have you taken an interest in my life, anyway?”

Siegrid’s face twists in a scowl, and for a second, it’s like looking in a mirror, which just makes me more on edge.

“You know this is bigger than just you,” she snipes. “She’s the queen, Stark. Were you aware that historically, the wolves of Sturmfrost Queens have always had mates? And that the riders are typically involved with each other?”

A chill runs through me. “No, I was not aware of that, since you keep so much information to yourself, Sovereign Alpha.”

She doesn’t blink at my harsh tone. “This is an excellent development. You should woo her.”

“I agree,” Cratos says.

My stomach bottoms out. The last thing I need is to spend more time in close proximity with Meryn.

“Like fuck I will,” I growl. “Are you out of your mind?”

Siegrid lifts a shoulder casually, as if making a suggestion for a paint color and not a romantic partner. “Why not? Your wolves are mated. You have an infamous reputation for your escapades at the front, so I’m well aware that you are not otherwise engaged. She’s powerful and relatively attractive. You could do worse.”

Meryn’s long, toned legs exposed to me in the moonlight. The full shape of her breasts under that nightgown. Her pert mouth that spews tart words but looks like it would taste so sweet.

Unfortunately, there’s nothing fucking relative about Meryn’s looks.

“You know, you would probably get to see her naked,” Cratos helpfully chimes in.

“One more word out of you and I’ll have you kenneled,” I toss back.

As attractive as the queen is, it’s a line I’m never going to cross.

What happened in the arena with her killing those Bonded… I caused that. I saw the moment she debated whether to use her powers, and the chaos inside me spoke up, egging her on, encouraging her.

When she took those lives, a dark thrill lit my veins—so much raw, unvarnished power. She should have every man groveling at her feet.

Our country needs her to be a steady leader, and I’d only corrupt her. The depraved parts of me long for it.

Siegrid just folds her hands onto her lap and frowns at me like I’m being the unreasonable one. “It makes good sense, and it would bring our family that much closer to control.”

And there’s that reminder again: Everything is about control with Siegrid.

I might be a bad influence on Meryn, but I need to keep Siegrid away from her at all costs. I’m a living record of the damage the Sovereign Alpha can wreak on a person in the name of seeking and retaining power. If she lays so much as a finger on the queen…

I stand abruptly and walk away, pacing throughout the room. If my body stops moving for even one moment, I’m going to punch the self-satisfied look off this woman’s face, and I really don’t think I should hit the person who birthed me.

“First of all,” I grit out as I pace, “I am not interested in wooing her. She’s made it very clear that she dislikes me, and I can assure you it’s mutual. She drives me mad, and spending more time than strictly necessary in her presence sounds like torture.”

“You don’t have to like someone to be with them,” Siegrid retorts. Unbelievable.

“Second,” I continue loudly, “even if I was interested, you are talking about a woman who had her heart savagely torn out mere days ago. She’s an absolute wreck.”

Siegrid sniffs. “Hearts heal. She will eventually have to marry. Do you want to suffer through your wolves’ mate bond while she marries someone else? The queen’s future marriage is a state matter. Whether or not you’re interested, our family will help her make those decisions.”

I say nothing, too livid to speak.

“Just continue to think about it, that’s all I ask, Alpha Stark.” She manages to make the title sound like an insult; her voice is sharp as a knife, but she can’t quite pierce me, not after all these years of building up my armor.

I can’t do this fucking dance with her anymore tonight. Looking at Cratos, I say, “Time for us to get back on guard duty.”

He stands, baring his teeth once more at Siegrid in a snarl. Then he whips his tail at her as he turns, slapping her in the leg, and saunters out the half-splintered door.

“By the way,” I say, pausing in the doorframe and looking casually over my shoulder at the Sovereign Alpha. “Meryn’s sister has been turned into a Siphon. The queen is keeping Saela in her chambers, and if you so much as cast either of them an untoward look, I’ll remove those scheming eyes from your head.”

I slam what remains of her door behind me as I leave.

9

MERYN

I’m on edge. The Sovereign Alpha arrived last night with her traveling party, and I’m due to welcome them to the castle with a dinner this evening. Which means I’ve spent the last hour getting ready with my new primary attendant, Brionna, who can barely look me in the eyes.

Apparently, the Castle Matron and I have differing opinions on what a “willing servant” looks like.

Maybe she can’t recognize true consent after so many years servicing the Valtieres.

After Brionna nearly drops the gilded brush for the fourth time, I turn to face her directly, and she jumps.

“You and the other castle staff have nothing to be afraid of, whatever you might have heard,” I tell her. “Until the past few months, I spent my entire life in the Eastern Quarter. My goal is to make life better for the common people.”

Brionna dips her head. “I’d heard that, Your Highness.”

Grimacing, I say, “Highness, huh? I’m not a Highness. Please, just call me Meryn.”

Her shoulders loosen. She blinks, easing up a little. “Okay… Meryn.”

I smile in relief. “That’s less awkward, isn’t it?”

Brionna nods and blushes a bit. Finally, she’s loosening up.

We chat while she works on my hair. She tells me she’s from the Central Quarter. We discover that Brionna went to the same school as Saela, about a decade earlier, which makes me happy and also leaves me with a sharp sting of grief.

Saela will never return to that school and very likely not to any other.

The crushing weight hits me again: the life I’d imagined for us both disappearing into thin air. Nothing but daydreams in the end.

Saela’s not even talking to me. It’s been only a day—a day locked in that room, not a dungeon cell but a prison all the same. Still, the ache of it is everywhere.

And I hate that I look at her and wonder… if Killian is in her head, too.

Aldrich and I spent all morning researching Siphon reversals and found nothing to show for it. Still, I can’t give up hope.

By the time my hair is done—two elegant braids wrapping together around the base of my skull, as close as we can get to an updo with my length—Brionna has relaxed. She doesn’t flinch any longer. And she places the crown of wolves on my head with something approaching reverence.

Power floods my veins, and I try not to flinch at the unfamiliar surge.

I’ll get used to it soon, I tell myself. To all of it: the magic and everything else.

A knock at the door alerts us that my friends have arrived. I told them they had to attend the dinner, too, as interim members of my Council Palast. Their first responsibility: shielding me from whatever weird power battle I’m about to engage in with the Sovereign Alpha.

Izabel’s eyes light up at the silver-blue tunic and dark suede trousers I’m wearing, an outfit Brionna picked out for me. “Ooh, pretty. Elegant but not soft. A perfect choice.”

Tomison grins toward Brionna, exposing his line of perfectly straight teeth. “Great job, new girl.”

Her entire face turns red. I try to imagine Tomison through her perspective—the rich auburn hair, the tall and toned stature, the confident look in his eye. He seduces people without even trying.

Izabel scoffs a little too hard. “Must you flirt with every woman you see?”

“Rude,” Tomison retorts immediately. “I’m not allowed to pay people compliments?”

Izabel crosses her arms over her chest and levels him with a snippy gaze. “If only I believed your intentions were so pure.”

Nevah groans, sidling over to me. She’s in a vivid yellow satin dress. “Can these two just fuck already? The bickering is getting tiresome.”

“Izabel loves lengthy, angry foreplay,” Venna jokes. Her twin turns toward her, sputtering in outrage, but Venna continues, “It’s time to go or we’ll be late.”

“Fine,” Izabel says tersely, sweeping past Venna and linking her arm with mine. She tugs me out the door, and I wave goodbye to Brionna. “What should we expect from this highly important royal gathering, anyway?”

We move down the echoey halls of the castle, and I wonder that myself.

The first time I met Siegrid Therion, the day she told me I was chosen as Strategos Alpha, I was a sweaty, nervous mess. She made me feel so small. Like I was a clumsy child who stumbled into something I didn’t understand.

It was true, sort of, but still…

She knew. Even before I did. She knew who I really was, and it seemed like she found me lacking.

I pull my shoulders back, channeling the energy I would bring to my pit fights. Our roles have changed.

I will not let her see me as weak or uncertain.

“I’m not sure,” I answer honestly. “Matron Alienor said this was just a welcome meal for the Sovereign Alpha and her party. But you know I didn’t exactly grow up attending fancy dinners. If I’m breaking some sort of Bonded or court protocol at any point, could you let me know?”

Venna pats me on the back as we walk. “We’re on it.”

When my friends and I enter the formal dining room, five people are already seated. Everyone stands in deference when they see me. There are only riders in here tonight; Anassa has taken the wolves of the traveling party out for a welcoming hunt.

Nothing says “glad to see you” like violently tearing apart prey together.

The Sovereign Alpha is the last to stand, of course, and she does so with a loud scrape of her chair that echoes through the room.

She wears a perfectly tailored deep green formal jacket with matching trousers. Her graying brown hair with its bloodred streak is pulled into a tight bun, and her expression is stern—although it probably always is.

Like mother, like son.

Her appearance declares to everyone: I’m powerful and in command here.

With a start, I realize that Sovereign Alpha Siegrid has seated herself at the head of the table. Maybe we riders are in for some violence tonight as well.

I swallow my immediate spark of resentment and say, “Welcome, everyone.”

Siegrid’s eyes dart to the crown I wear. At the sight of it, so long hidden, her nostrils flare and her eyes go slightly glassy. I have the sense this is a remarkable show of emotion from her.

Then Siegrid purses her lips and inclines her head.

“Queen Sturmfrost,” she says. “We came as soon as possible.” She turns, holding her palm toward those accompanying her. “Your Kryptos Alpha, Hannelore Woodward.”

On Siegrid’s left side is a flinty-eyed older woman with a blue streak in her hair. She’s shorter than Siegrid but matches her in severity.

“Your Phylax Alpha, Tormun Belrose.” He stands to Hannelore’s other side, a hulking man with round features, prominent eyebrows, and a tawny streak.

“And, of course, you know Egith.” My Strategos Beta, Egith, is to Siegrid’s right. She has deep brown skin and closely shorn dark hair with a hint of a silver streak.

Warmth fills me at the sight of the woman. Egith was tough on me as my instructor but never unreasonably so. In fact, given how resistant I was to becoming Bonded and accepting Anassa, she had remarkable patience. Our pack Gammas are in charge at the front while Egith is here, but we’ll both stay in contact with them.

“I’m really glad you could come,” I tell her.

She nods, her dark eyes glinting with amusement. “Of course, I had to witness the incredible transformation of my misfit commoner Rawbond into our long-lost queen.”

Standing next to Egith is a woman I don’t recognize, and her presence briefly paralyzes me.

She’s probably the most stunningly beautiful person I’ve ever seen.

The woman has porcelain skin and curly, thick, vibrantly red hair. It’s a color I’ve never seen in nature, and it seems to almost shimmer in the candlelight of the room. Her nose is pert, framed by glittering emerald-green eyes, and her lips are full.

Even though she looks like she might be shorter than me, her proportions are wild. Everything about her is long. Her legs. Her lashes. Her slender neck. I’ve never seen the word elegant embodied so wholly in a person before.

My eyes catch on the tawny streak in her hair. Phylax, then. I wonder why she’s here. Is she a Beta?

Whoever she is, she’s mesmerizing.

As if reading my thoughts, Siegrid continues, “This is Noemi, the daughter of Lord Eisenfall.”

“Oh, you’re a noble?” My brow furrows in confusion. I didn’t realize nobles let their children become Bonded.

“Half noble,” Noemi corrects with a polite smile. “My mother was Bonded.”

That explains the height, then—she’s not as tall as the average Bonded woman.

“Noemi will act as your diplomatic envoy,” Siegrid continues, “and will make contact with the fiefdoms to encourage the nobles to attend.”

The threat in her voice is obvious. Noemi won’t be visiting to deliver polite invitations. Her encouragement won’t leave room for refusal.

I gesture to my friends. “Egith is familiar with these four, but I’ve retained Izabel and Venna Brooks, Tomison Thorne, and Nevah Rivenson. They will serve as interim members of my Council Palast until I have fully settled into my role here and we’ve selected suitable permanent members.”

Siegrid makes a hmm-ing noise that’s hard to parse. Disapproval, I’d guess. “And I’ve heard your other interim Council member is a commoner?”

Is that going to be a problem? “Yes, Igor. He was my neighbor in the Eastern Quarter and is like family. I trust him more than anyone else I know.”

Siegrid stares at me for a long beat, and I know she’s heard the undertones to that statement. I trust him more than you, so don’t fucking question his appointment.

“Understood, Your Highness. It’s good to have a Council whose advice you’ll follow.” It’s said in a pleasant tone, but there’s a dig there, too.

Because we all know you’re bad at following advice.

The five of us move to empty chairs, and I take the seat of power, directly across from Siegrid.

As all sit down, the door to the dining room slams open. I startle and raise my gaze.

Stark enters, his familiar, powerful stride wrapped up in formal clothing, and all the air in the room seems to evaporate.

He’s in a dark jacket, because of course he is. The soft fabric makes his dark eyes look harder, sharper. The long column of his golden-brown neck is uncovered, exposing his many kill marks.

And two thoughts instantly pop into my head: Dangerous. Delicious.

My breath hitches. Audibly. In a room full of important people.

What the fuck is wrong with me?

I stifle my reaction, covering it up, focusing intently on my facial muscles so they won’t betray whatever is happening in my out-of-control brain to the rest of the room.

Noemi has no such constraints. She turns, sees him, gasps, and leaps to her feet.

“Valstark!” she shouts.

She throws herself at him, into his arms, and I instinctively recoil. Who is she? A friend? A… paramour?

The thought makes me weirdly uncomfortable.

Sudden flashes of memory hit me: Stark’s tongue on my neck. His teeth on my arm. The heat of his body next to me in the bed in Linsfall.

Unfortunately, it’s entirely too easy to imagine him in the position of someone’s lover, and goddess knows the Bonded are casual about sex.

I swallow, trying not to blush.

Stark’s arms come up and close around Noemi, and it looks almost protective. Then his eyes meet mine over her shoulder.

I lean an elbow on the table and mouth, Valstark?

He scowls at me in response, pulling away from her gently. He tucks one of those long, gorgeous, shimmering locks of hair behind her ear. It’s intimate enough that I look away, feeling like an intruder.

Yeah, they’re probably lovers. People this beautiful belong together.

I can control my facial muscles, but I’ve failed at controlling my blood. My cheeks are hot.

“Hi, Mimi,” Stark tells her, his voice a low and rasping rumble. There’s genuine affection there, the sort I think I’ve only ever sensed from him when he’s with Cratos. “I’ve missed you.”

So. That’s quaint. They have pet names for each other.

I really don’t understand why this is bothering me so much. It’s Stark. We’re nothing to each other beyond protector and queen.

Does it have something to do with the mate bond? Perhaps Anassa and Cratos’s connection will always mean it’s uncomfortable to see Stark with another woman, to think of him as intimate with someone.

Anassa must have heard me think her name, because her presence lights up in my mind. “No,” she says with amusement. “I told you; I am fully shielding you from my love toward Cratos. This petty jealousy is all of your own making.”

It’s hard not to scowl. “Who is she?”

And Anassa, the bitch, just replies, “Someone important to him.”

“Choke on an elk bone.”

Stark folds his huge body—I swear the jacket’s seams almost burst when he pulls his seat out—into the chair beside Noemi’s. Immediately, Noemi leans closer to him, her graceful arms draped over the armrest. He leans in, too.

As servants bring out the first course, their heads remain bent together in quiet conversation I can’t quite hear.

I ignore the strange lump in my throat and focus on chatting with Nevah and Izabel instead.

Jealousy, Anassa said. As irrational as it is, I think she might be right.

But it’s so… stupid. I only just escaped a disastrous relationship. I don’t have room to think of other men. The last damn thing I need is to develop something for a person whose wolf just happens to be mated to mine.

Someone who I don’t even like.

Besides, I don’t think I’d ever trust that my feelings were truly my own and not just my mind accommodating the entanglement of our wolves.

Bonds getting knotted up and manipulating me the same way…

Just, not again.

I’ve almost tricked myself into believing this, and then Noemi touches Stark’s arm. She says something quietly, and he smiles.

Oh, fuck, he smiles. It’s a real smile. A face-splitting, sun-coming-out, unreserved smile that makes him look younger. I’ve never seen him smile like that. I didn’t know he could smile like that.

Siegrid clears her throat pointedly, and the smile slips from Stark’s face as he looks toward his mother.

“We have much to discuss, so forgive me for jumping directly to serious matters,” Siegrid says. “I have been discussing the Killian Valtiere situation with my Alphas.”

I bristle. I am one of the Alphas. And I’m the queen. So why was I not involved in the conversation?

Does she not trust my judgment when it comes to him?

Siegrid continues, “It has been decided that Phylax Alpha Tormun will be tasked with leading a specialized hunting party to track down the former prince and eradicate him. They will head out as soon as possible.”

I have so many questions.

“We’ve already received intelligence suggesting that Killian is establishing a base in a western fiefdom. We have yet to—”

“If you’re going after him, I’m coming with,” I interject, the words coming out of my mouth before I can think too hard about them.

He’s mine. Mine to hunt. Mine to kill. I won’t let anyone take that from me.

Siegrid takes a casual sip of her emberwine. “Absolutely not.”

“With all due respect,” I say, “Killian is unlike any threat you’ve faced before. He has access to my magic. You’ve experienced for yourself that he can access our pack communications. Alistair Brightbane, an ancient and unknowably powerful Siphon, is inhabiting his body. And, as you know, this is personal for me. I need to do this myself. Moreover, you need me—I’m the only one whose powers might match his own.”

“With all due respect,” Siegrid throws back at me, “Your Highness, we are dealing with a single Siphon, not an army. I have been fighting Siphons since before you were born, and you have been a queen for less than a week. You have not even been Bonded for half a year.”

“You are underestimating him, and it’s a mistake,” I shoot back.

“You are wrong, as you know very little about war,” she seethes. “And at this moment in time, you have one job and one job alone—attending your own coronation and officially being named queen of Nocturna. If you fail at something as simple as that, you do not deserve the title.”

Her words hit me like a slap and leave me stinging.

The entire table is silent as we glare at each other.

“Your Highness,” Alpha Tormun says with significantly less condescension, finally breaking the standstill. “I’ll get the job done.” His smile is warm as he lifts his massive, tattooed arms and flexes above the table. “I’ve killed more Siphons than nearly any Bonded warrior in history.”

Stark lets out a small scoff, and I get the sense this is an accolade he and Tormun argue over.

Tormun seems kind, but he’s backing Siegrid. Dismissing my concerns. Dismissing me.

The shadows around the room start to stir, and I watch Siegrid notice it in her periphery. Her lips thin.

The only thing I’ve ever been good at is taking action. Being left behind is wretched.

Is this how it’s going to be from now on? Am I to become a figurehead? Sequestered away in the palace, taking direction from my Sovereign Alpha?

“There is a time and a place for you to be involved,” Siegrid says, her voice gentler, trying to coax me into a calmer place. I know what she’s doing; she wants to avoid an uncontrollable explosion of my power. “But it cannot happen until after you’re crowned.”

Taking a deep breath, I tap into some of those Strategos instincts. Use my ability to think instead of my ability to react.

I don’t want to give in so easily. He’s mine. I won’t rest easy until I know how red his blood can run.

But I’m their queen. I don’t have to accept this without concessions.

“Very well.” I keep my spine straight and my head high. “I defer to your expertise, Sovereign Alpha. However, I know Killian and his abilities the best out of everyone, so I will brief Alpha Tormun before he departs. And I would like him brought here so I can execute him myself.”

Siegrid accepts with a slight nod of approval.

Compromise. What a beautiful thing.

“Moving on,” Siegrid says firmly. “Preparations will begin immediately for your impending coronation. I propose it takes place in three weeks’ time.”

I try not to drop my fork in surprise. That seems awfully fast, although I’m sure the sooner we lay claim, the better. “Three weeks? Can we… do that?”

Siegrid straightens, as if offended that I would question her ability to do anything. “Obviously.”

“Okay, then. Let’s get coronating!” My joking tone falls flat with this crowd. I clear my throat and then gesture to Izabel, who lives for this shit. “I’d like Izabel to be involved with the planning.”

Her grin spreads ear to ear, and I instantly wonder if I’ll regret this choice. “Yes, please. Put me to work, Sovereign Alpha!”

Siegrid shrugs. “Fine.” Her eyes slide over to Venna. “You too?”

Venna’s mouth turns down, and she narrows her eyes. “I’ll pass.”

“Venna is busy with other tasks,” I add. Like finding out how to get this stupid fucking shackle off my wrist so my magic is no longer manipulated.

“The Mother Priestess from the Sect of the Faceless Goddess has traveled with us here to Sturmfrost,” Siegrid continues. “You will need to meet with her once or twice before the ceremony to prepare. She’s staying with the order in the commoner side of the city, but she’ll come to the castle for your meetings.”

I nod. “Anything else we need to prepare for?”

“The nobles. The coronation cannot happen without the majority of them in attendance. After all, if no one attends the ceremony, is it even legitimate? As mentioned, Noemi will travel to the seven fiefdoms over the next three weeks and secure noble attendance. Since she is one of them herself, the nobles should accept her overtures.”

Noemi smiles at this, blushing prettily. Everything she does is pretty. Stark’s barely taken his eyes off her since he sat down, so he’s surely aware.

And that ugly seed of jealousy is back again, coupled with a spiteful voice that says, Good, get the fuck out of my city. Am I jealous of his relationship with her or just… her? Her looks and her grace and her effortlessness?

I might be wearing the crown, but she looks more the part.

“Stark will accompany Noemi on this diplomatic mission,” Siegrid continues.

And my stomach drops to the floor.

Well, that answers that question at least. I am most definitely jealous of their relationship. The idea of the two of them out on the road together, sleeping under the stars…

Stark’s head snaps up toward his mother, his glower burning enough to singe. “I was not made aware of this.”

Siegrid shrugs. “It’s been decided,” she says coolly. “You’re a necessary component of this strategy.”

The two of them stare each other down so viciously that I start to grow uncomfortable. Surely this is worse than Siegrid’s and my glaring match. I know the Sovereign Alpha is also his superior, but is this seriously what his relationship is like with his mother?

The frost between them bites as hard as the worst of winter.

Eventually, Siegrid shifts her attention away from him and back to me, as if deciding that his opinions about this don’t matter.

“Stark’s reputation makes him particularly persuasive in these matters. Certain nobles may hesitate to pledge allegiance to a new queen, but none would dare refuse the Daemos Alpha’s… invitation.”

I glance over to him, only to discover that Noemi’s put her hand on his arm and is stroking it lightly, as if trying to calm him down. It seems to be working; he’s settled back in his seat, brutally stabbing at the meat on his plate but no longer murdering his mother with his eyes.

“If he can be spared here,” I say, “then—”

“He can,” Siegrid interrupts, her tone brooking no room for argument. “As I said, it’s been decided.”

I spend the rest of the dinner living with the unsettling feeling that despite being queen, I am very much not in charge of anything.

After the meal ends, I find Anassa in my chambers, curled up in front of Saela’s door. “Has she fed again?” I ask her quietly.

“No need yet,” Anassa replies.

I open the door silently and duck my head inside. The room is dark. Saela is fast asleep, curled on her side in a tiny ball as she used to do when she was a smaller child.

Asleep, she looks almost herself—a normal girl of eleven without the weight of unimaginable trauma on her shoulders.

I kneel beside her bed and slowly brush a strand of hair from her face, careful not to wake her. When she opens her eyes, the weight will fall on her again. I know that. But for now, her face is relaxed and her expression peaceful.

Hopefully, that peaceful expression means she’s not trapped in some shadow realm with Killian while she sleeps, or otherwise being manipulated by her Siphon sire.

I sigh and settle my chin on the edge of the mattress. I watch her slowly breathe. When Saela’s fingers twitch in her sleep, I fight not to cry.

A soft knock on the external door has me sitting up. “Anassa?”

She responds without words; she left for the woods again and can’t tell me who’s at my door. I look back to Saela for another long moment, soaking in the quiet, then I stand, leaving Saela’s room and locking her in.

The knock comes again moments before I answer it.

And when I pull it open, Valstark is standing there.

He’s still wearing his formal wear, except it looks like some of his wildness is starting to tear free from it. His jacket is unbuttoned, as are the top buttons of his shirt, revealing more runic ink. His cuffs are undone. His once neatly arranged hair looks like he’s dragged his fingers through it a few times now.

Or maybe Noemi did, says that wretched jealous voice.

Before I can question why my heart is beating so loud or if he can hear it, Stark lifts his hand to show me the tattoo pen he’s carrying.

“You need your marks for the Bonded you killed in the arena,” he says plainly.

His words hit me like a splash of cold water in the face. Fuck.

It’s not that I’ve forgotten what I did.

How I entirely lost control in front of everyone, how I effortlessly killed so many of the Bonded who had just graduated the Trials. But between Saela, the Sovereign Alpha’s arrival, and my nightmares, it’s been easy to ignore my own vicious, ruinous mistakes.

I took those lives, and it’s my job to remember them.

I step aside. Stark doesn’t look at me as he enters my chambers. I listen to the gentle tap of the ink bottle as he sets it down on the low table next to the chaise. My chambers are still dark. Quiet.

And the two of us are excruciatingly alone.

10

MERYN

I desperately need to move my body so I don’t fall apart thinking about the Bonded I’ve killed. Or the tattoo I’m about to receive—and the way my skin might feel when Stark licks it.

My face flushes. The last time he tattooed me, when we were at the war camp in Grunfall… something almost happened between us, even though I was with Killian, even though I was sure I hated Stark. And that was when we were in a tent, with other soldiers on the other side of the thin canvas.

Busying myself, I grab a matchbook and light candles and oil lamps around the living area until there’s enough light for us both to see clearly.

“Where’s Anassa?” Stark asks, still not looking at me.

“In the woods.”

He nods toward Saela’s room. “And—”

“She’s asleep.”

Stark gestures toward the room before him, now obvious in its disarray. His upper lip curls in disgust. “What is this?”

It’s not just my bedroom that looks like an avalanche of things has collapsed on it. The living area is covered in clutter.

All the outfits Brionna had me try on are scattered over the furniture. Used tumblers of water sit on at least four surfaces. There’s a half-eaten plate of fruit on the dining table from this morning that is emitting a slightly rotten sweet smell. A pile of books on the floor must’ve toppled over at one point and is now just… a mess of books, I guess we’d call it.

“What do you mean?” I ask innocently.

He steps closer to me, a dangerous, quiet rage alighting in his gaze. “I noticed this in your bedroom the other night, too. Are the servants refusing to attend to you? That is not acceptable. I’ll speak to Matron Alienor immediately and—”

I hold out a hand. “Stop. I appreciate all the, uh, angry energy you’re willing to toss around on my behalf, but I do have a primary attendant now.”

He looks back at the room in confusion. “She needs to be replaced, then.”

“I told her to leave the stuff,” I tell him. “It’s a disaster and I caused it, so it’s weird having her clean it up. I’ll do it myself. Eventually.”

Stark huffs, a vicious blast of air. “That is her job, Meryn. She is paid to clean it up. Are you truly comfortable living like this?”

I shrug. “I’m not used to having this many things. It’s kind of nice.”

“I’m sorry, but that’s disgusting.” He scowls deeply at me, and I realize he’s used to getting what he wants with this look. It’s the warning rumble of thunder before the sky splits violently apart. “Clean up your fucking mess, princess.”

“What happened to ‘my queen’?” I ask, bristling at his commanding tone.

“Act like a filthy little princess and get treated like one, Your Highness.”

My eyes widen, and heat, needy and insistent, pulses through me. I cough and look away, hoping he didn’t see the absolutely ridiculous effect his bossy words had on me.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I say mildly, a more than casual curiosity starting to build. Just how would Alpha Stark treat a filthy little princess? Noemi could probably tell me. Goddess, this is not what I should be focusing on. There’s a reason he’s here. “Anyway, the tattoos?”

“There isn’t much precedent for this type of marking,” he tells me, and gestures to the ink. Thank fuck, he’s letting me forget any of that happened. “Bonded rarely kill their own outside of training, so you can choose where you want them placed.”

The words spin me back into the gravity of the situation.

Bonded shouldn’t kill their own outside of training. It’s not what we do.

Only someone horrible would kill one of their own—never mind a dozen.

“It can be anywhere,” he says, interrupting my spiraling guilt like he saw it happening in my head and spoke to shut me up.

I swallow, thinking. “My ribs, then.”

Near my heart. So that if someone were to kill me the way I killed Henrey, they’d have to push their blade through the designs. It will be a permanent reminder of the pain I caused and how badly I need to control my power.

Stark doesn’t move, and I realize he’s waiting for me.

Jerkily, I reach up to untie the silk knots at my hips, then I pull my tunic from my shoulders. The undershirt beneath doesn’t provide much warmth, and the cool air nips at my bare skin.

Stark takes off his jacket and rolls up his shirtsleeves, exposing his muscular forearms. The veins beneath his tattoos flex as he moves, and suddenly it’s entirely too much like we’re undressing for each other.

I look away.

Stepping to the chaise, I shove some of the clothes off it and onto the floor, ignoring the disapproving way his eyes track the movement. Then I sit and curl my fingers under the thin fabric of my undershirt.

I pull it up to just under my breasts, exposing the area where I want the needle. When I look up, Stark’s still standing there, not moving, staring at me.

“Stark,” I say. I sound calm, but the air in the room is suddenly thinner.

He turns and picks up the ink. “Your clothes may chafe,” he tells me in a level voice. “When we’re done, keep it bandaged until it heals.”

When his dark eyes land on me, tingles race along my arms and my exposed side. He kneels beside me, gaze unyielding. “Lie down. It will be easier that way.”

“Bet you say that to all the girls,” I crack, and then my traitorous mind goes instantly to Noemi and imagines the two of them tangled up in all sorts of positions.

He doesn’t respond, and I realize his eyes are locked on my exposed expanse of skin.

After that, I can’t find words. Or maybe I could, and I just don’t want to.

His tattoos flex around his fingers as he methodically readies the pen.

One of his calloused hands slides forward on my stomach, and I stop breathing entirely. The warmth of his palm presses into me, holding me steady. I haven’t been touched like this, skin on skin, since Killian. I thought I would find the sensation repulsive after everything.

Instead, it soothes me. Heals something deep inside.

I meet his eyes, and it feels like a lightning strike through my body. Quickly, I avert my gaze, desperate to stop the blush spreading across my cheeks.

Stark frees me from this torture by pressing the needle into my skin.

The bite is a welcome relief from the turmoil in my head, the reminder of why I’m getting these tattoos in the first place. Normally, I’d lean into it, let the physical pain ground me in my body. Free me from the chaos thriving inside my head.

But then I remember his words from the other day. “Hit me. Hurt me.”

And I know that using one type of pain to cope with another probably isn’t the answer.

So I take a deep breath and try to let myself experience… all of it. The sting of the tattoo. The crushing guilt. This bizarre, unwelcome draw to Stark and the jealousy it provokes, and my still-broken heart, and my twisting confusion.

The storm of feeling rages through me, and I embrace it. It aches inside me, pressing on my heart, my lungs. His presence is crushing in its intensity.

I breathe through it.

Eventually, my heart rate lowers.

“When are you leaving?” I ask quietly. I try for casual, but he’s so close to me. It comes out shaky.

Stark pauses and wipes at his work with a clean cloth, then the needle starts again. “The Sovereign Alpha wants us to leave tomorrow morning.” His jaw tenses underneath his dark scruff, and for a moment, I think he’s going to say something more. But he doesn’t.

It’s maddening. This whole thing is maddening.

I don’t want him to go, I realize. And it’s not just about all this disorienting… whatever. His presence makes me feel safer.

Lately, it’s as if I’m standing on a frozen pond, just waiting for the ice to give out. Stark is a hand offering to pull me back to shore.

“Stop moving,” he says in a slightly raspy voice. I try, but my chest hurts almost as much as my ribs.

While he focuses on what he’s doing, I focus on him.

The flick of his eyelashes as his gaze darts over his work. The strong line of his stubble-covered jaw and the hidden scar I see for just a second when he turns his head. The slight crinkle at the corners of his eyes as he squints to lay down the finer lines.

His hands are gentle despite their size and strength—despite what they’ve done—and I can’t shake the idea that there are depths to him I haven’t seen. That maybe no one’s seen.

Well, no one except perhaps Noemi.

The tap of the ink bottle returning to the table jars me from my thoughts. He’s finished. For a long moment, I consider asking him to continue, just to keep his hands near my skin.

I’m losing my mind.

I blink rapidly and twist slightly to see what he’s done.

It’s a beautiful series of interlocking runes, incorporating a bit of each of the four pack symbols. Without counting, I know there will be twelve lines, one for each of the lives I took. It’s unfair that he made something horrific look so lovely on my body.

Stark’s hand is suddenly on the bend of my waist, and my stomach swoops. His fingers press lightly into my skin, pricks of searing heat. He holds me still and leans forward.

So much for my lowered heart rate.

Then he dips his head and opens his mouth. His breath heats my skin, oversensitive from the needle.

And his tongue is on me. Over my ribs, below my heart, so close to my now-aching breasts. He drags it in long paths over the markings, and I hold my breath to stop my audible reaction.

Just when I think he’s going to stop, he traces the entire thing again. His tongue presses into me harder this time, like he’s devouring me. Like he’s ravenous for the taste.

When he finally sits up, I’m half delirious. His eyes open and meet mine.

I can’t move for a long moment. Or breathe. Or blink. The entire room falls away. There is no Killian. There is no coronation. There is no rebellion.

There’s just Stark.

My hand moves of its own accord to the edge of his jaw. I trace the rasp of stubble, then smooth scar tissue hidden there. My lips part.

He’s breathing heavily now, too.

I’m not in control as my fingertips trace up the side of his face to his cheekbone, his temple. They sink into his thick, dark hair. My body lights up with sensation. His hair is soft, and his breath is on the inside of my wrist as my fingers tease the locks apart.

I tighten my grip in his hair. He leans almost imperceptibly closer to me.

Every inch remaining between us is a living, electric thing. I can feel the slightest twitch of his muscles, see the smallest changes in his face.

His eyes lock onto mine, and there’s a strange burning in their depths, like a fire that’s been raging for eons. His breath stills, and my eyes go to his mouth.

Arousal sears through me.

It feels like we’re each daring the other to close the distance. Do I have the courage to do it?

11

MERYN

Before I can coax my brain into deciding one way or another, Stark turns away from me and stands. The electricity fizzles out. My hand slips from his hair as he goes.

It hurts. More than it should, honestly. If that had gone any further, it would have been a mistake.

I don’t have a heart left to give, and Stark does not seem like the type to settle for pieces of a person. He’s controlled and demanding. He’d want it all.

Plus, it seems very likely that he has someone already.

I sit up, wincing. His body is rigid, his back to me as I pull my shirt down over my fresh tattoos. It’s silent between us again. He reaches up and smooths his hand over his hair, right where I touched him, as if to erase the evidence.

I chew my lip. Did I imagine that light in his eyes? Am I seeing things now, mind muddled by the mate bond between Anassa and Cratos?

“Be safe,” I say to the wall. “On your travels… with Noemi.”

The last part comes out more biting than I intended. Now is not the right time to question him about their relationship, but curiosity is eating me alive.

Stark turns halfway back toward me, his face an unreadable mask. “If I could avoid leaving, I would. It’s…” He lets out a frustrated grunt.

“What?” I push.

His eyes rise to mine, and there’s pain in his dark gaze. “My duty is protecting you, Meryn. It feels shitty to leave you here. But getting the nobles to agree to come and legitimize your claim, that’s a way of protecting you, too.”

I blink, a little surprised that our relationship would cause him anything but exasperation and annoyance. My mouth goes dry as we stare at each other for a too long, weirdly heated moment. I can hear my heartbeat pounding in my ears.

He breaks it by saying, “Be careful around the Sovereign Alpha, okay? She’s always in service of her own ends.”

Seriously, what is their deal? It seems like he loathes his mother. But we don’t have time to talk childhood trauma tonight, nor do I think he’d welcome it openly, so I just nod.

He turns, and over his shoulder, he says, “Have a good night.”

I thud back onto the chaise. The sound of the door shutting echoes in my ears. There’s something wrong with you, my brain hisses.

I reach out to Anassa, to distract myself with that closeness that we’re just starting to cultivate. “Where are you?”

Our minds connect for mere moments before I yank myself away in embarrassment. Of course, she and Cratos would be saying their goodbyes, with him also heading out in the morning.

But dear goddess, I do not need to see that.

I reinforce the emotional wall between us that we use to keep out the mate bond. Maybe their private time was leaking through. Maybe that’s why I can’t shake the phantom sensation of Stark’s hot tongue tracing my ribs.

If only I believed that with any conviction.

In the morning, I fill Phylax Alpha Tormun in on everything I know about Killian and Alistair’s powers before he departs for his hunt. Then Siegrid summons me.

Summons. To the royal chambers, where she’s made herself comfortable. As if she were the queen.

I try not to chafe at that; after all, I stole her rooms first, and I don’t want anything to do with these ones. But as I reach up and knock on the door, I once again have the sense that I’m not really in charge here.

She opens the door quickly. “Come inside.”

Siegrid leaves the doorway. I step through and shut the door behind me, watching her stride across the room. She really does move like she owns the air around her.

Then, for the first time, I take in what are supposed to be my rooms.

The royal chambers are atrocious. Sure, some people might use other words to describe them. Elegant. Opulent. Glittering. Regal. But in my eyes, they’re an unnecessary extravagance.

Precious metals are everywhere. The furniture is all spindly and delicate-looking. Whoever crafted the chairs set up along the round table to my right clearly sacrificed comfort for style. The bed I spot in the other room is massive and canopied, big enough for ten people.

The worst part is the walls. Animal heads are mounted. Trophies. Mostly stags and elk, but there’s a fox, too. All of them have been taxidermized with jewels for eyes.

“What a waste,” I grit out, my head buzzing with the injustice of it. While the commoners of Nocturna struggled to keep themselves fed, the king placed precious gems in the bodies of dead animals and hung them as art.

Siegrid glances over at the taxidermy. “I agree,” she says, “not to mention how horrifically ugly they are. What do you want to do about it?”

I startle at her words. She’s actually asking me what I want to do, instead of telling me her plan?

“Sell it all,” I tell her. “Start with anything unnecessary in these chambers, and then we’ll go room by room through the whole castle. Surely some nobles and merchants can afford the dead king’s castoffs. We’ll put the proceeds back into the communities that need it, starting here in Sturmfrost.”

Siegrid nods. “I’ll inform Matron Alienor.” She takes a seat at the table, which is laden with food, then gestures to her side. “Sit.”

And I’m back to taking orders.

Still, I do as she says. Siegrid leans a forearm on the table. The look she gives me is severe but not unkind.

“We have three weeks until the castle is swarming with nobles. Three weeks to mold you. We must start immediately. Alienor will continue to instruct you in court etiquette, while I train you on your new powers. How is your access to the Bonded communication channels?”

My head spins at what she just said. “Uh… not great. I’m able to reach everyone, as you saw when I informed them of my identity, but it took an enormous amount of energy. And I’m still not sure how to reach individuals outside of my pack.”

Siegrid picks up a grape and chews it, thinking.

Eventually, she says, “It takes training to understand how to manipulate the new flow of conversation and connection. A pack’s connection is a river. As their Alpha, you can speak down the river, and your voice will reach your entire pack. I think you understand this already.”

I nod.

“As queen, or as Sovereign Alpha, you and I have access to a veritable sea of connection. You can reach everyone. You can reach the rivers of the separate packs. You can reach the tributaries that represent each Bonded individual.”

“In theory,” I grumble.

“Oh, it’s complicated, of course. Distance is an obstacle, though the magic you possess can overcome any distance with enough focus, as you’re already aware. Additionally, while you can reach any Bonded, they cannot reach you unless you initiate contact first. You alone can open the channel, and you alone can close it.”

“The exception being the mate bond,” I muse.

Siegrid gives me a long, unreadable look. “Yes,” she says eventually, her tone uncharacteristically encouraging. “Perhaps Anassa has informed you of that already. If your wolf has a mate bond, which it appears yours does, you can reach the mate’s rider and they may reach you as well. You should make ample use of that uncommon connection.”

There’s a spark in her eyes that unsettles me.

Before I can parse it, Siegrid swallows another grape and leans back in her chair. “Individual will may be an obstacle as well. If someone doesn’t wish to speak with you, they are capable of erecting mental walls just as you might with your direwolf. Though, you may be able to overpower such boundaries.”

“I wouldn’t,” I say quietly.

Sigried doesn’t respond to that. “The only thing that will help you learn how to navigate the waters of communication is practice. Devotion to it. It is no fault of your own that you cannot manage the bonds as you are. You are weak.”

What a nice reminder that this woman is Stark’s mother.

“But you think I can change that.” I hope?

“Any muscle can be strengthened. We’ll work on this in our sessions together. You also need to practice your powers, as you now can harness the magic of any pack.”

I blink in surprise. “I can? Are you sure?”

Siegrid presses her lips together, as if frustrated by how little I know. “Of course. From what we know of the Sturmfrost Queens, you are the conduit of all Bonded pack powers. Have you noticed that everyone’s powers have strengthened now that you’ve reclaimed your place?”

It was apparent during the battle in the arena—the way that Kryptos woman went totally invisible, the unusual strength from the Daemos boy, the way Stark pulled down an entire archway—but I didn’t realize why it was happening until just now.

I let out a shaky breath. “Okay, so, what does being the conduit mean?”

She lifts a shoulder. “You have the same abilities as each of the packs, but heightened beyond what anyone else is capable of. You already know how to use the basic Strategos powers of foresight and strategy, but now you can extend the foresight and see further into the future. It’s a skill unique to you as the queen.”

Surprised, I laugh. “I can see the future?”

“Sort of,” Siegrid says. “When you’re on the battlefield and the pack is working together, the foresight is always accurate—many minds looking into near events. Alone, you can extend longer stretches of time. But the future is not set in stone. You may not get a vision for a clear path. And even then, the future you see might change. It’s a helpful tool but also an imprecise power, so you should not rely on it often.”

That would’ve been handy a few months ago.

Siegrid continues, “Now, you’ll learn how to tap into all the other pack powers and see how far you can take them. There’s rifting, the Kryptos art of concealment. Shielding, the Phylax defensive maneuver. Impelling, the strength that the Daemos wield.”

My throat is suddenly dry. I take a sip of ice water. That’s… a lot to learn. I’ve barely mastered my Strategos powers, and that took me four months. “And how exactly will I be learning this all?”

“Kryptos Alpha Hannelore will teach you rifting, and we’ll bring a retired Phylax in from the Bonded City to help you with shields. As for impelling, Stark departed with Noemi at dawn, so I’ll teach you myself.”

I nearly spit out the ice cube I was sucking on. “Did he?”

My brain is spinning uselessly, and I don’t know why. I knew he was leaving. It doesn’t matter that he didn’t say goodbye. It’s not something I’ve ever expected from him before. Why is this hitting me so hard?

Siegrid is either ignoring my slack-jawed reaction or doesn’t make anything of it, because she breezes past it and says, “No matter. Surely you know I was Daemos Alpha before Stark. We’ll start first thing tomorrow.”

Great. Can’t wait. Except there’s one power we haven’t discussed, and it’s the one I most need to get under control.

“And the shadows?”

A knowing smile creeps across Siegrid’s face. She raises a hand and crooks one finger.

And shadows slide up the walls, dark and creeping.

My breath leaves my entire body. “H-how are you doing that?”

She puts her hand down, and the shadows slink back to the ground, fading. “It’s called shadebending, and it’s a skill unique to the Sovereign Alpha and the queen. My powers are not even a tenth of your own, though.”

I hold up my wrist, the blackened ruby glinting in the engagement bracelet. “Unfortunately, we are not the only ones with this skill, as I think you know. Alistair Brightbane has some control over my shadebending through this bracelet.”

Siegrid temples her fingers. “Yes, I’m aware. I can sense a throttle on the power—on my ability to impel as well, in fact. His presence is corrupting and warping the magic for all Bonded.”

Alarm spikes in my chest. “Then we need to do something. Immediately. I haven’t found someone who can get the bracelet off yet, but I’ll cut off my hand if that’s what it takes.”

Her brows rise. “You would, wouldn’t you? You’d injure yourself for the sake of others.” Her voice is contemplative, surprised. “How noble. However, there’s no need to take such a drastic step. Tormun will succeed in capturing Killian and will bring him back here. We’ll force him to remove the bracelet.”

My shoulders relax slightly. “So you’ll teach me how to shadebend? Right now, I can only access it in times of high emotion, and even then, I have no control over it. I think of what I want, and it reacts, but to an extreme.”

Siegrid sighs, picking up another grape. “It’s all about discipline, Your Highness. To bend the shadows successfully, you need to clear your mind. Emotion can heighten their strength, no doubt, but you should not be possessed by your… feelings.” She spits out the word with virulent distaste, as if she bit into her fruit and found it rotten. “We’ll drill those histrionics out of you in no time at all.”

I can tell she’s trying to be helpful, so I don’t reach across the table and throttle her, as much as I may want to.

Anassa growls in my mind. “You are not histrionic. You are passionate and feel things greatly. There is a difference.”

“There is one final matter I wish to discuss with you,” Siegrid says before I can make a break for the door.

I straighten and nod for her to continue.

“Now that you have discovered your true identity and laid claim to the crown, it no longer makes sense for you to be Strategos Alpha. My direwolf, Genicos, believes you and Anassa should step down and let the wolves pick someone new.”

Surprise hits me first and then pain.

Alpha. I’m an Alpha. They’re my pack. Even if what she’s saying makes sense, I don’t want to let go. It’s a role I was just starting to embrace. Even though I haven’t been Alpha for long, it’s familiar—something I was starting to feel confident in, unlike my position as queen.

I don’t want this to be another thing I have to lose.

“You will never lose your pack,” Anassa says gently. “You will always be Strategos, even if you now are more.”

“Do you support this?” I want her so badly to say no, to fight.

She’s silent for a moment, and it says everything. How many times can a heart break before there’s nothing left to put back together?

Finally, she goes on, “If we continue to serve as the Strategos Alpha pair, our loyalty will be to them. That would do a disservice to our kingdom. We serve everyone now. All the wolves, all the people, no matter their pack or their rank.”

She’s right, I know she’s right. Strategos deserves an Alpha that belongs to them, who has no priority higher than their well-being and strength.

And my people—all my people—deserve a leader with no divided interests.

“You know why she’s suggesting this, though,” I say. It’s so transparent. Siegrid would like a new Strategos Alpha who will be completely compliant.

“I do, but I was going to suggest this to you myself.”

“I understand,” I tell Siegrid, and she looks pleased. Outright pleased, confirming my suspicion. “I’ll step down and let the wolves choose.”

“It will be Sofos, the direwolf bonded to Egith,” Anassa says. “I have influence over the decision. Sofos and Egith will be loyal to us above anyone else.”

If Anassa believes that’s true, I trust her.

“Take a break and meet up with Hannelore in the Kryptos training area after lunch to continue your work,” Siegrid says. “I’ll let her know she’s needed.”

It sounds dangerously like an order, but I let it go. I just want to get out of here.

I return to my rooms to check on Saela. What I find doesn’t surprise me. She’s clearly gotten out of bed, cleaned up and dressed herself, and then climbed back under the blankets again.

“Hey, Sae,” I say, sighing. I bend to pick up her discarded shoes and set them straight next to her bed. “Doing okay?”

She doesn’t answer.

“Please talk to me,” I beg. If I could get one smile out of her…

Nothing.

“I know this has been hard for you, but it breaks my heart to see you like this. Do you need to go outside and get some fresh air?”

Saela scoffs. She doesn’t look at me, but I don’t need to see her face to know she’s angry. “Wouldn’t I be a danger to myself and others? Leave me alone, Meryn.”

I open my mouth to respond, but before I can, there’s a piercing pull in my brain. A gasp flies from my lips. Saela turns quickly, the sound startling her.

My knees give out, and I sit down quickly on her bed.

This feeling…

It’s him again.

“Bonded,” Killian—or Alistair, if he’s to be believed—says over the rivers. “You have had several days to consider your loyalties. The fiefdom of Rabenfrost has welcomed me with open arms, and they welcome you, too.”

Those traitorous fucks. My hands tighten on Saela’s bedcovers, and my eyes alight on the engagement bracelet clamped on my wrist. It’s tighter than ever, and the ruby once again swirls with dark shadows.

“Meryn?” Saela asks uneasily.

My shoulders start to tremble in anger. I need to stop this. I have to cut him off somehow—he’s not allowed to address my people like they’re his own.

“Do you think I can erect a wall against him?” I ask Anassa with urgency.

“Try it. Quickly.”

Closing my eyes, I seek out the ocean of communication in my mind. His foul energy is in there, too, like a dark cloud hanging over all the streams that branch out to the packs. I take a deep breath and then…

I push.

The wall I erect is stronger than anything Anassa and I ever threw against each other. It’s iron, and it stretches and stretches and stretches, reaching out, protecting all the Bonded from his influence. She throws her power against it, too.

Instantly, I’m sweating, and my head starts to pound. It’s as if something was roughly squeezing my brain, juicing it like a fruit. But I ignore the ache.

I’d endure any pain to keep him out. And it’s working—his twisted influence is leeching away.

“Meryn!” Saela’s fingers are on my wrist, pulling at me, but I keep my eyes clamped tight.

“More,” Anassa says. “It’s almost enough.”

A scream tears from my chest as I continue to mentally push the wall up against him. Finally, something slips into place. He’s out; he’s totally removed from the pack communication channels. I can sense it.

“Will it stay? Do you think it will keep him out for good?”

There’s a pause before Anassa answers. “We may have to keep reinforcing it. But… it seems as if it is working for now.”

My eyes flutter open, and Saela is gaping at me in concern. I’d be almost pleased that something’s gotten through to her if I wasn’t about to double over from my searing headache.

Terror ricochets in my chest. I grab her shoulders, and she sputters. “W-what—?”

“Do you hear him?” I demand.

She wriggles away from my grasp, moving across the bed and closer to the wall. “Mer, what are you talking about? Are you okay?”

“Killian,” I press. “Can you hear him? Are you hearing him right now?”

Her eyes are wide. Fearful. She shakes her head. “I—no. No, I told you. No one is reaching me or anything.”

She looks so earnest. Can I believe her? Can I trust my own sister?

I have to. Because if I don’t give her my trust, who will?

Opening my arms, I beckon her into a hug. She comes, her small body pressing against my own, and I wrap her up tightly.

“You scared me,” she mumbles.

I lean my head against her hair and breathe in deeply.

She scares me, too.

Will anyone in Nocturna have faith in me if they discover I’m harboring a Siphon?

12

STARK

Riding hard on my direwolf is the only place I find peace. Cratos sprints almost as fast as a blizzard, and I’m able to clear my mind. All that exist are the giant black wolf underneath me and the movement of our bodies together, the wind rushing against our skin and fur.

It’s a reprieve from everything. The responsibility of my station. The spike of worry I felt earlier this afternoon when Killian reached out to the packs.

And thoughts of… her.

Like how she tasted when I licked her tattoo last night, as sweet as spun sugar. It took all of my decades of well-honed self-control to not hold her down and keep going until we were both sated.

I shake my head, trying to dislodge the image so I don’t grow half hard again.

Clearly, it’s been too fucking long since I was with a woman.

Remember where you were, I tell myself. Kneeling down on a pile of her dirty, discarded laundry.

There, that helps.

Meryn Sturmfrost is a bad idea, regardless of how she tastes. Especially now that Siegrid is aware of our wolves’ mate bond and wants to use it against Meryn.

The beautiful woman at my side stares at me from atop her lithe brown direwolf, Ephyse. Noemi’s pale skin is as white as the snowy landscape around us, but her hair is a fiery slash against the quickly passing scenery.

Thankfully, we’re riding too hard and fast to talk out loud. Since Noemi is a Phylax, our wolves can’t speak to each other mind to mind.

I’m glad for the silence. Noemi has always been fucking nosy.

By the time we stop for the night to make camp, Noemi is clearly bursting with held-in conversation. I make her wait, scouting with Cratos up the road just to be certain we won’t have any unwelcome company. Noemi pitches our simple tents and gets the fire going.

Back at the site, she hands me a stick of cured meat and sets a rabbit Ephyse killed over the fire. My ass barely hits the ground before Noemi turns around, emerald eyes blazing with mischief, and sets right in.

“So Cratos has a mate,” she says delicately, but her glance at me is sharp and amused.

“He does,” I say shortly, ending the conversation.

“How’s that all been for you?” Noemi is intent on pushing this, it seems. Typical. “With, you know, the rider.”

“Complicated.”

Noemi’s full lips tilt upward in a playful smile, and she nudges my boot with hers. “Complicated, huh? You and I certainly know something about that.”

I knock my foot back against hers hard, and she almost topples over, laughing.

“Fine,” she says. “I’ll stop asking about it. For now.”

Ominous.

I sigh, guilt setting in. It’s been so long since we’ve seen each other, and I’m conscious that I’m being a sullen asshole. She doesn’t deserve that.

“Look, there’s not much to tell,” I say, relenting. “There’s nothing going on between me and the queen, if that’s what you’re dancing around.”

My tongue on her soft skin. Her hazel eyes meeting mine, wide and glazed over with an expression I wanted to read into too much. Her hands, weaving into my hair, tugging me toward her…

Her messy. Fucking. Rooms.

There’s nothing going on, and there never will be.

My mind darts back to the power she showcased, the shadows whipping around her like a violent, glorious whirlwind. The terror she inflicted in others and the fascination it unfurled in me. Even now the memory makes my blood run hot.

My vicious instincts meeting her total lack of control… it’s a spark meeting the match that could burn down the kingdom.

“Mm-hmm.” Noemi’s brows are raised, her expression disbelieving. She turns and pokes at the fire again.

She knows me too well.

We grew up together in my great-aunt’s household. Siegrid dumped me with her Aunt Gertrude the moment her body was healed enough from birth to head back to the front. The Phylax soldier who sired me was dead before I was born.

Gertie collected wards, and Noemi was one of several who came in and out of the house over the years—but she was the only one who stayed for good. Her father didn’t want her, and her mother was a wartime casualty by the time she was six.

She was lost and fragile, and so beautiful, even then. The kind of child that can attract the wrong sort of attention. From the first moment I saw her, I assigned myself as her protector.

Although, of course, I failed her in the end.

Noemi sits down next to me, the firelight flickering against her pale skin and creating deep shadows. Worry lines crease her face.

“When’s the last time you saw them?” I ask, and I see a reflected flash of annoyance—I can read her just as easily as she can read me; she’s always hated that.

Her gaze goes pensive as she plucks the rabbit from the fire, slicing off some meat for each of us and then sitting back down.

“Probably…” She worries at her bottom lip, a bad habit she’s mostly broken over the years. “Bonded graduation ceremony, it must be. I mean, I’ve basically been at the front ever since.”

Her expression shutters then, and I wish I could execute every last member of the House of Eisenfall, Meryn’s campaign of noble support be damned.

“I’ll be right there the whole time,” I say, reaching for her hand and squeezing it. “Nobody’s going to do anything to you.”

Noemi looks up and meets my eyes, a rare moment of vulnerability for her. Then a log in the fire pops, and we both turn to look into the flames.

The shutter comes back down over her gaze. “I’m not that little girl anymore, Valstark. I can protect myself.”

“I know you can. But you’re not facing it alone. Just remember that.”

“Give me five minutes with any of them if they try something,” Cratos growls in my mind. “I beg you.”

I laugh darkly and relay his message to Noemi, who gives a weak chuckle.

“They’d probably taste rotten, Cratos,” she says to him.

I finish my meal, then lie back, propping myself up on my elbow, looking at the sky. It’s a cloudy night, and I can’t see a single star.

“Go get your aggression out on a deer or something,” I say to Cratos, speaking aloud for Noemi’s benefit. “Bring back a snack for Ephyse while you’re at it.”

“I’ll make it extra bloody,” comes his sardonic reply.

I hear Noemi shift and then feel her warmth as she settles down next to me. She takes my hand and squeezes it, but there’s no heat there, only friendship.

“Thank you,” she says, sounding more like herself. We sit in comfortable silence for another few minutes, until she sighs and stands, stretching, hands on her lower back.

“I’m going to sleep,” she says. “Cleanup’s on you; I cooked.”

“Please, Ephyse did all the work,” I say, poking fun more out of habit than anything else. I stand to gather up our things, and the familiar, welcome movements of cleaning calm me down until I almost—almost—no longer want to murder every member of Noemi’s family.

When I finally set out my bedroll, my mind continues to drift to a certain hazel-eyed queen and what might have happened last night if both of us had decided to think a little bit less.

It’s deeply fucking annoying that my mind keeps returning to her, over and over, like a hawk returning to its master’s hand.

There’s only one clear explanation.

“Stop that,” I snap at Cratos, who is still out in the forest.

“Stop what?” he replies. “Hunting? I thought the point was to get some aggression out.”

I let out a hiss of irritation. “You know what I’m talking about. Put your fucking shields back up on your mate bond. I know you hate being away from Anassa, but we’ve been over this a thousand damned times—I don’t want to feel it.”

“Shields are as strong as ever, mighty Alpha.” I can imagine his lupine grin. “Thinking about her, huh?”

Shutting out his amusement, I try to refocus on falling asleep. Clearing my mind. Breathing in the cold air.

Anything other than this frustrating tightness in my chest and the frustrating woman who is apparently the cause.

The town of Eisenfall looks like one from a storybook—houses in brightly painted colors, manicured rows of pine trees, broad paved avenues. It’s handsome and idyllic. Hardly the place of nightmares I imagined when Noemi would talk about it.

But I know as well as anyone that beauty can help evil hide in plain sight.

Noemi catches me looking around and smiles wanly. “Father likes things to look nice,” she says by way of explanation.

She is saved from hearing my rude retort by our arrival at the castle gates, where we’re greeted by two harried-looking servants. We sent word ahead by graydove for them to expect us, and the servants have the wolves’ lodging prepared.

“Raw steaks are being sent down straight away, Alpha Stark,” says one of the servants, bowing. Neither of them looks at Noemi for direction or approval. My mood darkens.

Eisenfall Castle is grossly ostentatious: Tapestries line every inch of the walls in garish colors; thick carpets overlap beneath our feet, leaving no cold stone gaps; even the wall sconces are ornate.

Our guest rooms, however, are bare bones. I raise my eyebrows at Noemi after we’re deposited at them. “Do they not keep a dedicated room for you as a daughter of the lord?”

She scoffs. “Please. We’re lucky they didn’t place us in the servants’ quarters. You know the Eisenfall clan doesn’t think of me as family.” She turns sharply and heads to her own room to wash up.

Finally, after a long, dull wait, a servant informs us we are summoned to attend a minstrels’ performance in the great hall.

Noemi explains that these musical performances are common at her father’s court. “He doesn’t have much to take up his time, since he delegates all the duties of overseeing the fief to various cousins who want to curry favor,” she explains. “So entertainment like this and elaborate hunting parties are his two favorite pursuits. But his taste in music… let’s just say, it isn’t what I would choose.”

It doesn’t surprise me that her sniveling wretch of a father has shit taste. The decor in his home could tell you that.

The hall is packed when we arrive, the air hazy with smoke and the moisture of too many people’s bodies in too small a space. The minstrels are set up on a small stage in the far corner of the room, plucking at stringed instruments of various sizes.

“Who are all these people?” I ask Noemi, looking around at the motley collection of courtiers, most in some stage of drunkenness already.

“Cousins, second cousins, third cousins, cousins’ cousins…” Noemi catalogs, looking around. “Cousins’ wives, cousins’ ex-wives, sons and daughters of cousins…”

“I get it,” I cut her off.

“Anyone who’s vaguely related at all shows up for these things,” Noemi says. “They know that Father values his music, and they want to at least seem to like the things he likes…”

“Aha.” I weave around clusters of cousins, trying not to wince at the slightly off-tune harmonies drifting across the room.

Sweetness of life personified

My lady love so wondrous fair

The marriage knot we two did tie

My wife, who had the roving eye

Noemi squeezes her eyes shut as if that will somehow drown out the warbling voice. “Not this one again. He loves this misogynistic bullshit.”

I struggle to make out the words, and my mouth twists in distaste as the song continues.

… my brother’s mouth upon her thigh

Her fingers tangled in his hair

My untrue wife just moaned and sighed

My wife, who had the roving eye

Brother, this marks our last goodbye

My wife with you I will not share

Lock her away in tower high

My wife, who had the roving eye

Seven tears that woman cried

I laughed to see her deep despair

But ne’er did she apologize

My wife, who had the roving eye

I manage to shut out the words, focusing instead on studying the people in the crowd, committing their faces to memory so that I can later gauge how many of them come to the coronation.

Blessed relief finally comes when the lurid song ends and the gathered audience bursts into applause.

I stand up, ignoring the confused looks that morph into fearful glances as people recognize me and whispers start in my path.

“Whether or not they’re done playing, I’m done listening,” I growl, not bothering to keep my voice down. “We need to deliver our message and get back on the road.”

Noemi rolls her eyes but stands to follow me. We pick our way through the crowd toward where her father sits. He’s a reedy, thin man in his midfifties, with peppered gray hair. His face is blotchy and red from years of overindulging.

Seated next to him is his current lady—wife number eight, if I remember correctly. The first seven didn’t give him any sons, so he had them killed. The lady is about Noemi’s age, plump and blond. She somehow looks simultaneously bored and on edge.

I let Noemi push in front of me and take the lead.

“Ah, Noemi, we heard you were paying a visit,” Lord Eisenfall says distractedly when he finally acknowledges us. He doesn’t offer us a seat or any food. “Did you travel far?”

“No, my lord.” Noemi’s voice is impressively calm. “It was barely more than a day’s ride on wolfback.”

“I trust your wolves have been well cared for?” His concern for the direwolves seems to eclipse that for his own daughter. “How’s your mother, by the way?”

“Still dead,” says Noemi.

My fists get so tight that knuckles crack, and I swallow back words I might regret later. Disrespectful fuck.

Lord Eisenfall is steadfastly ignoring me, looking at his daughter and swishing his emberwine around in his glass.

“Yes, yes, of course. Well, to what do we owe this visit?”

“We need your confirmation that you’ll attend Queen Meryn Sturmfrost’s coronation,” Noemi says, voice still level.

“Well, I’m not so sure about that,” Lord Eisenfall says slowly, then purses his lips. “After all, the Eisenfalls have been loyal to the Valtieres for as long as anyone remembers.”

I stride forward. “Cyril Valtiere was beheaded for his crimes, and Killian Valtiere has fled. Queen Meryn Sturmfrost is the heir of the true, original royal line of Nocturna. Our country needs a leader, and we have one. She wears the true, ancient crown and wields awe-inspiring power.”

The young Lady Eisenfall stares at me, mouth open. Lord Eisenfall just shakes his head, taking his time cutting a bite of food and chewing before responding.

“I’ve received word from Rabenfrost that they’re sheltering King Killian from the usurper and they’re looking for others to join their cause. It’s a compelling argument.”

His words echo Killian’s proclamation made yesterday over the bonds. I hope more Bonded aren’t defecting to that spineless fuck…

With the Dire Blade still broken, though, the wolves seem to be in disarray, rudderless. My teeth grind together.

“You’d run to a Siphon pretender instead of supporting the true queen of Nocturna?”

Lord Eisenfall takes another bite of food, then pulls a piece of gristle from his mouth. Disgusting.

“Yes, I’ve heard the girl’s accusation about the rulers being secretly Siphons all this time,” he says, pulling apart a piece of bread and dunking it into gravy until it’s sopping wet. “A bit dramatic. But then women are so often prone to flights of fancy. What can your upstart queen offer me that Valtiere cannot?”

My hand flies to the hilt of my sword, but movement behind the lord makes me pause. A drunken, red-cheeked, weasel-faced young man comes stumbling over from his seat a dozen chairs down, his glassy stare directed at Noemi.

“Cousin,” he slurs, “what are you going to do now that the king is dead?”

Noemi just looks at him, face stony.

“Will you spread your legs for this new queen, too? I hear you like that, but does she? Have you already tasted her?”

The man’s mouth opens to say more, but whatever vile words he intended next are silenced forever with an angry swipe of my hand.

Sometimes it takes effort to impel, but the power comes to me now without a thought, slamming into him like a brick wall.

He’s pushed up and back, and the luxe tapestry behind him isn’t enough to cushion the blow as his head thwacks into the wall and splits open like overripe fruit.

Lord Eisenfall and his court look on, stunned, as my power releases him. His body crumples onto the serving table below, displacing several full goblets of wine that spill and tumble onto the floor. A wide slash of red and an accompanying splatter mark the spot where his head met tapestry.

I gesture at the stain. “Hope that’s not a family heirloom.”

Lord Eisenfall swallows audibly. I look over to Noemi, and she gives me the smallest hint of a nod.

I keep my voice flat and level, knowing I have every ear in this hall. “What I’ll offer you is your life and your freedom, and if you don’t fall in line, you will have the full force of the Bonded bearing down on your fiefdom. Are we clear?”

The silence is profound, until finally the lord merely nods. “We’re clear. I’ll be there, Alpha Stark.”

Turning, I lead Noemi away through the shocked, silent crowd. And then a buzzing, electric connection unfurls in my head, a dam that’s been opened wide.

It’s never happened before, and still, I know what it is instantly.

Fuck.

“Stark?” Meryn’s voice calls in my mind. “What’s happening? Are you okay? I… felt something.”

Noemi and I push out of the doors of the great hall. “Go pack up,” I tell her. “I’ll be down there in just a moment.”

She gives me a bewildered look, but she shrugs and heads toward our guest rooms. In the now-empty passageway, I focus my mind back on the surging connection that Meryn has torn open between the two of us.

Our connection has lived inside me from the moment she and Anassa bonded, but with Cratos’s barriers up, it’s been easy enough to ignore. I’ve never sought it out or attempted to use it.

It’s been like the sun: a fact of my life that I don’t have to pay attention to because it simply is.

Now my vision has been directed into it, and I can no longer avoid it because I’m being blinded by its warmth.

With Meryn’s voice comes a slow leak of her feelings, too—something she should be able to safeguard me from if only she was better at this. Meryn and Anassa are still working on the finer skills of mental communication after blocking each other out for so much of the Trials.

She’s on edge, concerned.

Concerned about me.

“Don’t worry about it,” I say quickly. “It’s nothing.”

Her frustration pours through the connection. “That was a blatantly suspicious response. You were angry about something, angry enough that it reached me. Tell me.”

That’s not good. I’ll need to do a better job of keeping her out, or at least of leashing my temper.

“Is Eisenfall refusing to come to the coronation?” she asks, uneasy.

“They’ll be coming,” I say. “I was pissed because Noemi’s family are behaving predictably toward her.”

Meryn might be all strong bluster on the outside, but I’ve seen the woman beneath it now. The unending concern for others—now extended to an entire kingdom. The way she bottles up every bad thing that happens to her, locks it away, until it begins to eat her alive. And the way she would let it, time and time again, if it meant sparing the people she cares about.

It would be admirable if it wasn’t deeply unhealthy.

Even the hardest things can break with enough pressure. I’m in no hurry to push her toward that edge.

“Okay,” she says slowly, and I can tell she’s trying to parse what that means. “I was just worried for a second that you were doing something reckless like killing people out there.”

Well, shit. So much for sparing her.

I’m not sure what to say, so I just shake my head and go in the same direction as Noemi. As I get into my room, Meryn pipes in again, accurately reading into my silence.

“Stark, you’re not killing people, right? Like, the people we’re trying very desperately to convince that my claim to the throne is legitimate?”

“I told you not to worry,” I say, throwing my few unpacked things into my bag.

“Stark!”

“Meryn.”

I pause, annoyed. She might not want any blood on her hands, but intimidating the nobles to attend by any means necessary is why I’m here. You can’t agree to use a weapon and then get mad when it cuts. She’s being fucking obtuse.

“Do you want the nobles to attend or not? I didn’t kill anyone important. Just an insignificant cousin. The Eisenfall nobles will be at the coronation, and we’re leaving for Nachtfall now.”

“So what’s the plan, then?” She’s growing agitated. “A whirlwind murder tour? Dead nobles in every fiefdom, but at least we’ll scare them all into showing face?”

For someone with a vicious streak, she’s really naive sometimes. “Yeah, possibly. Is that a problem?”

“That’s not what I want, Stark. They should come because they believe my claim, not because my brutal enforcer has them worried for their lives.”

I’ve heard people call me worse things. I’ve believed worse, in fact. The words shouldn’t smart.

But they do, worming their way under my skin, peeling away at the tenuous alliance the two of us have started to build.

“All these nobles have heard about you is a horror story,” I seethe. “No one is coming unless it’s for self-preservation. You don’t want to rule through fear? Great. Prove that to them when they get there for your coronation. In the meantime, leave me alone to do my fucking job of getting them there in the first place.”

There’s a knock on my doorframe. Noemi’s in the hallway, her bag over her shoulder. “Ready?”

“Let’s get out of this shithole,” I respond.

I slam my mental connection with Meryn shut—rebuilding the dam, looking away from the light, and hoping that it keeps her out for good.

13

MERYN

I stand at the palace gates, staring at a patch of shadow on the ground and willing it to move.

Stretch. Do something. High-five me.

Anassa stirs from where she’s curled up on my left side. “Is it possible that you are getting worse at this? It appears that you have made backward progress.”

Sighing, I lean against her, my legs aching. I squint at the road ahead, which leads downhill to the Northern Quarter and the city I so recently called home. We’re due to greet the Mother Priestess as she arrives at the castle, but apparently the Faceless Goddess doesn’t keep time, because she’s extremely late.

The crown on my head is starting to make my temples throb. Although, everything makes my temples throb these days. I’ve been continually reinforcing the communication wall against Killian and have almost grown used to the near-constant headache.

“No sage advice on wielding this power, then?”

It’s been two weeks of constant practice, and the pack powers have come surprisingly easy—perhaps because of Anassa’s own sheer strength.

It takes little effort to call a shield or throw an impelling blast. I’ve moved past regular rifting and can now pull a mask around a large surface area. We’re still expanding our ability to use foresight, and I can now see snatches of a day ahead, sometimes two—but as Siegrid cautioned, the glimpses aren’t always clear.

But shadebending? That’s another thing entirely. The shadows still won’t come at my beck and call. I can’t wield them in any cohesive way. And Siegrid gets more frustrated about it by the day.

“When I want to direct something, I growl at it or bare my teeth, and that usually suffices.”

Experimentally, I let out a low growl at the patch of shadow. You never know.

The castle attendant waiting for the Mother Priestess practically jumps in the air at the sound, and I shoot her a conciliatory smile.

“Sorry,” I say. “It’s a Bonded thing.”

“Do not tell the poor child lies. You should never attempt that again,” Anassa says with a huff. “You sounded weaker than a pup.”

I’m saved from having to respond as the priestess’s carriage finally rolls up to the inner gates of the castle. It’s flanked by female guards in flowing robes riding handsome dappled horses. Apparently, she’s arriving in ceremony.

The Mother Priestess arrived in Sturmfrost with Siegrid, but she’s been staying at the Sect of the Faceless Goddess in the city. Now, with my coronation just a week away, she’ll move into a guest suite in the castle. Matron Alienor had some religious icons brought in from the city to hang on the walls to welcome her.

All of them creepy, if you ask me. But in fairness, it’s probably hard to represent a faceless entity in a noncreepy way.

Preparing for her arrival makes me antsy. It’s important that I show respect so that we can count the goddess-worshippers among my supporters. My family was never particularly observant, though, and I’m worried about offending her somehow.

Anassa stays seated as the delegation pulls up, out of politeness. Horses often startle when confronted by massive wolves who could eat them as a snack.

“You need not be nervous,” Anassa insists. “These are followers of the old ways, so they should be your most devout supporters, intent on seeing the old line of queens returned.”

I settle my shoulders and step forward, conscious of the heavy crown bearing down on my forehead. It feels too formal for the daytime, but Matron Alienor insisted it was appropriate for greeting someone of this stature.

“Mother Priestess,” I say with hopefully the right level of respect.

“Queen,” she says shortly as she steps down from the carriage. At first, she gives the impression of fragility. She’s short and wizened, with crepey, age-spotted hands and long white hair braided elaborately around her head. She moves slowly, as if afraid to fall.

But then she straightens, and I see the fervent light in her green eyes. It sharpens as it drags up my face and locks onto the crown balanced on my head.

No… this woman is anything but fragile.

She moves toward me with surprising speed, and her gnarled hand reaches for the crown.

I stumble backward, nearly tripping over Anassa, who leaps to her paws and lets out a low warning growl in the priestess’s direction.

The Mother Priestess stills, anger flashing across her face so quickly that I could almost believe I imagined it. Then she raises her hands and says, “My apology, Your Highness. I was astonished to see a Tear.”

“Tear?” I ask, confused.

She points to my crown and says, “May I?”

I look to Anassa for guidance. Something about this just feels… wrong.

“If she tries to run with it, I shall snap her in two. It is safe to let her take a look, if you wish.”

Reaching up, I untangle the heavy golden crown from my hair and pass it gently over to the priestess. She rips it out of my hands greedily, a hint of avarice in her gaze. One finger traces the opal at the center of the crown.

“This is a Goddess Tear,” she says reverently. “It was rumored that a Tear was in the crown of old, but I’d thought it had been lost to the Siphons.”

My brow furrows. Does she mean in Astreona? Or did she somehow know that Killian’s family was all Siphons before I revealed that information?

Her eyes land on me again, and I can’t get in any questions. “Tell me, Meryn Sturmfrost. Are you a true believer?” She strokes the crown lovingly.

I flinch internally. At best, I’ve questioned the existence of the Faceless Goddess, denied it at worst. And this prying seems weighty, intentional—like her judgment of me and my rule will depend on my answer.

But surely I shouldn’t lie to the head of the religion?

“I have found comfort in praying to the Faceless Goddess during times of need,” I answer truthfully, hoping it’s enough.

She sees through me at once. “But you were not raised attending temple services? You have not formed a deep personal relationship with the goddess or any of her stewards? You do not let her grace guide your life in all matters?”

My stomach twists. My first interaction with the woman who is supposed to oversee my coronation, and I’m failing a test I didn’t prepare for.

“No,” I say, mouth dry. “But I hope my lack of a past relationship with the Sect of the Faceless Goddess will not impede my future one. I have an open mind.”

“Hmm.” The Mother Priestess’s hands tighten on the crown, and I get the sudden urge to yank it away from her.

Instead, I hold out a palm. She considers it for a moment and then slowly gives it back. I resettle it on my head.

The Mother Priestess brushes past me, walking swiftly toward the castle with her guards trailing after her. The castle attendant gives me a startled look and then trots after her, shouting, “Let me show you to your chambers, Mother Priestess!”

I let out a tense breath. “What the fuck was that?”

“A zealot,” Anassa replies. “One of the most dangerous types of humans to exist. We must keep an eye on her.”

I nod. Turning back to the castle, I ruefully think of the good first impression I was hoping to make.

Are any of the leaders in Nocturna remotely normal?

The next day, Venna and I have an appointment with a contact she’s found in the Bonded City. He’s a collector; someone who might be able to tell us about the bracelet around my wrist.

Siegrid continues to insist that the engagement bracelet is a nonissue. Once Tormun captures Killian, we can get it removed and the strangeness that’s been corrupting the pack magic will go away.

And he’ll no longer be able to reach any of the Bonded through our pack communication—though so far, the mental barrier Anassa and I erected has held strong.

The way she tells it makes it sound so neat and tidy.

Still, I need to do something. I’m barely sleeping, so worried I’ll end up back in that shadow realm, trapped with Killian. Every time my eye catches on the darkened ruby, it reminds me of the ruinous mistakes I made with him.

A painful shard of grief, encased in an exquisite lie.

If we can figure out what the bracelet is—or, better yet, how to get it off immediately—we can ensure that something like this will never be used again.

Venna and I meet in the back courtyard that faces toward the Bonded City. Izabel, Tomison, and Nevah join us. When I realized where we were going, I insisted that everyone come along. It’s been too long since my friends have had a break or seen their families.

It’s a quick ride to the Bonded City. Izabel and Tomison lead the way on their direwolves, bickering in a way that is obviously flirting, like normal. But Asteio and Filikos are standing closely, their tails occasionally swishing together.

And then… Tomison grabs Izabel’s hand, lacing her fingers with his.

Well, that’s not normal.

I look at Venna and Nevah in shock and sign so that I can hide the question from Izabel and Tomison’s ears.

“Are they…” I don’t have the sign language vocabulary for what I want to say. How have I not asked Venna for a crash course in sex terms? “…together now?”

“For at least a week,” Venna signs back, eyebrows raised.

“And they’re being disgusting,” Nevah shouts at their backs.

Izabel’s head whips over her shoulder, a pissy look on her face. “Are you talking about us? You know, you’re being kind of a bitch for someone who kept begging us to ‘just fuck already.’”

Nevah throws her hands in the air. “Yeah, I thought the two of you would get it out of your systems and then move on. But no! It’s Izzy this and Tomtom that and sex everywhere! I am so tired of seeing your tits, Izabel!”

I burst into laughter. “Izzy? Tomtom?”

Tomison grins slyly, although his face is about as red as his hair. He holds out an arm, beckoning her. “Aww, Nev. Sorry if we’ve been making you uncomfortable.”

Nevah and Agmatta spring toward them, and Nevah gives him a playful shove. Tomison almost topples off Filikos. “I’m happy for you two, I swear, but it would be nice if your lovefest was just a little less in my face at all times.”

Venna and I ride behind them, and my head reels. At least a week, and I had no idea.

Izabel’s supposed to be my best friend. I asked these four to remain behind for me, and now I barely see them except when they’re doing things for me.

“Hey,” I call out to my friends from Anassa’s back as we near the Bonded City. “Venna and I need to run this errand, but then what if I came with you to see your families?”

It would be nice, getting to see where they all come from.

We can have a day that’s not about me for once.

Izabel squeals, and even reserved Venna gives a broad smile at the suggestion. “Father would love that,” Venna says.

I look over to Nevah and Tomison, and I’m met with conflicted expressions.

“It might be best to skip my house for now,” Nevah says slowly. Her expression is shuttered, and Agmatta slows his pace. “My siblings might be busy, and I know my aunt’s home but…”

She doesn’t complete the thought, and I turn to Tomison. “Well?”

He shakes his head but doesn’t say anything.

“What am I missing here?” I ask, confused. Maybe they just want time alone, and I’d be intruding.

Nevah coughs, then speaks again. “My family… they are struggling a little with the changes. They haven’t fully declared for you. I’m working on them, and I think they’ll come around. But I don’t think they’re quite ready to welcome you into their home.”

My chest tightens. The family of my own friend?

Tomison nods, refusing to look me in the eye. “It’s worse with my family. My mother and grandmother are staying in the Bonded City for now, but they aren’t supportive. They think you might be a fraud. They’re… they’re talking about heading to Rabenfrost.” His tone is light, but a note of defensiveness is there, too.

“But Killian’s a Siphon,” I exclaim. “I showed everyone that. How could they consider supporting a Siphon?”

He finally meets my gaze, his mouth a thin line. “They don’t believe you, Meryn,” he says plainly, and it hits me in the gut. “It’s your word, your memories, against his. And they think yours are… well, false. Even when I’ve tried to tell them otherwise, they refuse to listen to common sense.”

Head spinning, I reach out to Anassa. “Did you know it was this bad? I thought Siegrid would be able to convince everyone.”

But she doesn’t respond; her mind has turned into an aggressive tempest. She lunges toward Tomison and Filikos, ears back, and starts to circle them.

Filikos’s lips pull back from his fangs, a low growl starting.

“Anassa, no,” I say helplessly, but her instincts have taken over. “Our friends are not the enemy.”

She ignores me—either by choice or by instinct.

And pounces on Filikos.

“Meryn, stop her!” Izabel shrieks.

My hands are fisted in Anassa’s fur, yanking and yanking as I’m tossed around on her back, but her fury has no ending. Her fangs close on the scruff of Filikos’s neck, shaking.

“Meryn!” Tomison screams, his eyes flickering with fear.

“ANASSA! I command you—stop!”

The wolves break apart, and Anassa takes two tense steps backward, still growling.

“They can’t help how their families feel,” I say sternly. “This is not Tomison or Nevah’s fault, and attacking them for something they cannot control will only further divide us.”

“Pack is pack,” Anassa replies, her anger leaking through the bond. “Loyalty must be absolute, from everyone. Or what good is it?”

“We aren’t the zealots, remember? That’s the weirdo priestess and her flock. I know the wolves have their own dynamics, but we cannot attack our own for having questions. That will only drive them away.”

Anassa lets it go, but she sulks the rest of the way to the Bonded City. Conversation is muted after that, and I’m guiltily relieved when Venna and I part ways with the rest of them for our errand.

I thought that keeping my friends here would be a source of comfort.

Maybe queens don’t have that luxury.

My boots have started to pinch my toes, and I kick them off when I enter my room. They land in a pile of discarded shoes that I know I should put away but can’t quite bother with.

I’m collapsing into an armchair when Saela comes out to greet me. I straighten, suddenly alert again.

I’m glad to see her up. We’ve been leaving Saela’s door unlocked recently; Anassa’s kept her fed on animal blood, and Saela’s shown no sign of mindlessly attacking anyone, so we’re reasonably confident she’s not a danger to us. Helene and Grigore are still doing guard rotation, of course.

We tell Saela it’s to keep others out, not to keep her in. I can’t tell if she believes us.

“Back already? How did it go?” Saela hasn’t shown interest in much since… since Killian did what he did. But she’s been darkly fascinated by the engagement bracelet.

Perhaps its removal will be one small victory over the shithead who ruined her life.

I hope it’s not more; that it’s not some part of her sire bond leaking through. Is Killian in her mind, directing her to pay attention to the bracelet? I can’t start thinking that way, or I’ll never be able to relax in her presence.

I beckon her over to the seat beside mine, and she gathers up the stack of clothing on the cushion and moves it to my bedroom before sitting.

“You can just throw that on the floor,” I say.

Saela rolls her eyes.

“Well, he confirmed that it looks like Siphon-made magic, which we basically already knew.” I sigh and stare at the bracelet, holding my arm out in front of me so we can both look at the ruby’s ominous sparkle. “He had no idea how to get it off, and he said I shouldn’t do anything drastic like cutting off my hand, either, because the magic could backfire anyway and kill me.”

Saela screws up her mouth, thinking this over. Her feet come up to tuck beneath her body. I hold back a smile. It’s good to see her engaged in something.

Even something so grotesque.

“And what about the sword?” Saela has been equally fascinated by my tales of the Dire Blade, asking Aldrich to bring her any legends he can find about it. She’s convinced that it’ll be important to my rule.

We all hoped we could find someone to reforge the blade from the shards that remained. However, just like with my bracelet, all the local smiths have turned us away, mystified. Now the shards just sit in a dusty sack shoved under my bed.

“This collector guy, Jorgen, said it doesn’t look like human-forged metal.” I chew on my lip, staring toward the window and the view of the pine trees beyond. “Seems like we don’t know much about anything anymore, to be honest. A lot of knowledge was lost because of the blood curse.”

Saela fusses with a loose thread on the arm of the chair, flattening it down only for it to bounce back up when she moves her finger. Her face, hopeful when she thought I was bringing her new information, now holds a detached expression that’s starting to be all too familiar.

I frown, wishing I could do more to bring her back out of her shell. She’s been so focused when she has some kind of problem to think about, like finding out more about the Dire Blade.

My eyes fall to Mother’s necklace around her neck. The gem seems to have a soft glow even when the light isn’t hitting it.

Just like the opal in my crown…

Could it be the same kind of opal?

A Goddess Tear, the Mother Priestess called it.

I haven’t been able to get any more information from her about what that means. In fact, we’ve barely even met to review the rituals for the coronation. I get the distinct sense that the priestess is avoiding me since I don’t meet her standards of a “true believer.”

I study Saela’s face. Perhaps another area where research would help?

It can’t hurt. I’d do just about anything to draw Saela out of her grief and depression.

“Saela… I need your help with something.”

14

STARK

From the petulant looks on Lord and Lady Volkenfrost’s faces, you’d think I was dragging them to Sturmfrost for a funeral, not a massive party.

As we reach the edges of the city, Cratos bounds faster to ride up next to Ephyse and Noemi. We’ve been traveling more slowly than the direwolves are comfortable with for the past couple of days, all because the nobles have to ride slow horses.

“Can’t wait to get rid of these sour fucks,” I tell her, inclining my head behind us to the large Volkenfrost party.

She glances behind us, then raises her eyebrows at me, lips pursed.

“What?” I growl. “They’ve been silent all day.”

Noemi stifles a laugh. “It’s probably hard to think of anything to say when the big bad Daemos Alpha and his direwolf are glaring at you all the time.”

I scoff. “This is just the way my face looks. You know that.”

“If you say so, grouchy,” she says. “Look, we’re basically at their dusty and underused Sturmfrost residence. I’ll see them all the way there. Why don’t you head back to the castle?”

She doesn’t have to tell me twice. Cratos and I take off quickly in that direction. Within a few minutes, the castle is on the horizon. I dismount and stalk into it as Cratos peels off to find Anassa.

The first order of business is reporting to Siegrid. As her door swings open, I note that her redecorating project has sped along. Gone are the ridiculous hunting trophies from the walls, along with the spindly, showy furniture favored by the Valtieres.

In its place, Siegrid appears to have fully moved into the regent’s chambers. A tapestry from her house that features our family seal is on one wall, and thick curtains in the Therion colors, scarlet and white, are at each window.

They hold no sentimental meaning to me. I can count on two hands the number of times I’ve been in her house in the Bonded City.

“I hear the Volkenfrost delegation is as sizable as we’d hoped,” Siegrid says in lieu of a welcome.

“Yes,” I tell her. “Hand-delivered to you, all body parts still intact, as ordered.”

Human body parts, at least.

Last night at the camp, I overheard Lord Erlyn Volkenfrost discussing coronation traditions with some of his male courtiers.

Apparently, the new monarch typically strips down naked in front of the entire congregation to humble themselves before the Faceless Goddess. While naked, the Mother Priestess anoints them with sacred oils.

“Cyril Valtiere wasn’t a bad-looking man, I can say that,” Erlyn boasted. “But just wait until our firm, young queen is displayed before us, rubbed down in oil for our pleasure. How humiliating and delicious it will be.”

I didn’t have to act; Cratos took care of it.

Before I could stop him, Cratos dragged Lord Volkenfrost’s spare mount into the firelight. Then, as Erlyn’s face paled in shock, Cratos ate the horse.

It was brutal and cruel, but even I can’t stop wolf instincts.

“My direwolf does not appreciate the idea of our new queen being humiliated,” I said lightly as Erlyn retched into the fire. “I recommend you keep that in mind before recounting any other traditions you’d like to see reenacted.”

Now, I look across the room to the Sovereign Alpha. She’s seated at the dining table amid a pile of parchment and a half-eaten breakfast of bread and fruit. Despite the early hour, she’s perfectly coiffed and in her military uniform already.

I wonder if she sleeps in it. Siegrid would never let someone see her dressed casually; she allows for no vulnerabilities. Not even for her son.

“How are the coronation preparations coming along?” I ask, curious if Cratos will try to eat any more noble steeds before this has ended.

Siegrid sighs. “Mostly fine, although the queen has rejected several of the usual traditions. She has agreed to be anointed in oil”—I still, my blood starting to heat—“but she’s refusing to undress for it, and the Mother Priestess is greatly offended. Still, we’ll get through the day.”

Siegrid doesn’t look up, still focused on the papers in front of her. She signs off on the order she was writing out, then pulls up another paper and begins scanning it while she talks.

“Anyone give you trouble in the other fiefdoms?”

“No more than we expected,” I reply, sitting across from her and pouring myself some lukewarm coffee. “Eisenfall’s still a boorish asshole. But he’s coming. Blumenfall’s playing it close to the chest, like usual. The rest of them will all be there. It’ll be a full room, as you wanted.”

“The rest of them,” she muses. “Not Rabenfrost, though. Did you hear their lord’s eldest daughter is personally waiting on Killian? He really has them eating out of his hand. Alpha Tormun is waiting for the right moment to strike, but he’ll be taken care of soon enough.”

Her voice is detached, assessing. She delicately sips her tea, then places the cup back on its saucer.

If she’s disturbed by the idea of Lord Rabenfrost’s twelve-year-old daughter waiting on the new Siphon host of Alistair Brightbane, who’s had a penchant for young girls over the years, she doesn’t show signs of it.

It takes some focus for me to keep my anger off my face, so her next comment catches me off guard.

“Stark, before you go, there’s something else. I’ve decided you will marry the queen.”

For a second, the room is so silent we can hear the slow drip of water as last night’s icicles on her windowsill slowly melt in the sun.

“Excuse me?” My voice comes out low and deadly.

She makes eye contact with me, challenging. “You heard me. You are to marry the queen.”

I barely have to call my strength, it comes so freely. With a swipe of my hand, I unleash an impelling blast—directed toward her but not at her so that it tips over her table. Her breakfast plate smashes across the floor, shards scattering in all directions.

Anyone else would cower in fear at the violence I have living inside me, so close to the surface at any time.

Siegrid merely looks bored.

“I thought I made my position on this perfectly fucking clear the last time you brought this up,” I snarl. “I’m not interested.”

Liar, slithers a dark voice in my mind. You lie.

With a flick of Siegrid’s fingers, shadows descend on the room, righting the table. It’s a clear message: However strong I might be, the Sovereign Alpha is stronger, with a type of magic I won’t know until we’ve performed her funeral rites.

“Yes,” she says mildly. “I was disappointed in your reaction. Now that I’ve had more time to work with the queen myself, I’ve formed my own opinion. She’s impossibly powerful and entirely unpolished. She will not rule well without a firm hand guiding her. If you are her husband, we can proxy-rule the throne.”

Disgust and horror rise in me so strongly that I’m nearly shaking. She doesn’t want to forcefully shape Meryn into her own image. She wants to take over the queen’s throne entirely.

“You misjudge her,” I say through clenched teeth. She will rule impeccably if I can keep Siegrid’s “firm hand” off her. If I can keep my distance enough that Meryn’s own violence stays at bay.

Siegrid narrows her eyes. “Perhaps. But as the stewards of Nocturna, we cannot take that chance. We can convince her by showing her historical records, pointing out that the ancient Sturmfrost Queens always married the mated rider. She may protest initially, but she will come around.”

“And me?” I growl.

Siegrid might have forgotten this in her hurry to seize Meryn’s throne, but she’s spent nearly thirty years forging me into a waking nightmare.

A villain has no place next to a queen.

“You need to stop being obstinate,” she says crisply. “This isn’t about your feelings on the matter. We’ve been presented with an opportunity we can’t pass up. We’ll organize a fast wedding, and you should get Meryn with child as quickly as possible.”

Her skin under my tongue. Her soft noises of pleasure.

Fuck.

Reeling in my self-control, I remind myself that Meryn is in no place to be married to anyone, least of all to someone she hates.

Someone who enjoys calling forth the darkness in her, who would nudge her toward the worst version of herself.

Siegrid pauses and looks out the window, considering her next words. “A child born with the powers of both the Therion and the Sturmfrost lines…”

The expression on her face turns my stomach. Like she’s starving and has just been presented with an opulent feast.

I know, then, everything she’s planning. Once a child is born—her grandchild, a baby she can have entire control over and mold to her image—she’ll do exactly what she threatened in the first place.

She’ll get rid of the queen.

I’m going to kill her. I have to kill her. It’s the only way I can keep Meryn—and Nocturna—safe.

My hand inches down toward the dagger strapped to my thigh. If Cratos wasn’t currently… engaged… with Anassa, I know he’d be here immediately, ripping out her throat himself.

The Sovereign Alpha turns back toward me and says lightly, “It will help legitimize her claim, you know. With my son by her side, the Bonded will have to accept her.”

Her hunger for power has made her delusional.

With me by her side, the Bonded might accept Meryn, but the common people and the nobles would flee in droves to Killian. They’re wary enough of her as it is. They don’t need the butcher of Nocturna’s army seated on the king consort’s throne, adding fear to their caution.

Still, her words make me pause, cooling the heat that has slid over my vision.

If I kill Siegrid now, the coronation will fall apart. The Sovereign Alpha has more power and influence over the Bonded than anyone else in the entire country.

If things are to have even a chance of going smoothly, she needs to remain in charge of our forces and an ally for Meryn.

For now, at least.

“Let’s discuss this once the coronation is over,” I say, voice flat.

“Yes,” she says, smiling with satisfaction at my apparent acquiescence. “Let’s do just that. I’ll start figuring out a date for a ceremony.”

I bow and take my leave quickly, my rage a barely leashed thing. I make it halfway down the hall before I lose it and slam my fist into the wall, shattering plaster.

The bang reverberates throughout the empty, echoing hall.

A door flies open… and there she is.

Shit.

Meryn looks startled, and she holds a dagger at the ready. When she spots me, she sheathes it, rolling her hazel eyes. Her hands come to her hips in irritation.

“Bullying walls now, huh? What did it do, look at you the wrong way?”

I take two steps toward her, drinking in her appearance in alarm. There are dark, bruised circles beneath her eyes, and her skin is wan. She’s lost weight in the past three weeks. Her face is hollow and ghostly.

What has been happening while I’ve been gone?

I could have kept in contact with her, could have reopened that dangerous river between us. Instead, I relied on reports from Grigore and Helene and the Sovereign Alpha, content to hear that I wasn’t missing anything important.

Content to keep her at arm’s length for the sake of my own sanity.

Clearly, that was an error in my judgment.

My hand itches to stroke her cheek, trace the circles with the pad of my thumb. I shove away the notion. Touching her face is a slippery slope toward Siegrid’s getting exactly what she wants.

Toward dragging Meryn down into the darkness with me.

The words just slip out. “You look like shit.”

She barks a laugh. “First, the wall, and now me? Well, it’s been great seeing you, too, Alpha Stark. Welcome back.”

Meryn turns back into her room, quickly moving to shut the door.

I stick my foot in the doorframe, stopping it, desperate to keep her in my line of sight—desperate to measure every part of her until I can untangle what’s gone wrong.

“You don’t want to hear how the journey went?” I say. “Aren’t you curious if your brutal enforcer killed any more poor, unsuspecting nobles?”

She flushes and looks away, guilt flickering across her face. Guess she hasn’t forgotten those words, either. “Fine. Do you want to come in?”

Meryn turns and leads me into the living area, but I don’t make it much farther than the door before I stop dead in my tracks.

It’s been three weeks, and she’s apparently still not letting her attendants tidy her room.

The furniture is not even visible at this point; if you didn’t know better, you’d think that the chaise and the chairs were made in a scattered, patchwork fabric. The dining table has disappeared entirely under maps.

“Does anyone at least lift up your piles of chaos and clean underneath them?” I grind out. “Or should we expect that rodents are making their homes here? How long until we need to call for the palace exterminator?”

Meryn lets out an affronted sound. “I get it. I’m a hideous toad, and my room is a squalid pit. Did you want to talk or not?”

My eyes cut to her. She looks like she’s going through a rough patch, but even now, there’s a familiar, challenging fire in her posture. “You’re not a hideous toad.”

“I notice you’re not denying you think I live in a pit. So how would you describe me, then? An ugly sow?”

We’re starting to walk a dangerous line here. “Fishing for compliments, Your Highness?” I deflect.

“Well, when an attractive man says I look like shit, I tend to take him at his word.”

My pulse pounds at her words, but her bravado does nothing to disguise the fact that I hurt her. Fuck. “I apologize for my bluntness. You don’t look like shit. You just look like you haven’t been sleeping.”

Meryn nearly winces and presses her lips together. What is she hiding? “It’s been a very taxing couple of weeks. But I’m fine. So, the nobles?”

“They’ve all come, aside from Rabenfrost. I just arrived with the Volkenfrost contingent. You’ll be pleased to hear that I behaved myself the rest of the trip. No more cousins were sacrificed.”

“Thank you.” Meryn’s face goes a little pink as she asks her next question. “Have you… do you need the tattoo? For that, um, cousin, I mean? I could help with that?”

The color brings some life back to her face, and an uncomfortable warmth builds in my gut. Fuck, she’s pretty when she’s embarrassed.

Something primal starts to break through my tight control. How low can that blush extend? Does it reach all the way down to the tattoo just beneath her breasts?

I give into my hunger, wanting to see how red I can make her.

“Eager to lick me, princess?”

Meryn’s eyes shoot to mine now, wide and unblinking. I don’t even think she realizes she’s doing it, but her pink tongue darts out across her lips. I stare at the shimmering wetness, my blood heating as I imagine her lips and her tongue on me, licking where she’s caused me pain, moving lower to my—

“Meryn!” comes a young voice. Saela’s door creaks open, and the eleven-year-old girl walks into the living area. “Oh, hi, Alpha Stark.”

I take a ragged breath and bow, using the moment to clear my head. What the fuck was I doing? “Princess Saela,” I say to the dirty rug. Take another breath. And then straighten. “It’s nice to see you looking so well.”

Unlike Meryn, the girl looks significantly healthier than the last time I saw her. Her skin tone is back to a typical flush. She seems to have figured out how to manipulate her fangs, because she’s keeping them hidden.

There are no obvious signs she’s anything other than a normal child.

Meryn clears her throat. “Yes, Anassa has been keeping Saela fed regularly. We haven’t found a cure yet, but Aldrich continues his research.”

Saela looks a little embarrassed at this and slinks over to the chaise. She shoves some of Meryn’s clothes to the side and settles herself into it, pulling her knees into her chest.

Meryn watches her sister carefully, sadness lingering. “Saela’s been doing some research of her own,” she says with forced cheer. Saela just nods. “Tell Alpha Stark about it, Sae.”

Sighing, the girl looks up to me. “Have you ever heard of a Goddess Tear?”

I shake my head. “Rings no bells. What is it?”

Meryn crosses the room and sits down next to her sister. “We’re not sure. But the Mother Priestess called the opal in my crown a Goddess Tear and seemed very excited to see it. She said she thought it had been lost to the Siphons.”

Saela pulls a necklace out of her tunic, one that I recognize immediately. The royal heirloom that has been passed down through generations of their family. The gem is sizable, nestled in a delicate gold setting, and seems to give off a faint light from deep in its depths.

“If the opal in Meryn’s crown is a Goddess Tear, maybe this is one, too,” Saela says quietly. “I’ve been trying to understand where the term came from. Maybe it would help us learn some more about our family’s history.”

“Can’t you ask the Mother Priestess?” I ask, brow furrowing.

Meryn’s mouth twists in distaste. “She hasn’t been forthcoming with more information, no. Let’s just say that the Mother Priestess and I have not exactly seen eye to eye over the past week.”

“I’m shocked to hear that you’re not getting along with someone,” I say smoothly.

Meryn picks up a discarded shoe and tosses it in my direction, and I dodge, smirking.

“I’ll look into it, too,” I tell them both, then bow again. “And Meryn, that thing we were talking about? Noemi took care of it already.”

Her blush is back now, traveling down her neck. “Ah, of course she did.”

“But now that I know you’re interested in performing such services, you’re welcome to do the next one. Anywhere you want.”

I turn on my heel before I can witness her reaction, but she sputters and starts to cough. As I shut the door to her chambers behind me, I can hear Saela say, “Are you okay?”

I tell myself that I said it only to get a rise out of her.

I almost believe it, too.

15

MERYN

The day has finally arrived.

My coronation.

And my sister is an absolute mess.

Saela is curled up against Anassa’s side in her bedroom, weeping softly. We still don’t let the servants around her, so Helene helped her get dressed into an elegant ice-blue gown. Her face is blotchy, and she looks delicate and doll-like as she cries into Anassa’s fur.

My heart twinges. She’s still so young.

Siegrid and I decided that Saela had to attend the coronation, despite the risks. There would be too many questions otherwise. I don’t think her appearance has changed much since becoming a Siphon, but she’s learned how to retract her fangs.

I walk over and sit gently next to her. Saela looks up. Her sobbing immediately quiets somewhat, but she can’t stop her tears. “M-Meryn.”

“Sae,” I say, and smooth my hand over her hair. “What is it?”

“I don’t want to go. There’ll be too many people there. I’ll hurt someone again,” she chokes out, reaching for me.

I take her hand and shake my head. “You’ll be all right, Saela.”

Anassa hunted for her earlier today, so she’s recently fed. It took a while to wash off all the gore matted in her hair. The animal blood should keep her hunger under control for a couple of days.

“The d-deer wasn’t enough,” she cries, even though we both know that’s not true. “I don’t want to hurt anyone.”

“We’ve taken precautions. I promise. Anassa or I will remain close to you throughout the ceremony and reception. And if anything feels wrong, you only have to signal and you’ll be escorted out immediately.”

Saela’s fingers curl in Anassa’s fur. Anassa’s support always calms her. Helene, Grigore, and Siegrid are also going to be on high alert.

Gently, I add, “But you have to attend. You’re a princess of the kingdom, and very few people know anything else. If you’re not at the ceremony, it will cause confusion.”

In our weekly Council Palast meetings, Igor told me that the commoners were asking questions about the princess. I wasn’t particularly beloved in the Eastern Quarter, but Saela was; the precocious, smart child who was bound to rise above her circumstances.

Now, they see her as a hero: someone who endured a horrible kidnapping, helped free other children, and became a princess. It’s clear she’s going to become the cherished symbol of our nation—and burnish my own reputation, too.

As long as we can keep the truth of her condition a secret. As long as we can find a way to heal her.

Saela’s head drops against Anassa’s side. My direwolf bends her neck and nudges Saela with her nose. Saela’s lips twitch toward a smile. Her tears are drying up.

“You can do this,” I tell her. “I promise you. You can do this.”

She takes a shaky breath. She’s clearly still nervous, but she squeezes my hand and says, “We’re Mother’s daughters.”

I’ve had longer to sit with Mother’s death than Saela has. It’s been hard for her on top of everything. But we’re arranging a time to visit her grave together once the coronation is over.

My chest flares with pain. What would Mother think, seeing this day? It should’ve been her here, claiming her throne, choosing to rule.

For a second, I can almost see what that life would have been like: a loving mother, strong and sane. A sister protected from all the pain and hurt of these past few months. A childhood where I hadn’t gone to bed hungry at least once a week.

The list of things that Killian and his family stole from us would be a thousand pages long.

Swallowing down the lump in my throat, I kiss her head. “Mother’s daughters.”

There’s a knock at the door in the living area. Then I hear Izabel’s cheerful voice. “Oh, great and powerful queen! We’re here to wait upon you dutifully!”

“Are you ready?” I ask Saela.

She nods, caution in her gaze.

Over the past couple of weeks, she’s seen my friends occasionally—just enough for them to not get overly worried. She sees Venna more regularly for sign language lessons, something that has jolted Saela out of her misery for a solid ten minutes at a time.

Even then, we keep their sessions brief. They still don’t know what’s happened to her.

Grasping her hand, I lead Saela out of her room.

I exhale the moment I lay eyes on Izabel, Venna, and Nevah. The twins wear the same dress but in different colors. The top of the bodice is ruched, flowing into off-the-shoulder sleeves, and the body of the gown is a sleek, sparkling fabric that appears to flow down their bodies like water. Izabel’s is a burnished orange, and her hair is artfully arranged over one shoulder. Venna’s dress is a light purple, and her shorter hair is set in soft waves.

Nevah’s in a deep silver dress that matches the silver streak in her dark curls. It has thin straps and a high slit up one side, and embroidered rhinestones cascade from the bodice of the dress all the way down the slit. Matching rhinestones are laced throughout her hair, making her shimmer from head to toe.

If I’m playacting as a queen, they look every bit the important members of my court.

“Thank the goddess you’re here,” I say. Venna gives Saela a small hug, and my sister starts to warm up.

“Where’s the gown?” Nevah asks eagerly. Even Nevah and Venna have gotten into the excitement of the day as it’s approached. Izabel’s energy is infectious.

Brionna and my other attendants came earlier to do my hair and makeup. I saved getting into the coronation gown for my friends.

“Over here,” I say, and lead them to where it’s wrapped up for protection. “Go ahead.”

Venna reaches for it first, and Izabel watches in excitement as her sister cautiously removes the creation from its wrappings. Izabel’s hand immediately closes around my arm when she sees it. I rest my hand on hers and let my eyes wander over the garment.

It’s a queen’s dress, without a doubt. A masterpiece of tailoring and stitchwork.

It’s deep blue, embroidered in a filigree of thousands of tiny gold crystals that catch the light like stars when Venna lifts it. The neckline dips knifelike and low, almost daring. The full-length sleeves make the dress modest, though, and they will thankfully conceal my stupid fucking engagement bracelet.

Two full-length slits stretch the length of my thighs, but these are practical additions that will allow me to ride Anassa without constraint, should I need to do so.

“Oh,” Nevah breathes as she traces her fingertips over the long cape and its train. This element of my ensemble is white, but it’s threaded all the way through with golden embroidery of wolves running, leaping, almost dancing.

“You’re a queen,” Saela says in awe, as if seeing this dress finally made it real for her.

“Let’s make sure everyone else knows that, huh?” I say playfully.

“Shall we?” Izabel says, gesturing to the gown, and I nod.

It’s a delicate art to get me into the dress without disturbing my carefully arranged hair, but with my friends’ help, we manage it.

When I lift my head to assess myself in the mirror once more, strength settles in my Sturmfrost blood. I may not recognize myself, but when I look at my reflection, I see a queen.

I see Queen Chiara in her own coronation gown as if she were standing at my side, hand on my shoulder.

I hold fast to that image of myself as I approach the throne room, my sister and my direwolf both trailing behind. Even as I enter and take in the elaborate decorations, I do not let my vision waver.

This is the same throne room I saw Queen Chiara in when I first put on the crown. And now it’s bedecked for a luxurious show.

The room is flooded with flowers from the greenhouses. Thousands of bloodred blooms have been artfully arranged to look as though they’re growing up the walls, curling over the golden throne, and even dripping from the high ceiling.

It gives the impression of a beautiful threat. Exquisite with a hint of potential violence.

I asked for something that didn’t visually scream, I’m a bit deranged and might kill you all at any moment!

Alas, Matron Alienor said that the Valtieres always had scarlet blooms at their coronations and that the nobles would expect nothing less.

The air is heady with the flowers’ natural perfume. It’s so rich that I can almost taste it, floral and cloying on my tongue.

My head twinges with pain, a reminder of the shield against Killian that I’ve continued to reinforce. Anassa and I threw more power against it today. The last thing we need is Killian reaching out to all the Bonded midceremony.

I can only hope it will be enough.

Swiveling, I look back at Saela to make sure she’s still doing okay. Her eyes are wide, but she gives me a nod and a wobbly smile.

“Fix my skirts if they get tangled, okay?” I whisper. “I think falling on my face would ruin the effect.”

Saela rewards me with a faint giggle.

The room is bisected by a carpeted aisle. On either side are rows and rows of chairs. The common people are seated in the back, wearing the nicest garments they own.

Igor makes eye contact with me from where he sits with his wife, Prina, and nods. Next to him are the women from the laundry, my mother’s old friends. They’re dressed more formally than I’ve ever seen them, so much so that I barely recognize them. I smile at Mae, whose hair is painstakingly arranged and adorned with white flowers.

Heat burns behind my eyes, and that feeling of unfairness returns. If only my mother had been here.

The next section is filled with high-ranking Bonded, all brightly dressed in their most expensive finery. Some of them I recognize, like the Kryptos Alpha, Hannelore, who is next to Egith. Many of them I don’t.

My face flushes when I set eyes on Stark, a row ahead of them and next to the Sovereign Alpha.

He wears a dark suit again, this time accented in a deep Daemos red, the color of blood. His broad shoulders and the wicked tattoos on his neck and his hands set off the crisp lines of his suit in a way that’s almost perverse.

As if sensing me—always sensing me—he lifts his head. When our eyes meet, his face softens for the briefest of moments. His gaze moves over me like a feather drifting against my skin. My flush stretches in a warm heat down to my chest.

I force myself to look away from him, my pulse racing with something other than nerves.

The dais at the far end holds the throne King Cyril occupied only a little over a month ago. A trumpet heralds, announcing my presence as I advance down the aisle, my train trailing me.

Saela walks to my right, slightly behind me. Anassa keeps pace on my other side.

Row by row, the gathered assembly rises and remains standing even after I pass. Hundreds of faces turn to watch my progress down the long central aisle.

My journey to the throne.

I’m not sure which is more intimidating: the nobles whose faces show barely masked hostility, their brows tense and lips downturned, or the people watching with genuine expressions of awe.

I push past it all and focus on the Mother Priestess, a person I’d barely thought about before this week but who has now been an unending thorn in my side.

The Mother Priestess stands on the dais in ornate gold robes, her white hair once again wrapped in elaborate braids around her head. Her gnarled hands clutch a filigreed bottle of sacred oil. The priestess’s rheumy green eyes may make her look feeble, but I see the sharpness to them, even if no one else does.

To her side, on a pedestal, is the golden Sturmfrost crown with its leaping wolves.

She’s made no secret—to me, at least—that she finds me unsuitable for the throne. Every choice I’ve made about this coronation—from refusing to disrobe in front of a crowd to insisting that we did not need to rush in a slaughtered sea serpent to feed the nobles—has been met with a frown of disapproval.

The condemning wrinkles around her mouth and I are best friends, at this point.

Still, she’s here.

When I reach the dais, I turn around to face the assembled congregation. Saela takes her seat in the front row, and Anassa goes behind me to sit by the throne.

“Meryn Sturmfrost, heir to the Sturmfrost throne, you seek to be queen of the sacred nation of Nocturna,” the Mother Priestess bellows out, her voice far stronger than her body would imply.

“I do,” I say, following the script we’ve drilled over and over again.

“Humble yourself before the people you wish to serve. Humble yourself before the Faceless Goddess herself,” she cries out.

The nobles straighten in their seats, necks craning. More than a few of the men have a lecherous look in their eye.

Sorry, you fucking creeps, I’m not getting naked for your pleasure.

Instead, I kneel—a tough task in this heavy, gilded gown. Disappointed murmurs reach me from the crowd.

Then I place my head on the floor. “I humble myself before the people and the goddess herself. I beg that she assesses me and provides due approbation.” The words nearly make me shiver. I’ll never forget the way Cyril Valtiere said that phrase when we first met.

As if he fancied himself a god.

I stay in this prostrate position for a full minute. Theoretically, if the goddess was up there and watching over this, now would be the point she’d strike me down.

That’s how I know this ceremony is bullshit.

What kind of goddess would have let the Valtieres pass?

“You may rise, Meryn Sturmfrost,” the Mother Priestess eventually announces.

I lift my chest but stay kneeling and angle my body toward her. The Mother Priestess uncaps her sacred oil. The pungent, bitter scent of it wafts over me, and I try not to gag.

And that’s when I notice it. On her thumb is a large signet ring. And in the center of it… a teardrop-shaped opal.

Just like the one in my crown. Just like the one around Saela’s neck.

My blood starts to buzz. Is this another Tear?

The Mother Priestess dips her thumb into the dark liquid, drawing my eyes back to her face. “With your power, shall you rule for all?”

“With my power, I shall rule for all,” I echo.

She smears the oil across my forehead—once, twice, in an X.

“With persuasion, will you speak for all?”

“With persuasion, I shall speak for all.” Her thumb dips back into the oil, and she smears one line vertically across my mouth. I keep my lips clenched tight so the acrid flavor doesn’t touch my tongue.

“Will you keep your people first as you create and you destroy?”

I hold out my hands to her, palms up. “I will keep my people first as I create and I destroy.”

She smears one thick line on each palm.

“Will your heart aim to protect instead of harm?” she asks.

“My heart will aim to protect instead of harm.”

She draws another X—one swipe, two swipes—across my breastbone.

Then she moves over to the pedestal that holds the crown. Her back is to the crowd.

No one else can see the covetous glint in her eye or the way her fingers tighten over the center of the crown, over the opal. For a moment, I worry she’s not going to give it to me.

Anassa growls low in her throat, faintly enough that I hope I’m the only person who hears it.

Does the Mother Priestess believe these jewels are truly connected to the Faceless Goddess somehow?

Or maybe she just loves a matching set of jewelry.

Finally, the Mother Priestess turns and gently places the crown on my head. Her voice rings out steady, and the fanatical gleam in her gaze never wavers. “With the almighty blessing of the Faceless Goddess, I proclaim you Queen Meryn Sturmfrost, the rightful sovereign of Nocturna and protector of the bond.”

With a violent, echoing slam, the doors to the throne room burst open.

16

MERYN

All the Bonded jump to their feet so quickly, weapons drawn, that it takes me a moment to realize what’s happening.

It’s the direwolves. They stream into the throne room en masse. There must be at least fifty of them, claws clicking loudly on the shining marble. Their presence looms over everyone as they fill up the room—heads high, eyes gleaming, muscles rippling with their graceful movements.

The nobles draw back in fear. Gasps and whispers ripple through the crowd as they whirl around, craning to watch the procession as it overwhelms the borders of the room.

Some of my wolfish viciousness returns, watching the power shift. I have a flicker of satisfaction at their discomfort. Good, I think. Let them be the vulnerable ones for once.

Even nobles who attended the Trials were seated far away from the direwolves, watching the events at a remove. This is the closest most of them have come to the wolves, and certainly to this many. I’m proud to see that the common people temper their reactions.

Some of the wolves are the companions to the Bonded at the ceremony. But I know others have not taken riders yet. Bounding playfully among them are four direwolf pups, one in each pack color.

Saela gasps in joy. “Cute,” she squeals.

“What is this?” I quickly ask Anassa.

It takes a moment for her to respond, but she sends me her emotions. She’s awed, humbled. Deeply touched. “They have come to show their respect and loyalty to us as the royal pair.”

Tears spring to my eyes, and I weave my fingers through her coarse fur.

When the last wolf has entered, barely contained within the boundaries of the hall, Anassa moves to stand before the throne. She lifts her massive silver-white head, her muscles ripple, and she tilts her muzzle back in a haunting howl.

The sound is the ghosts of all our losses, the echo of the Sturmfrost Queens, and it moves through the throne room like a wave. It wakes the voice of the other wolves. They reply in kind, howling in unity. Their song echoes over the vaulted ceiling and rattles me to my core.

The nobles watch, speechless, as the wolves fall silent and begin to move as one. The direwolves bow deeply, first to Anassa, then to me. Then, as swiftly and surprisingly as they entered, the wolves file out of the throne room.

The Mother Priestess clears her throat, redirecting the crowd’s attention to me. “Long live the queen!” she calls out.

The assembly rises, nobles and Bonded and common people calling out in a unison far messier than the wolves’.

“Long live the queen!”

The words ring hollow.

Coronation day is endless, blending into night in a long blur.

When I first swept into the central ballroom, trailed by Anassa and Saela and Siegrid and the rest of my entourage, the light of the thousands of flickering candles and sparkling chandeliers struck me with its beauty.

Now, hours later, the dancing lights are like a thousand tiny pinpricks in my eyes, accentuating the headache that’s continued to throb dully at my temples.

Anassa left with the rest of the direwolves hours ago, instinct calling her to hunt. She told me she wanted to make a new coronation tradition for the wolves, since all the traditions from the Sturmfrost era had been forgotten.

Occasionally I get a flash of awareness from her as they bound through the snow, skirting around Mount Wolfsbane to the deeper forests—and bigger game—beyond.

Lucky bitch.

Unfortunately, the recent coronation traditions from the Valtieres haven’t been forgotten. The tables in the central ballroom circle around a cleared area, where seven dancers from the city are engaged in a “special performance.”

That’s what Matron Alienor called it when she insisted we needed to have it, that the nobles would expect it.

The “special performance” is some sort of erotic striptease.

The dancers are all stunningly beautiful and talented. I’m in awe of their physicality. But…

“Is this appropriate for a coronation meal?” Izabel says, coming behind me where I sit at the head table. The table has been covered in dish after dish of food. We’ve been eating for hours, one exquisite, absurd, rich thing after another.

We watch together as one of the dancers bends over, wraps her legs around her head and exposes her—thankfully, covered—crotch to a table of practically panting nobles.

“You took the words right out of my mouth,” I mutter as one of the other dancers goes onto her toes. The woman next to her grabs the first dancer’s dress and spins her. The first dancer pirouettes around the room, her dress unraveling as she goes until she’s in only pasties and glittering bottoms. She ends her move in the splits, and several of the noblemen whistle.

“She’s really flexible,” Saela says innocently through a mouth full of venison.

She can eat regular food, another thing we learned from Aldrich’s research, although only blood will provide her sustenance. Food is just meant for pleasure. And for someone rarely exposed to these kinds of meals, Saela is delighted by all her options.

“Do me a favor,” I tell Izabel. “Find out how much Matron Alienor is paying these women and triple it?”

“Done,” she says. “I was coming to let you know that the greeting procession is about to begin.”

I sigh as a long line of nobles forms at the stairs to our dais. “On it, thanks.”

Siegrid’s work has been a victory—the nobles are lining up to greet me, pay respects to their new queen. Everything is going as planned. If only their queen wanted to talk to a single fucking one of these sniveling dipshits.

I rise and step forward reluctantly, taking my place on the throne that’s positioned just by our royal table. Saela comes to stand at my side. She’s doing great so far, but I’ll need to send her to bed after this.

“Your Highness,” an older man intones, his voice a bit nasal. He moves slowly, and I swear I can hear his knees creak as he bends down to pledge his house’s allegiance.

“Lord Blumenfall,” I respond, thankful that Siegrid made me study the names, titles, and portraits of each lord or lady. “And Lady Heir.”

The younger woman to Lord Blumenfall’s right, also kneeling, stands and offers me a gilded box. “Our congratulations, Your Highness. We brought this as just a small token of our gratitude to have the rightful queen returned to us.”

I meet her eyes, looking for sarcasm, but her gaze is steady.

Perhaps these nobles genuinely are open to a commoner, Bonded queen? As the lord’s only child, Lady Heir Blumenfall is set to inherit his estate and responsibilities when he’s gone. She’s solid-looking and flinty-eyed. Maybe in her fifties at most.

She notices me giving her the once-over and quirks an eyebrow, eyes glinting. “We look forward to getting to know you better, my queen.”

As she steps away, I cast my mind around for the name of the next lord who approaches, a tall and thin man with a wispy mustache, but it’s escaping me. He doesn’t offer it, either, and I can see his gaze grow calculating when he realizes I’m not sure who he is.

“Congratulations on this momentous day,” he says, voice dripping with insincerity.

“Thank you for being here,” I murmur, distracted by my effort to match his face to one of the portraits I studied.

He sneers at Saela behind me and then marches off without a farewell. Saela and I exchange glances, but there’s no time to talk before the receiving line carries on.

The next couple is somehow better and worse: a young husband and wife whom I luckily remember as royal cousins of the Valtiere line, twice removed or something.

Despite the fact that I just recently decapitated one of their family members and snatched the throne from another, they’re bending over backward to fawn over me. The husband bows so deeply his head touches the ground, and the wife weeps as she grabs my hand and presses it to her forehead.

It’s transparently phony, the sycophantic worship, but I suppose I can’t blame them. They’re trying to persuade me not to lock them up for being distant relatives to the previous rulers.

I turn and grab my water goblet, taking a few quick gulps.

The Councilor of Sturmfrost, Gerhold Herzog, approaches next. The oily man is a necessary but unwelcome part of my Council Palast, and I spend our weekly meetings trying desperately not to engage in conversation with him.

Neighbors in the Eastern Quarter used to crack jokes about how he’d bestow royal contracts on folks who did him favors… especially beautiful young women. I believe the rumors even more now that I’ve had the unfortunate luck of getting to know him.

“You changed the coronation ceremony,” he says bluntly by way of greeting.

“I did,” I say, trying not to scowl. “Elements of it did not suit me.”

He sneers. “I beg to differ, Meryn.” I bristle at the casual use of my first name—from him, it’s an intended slight. “Those elements would have suited you quite well.”

My face burns. This fucking pig.

My first order of business now that I’m officially crowned will be finding a suitable replacement for him, an appropriate steward of Sturmfrost who can be trusted to run our city well.

He must see the barely controlled rage behind my civil veneer, because he smirks and bows his head, taking his leave.

Noemi and her father, Lord Eisenfall, are next. Noemi’s gown is a showy, sleek, fiery red, almost matching the color of her hair. To call it a gown might be an exaggeration. It’s a garment made of crisscrossing straps that cover up just bits of her body, with very little left to the imagination.

It reminds me uncomfortably of the balls held during the Bonding Trials. I blink in surprise at it; she struck me as demure when we first met.

Her attire looks drab in comparison to the wealth draped across Lord Eisenfall. His suit is a gaudy velvet, his sword hilt is studded in rubies, and precious stones glint from rings on every finger. Noemi stands slightly behind him, her head bent.

“Lord Eisenfall—you’re Noemi’s father?”

The lord scoffs. “I sired Noemi, to be sure, but we don’t claim bastards as our children or heirs, not in Eisenfall at least.” His gaze skims over me and my sister disapprovingly. “But yes, Noemi belongs to Eisenfall.”

My already pounding head grows hot at his words, and I look between Noemi and this man. A father who makes it sound like she’s a thing he owns rather than a daughter.

Lord Eisenfall plays with the jeweled hilt of his sword as he speaks, his tone lazy. “We do consider it a point of pride, of course, having a Bonded to display as one of our own.”

What the fuck?

I glance back at Noemi, who looks away as if she’s embarrassed.

I need to make a good impression on this asshole along with all the other disgusting leeches in this room. But my mouth doesn’t listen to my brain.

“As your new queen, I find it’s a point of pride to have so many dithering nobles to display as my own.”

I extend my hand in what I hope is a queenly way, keeping my face as blank as possible as Lord Eisenfall studies me, clearly unsure how to take my words.

He leans in and kisses it, and I immediately want to go wash.

After they finally go, the Mother Priestess steps up. I didn’t see her shrunken form behind Lord Eisenfall’s towering one, and she takes me by surprise. I assumed she might have left after the ceremonial portions of the coronation were complete.

That zealous intensity has returned to her eyes as she glides up the stairs to the dais, moving toward me until she’s uncomfortably close.

“Mother Priestess,” I say uneasily. “Thank you for presiding over the ceremony.”

Instead of responding to me, she turns toward Saela and reaches out a hand. My sister takes a frightened step backward. It immediately sets alarm bells off in my head.

“You have two?” the Mother Priestess hisses, moving closer.

She’s focused on the opal necklace Saela wears around her neck. The other Goddess Tear. She lunges forward as if to yank it off my sister’s neck.

“Mother Priestess,” I snap, and the woman straightens, a peevish look on her face. “You forget yourself.”

“No, you forget yourself, Your Highness.” She holds up her hand, displaying the opal ring. “You have said it yourself—you are not a true believer. You are not worthy of carrying one Tear in your family, let alone two. They are sacred symbols of the goddess. They belong with me.”

Anger floods me, and shadows begin to stir in the corner of my eye. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Not now. I cannot lose control.

Taking a deep breath, I say, “I have an open mind about the goddess, as I told you. If you find me so unworthy, perhaps you should have declined to oversee the ceremony. And I believe my family’s heirlooms belong in my family’s possession.”

I nod toward Siegrid, who approaches swiftly.

“Siegrid, the Mother Priestess is exhausted and needs to retire for the evening. Can you personally see to it that she reaches her chambers?”

Siegrid bows to me, then grabs the Mother Priestess’s arm, leading her away.

“Well, that was weird,” Saela mumbles.

“No kidding,” I say. “Speaking of exhausted, are you ready to head back to your room?”

Saela nods gratefully, and I wave down Helene. After the two of them depart, I slip down the stairs past the other waiting nobles, ignoring the questioning eyes that land on me.

I need air. This cavernous room is suddenly stifling.

There’s a side door behind a table overladen with chocolates and pastries, and I make for it as fast as my heavy gown and stupid dress shoes allow. It opens onto one of the balconies that overlooks the castle grounds.

Letting the door close behind me, I make my way over to the banister. The cold stone is delicious against my overheated skin. A scent of snow is in the air.

It’s only a minute or two before my solitude is interrupted. The door opens with a burst of warm, damp air from inside.

Maybe it’s his tread against the solid stone of the balcony floor.

Or maybe it’s a subtle change in the back of my mind, Anassa’s awareness shifting, blending with my own, giving me an almost wolfish intuition.

But somehow, I don’t have to turn and look to know it’s Stark.

I swallow hard but keep my gaze straight ahead, watching the trees of the courtyard shiver in the frigid wind. Stark is quiet as he moves to stand beside me at the balustrade. I don’t look at him, but I can feel his movement, sense the heat coming off him, his arm resting inches from mine as he leans on the banister and looks out.

Neither of us says anything for a moment, and the silence settles over me like a comforting blanket. It’s odd to be in his presence and also so… at peace.

Eventually, I sense his gaze on me, and I turn to meet his dark eyes, pools of night in the dim light.

My breath hitches, that tension between us from yesterday returning in full force.

What would it be like to take him up on that offer? To tattoo him somewhere intimate and learn the feel of his skin with my tongue?

“Hiding from your scary subjects?” His teasing, low voice interrupts the moment. But his gaze holds mine, and I somehow know there’s concern behind the question.

“Only until they all go to bed?” I laugh weakly. He just stares at me, as if he’s drinking in every detail of my appearance. “Can you blame me? A bunch of ass-kissers who normally treat the Bonded like garbage, suddenly falling all over themselves to tell me how happy they are for me, how glad they are to serve the rightful queen. Honestly, I’d rather drive nails into my eyeballs.”

That gets a snort from him, though his gaze never drops. “Ass-kissers or not, you need them to show their support, even if it’s a total farce.”

“I know,” I sigh.

“Their wealth, the soldiers from their fiefdoms, their influence over their subjects, it’s all—”

“I know,” I bite sharply, my irritation spilling over as I turn to face him fully, leaning in. “I might act like an idiot most of the time, but I’m not a total imbecile.”

The clouds overhead are thinning, and the moonlight outlines his hair, the angles of his cheekbones, making him look like a hero from one of Saela’s storybooks—or a villain. He looks different tonight, I think, although I can’t pinpoint why exactly. Something in the set of his face.

“You look beautiful,” he says quietly. Maybe I’m making it up, but I could swear there’s a longing in his voice.

Is it just our wolves’ mate bond influencing him? Or… something else?

A yearning that has started to build in me, too. One that confuses me so much I rush to shut it down.

“Glad to hear I didn’t show up to my coronation looking like shit.”

He grimaces but steps closer, until his breath heats me. Until I can smell his amber musk so deeply that it twists inside me and ignites my veins. “Sorry. But when I saw you yesterday, you looked like you hadn’t slept in a month.”

His hand comes up to my face, and for a moment, I think he’s going to cup my cheek, tilt my face toward his. Instead, his fingertips lightly brush the spot under each eye, where I know under my makeup I’m boasting circles as dark as a bruise.

I want to be insulted, but he’s right. I have barely been sleeping. I’m too afraid that I’ll somehow end up back in that shadowy realm, trapped with Killian, unable to escape him.

Maybe it’s time to ask for help, to tell someone other than Anassa the truth. I know I can trust him.

But as I open my mouth to explain, the door behind us swings open again, knocking against the stone of the wall and bouncing back.

We both swivel to look at the new arrival: Siegrid. She gives us an assessing gaze, then smiles.

I step away from Stark, not wanting her to read into whatever this is.

“It’s time for the traditional toasts,” Siegrid says. “I don’t think they’ll get started until our monarch returns to her table, however…”

She somehow imbues the word monarch with respect and irritation and weariness all at once. I almost admire the way she manages to make the words sound like an insult without technically saying anything negative about me.

So much for my heart-to-heart with Stark. I feel a sinking disappointment in my chest, but I know Siegrid’s right. “Far be it from me to keep the nobles from their next glass of emberwine,” I quip, moving toward the door before looking back at Stark. “You coming?”

Siegrid bustles me back onto the dais. A server darts forward to hand me a glass of sparkling emberwine as soon as I’ve reached my spot at the head of the table.

The glass is made of shining crystal, intricately engraved with twisting vines and, at its center, the Sturmfrost crest. I study it, wondering how old it is, if one of my ancestors might have held this very same glass at a coronation of her own.

Siegrid begins the traditional coronation toasts. I catch a few words of her clearly rehearsed speech; “the true royal line” and “tradition embracing necessary change as we move our country forward” and other carefully worded phrases.

“…with the full support of the Bonded warriors and myself, the Sovereign Alpha, behind her…”

If only I believed I had the full support of the Bonded warriors. Hopefully, after tonight, my friends’ families—and the others like them—will start to come around.

I look out at the sea of faces, each table standing with their glasses held aloft, waiting for Siegrid to finish her remarks.

Turning back toward Siegrid, I see Stark slip into place by her side, and my exhaustion recedes just for a moment.

“To Queen Meryn!”

The words repeat and echo throughout the ballroom. I lift my own glass, smiling and nodding like I heard a word of what was said. Sitting back down, I place the cup carefully to the side. I don’t need anything to dull my nerves tonight.

Conversation resumes around the room, and the hundreds of conniving eyes thankfully shift away from me. I sigh again, and then a hand slips over my eyes.

“Who’s your favorite packmate,” comes Izabel’s voice. I manage a half-hearted chuckle as she lets me go, grabs herself a chair and scooches in next to me. Siegrid looks on disapprovingly from her end of the table, but I can’t bring myself to care.

Tomison is with Iz, and he takes the chair next to her. “Great party, Queenie.”

I laugh. “Thanks, Tomtom. You two having fun?”

Izabel pulls a face. “Not really. As your events planner, I’m duty bound to say this has gone perfectly and everything is just right.”

Tomison chuckles. “But as your friends: This party is creepy.”

“Oh, you didn’t like the display of the ten roasted peacocks? The tiny cakes that looked suspiciously like breasts weren’t to your taste? Or is it the nobles using their drunkenness as an excuse to do… that?”

I gesture to the ballroom floor, where several older, inebriated nobles have cornered young commoners and Bonded, forcing them to dance. Technically, they’re keeping their hands to themselves, but it’s revolting to watch all the same.

Izabel sighs. “See? How did they even manage to get into that state? You’d think my position as planner would get me a few more perks. I can’t even get the servers to bring me a glass of emberwine. What gives?”

Before I can reply, she spots the crystal goblet at my plate. “Great, here’s where it’s all been hiding. Time to get properly drunk and see if that makes this occasion any more tolerable.”

I roll my eyes and lean over her toward Tomison. “The woman you’re courting is a terrible influence. You know that, right?”

Izabel looks affronted. “Courting? Him? I have no idea what you’re talking about. In fact, I’ve never even seen him before. Who is he?” She takes a deep sip of the emberwine.

“That’s not what you were saying last night,” Tomison purrs, his mouth close to her ear. “You seemed to know my name very well when you were screaming—”

Izabel chokes on her drink.

I hold up a hand. “Stop. I beg you. It’s like I’m hearing my parents talk about sex.”

Izabel’s laugh gets stuck in her throat. Another choke. Her dark eyes go wide, and she looks to Tomison first, panic setting in.

Then she grabs my hand, wheezing.

All the blood drains from my body.

She struggles to her feet, and Tomison and I both bolt out of our chairs so quickly they tumble over.

He puts a hand on her back. “Iz—”

The goblet slips from Izabel’s fingers and rolls across the floor, bouncing once on the stairs before shattering into a million pieces on its next impact.

She looks to me, eyes filled with terror, as she takes one step backward. Her knees give out, and she crumples to the dais. Her mouth is open, screaming without sound.

Cold panic tears through me, ice filling my veins.

“Izabel!” I shout, falling to the floor beside her, frantically searching for something I can do to help. Tomison does the same, cradling her head in his lap.

She begins to convulse violently. Foam froths up at her mouth, red from the emberwine. Or, I realize with horror, from blood.

“Get—call the wolves—” I reach out with my mind, trying to focus, hating to look away from Izabel for a second, even internally. But if Asteio is here, she can heal Izabel. “Anassa!” Through the bond, I sense as she turns and sprints in our direction, but she’s leagues away.

It’s going to be too late, I realize dimly. Whatever was in the drink—the drink meant for me—has taken over Izabel’s body.

The party continues on all around us, clinking glasses and polite laughter.

No one else sees it—how the world is ending before our eyes.

17

MERYN

Get her direwolf now!” a voice roars. The sound rings in my ears like a bell before I realize it’s me. I’m the one screaming for help. “We need a medic! Get someone, anyone!”

Stark appears by our sides in moments, wrapping strong arms around Izabel’s legs, trying to stabilize her.

“Grigore, get the palace medic!” Stark echoes, the look on his face grim. “Anyone with medical knowledge! Come up here, now!”

I lean back as Stark and Tomison try to steady Izabel’s thrashing form. All I can do is watch in horror as Venna appears next to us, tears streaming down her cheeks as she takes in the sight of her sister.

When I glance back down from Venna’s face, I know immediately that it’s too late.

Izabel has stopped moving. Her lips are blue, still flecked with that red foam, and her dark eyes are glassy, sightless.

“No,” I whisper, reaching for her hand. It’s cold, limp. I quickly pull my fingers back, stomach heaving.

The most vibrant person I’ve ever met, snuffed out in a senseless blink.

I meet Tomison’s gaze above Izabel’s still form. He’s ashen, shocked into a stupor.

Venna falls to her knees next to her sister’s lifeless body, and Stark and I both move out of the way. She wraps her arms around Izabel’s form, cradling her gently.

The primal wail that comes from her mouth is piercing. It doesn’t sound human.

Stark helps me to my feet. Penetratingly cold waves flood my body. My mind is frighteningly calm, like an icy frozen lake.

That emberwine was meant for me.

Izabel died drinking emberwine specially meant for me.

I shiver as another wash of cold settles deep in my bones.

It’s only then I notice how the shadows in the room have begun to writhe, pulsing in time with my heartbeat, twitching as my fingers flex. That pulse I felt in the arena echoes inside me like a dark heartbeat, urging me to give up, let it in.

As I instinctively tighten my hands into fists, threads of shadow curl up from all directions. They wrap themselves around my fingers, weave their way up my arms like an extension of the tattoos at my neck.

The power is heady, all-encompassing.

I flick open my right hand experimentally, and a thousand tendrils of shadow shoot out, climbing the walls and writhing around the chandeliers, finding every last flame and extinguishing each one by one, leaving more and more of the ballroom in darkness.

“Meryn,” Siegrid snaps from where she’s joined us on the dais.

Her disapproval doesn’t register.

My eyes cut to Stark, and he inclines his head. A nod, maybe… encouraging.

The darkness has taken over. Some small part of me registers that I’m not acting like myself, like the queen I want to be, but…

I don’t care.

I don’t care if I’m out of control anymore. I don’t care if I’m letting my emotions consume me, if I’m leaving myself open to something sinister.

The power gathering in my chest is wild and frightening and drives out any thought, any feeling apart from the sheer rush of freeing it. The darkness inside me is a deep, unending cavern.

Siegrid’s not strong enough to stop me anyhow.

I release the ball of shadow from my other hand. With violent satisfaction, I watch as every single door in the room slams tightly shut. The nobles flinch at the sound, and I drink in their fearful murmurs.

My voice is deeper than usual, calm and deadly. “Who is responsible for this?”

The hall falls silent, the only sound Venna’s strangled sobs.

“Who. Is. Responsible. For. Izabel’s. Murder.” I stride to the front of the royal dais, arms outstretched in a plea to the power that’s all around me, gathering the dark to me like armor.

I stare around the room, my vision sharpened, senses heightened as more and more magic streaks into my veins, through my very blood.

Nobody steps forward.

My mind races, replaying the moments before the toast. A server brought the goblet to me. The moment is sharp in my mind, the memory of the intricate cup, the face of the woman—it was someone I didn’t recognize, someone with fair hair.

Not one of my regular staff.

Deliberately, I step down from the dais and onto the ballroom floor, shadows streaming behind me like a living cape. My anger is bright and hot behind my eyes, white heat clashing with the icy, shadowy tendrils that curl around my wrists, my neck, tangle in my hair.

Nobles and Bonded and servants alike shrink back as I approach them.

I take my time, methodical. Nobody is leaving this room. Not until I say so.

I spot her finally in a cluster of servants I do recognize. She stands behind them, trying to blend in.

Get her.

Like the other times I’ve used shadebending, I don’t tell it what to do. I just give a shove of emotion, and the shadows react, do what they will.

A dark rope of power winds around her ankles, yanking her forward across the polished floor. Shocked nobles scramble out of the way, gawking as the woman sprawls before me. People push to move farther from us, the circle widening around me.

I see Stark out of the corner of my eye, note as he stays close, positions himself behind me.

Good. He’s not going to interfere.

“Who are you?”

The woman sobs, writhing against the shadowy restraints. They slither up from her ankles, fastening her arms to her sides, ringing her neck, leaving her helpless.

“No one, I’m just—I’m no one, Your Highness!” Her voice is thin and reedy. “This was just a job. I didn’t know what I was doing, I swear to the goddess!”

Her body thrashes uselessly on the floor, a grotesque echo of Izabel’s final dying throes.

“Explain yourself,” I growl. Anassa’s anger grows stronger and stronger in my mind as she races toward the castle, needing to be here by my side. Her presence in my mind renews my strength.

The woman’s whimpers are loud in the silent ballroom. A few nobles start to edge toward the doors.

Stop them.

Shadows shoot across each of the doors, visibly barring the exits. Sobs start from a few more directions, but I ignore the sound, turning back to my quarry.

She cries and snivels, begging me to let her loose. “I didn’t know what was going to happen! He told me I could trust him, that I was doing the right thing for Nocturna! He just said this was the queen’s goblet, that it was important I give it to you and only you!”

“Show me.” Without my instruction, the shadows drag the woman upright and loosen one of her arms. “Who was this man?”

Her arm shakes as she lifts it, pointing tremulously at a man.

A man I know well from our Council meetings.

The Councilor of Sturmfrost.

That slimy piece of shit whose oversight of my city has been nothing but a curse.

On instinct, I throw my hands toward him. The shadows take it as a command, streaming in his direction faster than thought itself.

Gathering pools of darkness twist into thorny ropes, tangling around Councilor Gerhold’s legs. The shadows hoist him into the air, pulling him up, up, until he’s dangling from his feet above his family’s table.

His wife lets out a bloodcurdling scream, stretching up, trying to reach him. Their two sons, men around my age, cower in fear with their eyes glued to their father.

I ignore them. “Did you honestly believe you could kill the rightful queen? And make it out of here unscathed? You did this. You robbed the world of a true bright light, and you will pay for her death.”

The councilor is red in the face, his clothes flapping awkwardly, but nevertheless he snarls at me. His look is as supercilious as the portraits of him hanging all over the city. “Who gives a shit about some Bonded dying? I was only doing what others were too cowardly to attempt. You’re not my queen.”

His wife moans, covers her eyes.

“Long live King Killian!” the councilor shouts defiantly, and several nobles near him try to school their expressions.

My jaw clenches, vengeance and fury clashing into something deadly inside my chest. My vision darkens.

The shadows respond, engulfing the entire councilor’s table, including his family.

His table winks out of existence for a moment. Councilor Gerhold’s strangled scream echoes and then is cut off.

The sudden lack of sound snaps me back into myself. Whatever furious wave I was riding abates, and I suck in a panicked breath.

No.

No.

I was trying to avoid this show of violent power; I was trying to prove today that I wasn’t someone to fear—

The shadows recede, but their task is already done.

Four bodies lie broken on the floor. I didn’t just kill the councilor—I killed his wife and sons, too.

My hands start to shake, and I fight to stop it. I can’t let anyone see how rattled I am by my own actions.

I would do anything to protect the people that matter to me—and the shadows understand that darkest part of me, pull it out even when I shouldn’t show it.

My head and heart are aching and empty as I stride back up the royal dais, turning until I’m sure every single noble in the audience is looking my way.

“Now you’ve seen what your queen is capable of.” My throat scrapes like broken glass, the voice that emerges from my mouth strange and terrible.

Who have I become?

Siegrid was right—I never should have allowed the shadebending to take over. I should have remained in control.

Still, I lift my chin. I have to look strong and commanding in front of all these people. Somehow, somehow, I need to convince them I’m not insane.

“The former Councilor of Sturmfrost’s treason could not go unpunished. He attempted to murder your sovereign. He killed one of my closest advisors. He killed my—”

I can’t speak anymore around the tightness in my throat. Thankfully, Anassa’s presence perks up in my mind, a warm slide of fur against my brain. And more—her approval. I may have felt out of control, but my vicious wolf would do it all over again.

I’m not sure that I’m comforted by that.

“Treason against the kingdom will not be dealt with lightly,” I say. “And it seems I need to be clear: In my eyes, nobles, Bonded, and the common people are all of equal standing. Everyone’s life is of value.”

And yet, you took lives so easily, my conscience jeers. I press my lips together to hold back the thought. I’ll have time for self-loathing and regret later. Right now, I need to get these people in line.

Muffled sobs are now heard from nearly every table. I can almost smell the fear off the nobles in the room. The common people in attendance, too, are cowering. The Bonded, however, are looking at me in respect.

“I do not intend to rule Nocturna with an iron fist,” I announce. “But if I discover any more plots against me, or against the kingdom, they will be dealt with swiftly and with the appropriate level of justice. I will protect you and your families with the same fervor.”

I scan the room, meeting the eyes of a few of the nobles I met earlier. Each gives me a nod of acknowledgment as I stare them down.

The tension around me is thick and hideous. I stand there a minute longer, until every head in the room is bowed in submission.

“Stark.”

“My queen,” he says, stepping toward me.

“See that the bodies are removed.” Distantly, I register his agreement. Turning to Siegrid, I say, “Make sure that nobody leaves the castle grounds until I say so. We must ensure that this entire conspiracy has been… eliminated.”

She nods, gesturing to a few other Bonded, tersely sharing orders with them.

They move to the doors, and the shadow barriers I’d somehow created melt back into the floor. The Bonded open the exits, and nobles and commoners stream out, rushing to put as much distance between them and me as possible.

I ignore them, turning to look where my eyes have been unwilling to go. Down at the motionless body of my friend.

Her head is still cradled in Tomison’s lap. Nevah squats next to him, rubbing his back, whispering in his ear. I can tell she’s trying to get through to him, to snap him out of the wordless daze he’s been in from the moment Izabel’s body stilled.

My first friend in all this, now lifeless on the floor.

Because of me.

Venna stands up from her sister’s side, silently looking at me, appealing. As if there’s something I can do, something I can offer. But what can I say?

This was all my fault—because of my decision to claim this throne, because of the enemies I’ve made.

Venna’s face changes as I stare helplessly back at her, tears streaming senselessly down her cheeks, expression shifting between grief and wrath.

Finally, I close the distance between us, taking her into my arms. She clasps her arms around me tightly, and something breaks open in my chest.

I cry.

It might be minutes or hours later that I sense Anassa’s presence approaching, her claws scratching against the floor. Venna’s wolf, Skaia, pads behind her.

Venna and I break apart, both going to our wolves, clinging to their coats for some semblance of comfort.

But no direwolf magic can heal this pain.

18

MERYN

Two days later, I watch from my bedchamber as Nocturna’s nobles depart Sturmfrost Castle.

The scene is fuzzy and dreamlike through the rippled panes of glass in the window. Cold fog has descended from the mountains this morning. It coats everything I see, dampening the landscape and dulling the colors.

It’s like my grief made tangible. A blanket of sorrow, heavy and thick and cold, reaching icy fingers into my flesh and bones. I wonder if I’ll ever be warm again.

And there’s so much to do.

I need to check in with Siegrid and Tormun on the progress with Killian, the bracelet on my wrist a constant aching reminder of his menace. I need to get a status update on the war front. I need to check on my sister, who has remained in her bedroom since the coronation, terrified that she’ll be the next target.

But I can’t move from the window, the inside of my head a dull buzz.

It’s an endless parade of horses and carriages. Wagonloads of trunks full of ball gowns and pearls and perfumes. All the traces of a royal coronation, slowly emptying out of the castle and leaving nothing but sorrow behind.

What’s happened to Izabel’s clothes? All her beautiful party dresses.

Her riding leathers, the new jacket her parents had made for her for the Trials still barely broken in.

The thought rises in my throat, making it hard to breathe. I press my face to the frigid windowpane, screwing my red-rimmed eyes shut. The freezing glass smarts against my tight, tearstained skin.

I half-heartedly suggested to Matron Alienor and Siegrid that I be present as the nobles departed, to leave a last impression, but they both agreed the impression I left them with was “suitable” for now.

An impression of violence, nobody had to say out loud.

Of swift, ruthless retribution.

I don’t regret killing the councilor; he deserved what happened to him. But his family? I killed them without a thought. Just pure emotion made lethal by my shadows.

Is this the kind of ruler I am to become?

Is this what it takes to wrest this kingdom from the grasp of Killian and Alistair Brightbane?

The parade of departing noble guests continues, but I turn my face away.

I’m staring sightlessly at my sister’s room when a knock sounds on the door.

Stark, here to escort me to Izabel’s funeral. He’s insisted that he accompany me as guard whenever I leave my chambers, at least in the immediate aftermath of the poisoning.

He and Anassa are always there, always present. It’s like I’m a fragile child who needs watching over, and it’s starting to make me itchy.

Somewhere in the back of my mind is a woman who wants to snap at them that she’s fine, that she’s strong. Toss a rude joke their way, and escape their cautious babysitting.

But I’m too hollow to reach her.

Now, I open the door to his bulky frame, draped in mourning black. Not that he often wears any other color. The color suits him, this harbinger of death.

He looks too handsome for a funeral, his face clean-shaven. I breathe him and want to rage against the annoying comfort the smell brings me. I don’t deserve comfort.

We leave Saela behind and go outside to meet our direwolves. Anassa is as edgy as I am today. I pat her fur, and she huffs at me.

“We have lost a good wolf and a good rider,” she says in my mind. “But your distress is going to leak out into the entire bond if you are not careful. Izabel’s memory will live within you forever. Now it is time for you to lead.”

“Okay,” I say quietly, digging into that hollow place, searching for the brash, strong woman I once was.

With effort, I slip back into the mask of the person who doesn’t let difficult things break her.

How many hits can I take before that illusion is shattered for good?

Straightening my shoulders, I mount Anassa, then nod at Stark. We move as one on our direwolves to the site of the funeral, a clearing at the edge of the Bonded City.

By the time we arrive, I’m able to shake hands with Izabel and Venna’s parents without trembling.

“You honor us with your presence, Queen Meryn,” their mother murmurs.

I reach for her hands again, awkwardly pressing them in a show of support. “Your daughter was very dear to me,” I manage, the words a paltry ghost of what our relationship meant.

Venna stands next to them, face pale and eyes bloodshot. She looks at me only briefly, then nods and looks away.

I understand. In her place, I’m not sure I could speak without breaking down.

Stark and I reach the platform to the left of the family, where space has been reserved for the new queen. I look around. The landscape is barren but still beautiful; the rocky ground austere, small scrubby pines fading into forest and then mountains, peaks as far as the eye can see.

The fog is breaking up, and the midmorning light slants through the pine branches, illuminating Izabel’s funeral pyre.

I’ve seen too many Bonded die, but this is the first Bonded funeral I’ve attended; such indulgences weren’t allowed to us as Rawbonds, not under the Valtiere kings at least. Now, though, people have turned out in droves to honor Izabel.

Her extended family. Young friends from the Bonded City who haven’t attempted the Trials yet.

Tomison and Nevah, of course.

Egith, now the Alpha of Strategos, here to pay homage to our lost packmate.

And others, too; Izabel’s maidservant from the castle, and two children of a noble family who stayed behind to honor Izabel before returning to their fiefdom, evidently having befriended her at some royal function years ago. Others I don’t recognize, but who are nonetheless familiar because we wear the same expression of grief.

I try not to notice how they all avoid looking at me. Stark is a reassuring presence at my back. Ready to defend me, as always. Whether or not I’m worthy of such protection.

The pyre is built high, in accordance with Bonded tradition. Izabel has been dressed in ceremonial armor. Her direwolf, Asteio, who perished when Izabel took her last breath, is laid out beside her.

Together in death, after all too short a time together in life.

I blink rapidly, willing tears away. It is time for you to lead.

After a brief piece of music played by a woman I don’t recognize, Izabel and Venna’s father says a few words of welcome and then steps back so that Venna can deliver the eulogy.

She moves stiffly, as if having to remind her legs how to walk, her body how to move, without her sister present. Her hands tremble as she pulls a parchment out of her jacket, then swallows.

Their mother stifles a sob, and I bite my inner lip until it nearly draws blood. Press my eyes closed, then focus them on Venna, who’s started speaking.

“Before yesterday, there was never a single day that I was apart from my sister.” She stops, gathering herself. One of the noble girls behind me starts weeping softly.

“We always knew, though, that being Bonded meant that we’d likely one day be parted. It’s not unusual for Bonded to die young, whether in the Trials or at the front. We used to argue about it when we were little—which one of us would go first, and how.”

Venna smiles lightly, looking over at her mother and father.

“I always predicted Izabel would go out in a blaze of glory, doing something courageous and foolhardy. I think if she were able to talk to us now, she’d say she was thrilled to have gone out partying.”

I glance over at her parents. Her father manages a watery chuckle. Her mother just shakes her head, eyes glazed.

Venna’s tone turns somber. “When we’re faced with it every day, when we know so many who have passed on defending our country, death starts to seem commonplace. But my sister’s life is not an abstraction, not a statistic. Every day, I’ll look in the mirror and wonder how this face would have aged on Izabel. Every day, I’ll wake up with half my heart gone forever.”

Venna stares ahead, and I see the moment she locks eyes with Tomison. The two of them stand motionless, just looking at each other. Time slows down as their grief reaches out in ripples, sending small painful threads through everything and everyone, like millions of cracks in a pane of shattered glass.

Finally, Venna looks down, gripping the parchment in front of her blankly as if she’s forgotten what she was doing.

My heart clenches. I hunch my shoulders at the ache of it.

If I’d taken that drink instead, Izabel would still be alive. If I’d never stepped into their lives, Izabel and Venna would still be together. Tomison and Izabel would still have a future together.

The hurt is a vise, constricting my chest, and I struggle to draw breath.

“Get it together, girl,” Anassa chides. “Fair or not, you must become a place for others to rest their heartbreak. You cannot lose yourself to it, too.”

I let out a harsh breath, the warmth of it misting in the cool air around me. Suck in another one. Over and over. Breathe, until Anassa’s advice takes root.

Venna recovers and looks around at all the faces gathered. “I know that Izabel would hate for us to wallow. She’d have some kind of plan for how to help everyone around her recover and keep marching on, making jokes the whole time. It would be obnoxious, and she’d probably overdo it, but in the end we’d all be better for it.”

Her voice wavers, then gains strength again.

“So that’s what we have to do, for Izabel. Keep going. And know that she’d be proud.”

Venna steps down from the platform, and her father moves forward, taking a torch up from where it’s been waiting and lighting the pyre. The flames move fast, climbing high until Izabel’s face is obstructed.

Anassa moves behind me, then the wolves circle around us—the wolves of every Bonded present. They form a ring and, one by one, begin to howl, starting with Venna’s wolf, Skaia. The sound is wild and haunting.

Venna’s face is a stoic mask as she stares at the fire.

We wait as the flames burn on, howls fading to silence, until all we can hear is the crackle of the logs. Finally, the peak of the inferno passes.

Izabel and Asteio are reduced to ash.

Groups of mourners begin to stir. I stand unmoving as the mourners collect themselves, paying quiet regards to the Brooks family as they leave.

Stark puts a hand on my shoulder. “It’s time to depart, my queen.” It’s always “my queen” when he’s trying to protect me, I’ve noticed.

I shudder, and a resounding emptiness fills me. It’s so final, leaving her here. I know it’s irrational, but I don’t want the funeral to end. By clinging to the ceremony, it’s as if we’re still keeping some part of her with us.

Swallowing hard, I step down from the platform, moving toward the path back to the city. Anassa follows somberly behind, sensing that I need to walk this time.

The tears that I can no longer hold back cloud my vision.

I don’t see Tomison coming until he’s standing right in front of me.

Stopping short, I blink at him. “Tomison, I—”

“You did this to her,” he interrupts, voice breaking. His face is gaunt; it’s clear he hasn’t slept. It’s a look I know intimately.

His words are a welcome dagger in my chest—finally, someone has said out loud what I know to be true.

In many ways, it’s a relief.

“I know,” I whisper. “I know, I wish—”

But he cuts me off again, leaning toward me, swaying slightly. “That cup was meant for you. That poison was meant for you. Izabel didn’t have enemies. She’d still be here if it weren’t for you and your—your bid for power.”

There’s hatred in his gaze.

I stare at him, shivering. We should be united in our heartache, but he’s aiming his at me. He takes another step closer, until we’re only inches apart.

From behind me, Anassa bares her teeth in warning. Tomison’s wolf, Filikos, sidles up next to him, a low growl forming in his throat.

There’s a dark flash as Cratos appears, circling to put himself between Filikos and Anassa.

I glance over to see Stark’s hand on his sword, his face hard. Everything is balanced on a knife’s edge.

“You had to be queen,” Tomison continues, voice scratchy and almost unrecognizable. “You couldn’t settle for Alpha. And you’ve killed her. Now you’ve killed her—”

Filikos lets out a pained howl, echoing Tomison’s agony, and then moves in fast—lunging, eyes wild, toward me.

I jump back quickly into Anassa’s fur as Filikos’s jaw snaps shut on empty air, but he’s not done. He lunges again, slobbering fangs coming for my throat.

“My family was right about you,” Tomison shouts. “I was blinded, but they saw you for who you are!”

Anassa growls, but Cratos is on Filikos in a flash, huge paw slamming him to the ground. Filikos thrashes against him, his brown eyes still focused on my face. Death is in his gaze. He wants to kill me.

Tomison goes silent. Not egging on Filikos—at least not audibly—but not stopping him, either.

“Stark,” I plead. Then, without thinking, I reach out in my mind. “Don’t harm either of them.”

Stark is on Tomison instantly, a thick arm around Tomison’s throat.

“Call off your wolf,” Stark snaps, steel in his voice.

Tomison doesn’t say a word, just stares at me. The despair and pain on his face tangle in my gut until I might retch.

Behind them, Filikos scrabbles against Cratos, twisting wildly to free himself. Cratos swipes his claws across an ear, and Filikos yelps, a high, painful note.

“Tomison, stand down.” Alpha Egith has appeared beside us.

I’ve never seen her so imposing. Her face is cold and hard, and her eyes flash as she focuses on the pair. I feel myself straighten at her commanding tone. Through my mental link with all the Bonded, I can feel the reverberations of her order. Her iron will, forcing itself down on Tomison and Filikos, until Tomison slumps in Stark’s arms.

Filikos stops moving underneath Cratos, submitting to Egith’s dominance.

Stark releases Tomison, and he stumbles forward, gasping for breath.

There’s a whole world of pain in his eyes as they meet mine. “Queen Meryn—”

“You’re dismissed, Tomison,” I manage. “I’m relieving you of your duties on the Council Palast, and of active service generally.” I hear myself as if I’m listening to someone else, someone capable of managing this moment.

There’s a low pounding in my head. I’m saying goodbye to two friends today. My fingers ease, slipping down from Anassa’s coat.

I take a deep breath. “Go home, Tomison. You need time to heal.”

A small crowd has gathered around us, and I glare at them. Onlookers purse their lips, then move off. Ready to spread this story widely, I expect.

My shoulders slump. I stay where I am, next to Anassa, as Egith escorts Tomison away. Stark and Cratos stand with us, watching their backs as they retreat.

I turn at a pull on my sleeve: Venna’s beside me, mouth pressed into a thin line.

“He’s hurting,” she signs, clearly not wanting Tomison to overhear us.

It’s not just Tomison; Filikos is in pain, too. Asteio wasn’t his mate, but they were close friends who grew closer from their riders.

What happened today wasn’t a thought-out plan of retribution against me; it was two beings reacting with wolfish instincts to the person they blamed for their distress.

“I know. I know.” I suck in air. How many allies can I afford to lose? But I can’t expect Venna to carry on, not without time to heal as well. “Venna, I’ll understand if you want to take a break from your duties in the palace as well. I value your help so much, but I think you should be with your family right now.”

Venna’s brows draw together. “No. Meryn, I can’t sit around and do nothing. I’ll suffocate.”

I take her hand, squeezing tight. “Are you certain?”

“The worst thing right now would be for me to sit still.” Her expression is resolute.

I lean in and wrap my arms around her shoulders tearfully. “Okay. Okay. As long as you’re sure.”

Venna holds me close, then steps back.

“Take a night or two with your family, though,” I urge her. “You can resume your post at the castle in the morning.”

She nods and moves off to stand with her parents, who are saying their final farewells to other mourners. For a split second, watching her is like seeing Izabel’s ghost, pale and somber.

I shake my head to clear the vision and wrap my arms around Anassa, hiding my sobs in her fur.

I’m the last to arrive for our Council Palast meeting, but I don’t interrupt any idle chatter as I enter. Siegrid and Nevah were both at the funeral, of course, but even though Igor and Castle Matron Alienor didn’t know Izabel, they understand what a blow this has been for all of us.

The direwolves sit quietly along the back wall, watchful. Anassa moves to join them, exchanging a few brief sniffs of hello before she settles back on her haunches.

Gazing around at solemn faces, it’s impossible to miss the empty chairs: two for Venna and Izabel, one of which will remain empty; one for Tomison, who may never return; and one for the Councilor of Sturmfrost, a role that will need to be filled now that Gerhold is dead.

Sorrow rises in me as I stare at all the empty seats.

“Queen Meryn,” Siegrid says, almost gently, at least for her.

I startle and then sit.

A pile of paperwork is in front of my chair, and I pull it toward me, flipping through the first few pieces of parchment without processing anything on the pages.

“There is much for us to discuss today, of course,” says Siegrid, seamlessly falling back into her role as de facto leader of our group. “First among these concerns, however, is appointing a new councilor.”

Her words are followed by a silence so complete it’s almost loud. I don’t need my powers to know what images are running through everyone’s heads.

I draw a shallow breath and then stand again.

“Yes. I wanted to say something to all of you about that.” My brain is muddled and slow from the emotion of the day, but it won’t help to wait. This is important if I’m going to be any better than the Valtieres, that I own my mistakes and faults and try to improve.

Siegrid half-stands as if to interrupt me, but I hold out a hand. She sits back down, expression resigned.

“What I did was wrong.” I look at the people gathered around the table once more. Matron Alienor is focused on her clasped hands, but Igor, Siegrid, Nevah—they’re all staring at me squarely now. Waiting for more.

My mouth is suddenly dry. “I… the councilor’s family should not have been harmed. I lifted my hands in anger. I didn’t think, and instead I let emotion take control of my power. And… that’s not the kind of queen I want to be. I do not want to rule with fear. And I’m sorry.” I run out of words and sit down, feeling inadequate.

Another moment of silence passes, and then Igor speaks. “You’re right, Meryn. It was terrible, what you did. In that moment, I was ashamed of who you were becoming.”

His gaze on me is unflinching, and beside him, Alienor nods once, decisively. The disappointment radiating off my dear friend—my family, really—is almost more than I can bear.

My stomach clenches. He’s right, of course.

It was an evil act, killing that whole family. What did I think I could say to make up for what I did? Are any words enough to hold up against mindless slaughter? Any reason that could possibly justify it?

“Well.” Siegrid’s voice is brisk. “This may not be a consolation, but you should know that the Bonded disagree with Igor’s assessment. Word has spread at the battlefront and throughout the Bonded City. People are impressed by what you’ve done and the swift vengeance you took on behalf of one of our own.”

Nevah nods lightly. “My family has thrown in for you now.”

Siegrid’s right; it’s not a consolation. It’s a reminder that those with pack instincts will value ruthlessness and loyalty, even at the risk of alienating the rest of the population.

Igor’s lips thin in disapproval, and he looks away from me.

Is this the fate of a Bonded queen? To be just another face of violence and destruction? How do I balance it all?

“Still,” Siegrid continues, “I agree that you should have kept your power on a tight leash. But what’s done is done. Let’s turn to the task at hand instead of losing more time. The councilor vacancy?”

“It should be Igor,” I say quietly. His eyes snap back up, brows furrowed.

Igor shakes his head firmly. “No, Meryn. I don’t have the experience or knowledge to do the job justice.”

“I agree,” Siegrid chimes in. “The position should be held by a noble family.”

Of course she believes that. “Which one do you recommend, then, Siegrid?” I ask bitterly.

She doesn’t respond.

“We do not know which noble families will remain loyal to us.” I’m only saying what everyone else here is thinking. “In the meantime, someone needs to immediately take over leadership of the city. We will spend time vetting proper candidates and choose the councilor’s replacement with appropriate consideration. Until then, I’d like Igor to take the position temporarily. I know I can trust him, and that’s all that matters at this moment.”

The silence in the room is stiff, stretching on indefinitely.

Eventually, Igor sighs, placing his meaty hands on the table. “Fine, Alley Cat,” he says, using the nickname he gave me as a child. “I’ll do it, for now, but we start looking for a new permanent councilor right away.”

Siegrid shrugs. “It’s settled then. Let’s turn to the war effort.” She leafs through the pile of parchment on the table. “I’ll depart tomorrow to rejoin our forces at Linsfall.”

I hope my relief at the thought of Siegrid returning to the front isn’t too obvious.

Igor and Siegrid get into a detailed conversation about troop deployment and training schedules, Igor making sure he understands the finer points of the army conscription, a responsibility the Councilor of Sturmfrost has always been at least nominally responsible for.

As good a place as any for Igor to start taking a more active role.

I scrub my hands across my face, my exhaustion and frustration merging into a murky fog that makes everything seem blurry and slightly distant.

We’re on our last topic of the day—some appointments that the Matron wants to make in the castle’s guard. It’s apparently a separate force from the army or the Bonded, something I probably should have known.

And then hell breaks loose.

Siegrid feels it first, standing up with such violence that her chair skitters backward and tips over with a crash.

Genicos, her wolf, races to her side, growling and bristling.

I reach for Anassa mentally, and that’s when I sense it, too: a break, huge and terrifying. As if a giant axe were reaching into that mental sea where I connect to the rest of the Bonded and slashing down, hacking off an entire river, as painful as hacking off a limb.

“What is it?” I ask Anassa urgently, panicky. Not understanding it, my head pounding and my vision hazy at the enormity of what’s happened.

Anassa also leaps to her feet, hackles raised and fur standing on end.

Nevah pushes back from the table, too, a sickened expression on her face.

The un-Bonded at the table look around warily, unable to sense what we’ve all felt.

What I’m only just starting to understand.

“It’s—it’s the Phylax pack,” Siegrid chokes out, the first to put it to words. “They’ve all…”

She swallows, looks at me. Her face is ashen.

“The whole pack has defected to Killian.”

19

STARK

The sun is too fucking bright on the snow this afternoon, glinting in sharp rays that make my eyes burn. The fog of the morning, appropriate for the funeral, finally drifted off. But it left something damp and restless inside me, something I need to work out of my body with movement and wind.

I lift my hand over my brow and squint at the wolf terraces. Noemi is finally leading Ephyse down toward us. Took them long enough. Noemi’s been quiet and dazed ever since seeing off the Eisenfall party.

“She’s not the only one,” Cratos says, nudging my side with his large black muzzle. I shove him away.

“Can you blame me? Be prepared to run hard. I want my muscles screaming.” Meryn’s state over the past couple of days has been excruciating, especially after what happened with Tomison this morning.

Maybe her trauma is bleeding through the bond.

Or, more disturbingly, maybe I give a shit if she feels bad.

I’m culpable, after all, for the way she lost control at her coronation. Once again, I felt her on the cusp of her power and once again, I led her astray—to disastrous effect.

I need to keep my distance from her. She needs that.

“Ready?” Noemi says impatiently as she approaches, her hand on her hip. As if I were the one holding us up this whole time.

Before I can respond, there’s a sharp, dizzying twist in my brain.

I grit my teeth and lean against Cratos. The sensation is so strange and distracting and wrong, it takes a split second before I see it.

Noemi’s collapsed.

Her hair is a shock of red against the snow like spilled blood. She’s curled up on the ground with both hands over her ears, eyes screwed up tight.

She’s hurt.

Panic pulses in my veins, and I race to her side, reaching down.

Before my hand connects, Noemi lashes up to push me away. She straightens and stands. My throat tightens, and I take a step back, disconcerted. There’s something strange about her movements as she turns to Ephyse, seeming to communicate mentally with him.

What the fuck is happening right now? “Noemi?”

“I have to go,” she says sharply. Her usual open expression is tight—hard and unrecognizable.

She quickly mounts Ephyse, and they turn toward me and Cratos. We’re blocking the fastest way down from this part of the wolf terraces; to leave, they’ll have to go through us.

Alarm rings through me.

“Where are you going, Noemi?” She might wear my childhood friend’s face, but I don’t recognize the woman atop Ephyse.

“Phylax is joining King Killian.” Her voice is flat and colorless. She and Ephyse move to the right, aiming to skirt by us.

In one sharp movement, I cut them off. Grabbing Noemi by the wrist, I pull her off Ephyse and onto the ground. We hit icy rock, and I use our momentum to roll us.

Cratos steps forward, shielding us with his body and growling a threat at Ephyse.

“Like fuck you are,” I snarl at Noemi, using my knee to pin her to the ground.

She thrashes to the side and aims a punch at my head. But she doesn’t have a chance against the Daemos Alpha. I grab the other hand and wrench her wrists down so that she’s incapacitated.

“You can fight this, Noemi,” I say. In the background, Ephyse nips at Cratos, who lets out a ground-rumbling growl of warning. “You can fight this. Resist.”

I’ve failed her before. The knowledge of it lives buried in my marrow, flooding my veins with grief when I’m least expecting it.

I won’t fail her today.

Noemi pulls uselessly against my grasp, eyes wild, and doesn’t respond.

Fuck.

Cratos and Ephyse have moved away from us now, circling each other and snarling. Cratos lets out a warning bark, a sound I know well. It’s the bark he makes before he strikes to maim.

“Cratos, Ephyse doesn’t know what he’s doing. Don’t harm him.”

In the moment of distraction, Noemi pulls a hand out of my grip with force I didn’t know she possessed, slapping me viciously across the face.

I grab the offending hand again, pulling her toward me until our faces are nearly touching.

“Remember, Mimi,” I snap, praying that the harsh tone of my voice gets through. “Alistair Brightbane is inside of Killian now. You cannot go to him.”

A flicker of distress moves across Noemi’s face. Some piece of her can hear me.

I grind my teeth in frustration.

It’s rare, almost unthought of, for a pack member to resist their Alpha’s command. Still, recent events have shown that it’s possible—either due to the corruption in our magic or the Dire Blade’s shattering. That shit stain Jonah and his lackeys managed to close me out.

What could break through to her? What could make her listen?

It might take someone whose authority outranks Tormun’s, I realize.

Someone like our queen.

“Come quickly,” I say along that bond I’ve sought so hard to avoid. “And bring Anassa with you.”

There’s silence for a moment, two. Then, no questions asked: “Okay.”

Sighing in relief, I refocus on holding Noemi down. Her hands are turning white from my viselike grip. I’m hurting her.

But to let her go—that would hurt her more.

The minutes stretch painfully, but finally, Meryn and Anassa burst out of the castle.

Meryn’s astride her wolf, skipping the stairs to reach us in three huge leaps. She quickly slides down from Anassa’s side. Anassa races off to help Cratos contain Ephyse.

“Force her to resist the command,” I demand, and then soften my tone at the shock in her eyes. “Please. Help her.”

A storm of emotions crosses Meryn’s face, but she nods. She kneels next to us, grabbing Noemi’s cheeks in both hands. Noemi continues to struggle against my hold.

“I am your queen,” Meryn says sternly, steel in her voice. “I command you to resist your Alpha. You are to remain here, in Sturmfrost, by my side.”

While Meryn speaks, Anassa streaks forward and tackles Ephyse. He attempts to toss her off. Anassa gets her jaws around Ephyse’s throat, but holds, not biting yet. Just making the threat apparent.

The fight goes out of Ephyse at the same time Noemi relaxes in my grip. I wait an extra minute to be sure it’s not a feint and then release her wrists and stand, holding out a hand to help her up.

Her look of devastation as she rises is like a punch to the gut.

Not much can scare me. But the idea of Noemi leaving, of being forced to Killian’s side, after everything her father put her through?

I’d never forgive myself.

Noemi’s eyes water with distress, and she averts her gaze as if ashamed. She yanks her hand away from mine and stumbles back, breathing hard.

“I am so sorry,” Meryn says, moving to Noemi’s side. “I hate the idea of forcing a command on anyone. I would never, in any other circumstances. I only did that because I thought I had to—”

Noemi holds up a hand, cutting Meryn off. Her face is more composed, but her hand still shakes with a slight tremor.

“It’s fine,” she says softly. “Thank you.”

Noemi looks pale and almost breakable. Her years at the front have helped rebuild her confidence and fortitude. But suddenly, she looks dangerously close to the person she was when she emerged from the Trials.

“We’ll have to take our wolves out for that run another time, Valstark,” she says, speaking to the snow more than to me. “I think I need to lie down for a while.”

Ephyse comes up behind her, nosing at her hair, and Noemi turns and sinks her face into his shaggy fur, winding her arms around his neck. Familial protectiveness still burns in my chest as I watch the two of them head into the castle.

What must it be like to be cut off from your pack, your Alpha?

“Barely any Phylax from the front resisted the order,” Cratos growls, his burning indignation matching mine. “The wolves of our Gammas report that whole units of Phylax have just… left.”

I turn to Meryn, who is also watching Noemi depart, an unreadable expression on her face. “I appreciate your help,” I tell her gruffly. “Noemi… she’s like family to me.”

Meryn’s hazel eyes meet mine. “Just family?”

There’s a deeper question there. I know how it must look to her. But better she thinks that Noemi and I are involved. Better to shut any doors that might be perilous if left open.

“I love her,” I tell Meryn truthfully, feeling my heart clench. She makes a small noise of acknowledgment in the back of her throat. “What’s happened?”

She sighs. Anassa has padded back over now, and Meryn leans against her for support. “I don’t know. I don’t understand. Alpha Tormun was so confident he was going to capture Killian. How did Killian and Alistair manage to sway him? To tear an entire pack from us?”

My fingers itch to reach out to her, to smooth the worry from her brow. What an irritating urge.

Instead, I grab her wrist, touching the sliver of skin that peeks out from under her jacket. She startles at the contact. The warmth of her skin sears my fingertips, coursing through me until a heat builds low in my gut.

I use it to fuel my rage. “When we eventually capture Tormun—and we will,” I growl, getting worked up, “I’m going to decapitate him and put his head on a spike outside the Bonded City. It’ll serve as a warning to all the other Bonded: You don’t go against pack rule. We answer to one authority alone: Queen Meryn Sturmfrost.”

Her mouth drops open in surprise, and then she lets out a light laugh, her cheeks coloring. “Wow. I hate to say it, but that kind of turned me on. Does Noemi enjoy it when you talk dirty like that?”

Her words shoot straight to my cock, and I drop her wrist, swallowing hard. It fucking stings that she thinks Noemi and I are together.

But it needs to stay that way.

“Stark,” Meryn says, and the sound of my name on her lips imprints itself on my mind. It takes me a moment before I hear what she’s saying. “Your mother has called a war council, of all the Alphas. The… remaining Alphas.”

Sighing, I follow her back into the castle.

We convene in the room that Meryn uses for her Council Palast meetings, large enough to accommodate at least a dozen riders and their wolves as necessary. Anassa and Cratos take up guard positions around the perimeter.

As Siegrid, Egith, and Hannelore file in, Meryn stares at maps of Nocturna. There are tactical maps of the front, maps showing terrain, and maps that detail past campaigns, all spread out in a complex tableau across the huge oak table.

I sit to her left, watching as her expression grows more and more overwhelmed, further stoking my flaming anger at Phylax and fucking Alpha Tormun.

Egith takes the lead as the Strategos Alpha. “Well, as of course we know, Phylax forms the backbone of our defense. They are—they were—positioned at all the most critical vulnerabilities, places where we know the Siphons are most likely to try to push our forces back.”

Egith’s mouth is a pressed line, her eyebrows drawn together in thought as she paces over to stand behind Meryn, gesturing at the map directly in front of her on the table.

“However, we still have the majority of our Daemos forces in these areas as well, and plenty of foot soldiers. In a skirmish with Astreona, they should still be able to hold their own. Lately, though, a large concentration of the Phylax pack has been maintaining defenses around the village of Weisenstat, east of Grunfall.”

Meryn’s eyebrows rise. “Isn’t that where we grow the majority of Nocturna’s wheat?”

Siegrid jumps in. “Yes, it’s a critical farming area for multiple crops. If the Siphons overtake the town and destroy the harvest, the grain supply for the entire country will be decimated.”

The color drains from Meryn’s face, mirroring the sinking sickness in my gut. “And now we have no one protecting it.”

“That’s correct,” Siegrid responds, eyes fixed on Meryn. “Which is why you will head down to our camp by Weisenstat as soon as possible to join the effort there.”

“You better not be fucking serious.” My voice is controlled, but Cratos’s low growl betrays my outrage.

The Sovereign Alpha’s mouth purses disdainfully as she turns, glaring my way.

“Of course I’m serious,” she retorts. “Meryn can erect Phylax shields—and her capacity is far greater than that of a typical Bonded. We need to renew our strength at Weisenstat as soon as possible, but it might take weeks for us to get enough foot soldiers there. Meryn and Anassa can travel far faster than a quadrant of troops on foot.”

I get to my feet, turning to face Meryn and resisting the urge to reach across the short distance between us and grasp her shoulder.

“My queen, you don’t have to do this,” I say, ignoring the Sovereign Alpha’s angry look. “Your safety is paramount right now, especially in the wake of the assassination attempt.”

I practically can see the wheels turning in Meryn’s head.

“I need to hear the full plan,” she says, turning to Siegrid and Egith. I want to growl in frustration. “Surely you’re not just going to send me down to Weisenstat and hope for the best? We all know that leaving me down at the front lines forever is not a real strategy. Astreona is a threat but so is Killian, and someone needs to rule.”

Siegrid smiles. “There’s that Strategos mind at work. You’re correct. Egith?”

The Strategos Alpha pulls a map forward on the table. “After you build up the defenses at Weisenstat and buy us some time, Strategos and Daemos will run a diversion near Grunfall.” She circles an area on the map with her finger. “We’ll pull the Astreonan forces away from Weisenstat. Hopefully, by the time they move, we’ll have gotten reinforcements into place by you and you can depart for Sturmfrost.”

“Daemos forces?” I ask tersely. “Do you need my command?”

The Sovereign Alpha looks between Meryn and me—so quickly anyone else would’ve missed it. “No, you should stay with the queen. You know your orders, don’t you?” Then she smiles at me sweetly.

Siegrid has never done anything sweetly to me in her life.

That calculating bitch. She’s hoping that Meryn will come back from this operation with another engagement bracelet on her wrist.

“Fine,” I grit out, annoyed. I’d throttle anyone who tried to move me from Meryn’s side right now, anyway. “I’ll coordinate with my Beta and my Gammas.”

“I’ll head down toward Grunfall tomorrow,” Egith says. “Does the operation work for you, Your Highness?”

Meryn nods slowly. “Yes, it makes sense. We can’t lose our entire food supply; we’re in dire enough straits as it is. But I’ll want to get back here as quickly as possible to regroup and figure out what to do about… the Rabenfrost situation.”

“So that’s decided,” Siegrid says. You’d have to know her as well as I do to pick up on the smugness lacing her tone. “Hannelore and I will head out toward Weisenstat at first light. Queen Meryn, you should stay at the castle another day, two maximum, to make arrangements for your absence, and then join us as soon as possible. Stark will accompany you—” She looks my way. “Bring Noemi as well, I think. She will be useful in aiding Meryn’s shields.”

The talk turns to equipment and provisions, and I watch as Meryn focuses intently on the conversation, not having much to add but clearly eager to absorb what she can.

As the meeting ends, I linger to talk to Siegrid alone. Meryn gives me a look as she leaves with Anassa, full of meaning that I can’t quite decipher.

Siegrid barely waits for the door to click closed before expressing her displeasure. “Will you proceed to question my decision-making further, Alpha Stark? Or perhaps you, too, wish to defect and abdicate your duty?”

A muscle ticks in my cheek as I stare her down. “What are you playing at, Siegrid? You’re endangering our queen. I thought you were desperate to make her family before you disposed of her.”

Siegrid looks at me dismissively. “Don’t be childish, Stark. Surely you cannot believe that I, of all people, would put her in a situation she cannot handle.”

“Handling her powers in training is one thing.” I can’t keep the heat from entering my words now, my anger spiked with concern. “You saw her at the coronation. She has no control, and moreover, she fears what she might do.”

My head pounds. Truthfully, I fear what I might encourage her to do.

“She has no control over shadebending,” Siegrid says haughtily. “Which she is not being asked to perform. I can assure you she’s more than adept at shielding—in fact, she has remarkable control and range over the power.”

I growl in irritation. “And what of the fact that Weisenstat is an active war zone? If she’s hurt—if we lose her—”

Cratos howls, his pained furor mirroring my own, and Siegrid startles. Then she unleashes a glare at me.

“I assure you, I know far more than you do about what would be at risk if we lost Meryn Sturmfrost.”

I advance on her swiftly, backing Siegrid against a wall. She doesn’t even blink.

“Is that so?” I snarl. “Because we conveniently didn’t discuss it tonight, but I haven’t forgotten that you made the call to send Tormun after Killian. After Meryn explicitly told you it was a dangerous idea. And what happened there?”

She merely lifts her chin.

I thrust a finger into her chest. “You are responsible for an entire pack defecting. You are responsible for Weisenstat being unguarded. The innocent people who are going to be killed because of your hubris, because you wouldn’t deign to take a younger woman’s advice? That’s blood on your hands, Siegrid.”

The Sovereign Alpha swats me away and still says nothing.

“So, yes,” I hiss, “I’m going to question your decision-making. Because I’m not going to marry that woman, but I’m sure as hell going to protect her from the likes of you.”

Finally, something sparks in Siegrid’s gaze. It’s disorienting. It almost looks like… pride.

But all she says is, “You’re dismissed, Alpha Stark.”

20

MERYN

Tonight I fight sleep, just like every night, but exhaustion wins. After everything that’s happened the past few days—the coronation, Izabel, the Phylax betrayal—my body has reached a breaking point.

I’ve barely closed my eyes before I open them to that blurred and shadowy place, the space where Killian’s magic and mine seem intertwined.

Turning around in dread, I already know he’ll be there. He’s lounging on what looks to be a throne made entirely of shadow. Intricate curls and knots of shadow magic move slowly, lazily, creating a stomach-churning impression of the throne being alive somehow.

Killian’s eyes are bright, and when he smiles at me, he reveals a hint of fang.

Even now, with everything that’s happened, the sight is so wrong. My skin crawls. I squeeze my eyes shut tight, trying to will myself out of this place and back into my bed.

I cannot fucking deal with him right now. Or ever.

“Oh, now, Meryn, don’t be that way.” His voice, so familiar, makes me hot and cold all over. “Come talk to me. I’m sorry about Izabel; I know she was important to you.”

I grit my teeth, refusing still to look at him.

“Was that you?” I snap. “Did you supply the poison?”

Killian sighs. “Haven’t I made myself clear, kitten?” The old nickname pricks me like a knife, and my eyes jump to his, narrowing. “I don’t want to kill you, Meryn. I love you. Come now. We could avoid all this trouble if you’d just let me love you the way you deserve.”

One corner of his mouth pulls up in a smirk as his gaze rakes over me. I shudder, hating the flashes of memory that unwillingly skate across my mind: him washing my back, his lips on my ear, my neck.

His hands, touching me, unmaking me.

“And Phylax?” Shadows gather and swirl around my feet like a thick, inky mist as I move closer to where he sits. I stop just a few feet away, staring him down, refusing to be cowed by this lying snake.

“Of course Phylax came to me; they’ve always been the loyal ones,” Killian says smoothly, rising to stand. “They know better than to abandon their rightful king. Alpha Tormun saw the truth. Phylax are the guardians, the protectors. And right now, they think their duty is to protect the people from you.”

“I—I don’t believe you,” I sputter. The Bonded were thrilled by what I did at the coronation. It makes no sense that an entire pack would turn around and willingly abandon me. Killian must have… done something.

Alistair Brightbane is the most powerful Siphon in history, as far as we know. If anyone could pull off deceiving a Bonded Alpha, it would be him and Killian.

“No?” Killian’s eyes bore into me as he draws closer, voice almost a whisper. “The nobles have seen it for themselves, now. They know you have no control over your powers. They went running back to their fiefdoms in fear, Mer. You know what they’re calling you? The Mad Bitch of Sturmfrost.”

Tears prick at my eyes, shame welling deep inside me. I don’t believe him; and still, there is truth in what he’s saying.

He takes another step toward me. “You are gambling with our entire kingdom on the line. What’s going to happen to everyone now with the front lines so weakened?”

The darkness is dense, crushing. I suck in a breath, feeling like I’m drowning. Killian moves closer still, one elegant hand coming up to cup my cheek, thumb stroking softly against my skin.

“It’s not too late for us.” His voice is seductive, his touch so familiar. For a moment, I lean into his hand, my body betraying me. “Let me forgive you, kitten. Let me take you back. We can rule together if you’d just submit to me. Together, we’ll figure out a way to get rid of Alistair. I can be the king this country has always deserved.”

He pauses and searches my face before continuing. “Are you really going to surrender our nation to Astreona, all for your ego and arrogance? Bring us to civil war, just to choose a crown over the man who loves you?”

At the word man, my sense of self-preservation finally surfaces, and I recoil, half-jumping backward and out of his reach. My face burns, still feeling his caress.

“You’re no man,” I growl. “I’d rather die than rule beside a monstrous, bloodsucking parasite possessed by a body-snatching creep. I am the rightful queen by blood. I am the one the crown called to.”

Killian’s face contorts with rage, his mask coming off. The shadows grow violent, whipping around us like a tornado.

He lunges forward, grabbing my wrist, his hand painfully tight around that damn engagement bracelet, pressing it deep into my skin.

“You are mine, Meryn. I won’t forget that, even if you’re pretending to. How’s your sister doing, by the way?”

At those words, my fury flares, and something breaks. A light shines in my mind, and I sense the edges of this realm, and beyond them, somehow. Like the whole thing is a thick film that can be peeled up and away if I can just focus.

I turn away from Killian, screwing my eyes shut and putting all my energy into rejecting this shadow realm.

I will myself to wake. Somewhere on the other side of the shadowy wall is Anassa. I can almost hear her voice in my head.

Shadows pull at me, trying to wrap around me tight, keep me in, but I wrest them away. Killian’s voice twists and morphs as if he’s speaking to me through water.

Just—there, on the other side of this sickly darkness, there’s something—

I wake with a jolt. My nightclothes are stuck to me with a layer of sweat, and I gasp, kicking the stifling blankets away.

My wrist aches. I stare down at the bracelet, move it up my arm slightly, and look at the angry ring of red that looks almost burned into my skin.

I want it off. Goddess, I want to get rid of it so badly. We were placing all our hopes on Tormun’s capture of Killian and now…

When will I ever get rid of it? Will I be bound to him forever through this? Forever letting him corrupt the pack magic and siphon off my own?

The room is dark except for one sputtering oil lamp, but the darkness is totally different from that of the dreamworld. It’s cool and empty instead of that sickly dense pressure.

For a second, it’s still pressing in on me, and I scrub my hands against my eyes, trying to block out the feeling, the sound of Killian’s threats.

I allow myself a single, aching scream of rage, desperation, grief.

Then something scrapes loudly across the floor, and I nearly jump out of bed.

“This time,” comes a low, controlled voice from the dark corner near the door, “tell me the truth about what’s happening to you.”

I blink as Stark emerges from the darkness, his massive frame unfolding from the armchair in the corner of my room. Has he been watching me sleep?

He stares at me steadily, and I know: There’s no way he’s going to leave my rooms unless I give him some answers.

My hands are still trembling from the dreamworld encounter as I stare up at Stark, a nightmare in his own right. He’s only a foot or two from me, one strong arm braced against the bedpost of this goddess-cursed bed, expression unyielding. His dark eyes burn with some emotion I can’t name.

He’s terrifying as always.

And beautiful as always.

Right now, I’m too exhausted and wrung out to get into one of our little bickering matches. Unburdening myself sounds like a relief. “Fine. I was considering telling you anyway.”

Ducking around him, I turn up the lantern by my bedside, an ornate, multifaceted thing.

On the sitting table in my room is a pitcher of water and two delicate glasses; I pour myself a glass and gulp it down in a single swallow before filling my cup once more.

The water soothes my throat, cools me down enough to gather my thoughts.

“I’ve been unable to sleep for… well, for weeks now, I suppose. When I sleep, sometimes it’s normal, dreamless or silly bits and snatches of dream. But sometimes I find myself in this… place. It’s like a whole realm made of shadow magic, the same one that I have…”

Stark regards me silently.

“…and that Killian has, too, because of this damn bracelet.” I gulp, take another sip of water. “It’s real. It’s not just an ordinary dream. I don’t know how to explain it. It’s like my magic has been manipulated to create a place where we can talk and interact, even though he’s leagues away. He said he didn’t make it, but I don’t believe him. There was also… there was a voice once.”

Stark’s eyes narrow at this. “A voice?”

I set the glass down. “A deep, male voice.”

“Alistair?” Stark asks.

I shake my head. “No, Killian said that Alistair can’t access this space. I heard the voice before Killian started showing up. I…”

I don’t know what to make of it. I’m worried, even still, about the possibility of my mental health slipping. Of delusions setting in. Of my power taking me to the brink, and the possibility of crossing into a place I can’t return from.

My mother heard voices. And maybe it was because of suppressed magic and her unclaimed birthright, but… maybe it was something more.

“Perhaps that part really was a dream,” I eventually say.

I return to the foot of the bed and perch there, both comforted by and wary of Stark’s angry presence.

“This is only the second time that it’s happened,” I continue, looking up at him. “I can’t sleep. I’ve just been living in fear that if I close my eyes, I’ll end up back there. He was awful.”

I’m twisting my engagement bracelet around my wrist violently. The ruby that was once so beautiful to me now looks like an angry bloodstain clotted with darkness against my skin. I make myself stop.

“He was awful,” I repeat softly. “The things he said… he’s never going to let me go. He can get into my head. Literally get into my dreams. He has my powers.”

Stark is looking at me intensely, his mouth drawn tight.

“And I can’t get this fucking bracelet off!” My final word comes out as a wail, and I realize I’m spinning the bracelet again, over and over like it’ll make a difference.

The words from Venna’s contact echo in my mind even now—it might kill me if I tried to remove it.

Stark reaches out, stilling my hand with his. He’s shaking, and I look up in surprise to search his face. His features are taut with rage, and it comes off him in waves, like his magic and his physical power are gathering to strike.

He takes a breath and releases my hand, sitting down next to me on the bed. “You don’t need me to tell you that you’re strong.”

“I don’t,” I agree, and manage a weak smile. “Maybe Killian’s right. Maybe I’m arrogant. But I know I’m strong. I’m stronger than that coddled asshole who was raised to believe that everything he sets eyes on is his for the taking. And I’m going to fucking show him that.”

Stark nods, and I turn to look at him directly again, our faces so close together in the dark room.

“And I know you don’t need me to tell you that I would kill him in this world and then chase him straight into death and kill him in any others.” His voice is coiled violence.

“No, I don’t,” I agree, staring into his eyes, letting that violence sink into my skin, relishing it. “Because we both know that I’ll never rest easy until his blood is on my hands.”

His eyes search mine. He nods again, and I’m close enough to see the muscles in his neck shift with the movement, tattoos seeming to dance in the lantern light. “So tell me what you need, Meryn.”

I loosen a tight breath, my mind reeling. His presence puts me on edge, makes it hard to think straight. But there’s one question I have to ask.

“Why do you care, Stark?”

My curiosity has been building. Half the time, I can tell he hates being around me. The other half, well… I’m not sure what to make of it.

He looks down, his dark hair falling in his face. I try not to think about its silky texture between my fingers.

“Seriously,” I continue. “You’ve fulfilled your duty. I’ve claimed my crown. I don’t—I don’t need someone by my side who feels obligated to be here. I know you didn’t choose this for yourself. So just know as far as I’m concerned, you owe me nothing.”

Stark folds his big hands, the tattoos and scars on them intertwining. “I’m not going anywhere.” He still won’t look at me.

“Is it Anassa and Cratos?” I push. “I know—I know the mate bond can be so confusing. Block it out, though. It’s what I do.”

Finally, he whips his head up. The look in his eyes is burning—it’s an inferno, and if I get too close to it, it will consume me whole.

I take a nervous breath, and he hears it, his gaze dropping to my lips, lingering there.

“It’s not the mate bond, Meryn,” he finally says, dragging his gaze back to mine. His voice is a low rumble that makes my pulse pound. “And it’s not out of some noble, misplaced sense of duty, either.”

“Then why?” The words come out so quiet.

“All my life, I’ve been surrounded by people who want power for the sake of it. Who want to prove their dominance and force subservience. I didn’t know there was another way. And then I met you.”

I think I’ve stopped breathing entirely.

“I see you, Meryn Sturmfrost. I see who you are and who you could become. It’s about the hope you give me for a better future for our country, and my selfish desire to bring it to fruition. I choose to serve at your side because I want that. So tell me what you need, because it’s very late at night and I’m running short on patience.”

I swallow. My pulse is racing, my skin hot.

“I need…” Another shudder racks me, and suddenly I’m so tired, more tired than I’ve ever been. “I need to sleep. I want to be helpful when we go to Weisenstat and I don’t know how I’m going to manage it if I can’t get any fucking sleep.”

I squeeze my eyes shut again in frustration.

“And Izabel… I can’t stop thinking about her. I’m the one who asked her to stay behind, not go on to the front with the rest of our packmates. I’m the reason she was here. She drank that emberwine, and it was meant for me.”

My stomach churns, grief and exhaustion tying my guts in knots, and my heart starts to race again, out of control.

“Hey,” Stark says urgently, hand coming up to grip my forearm tightly. My eyes flutter open, and I glance up at him again. “Wherever you’re going right now, don’t,” he says softly. “Take a deep breath, and then get back in bed.”

I’m not sure what else to do, so I follow his instructions. The first breath is almost painful, but by the second or third, my heart is calming, exhaustion pulling me back under. I stand, smooth the bedsheets tangled from my movement while I slept.

The bed has cooled, and the sheets aren’t as constricting when I slip back in. I extinguish the lantern again, then watch as Stark rises, too, removing his boots and moving to the other side of my bed.

“What are you doing?” I’m so tired that my mind can’t make sense of things.

“You said you need to sleep. So sleep.” He gracefully settles himself atop the covers, his broad shoulders making the huge bed look small. “I’ll keep watch. I could sense that something was wrong, earlier. Through the wolves’ mate bond, maybe. Now that I know… if I sense it again, that you’re getting pulled into that dreamworld, I’ll wake you up.”

I stare at the dark of the ceiling. “Okay.”

This is strange. But it’s also somehow… calming. The heat from his body is so close to mine that I could reach out and touch him. But I don’t.

I turn over to my side, facing away from him, but feeling him at my back. Watching my back.

The moment I close my eyes, though, my heart starts racing once more. My breath gets shallow, and Killian’s face swims up in the darkness, melting into Izabel, her face as she drank from my goblet, contorting as she chokes.

My eyes fly open, but it’s still there, burned into my vision, and I can’t help it—I start to cry.

Stark wraps one of his strong arms around me, pressing gently into my stomach through the covers. I twist my neck to look at him, startled.

“Is this okay?” His deep voice is uncharacteristically uncertain.

“It’s okay.” My body warms from the inside out, starting at the place where he touches me. I face away from him, and his arm settles more firmly around me, his body ever so gently pressing against my back.

His warmth and the solid weight of him are comforting. It soothes my breathing, helping me remember to take a full breath, then another.

I close my eyes again tentatively, focusing on the sensation of his strength around me, and no more visions come.

I’m senseless of the moment that I slip from wakefulness into sleep, deep and dreamless.

The first I’ve had in weeks.

Stark sleeps with me the next night, too—and again, I have a perfect, dreamless night. When I ask him about it, he says he can sense the shadows descending. He touches me when he feels it, and it pulls us both out of it.

With sleep, I’m finally starting to return to myself.

Still traumatized, still heartbroken.

But finally confident that I can muscle my stubborn ass through it—my specialty.

And then it’s time for us to depart for Weisenstat. In the end, Venna decides to join us. I tried to persuade her to stay back, to be near her family, but she refused. She needs the sense of purpose, to keep herself going.

Nevah stays in Sturmfrost, though. She’s going to act as my liaison in the castle—and also keep an eye on Tomison for all of us. His words and his actions still fester like a wound, but he’s my friend. I need to know he’s all right.

I decide to bring the shards of the Dire Blade with me, for goddess knows what reason.

It’s not like they’ll be much use in battle the way they are. It just felt wrong to leave them behind, and perhaps we’ll meet someone outside Sturmfrost with a better sense of how they could be reforged.

Now the pieces are wrapped in cloth and gathered in a bag lashed tight to Anassa’s back. Just one more broken thing she’s carrying with her.

We ride hard in the direction of the front—Stark, Noemi, Venna, me… and Saela.

My sister shifts in front of me now on Anassa’s sturdy back. The hiccups she had from sobbing have finally stopped, I notice.

“The young pup will be fine,” Anassa says firmly, hearing my thoughts. “She belongs with us, her family.”

Saela and I had a blowout fight. I tried to persuade her to stay at the castle, where Aldrich and Helene and Grigore could take care of her, keep her safe. The war front is no place for a child—especially one in her condition.

She cried for two days straight, begging me to take her with us. Eventually, I relented, with Anassa’s encouragement.

Encouragement might be the wrong word.

She made it clear she would bite me if I didn’t follow her command.

“If you say so,” I respond, smarting with irritation. How can you argue with an unyielding direwolf and a mouth full of fangs?

Thankfully, my head is no longer pounding from reinforcing that wall against Killian. I can’t sense him at all anymore; he’s disappeared from the communication bonds alongside Phylax.

The sun drifts low, the sky turning purple and pink. The air is fresh. The trees flanking the road are dense and drizzled with sugary snow. We move through the forest as if we’re part of it, claws sinking into mud, tails whipping, fur rippling.

We’re nearing Linsfall now, according to Stark, where we’ll stop for the night.

But we’re not near enough.

Saela grows increasingly restless, fidgeting and scratching at her arms. At one point, she leans down to smell Anassa’s fur as if to ground herself.

Her blood hunger is rising.

“We should stop briefly before reaching the city so that I may hunt for her,” Anassa tells me. It makes sense for Saela to drink before we’re in a crowded area. I want to make things smoother for her.

I pat Anassa’s side in confirmation, and she slows her pace immediately. I signal to the others over the bonds that we’ll make a quick stop—Saela needs a bathroom break, I tell them, to explain the privacy we need—and guide Anassa into the depths of the woods.

Once we’re far enough from the road, I slip from Anassa’s back in a small clearing.

She waits patiently for me to help Saela and unfasten a couple of the bags she’s carrying. I want her light so she can catch something quickly. Anassa slips away between the trees, and Saela moves jerkily to lean against a tall fir.

She’s clearly stiff, her body racked by her need for blood.

We stand in the quiet for a long while. Golden light still shimmers through the boughs. Somewhere, a graydove lets out rhythmic hoots. I expected the silent treatment to continue, but Saela’s voice joins the sounds of the forest, crackly like her throat is too dry.

“This is going to be my life from now on,” she murmurs. “Forever hiding what I am.”

I shake my head. “I swear to you, Sae. Aldrich and I are doing everything we can. We’ll find a cure for you.”

Her cheeks redden. “If there’s a cure, Meryn. If.”

“Sae—”

“Just stop, please. You shouldn’t promise things like that. What if you can’t find a cure, Mer? What if I’m a Siphon forever? Have you thought about that at all? Because it’s always on my mind.”

Her words hit me like a punch to the gut. I don’t want her to give up hope. She turns her eyes on me, and they shine with tears.

“What are you going to do with me when you fail? Will you put me away somewhere? Banish me? Leave me behind, like you tried to do today?”

I turn away, hurt, afraid. I want to tell her that nothing is more important to me than she is, but—

A twig snaps behind Saela. I whirl back around to look for Anassa returning with prey.

But there’s a man there, tall and uniformed, face twisted with hate. And he has a knife to my sister’s throat.

“Gotcha, usurper,” he snarls at me.

21

STARK

Cratos and the other direwolves have barely had a chance to rest when a throbbing pulse of fear comes over my bond with Meryn, followed immediately by her voice in my mind—and in Venna’s and Noemi’s, judging by the way they both still.

“Come quickly. Deserter soldier, he has Saela. Don’t attack, I’ll try to talk him down, but please be at the ready.”

A growl rips out of my throat. How dare he?

If she hasn’t made progress by the time we get there, I’m going to yank out this guy’s intestines through his mouth.

The three of us mount up in record time. Our direwolves move swiftly and quietly through the forest to reach Meryn and Saela at the clearing. The setting sunlight through the forest leaves makes everything dappled in shadow.

We slide off our wolves to move closer but stay out of sight.

Meryn and Saela are on the opposite side of the clearing from us. The soldier is unkempt and dressed in a Nocturnan uniform, his eyes wild as he presses a glittering knife to Saela’s throat. Her skin is drained of all color, lips pressed into a thin, quivering line.

“Are you one of my soldiers?” Meryn’s voice echoes across the clearing.

The man’s face twists in contempt. “Your soldiers? Absolutely not.”

The rage in me builds, so close to the surface now.

The woods around the man rustle. Then figures emerge from the long shadows cast by the struggling sun. Their faces move in and out of the pale bluish light as they approach.

More soldiers. Maybe thirty, all wearing the same uniform.

Fuck.

“You two stay here,” I tell Noemi and Venna, voice low. “I’m going to disarm him. Be ready to attack, and make sure Skaia and Ephyse are prepared.”

Venna signs back—my words must have been too soft for her. “Please repeat?”

I attempt repeating the message in sign language. I’ve been studying it on my own since I first learned one of Meryn’s closest allies was hard of hearing. She nods, so I must’ve made enough sense.

“Is Anassa almost here?” I ask Cratos.

“Yes, almost,” he replies. “We’ll attack at your signal.”

Nodding to him, I begin to move quietly around the circle of the clearing.

“We’re King Killian’s soldiers!” the attacker shouts. His voice is bold and echoes through the devouring woods.

The piece of shit is proud.

No matter how this ends, the ground will be soaked with blood.

The soldier continues his loud, belligerent declarations as I draw closer. “Who the fuck do you think you are? The Valtieres have reigned over Nocturna for centuries! You can’t end our allegiance with some sudden order.”

Saela is standing very still. I’m surprised she’s not trembling. She must have that Sturmfrost steel in her, too.

“We left the front, and we’re traveling to Rabenfrost to support our king. Finding you was a fortunate coincidence.” He smirks.

Killian must have more military support than we’d anticipated. These fucking idiots. They’re allowing themselves to be tricked and lied to.

“I’m almost on him,” I tell Meryn. “Keep him distracted.”

She straightens a bit at the sound of my voice in her mind. Her silver hair looks nearly blue in the low light of the clearing. “Don’t kill them. Please. They’re my citizens, too.”

“Are you kidding me, princess?”

“Please,” she begs. I see her eyes search the forest, looking for me, pleading.

I shake my head but keep moving. I’ll make no promises. I’m nearing the soldier now, and Meryn’s in full view.

“Give me a few minutes to change your mind.” Meryn looks back to the soldier, her voice steady. “I understand why you don’t trust me and why you don’t want to fight for me yet. But I am the rightful queen. If you let my sister go, if you take time to have a conversation with me, I believe I can sway you to my cause. No one needs to get hurt here today.”

He just laughs spitefully. “We won’t bow to any mad bitch.” There are murmurs of agreement whispering from the woods around us.

Ah, so that’s what this is, then. Their opposition isn’t just about loyalty to Killian, and they’re not just rejecting Meryn’s claim.

They’re rejecting the very notion of a woman ruling, exposing the festering misogyny in this kingdom.

Meryn’s gaze hardens, and the shade in the clearing suddenly expands in a way that has nothing to do with the lowering sun. This fucker might not know what that means, but I do.

Finally, our queen is properly pissed.

Her anger lights a fire in my gut.

“Give in to it,” I say without thinking. “Use shadebending, and end them.”

She blinks, her lips thinning. “I can’t. I can’t! I might hurt you all, too. And I don’t want Saela to see me like that.”

Another man speaks from the soldiers’ side. I can’t make him out, but his voice is crackly. “It doesn’t matter how powerful you think you are, you psycho bitch. You’re outnumbered.”

That’s it. No one talks to her that way.

But before I can move, the woods themselves fully dim as if someone has dragged the sun from the sky.

The look in Meryn’s eyes has become deadly. She’s no longer seeking peace. There’s a vicious, hungry edge to her now that makes my blood heat.

She’s so fucking gorgeous when she’s mad.

“I think you meant, Your Royal Psycho Bitch Highness.” The sharpness in her voice could slice the thickest of skins.

“We done here?” I ask her.

“Finish them,” she responds. “I’ll protect Saela.”

I don’t need to be told twice.

I step out of the woods, unbridled rage roiling through me. Before anyone can blink, my blade is at the soldier’s throat, mirroring his threat against Saela.

“Bad choice, boys,” I growl out, tasting the promise of bloodshed in the air. My broad body dwarfs the weak man in front of me. “She might be inclined to show you mercy as your queen. But I’m no royal.”

Some idiot has the balls to ask, “Oh yeah, who are you, then?”

Locking eyes with Meryn, my insides ignite. “I’m the creature from your nightmares they wield like a weapon. Your lives mean nothing to me.”

I slice the man’s throat open in one smooth motion. Blood erupts, pouring over the back of Saela’s head and her hair.

She shrieks and runs to Meryn, stumbling.

Meryn’s arms are around her instantly, and she throws up a defensive shield around them both using Phylax magic. I nod to Noemi across the clearing. She races forward, stepping in front of Meryn and Saela and encasing them inside a second defensive shield.

At least when Saela’s around, Meryn will accept proper protection.

Fur streaks between the trees as the direwolves arrive in a storm of teeth and claws.

Anassa tosses a soldier into the air, and he lands atop another with a scream. She bounds over to stand by Saela and Meryn, protecting them alongside Noemi. Venna and Skaia emerge from the trees with frightening speed.

Even though the soldiers outnumber us, they’re suddenly looking a lot less confident.

They finally fucking realize they should not have threatened a queen.

The wolves leap into action. The screaming starts and doesn’t stop.

I throw up a hand as three soldiers try to charge me and release an impelling blast without restraint. The power comes stronger and more easily than ever, as it has ever since Meryn reclaimed her crown.

There’s an audible snap as the brutal force of my power cracks their ribs, throwing them backward.

Several more soldiers encircle me, though they all look hesitant to be the first to engage. Drawing my twin blades from my back, I come at two of them at once, slicing their throats with a single slash.

The men behind me try to run, but Cratos catches one in his mouth, chomping down. The other he pins beneath a massive paw, extending his claws into the man’s chest as he shrieks.

I move in to swiftly silence him with my blade.

Noemi stays close to Meryn, maintaining her shield while keeping soldiers at bay with her sword. Ephyse provides another layer of defense. He tears a leg off one of the soldiers with a vicious wrench of his jaw.

Whirling around, I look for any soldiers we may have missed. Their numbers are dwindling fast.

While Skaia leaps around, snapping up prey, Venna’s been slipping through the shadows, picking off fighters before they know what’s hit them. Now, she darts in again, dispatching a soldier who tries to flee with an efficient knife to the gut.

Anassa circles around Saela and Meryn, snapping at anyone who gets too close.

It’s a relief to be unleashed, after weeks—months, really—of being on passably good behavior.

This is me at my best. At my worst.

Myself.

Blood arcs across my face in a dark splatter as I spin to gut another attacker.

Meryn pulses a warning toward me, but I’ve already sensed the next one on my left. I slot my blade into place between the man’s chest and his chin.

For the briefest of moments, my eyes find Meryn’s, even as two more come for me. I need to see that she’s right where I want her to be.

Safe. Behind me. Protected.

The battle lasts only a handful of minutes. The final soldier falls to Cratos, whose jaws close around his entire skull. The man’s screams cut off abruptly as Cratos bites down.

Then, everything is silent. The birds are gone.

Slowly, the woods start to whisper and creak as if they’re letting out a breath.

Noemi relaxes her shield, as does Meryn. The shadows she summoned part, and the sun comes back out. She loosens her protective hold on Saela.

She’s behind her sister, so she can’t see what happens—but I do.

Saela’s eyes dilate enormously, swallowing up her irises. Her gaze—undeniably hungry—is locked on the blood-soaked ground, on the bodies.

Meryn’s not fast enough to tighten her grip. Saela rips from her and moves with inhuman speed.

“No!” Meryn shouts. As if she could stop it.

The little girl falls on the nearest corpse. She latches on and tears at it with her hands. I have an iron stomach for gore at this point, but even I’m a little queasy as the sounds start. Gasping, sucking, gulping sounds.

Saela looks like a starving animal savaging prey.

Meryn and I make eye contact with the others at the same time. Venna and Noemi are staring in shock, their expressions a mixture of revulsion and disbelief. Venna’s hand rises to cover her mouth. Betrayal flashes across Noemi’s face.

Fuck.

22

MERYN

Venna and Noemi have the grace not to scream. Within moments, I can tell they’ve both done a quick calculation—I’m not shocked or scared, and neither is Stark—and have schooled their faces back into neutral expressions.

I’m overwhelmed by all of it. My fear for my sister, the vicious spilling of blood, the terrible truth finally revealed to my friends. My body and mind are both wrung out.

And I’m aching from the rejection. Soldiers, who should’ve been my soldiers, whom I felt a duty to take care of—rejecting me full stop. How many like them are out there? How many more have deserted?

How many people refuse to recognize my rule because I’m a woman? And how can I ever win their loyalty if they’re withholding it over the most central, unchangeable part of me?

“We should do something about the bodies,” I say in a daze, as if my sister was not feasting on one directly in front of us all. “It’s not right to just… leave them here.”

Anassa chimes in, “We wolves can dig a shallow grave and bury them. That should suffice.”

I agree with this, although a part of me smarts. Despite how despicably these men behaved, they were people with families or friends—just as my father was. That they won’t come home—that no one will ever know what happened to them—will hurt someone, somewhere.

All four of the wolves start to dig and bury. Meanwhile, Saela finishes up her… snack… and seems like she’s in a disoriented stupor from the meal.

This is the first time she’s tasted human blood since the day she turned. I wonder if it’s doing something different to her.

She pulls off the body and crawls back toward me. She looks like a nightmare—her hands and chin and clothes soaked in scarlet gore, her gaze unfocused, hair matted and slick with blood. Venna’s face twists in a way too complicated to read.

I hurry toward my sister and help her stand, mostly carrying her back to the edge of the clearing. Then I sit her down against a tree, where she promptly falls asleep.

After I’m sure she’s safe, I take a couple of quick strides over to Noemi and Venna.

“Would’ve been useful information to know we had a Siphon traveling with us before we departed the castle,” Noemi drawls, her arms crossed tightly across her chest. Her beautiful face is slightly pinched in irritation, and she stares off into the distance where Stark oversees the wolves’ work.

Venna’s gaze cuts me to the quick. Her eyes are hard, flinty. “How long?”

Nausea roils in my stomach. “Ven—”

“How long, Meryn?”

“Since you freed her,” I say, resigned. “Killian turned her, at some point between when we found her in the dungeons and when you and Stark got there. She doesn’t remember it happening. He altered her memory.”

Venna’s face falls. “That poor girl.”

“I’m so sorry,” I tell her, my throat tight around the words. “I didn’t want to hide this from you but… I just didn’t know what else to do.”

“I’m not sure what you want me to say, Meryn,” she says. “I’m so fucking mad at you right now. Siphons are our enemies. They’re dangerous. And you’ve had one living under our noses this entire time. You let me spend time alone with her, tutoring her, without telling me the danger I was in.”

I grab her arm, but Venna shakes me off.

“Ven, I trust you, I swear,” I plead. “But the fewer people who knew, the better. She’s my sister. My only living family. You know that I would do anything for her.”

She turns her head, watching Saela as she sleeps against the tree. Hopefully seeing the same thing I do: a small, innocent, hurting child.

Someone to protect, not fear.

“We’ve been feeding her animal blood,” I continue. “She’s been under close watch at all times—yes, even when you’ve been teaching her sign language. Didn’t you wonder why Helene and Grigore were always keeping guard? Aside from the fangs, she hasn’t been a threat to anyone. And I’m trying to figure out how to reverse it. I’m going to save her.”

Venna’s lips flatten into a tight line, her dark eyes growing glassy. “I get it,” she says eventually. “There’s nothing more important than a sister.”

The words twist my insides into a tight, painful knot. I reach out again, but she holds up a hand, stilling me.

“I need some time to think about this, Your Highness,” she says, her voice aloof.

My heart sinks. “Please, Ven.”

The wind blows her short strands of glossy black hair around her face, still turned away. “I understand from one sister to another, but friend to friend, I just… need space, Meryn.”

Noemi finally chimes in. “Why don’t Venna and I go ahead to Linsfall? We’ll spend the night with the nobles there as planned and tell them that you and Stark had to keep moving.”

My gaze darts between the two of them. Venna still won’t look at me.

“That probably makes sense,” I say slowly. “Goodness knows we can’t exactly take Saela into town right now. Stark and I will set up camp somewhere nearby, and you can meet back up with us in the morning.”

Assuming they don’t both decide to turn right back around to Sturmfrost. I can’t say that I’d blame them for it, either.

Ephyse and Skaia pad over, their muzzles bloody and their paws coated in dirt from their horrific task. Stark follows, pulling Noemi to the side and talking in a low tone. Their bodies are pressed so close together, and I glance away, feeling like I’m intruding on something. When they part, Venna and Noemi mount.

Noemi nods to me, then the two of them turn tail and head toward the encroaching darkness.

Stark approaches me with Cratos and Anassa. “Looks like we’ll be camping tonight,” I tell him.

He grunts. “I have some packs for that. Dumped them off Cratos in the woods when we realized what was happening to you two. Let’s go grab them and find a clearing that doesn’t reek of death.”

Stark helps me lift Saela’s listless form onto Anassa’s back, and then we both mount our wolves. Within an hour, we’ve found a suitable campsite slightly closer to Linsfall and have set up a campfire to keep us warm in the cool night air.

I pull the shadows down around us, an amplified form of the Kryptos rifting power. It masks our location entirely. The ease and strength of the pack powers will never cease to mystify me, but then, I know Anassa is helping me channel them.

Of the two of us, at least one is wise and skilled in the ways of the Bonded.

My direwolf has lain down on the opposite side of the fire. Saela is curled up in Anassa’s side, continuing to sleep. I pull a scratchy woolen blanket out of one of Stark’s packs and lay it over her. I’m not sure how long she’ll be out, but between Anassa’s warmth, the fire, and the blanket, she should be comfortable through the night.

Finally, I stop busying myself and plop down on a big fallen log we have set in front of the fire. Then I put my head in my hands, grounding myself in the warmth of my own palms.

If I think too hard about the look that Venna first gave me when she realized what was happening… I just might fall apart.

Stark throws another log onto the fire, and I look up in surprise at the sound. He looks every bit his reputation right now: His shirt and jacket are caked in blood and gore. There’s a ruby slash of it across his cheek, and I know it’s not his own.

I’ve seen Stark fight before, was awed by his battle strength at the front. But today…

Venna and Noemi helped, but Stark killed at least twenty of those men himself. Without thinking twice about it. Never flinching, never faltering. His expert impelling was chilling to watch, even for me.

It’s astounding that any Bonded could have that much power without making some sort of corrupt bargain.

He senses me watching and turns to meet my gaze, then looks down at himself. “Probably should change out of this, huh? That’s one set of clothes ruined. This much blood doesn’t come out when it’s set.”

Spoken from experience.

A person with an ounce of self-preservation would be quaking with fear right now.

Instead, I swallow hard, a heat that has nothing to do with the campfire building in my core. “Yeah, I guess you should.”

First comes off the jacket, which he tosses into the flames. Then he reaches over his head and grabs the back of his shirt, yanking it off in one swift move.

And then Stark Therion is shirtless in front of the fire, and my needy brain wants to howl at the sight.

I thought I knew what I liked in a man’s body.

But then, I’ve never seen a man like this before.

His torso is as broad as the rest of him, narrowing slightly at the waist. There’s a slight dusting of hair on his chest, and underneath it… muscles. So many muscles. Does the human body even have this many muscles?

Apparently so, and Stark has perfected every single one. Noemi is a lucky woman.

His pecs are bulky and firm, leading down to what can only be described as abs for days. He looks like he has a forty-pack, pronounced enough that it could probably cut glass.

Beneath them is a V line, so perfectly defined that my stupid fucking mouth literally starts to water. I’m desperate to touch it, to find out where it leads.

It’s lewd.

The sight of his shirtless torso is lewd; there’s no other way to explain it.

And then, of course, there are the kill tattoos—runic in style, applied by different hands. They litter his body in a dark, dangerous dance that only serves to emphasize how utterly deadly he is. Almost every inch of him is inked.

I’m so busy ogling him that I almost miss it… until I don’t. The tattoos can’t quite hide them.

Scars.

Everywhere.

All over his front. He’s covered in deep, crisscrossing lines. They catch the firelight like spiderwebs.

And I know, with a sick churning in my gut—I know.

These are from before he was bonded.

The wolves heal wounds too quickly. Even deep cuts leave only a light scar. But he bonded when he was only eighteen…

I draw in a sharp breath, and he looks down at me quickly, meeting my eyes.

A shadow passes over his gaze, and he turns away, heading to his rucksack.

“Stark,” I say. We need to talk about it. That many scars…

He grabs a new shirt out and roughly pulls it on. “Leave it, Meryn.”

“No!” My voice comes out shrill. “Stark—”

He advances on me swiftly, fire in his eyes.

“I said, leave it.” He’s towering over me now, menacing. I forget, sometimes, just how much taller he is than me. I have to crane my neck to keep his gaze.

“Or what?” I say through clenched teeth, unimpressed by his attempt at intimidation. “You’re going to lose control on me? I’d love to see it.”

“I guarantee you, princess, you wouldn’t.” His words hold dark promise that do nothing to cool the inferno raging inside me.

Drawing a ragged breath, he tries to turn away from me.

Fuck. That.

He’s made me face hard things head-on. He doesn’t get to shrug off the same.

I grab a fistful of his black shirt, then yank it up his torso, exposing the scars once again to the firelight.

They’re even more brutal this close. The dark ink does a good job of masking things from a distance, but now I can see that the skin all over his torso is gruesomely puckered.

These weren’t an accident. Every one of these cuts looks intentional.

Anger starts to build, shadows dancing at the edge of my vision.

“Does it scare you?” His voice comes out as a viscous caress, and I shiver. “This reminder of violence carved into my body?”

Underneath his brusque tone, I can hear something else. I don’t know if it’s some wolfish instincts or the ties we have binding us, but I hear the real question he’s asking.

Does it disgust you?

My eyes sting. How could he think that? How could he ever see himself that way?

I place a palm flat on his torso, the heat of him and the bumps from the scars underneath my skin. He hisses. But I don’t move my hand, and he doesn’t flinch.

“Who did this to you?” I demand.

Stark lets out a low laugh, pushing me off him. He turns swiftly, trying to walk away again. But I snare his wrist, yanking him back around.

He thinks he’s some tough, violent avenger.

Well, guess what, buddy? There are two of us.

I draw closer to him until he’s forced to stare down at me, to see how serious I am, to read it in the pain in my eyes. Then I breathe deeply, his amber musk filing my senses and lending me strength.

When I speak, it’s with all the depth of the darkness that thrives in my veins.

“Give me a name, and I’ll erase it from the earth.”

Stark’s nostrils flare with suppressed emotion. I notice every twitch in his jaw, memorize every eyelash as he blinks at my rage.

“I already did, princess,” he says, voice low. “You can stand down.”

“Who?” I demand again.

He lets out an aggravated sigh and shakes my hand off his wrist. I feel the loss of the contact acutely. “My weapons trainer as a child. He found me lacking.”

Horror roils inside me, cold and unrelenting. “Did Siegrid know? Why didn’t she stop it?”

“She hired him for a reason. She wasn’t around, anyway. The Sovereign Alpha was at the front, and I was given over to teachers who could make me, in her words, strong enough to survive the end of the world.”

The words hit me like a punch. She did this to him. His mother—

The shadows are building now, starting to creep like leeches up my arms and legs.

He angles his jaw at me, and I can see it clearly, the scar I’ve always wondered about. “In fact, she did this one herself when I was twelve. Haven’t you learned this about the Sovereign Alpha yet? She cares only about her own goals. She needed me to be stronger than I was and did not care what it took to get me there.”

“I’m going to end her.” A wind kicks up as the shadows start to spiral around the two of us, darkness spreading through the campsite in a maelstrom. It’s inside of me too, coating my veins until all I feel is a pulsing need to tear something apart.

Stark leans his face closer to mine, something hard and frightening in his gaze. “Not everyone gets a loving family, Meryn. Some parents see their child only as a means to an end. This is how you make a monster.”

Then he blinks, taking note of the dark vortex I’ve whipped around us without even commanding it. As usual, it’s out of my control. I don’t know how I started it, and I don’t know how it will end.

Oh goddess, I can’t make it stop.

“Meryn,” he says, stern and commanding. The assertiveness in his voice makes my blood thrum, and the shadows respond in kind. “Stop that.”

I can’t. I can’t. But… maybe he can.

I have the strangest sense that if I just reach for him, he can funnel this feeling away.

If he’s such a monster, well maybe—

Only a monster can lead me out of the dark.

I reach and reach, but nothing.

“It’s not working,” I say in a gasp, tears starting to fall down my face. “I’m furious, Stark. My rage is eating me alive.”

Anassa chooses this moment to finally nudge her consciousness against mine. “Meryn. Breathe. Get the shadows under control. Siegrid is not here to direct your anger at. Even if she was—you need her, for now. When the time is right, we will seek retribution.”

Her words calm me, and the shadows slip back down to the ground, sink into the earth.

Stark reaches up, roughly swipes a tear from my face with his calloused thumb. I want to take the pad of it into my mouth, relish the heat of his palm against my face.

“Don’t waste your tears on me, princess,” he murmurs. “I’m glad she did this to me.”

I startle at the harsh words spoken so plainly. “You are?” How could anyone be glad for something so horrific, so unnatural?

“Yes,” he growls. “I don’t waste time on sentiment now. I act. And it makes people fear me.”

I still don’t understand. “Why would you want that?” It’s the opposite of what I’ve been seeking to provoke in people, with arguable success.

He presses his mouth to the shell of my ear. The warmth of his breath causes a buzzing so electric I’m sure I’ve never felt alive like this before. “Their fear is a balm. I’ll be everyone’s villain to scare them away from you.”

He pulls back, catching my eyes with his dark, burning gaze, and there’s an avalanche from my head to my toes.

His face is so near mine. I can see all his stubble in the firelight, all the colors of his irises. They’re not a solid brown, I realize for the first time. They’re ringed in black, and flecked with gold toward the center, so subtly that it’s easy to miss. My stomach swoops.

It would be easy to close the distance between us.

Two inches at most.

Does he kiss like he fights, with lethal force and incredible skill? Or would he be gentle with me, take his time and explore?

Saela coughs. We both startle from the sound, and he steps away. The loss of his heat is instantaneous and keen, like something precious has been ripped from my greedy hands.

What might have happened if I’d pushed Stark over the edge? Finally found out what it means for him to truly lose control?

I’m not sure I’d ever recover from it.

And what about Noemi, whom Stark claims to love? Maybe I imagined the spark between us. Maybe he has no interest in me like that.

Even if he did, I would never act until I knew for sure there’s nothing going on there. If they’re together… I couldn’t cross that line. I’d never do that to another person.

“We should get some sleep,” Stark says quietly. “We have a long journey tomorrow.”

We ready the sleeping pallets in silence. Get into them next to each other in silence. Close our eyes, pretending to sleep in silence. At least, I’m pretending.

Because all night long I burn and I burn and I burn.

Morning takes forever to arrive.

The fire has turned to coals, and the sky is barely lightening when I hear approaching footsteps. Anassa’s ears swivel. She lifts her head to inhale. But I don’t need her nose to tell me the heavy footfalls are direwolves. I stand at the sound.

Taking a deep breath, I let the rift mask ease away, revealing the rest of the camp to a tired-looking Venna and an annoyingly beautiful Noemi. The woman looks like she didn’t miss a wink. I try not to watch as she and Stark embrace.

Venna moves toward me, saying nothing. When her arms go around me, painful emotions riot in my chest. It’s guilt for not telling her the truth. But it’s also sweet relief tinted with grief.

We don’t have Iz any longer, but we have each other. Thank the goddess, we have each other.

When we pull apart, her hands linger on my arms. “Are we okay?” I ask, letting hope and fear show on my face.

Her expression is solemn.

“I know that you’re the queen now, Meryn, and I’m not always going to be privy to your decision-making. But your choices here hurt me. Can you promise you’ll let me in on anything you can, especially if it might concern my safety?”

“I swear,” I say instantly. “I’ll do better.”

Venna nods once. “Then we’ll be okay,” she says with certainty I probably don’t deserve.

I think she understands that it was fear that drove me, but I still resent myself for it. I was once so furious at Anassa for withholding the truth. To turn around and do the same thing to a close friend? It makes me hate myself a little bit, even if I had a good reason.

When Venna steps away, Noemi takes her place. “We’re good?” she asks gently.

“Uh… yeah,” I say. “I mean… are we?”

There’s still so much I don’t understand about Noemi—particularly Stark’s relationship with her. What are they to each other? Does she love him, too?

And can I stop fucking obsessing about it every time my mind has a quiet moment?

Noemi shrugs an elegant shoulder and brushes her long red hair over it. “Don’t let her bite me, and we’ll be fine.”

That seems about as positive a reaction as I can possibly hope for to a “hey, by the way, my sister’s a Siphon” reveal, so I shoot her a tight smile and start to break down camp.

Eventually, I wake Saela up from where she still sleeps against Anassa’s side. She looks down at her bloodstained clothes and then up at Venna and Noemi and starts to cry.

“It’s okay,” I tell her as I lead her into the woods to change.

It takes some coaxing to get her to come back out to the campsite. Saela is mortified and ashamed of what she is. But when we emerge from the trees, Venna holds an arm out and Saela goes to her. They cling to each other silently for a long moment.

Then it’s time to get back on the road. We ride hard, but Saela seems stronger. Or at least more alert and less withdrawn than she’s been since her transformation.

She still keeps close to Anassa’s side when we take breaks for her to stretch her legs, but a little flicker of secret hope catches in my chest.

Shadows lengthen across the cold ground as we ride toward Weisenstat. Dawn turns to noon turns to evening. The landscape begins to change. Forest gives way to open terrain, large segments of it divided into farms.

The first sign that we’re nearing the front is the smoke. We see it from leagues away. I don’t remember the choking haze the last time I came to the active war zone with Stark.

It’s not a good sign.

I tap into the sea of communication in my mind, as lightly as possible. The force of anxiety running through everyone stationed here almost knocks me off Anassa. It strengthens as we draw closer and closer.

We crest a hill, and take in the full extent of the disarray.

In the distance, the plumes of smoke rise from beyond the defensive line, marking successful Astreonan incursions into our precious farmland, territory that was previously secure. It’s an omen that swallows up the sky.

A wave of horror in the air that’s only going to creep closer and closer.

Slowly but surely, the Siphons are overtaking us.

A shiver runs down my spine, and I turn my head. Stark is already looking at me. I know he’s thinking it, too.

The situation is worse than we anticipated. Whatever awaits us inside that camp, we’re riding into a crisis that might already be beyond salvaging.

“What are we in for?” I ask Anassa over our bond.

She has no answer. She just moves forward, descending toward the chaos of the front lines.

23

MERYN

Looking down at the death sprawled out and waiting for us, one thing is    clear: I can’t take Saela down there without a plan. I’m sure it’s psychological, but I swear I can smell the blood from here.

“No, that is the smell of blood,” Anassa confirms.

Great. Helpful as always, Anassa.

She snorts and shakes her head.

I signal for our group to halt. Venna’s wolf, Skaia, twitches uncomfortably at the sight before us. Anassa gives a low rumble that is somehow both menacing and comforting.

My sister needs to be somewhere safe—both to protect her from witnessing the horrors awaiting us at the front line and to keep her away from anything that might trigger her bloodlust.

I take a deep breath and try to reach for calmness. “Saela,” I say simply.

Stark understands me. “There are some semipermanent tents on the outer perimeter of the base, where soldiers and Bonded can rotate for rest periods. Many of them should be empty right now, considering,” he adds grimly. Cratos shifts beneath him, and Stark’s body tenses to adjust for the displacement of his weight. “She’ll have privacy and security in one of the tents in the Bonded section. It will be comfortable.”

“I can accompany her. Stand guard,” Venna offers immediately. “We can have the wolves procure animals if Saela needs to feed.”

A zing of gratitude moves quickly up my spine. When it reaches my chest, it catches in my heart and seeps strength into my blood. It means a lot that Venna’s taking Saela’s condition in stride.

“Thank you,” I tell them, slipping from Anassa’s back to help Saela down.

She lets me guide her, but when her feet are planted on the ground, she doesn’t let me go. Her hands wrinkle the fabric of my shirt. I recognize the way she stands, folded in on herself. That little dip of her head has always been a giveaway that she’s nervous or afraid.

“I shouldn’t have come here,” she whispers. “This was a mistake. I’m sorry, Mer.”

She’s giving voice to my insecurity, too. I let myself be convinced that the safest place for my sister was with me. But seeing this, understanding what it means to be in an active war zone where my own side is rapidly losing ground… have I made a grave error?

I can’t afford to show doubt. She needs my reassurance, not my insecurities.

Kneeling before her, I reach up to gently hold her wrists.

“Regardless of how we got here, we’re here. And you’re a princess of Nocturna with responsibilities to its people.” Saela’s eyes widen slightly. “You need to be brave for them. Venna will protect you. I’ll come stay there tonight once I’m done at central command.”

She steps forward and hugs me. It takes everything I have not to burst into tears. I wrap her in my arms and hold her tight.

The embrace is far shorter than I’d have preferred, and then she’s stepping away from me. Venna helps her onto Skaia’s back, and then the two of them ride off in the direction of the tents.

Saela glances back at me, though, with an expression that makes my heart ache.

I stand there for a moment, staring after her. I stare until Stark’s fingertips brush the top of my shoulder. The fingers on that arm twitch like they want to return the touch. But when I look at him, I can’t tell if he’s comforting me or telling me we need to move on.

So I say nothing and continue toward the command center at the heart of the encampment.

As we descend, the stink of too many bodies and too much death becomes undeniable.

The camp is a strange mix of tumultuous triage and eerie emptiness. Phylax forces have been stationed here on and off for decades. Now they’re gone, and the reinforcements are still days away.

The empty tents make the place look like a ghost town. Which isn’t exactly reassuring.

We make our way through the medical triage area, feet squishing through deep mud.

I don’t know much about medical care, but even I can see that the workers here are shorthanded.

The few medics rush back and forth without stopping to rest. And to our left, a wagon that holds several bodies just… lies there.

I’m sure someone is going to come back for them, make certain they get home to their families so they can properly grieve. Still, the sight of them waiting is unsettling.

I look again as we pass closer to the dead, and my breath catches. I recognize one of them.

Roddert. He was Strategos. From my training cohort.

He sat at breakfast with us. I remember him staring at Izabel as if she were made of diamonds. I remember him sparring with Nevah. She said he had an uncannily good grasp of parrying.

Guess it wasn’t uncanny enough.

It hits me. Actually, it rolls over me like a snow squall. I’m drowning and burning at the same time. Because they’re not just anonymous casualties. Being here, seeing it, feeling it. Knowing it.

It’s impossible to put distance between myself and the lives being lost.

How many familiar faces will I never see again?

Izabel’s name rings in my ears.

“Meryn.”

I lift my head and see we’ve reached the central command tent. Stark holds open the door flap, waiting for me to enter first.

I exhale deeply and duck inside. The interior is dark, save for a few streams of light from slits in the tent’s canvas, a handful of lanterns, and a single brazier billowing smoke up into a ventilation channel.

Several people are gathered around a table. Goblets are scattered about the surface, as well as maps and figurines meant to represent the current strategic situation. A dagger juts out of the table’s wood, like it was plunged there in the middle of an argument and forgotten about.

As always, Siegrid cuts an imposing figure. She’s bent over the maps, her expression dark as she receives reports from soldiers. Her arms are spread, scarred, and tattooed. Her head is bowed. She’s listening to them like each word they say might be their last, depending on her mood.

Stark and Noemi duck into the tent after me, and the three of us wait for a break in the briefing. A stir moves through the tent as people realize I’ve arrived, and Siegrid lifts her head.

When she sees me, her posture doesn’t change. She remains with her hands braced, her wide shoulders on display, her biceps tightening.

And then, rather than addressing me, she looks past me and says, “Noemi, it’s so good to have you with us.”

Turning to the rest of the pack leaders gathered, she explains: “Noemi resisted the Phylax defection and refused to follow her pack when they declared for Killian.”

Noemi’s eyes turn to storm clouds. Her body is taut like a bowstring.

A Kryptos Gamma gives Noemi a frankly assessing look. Something in the way he stares at her makes me bristle.

I don’t have a chance to think about it anymore before Siegrid dismisses her officers with a stern command.

I turn toward her as the rest of the men and women file out. A few of them glance at me or Noemi before looking away quickly. Not one of them looks at Stark.

Then it’s just the four of us in the commander’s tent. And suddenly I remember all the things that Stark told me about Siegrid. The woman she is. My blood heats with anger, shadows starting to stir, and I have a ridiculous urge to step between her and Stark.

Protect him. Guard his throat. Punch hers, maybe.

Her throat is so fucking punchable right now.

“The situation here has never been this dire,” Siegrid says plainly, pulling me out of my violent musings.

Right. Dire straits at the war front. Maybe don’t punch your chief commander… yet.

Siegrid clasps her hands behind her back and rounds the table to stand before us.

“The Siphons have made several deep incursions into the farmlands, as you could probably see from your approach. Our original perimeter, maintained by the Phylax pack, is just gone.”

She draws a deep breath, showing a rare moment of unease. It shakes me to see her so unsettled.

“Your Highness, as you know, our plan had been to use your strength as a last resort to shore up our second line of defense. But things have changed.” She visibly gathers herself, smoothing her face back to her usual impassiveness as she delivers the worst of the news.

“As of now, the town of Weisenstat and the largest of our farming areas remain intact. But we got intelligence last night that Astreona has sent reinforcements—a very powerful Siphon general, with a whole host of new forces. This isn’t just a defensive mission anymore. The Siphons have noticed our weakness here, and we anticipate a major attack.”

She doesn’t voice the obvious conclusion, but I can tell we all think it: It’s going to be a bloodbath.

Ironically, the news that we’re outmatched gives me a funny sort of calm. It’s like the buzz I’d get before a difficult fight in the underground rings, I realize. Facing up against someone bigger and badder than me. Knowing that this might be it, the time that I’m finally outmatched.

Now, just like then, my resolve hardens into something steely, edged with anticipation.

I live for dangerous odds.

Stepping up to the table, I study the battle diagrams. “What are your plans so far? Will it still work to leverage my shielding power until we can get reinforcements in place?”

“No,” Siegrid says flatly. “There’s just too much area to cover, and with the forces we’re facing now, it’s likely the Siphons will strike in multiple places. But we’ll be spread too thin if we try to anticipate every potential target. Plus, the farmers are refusing to abandon their land and seek refuge elsewhere—even if we had the extra troops to help them get out, they won’t go.”

She scrubs a hand over her face. “There’s something else. Queen Meryn, the corruption in the Bonded magic seems to be getting worse.”

My stomach drops. We were keeping an eye on this ever since it was first noticed. But Siegrid was so confident it would clear up once Tormun caught Killian. Once this wretched bracelet was off my wrist.

So much for that.

I’ve heard more mention of Daemos riders getting blowback when they impel like what happened to that boy in the arena, although Stark hasn’t experienced it. Noemi mentioned casually on the ride down here that her shields had become too strong on occasion, blocking Bonded out.

Not that we have that many Phylax left to worry about.

“Does the added strength in the magic help at all?” I ask. Since I put the crown on, everyone’s magic has surged.

Siegrid purses her mouth. “No. The troops have had no time to learn the scope of the changes or adjust our battle maneuvers to compensate for the differences.”

We’re all quiet, considering that.

My instincts are trying to tell me something. What would I have done in the fighting ring when the odds were so clearly against me?

I almost always managed to win. No matter how formidable the opponent.

It was because I could surprise them. They looked at me, and they thought they knew me. Thought I was a weak little girl who would fold easily, barely put up a fight.

What surprises do we have up our sleeve now?

“I should use foresight,” I murmur, growing more confident of the words as I say them. “We don’t need to accept defeat before it happens. Nothing is inevitable. Maybe I’ll get a glimpse of a path to success.”

Siegrid nods slowly. “It’s worth a try, Your Highness. Do you have the strength to attempt it now? We anticipate their attack coming tomorrow or the next day at the latest.”

I swallow hard. I’m worn out from our travel, and from fighting off the deserters who attacked Saela. But what other choice do I have?

“I’ll do it.”

Stark finds me the most comfortable chair in the tent, and Noemi posts herself by the entrance as guard. Siegrid seats herself across from me, gathering ink and parchment so that she’ll be ready to make note of anything that I relay.

I pull the crown out from the pack at my waist and settle it onto my head. The rush of power it gives me is heady, dangerous. It’s unnatural, thinly papering over my exhaustion. I could get myself in trouble by relying on this strength too often.

Closing my eyes, I sink into myself. Even in the best of moments, it’s hard to trigger foresight. But I focus on the feeling I get when I glimpse what’s ahead—like the hazy image on the back of your eyelids when you accidentally look at the sun.

The magic pulls me under.

Battlefield. Siphons everywhere, bodies, blood. Smoke rising off in the distance—from farms burning, I realize. Anassa and I are still standing, maintaining a Phylax shield with the last of our energy—but it’s not enough. The reach of the shield is failing, and I can see many of our best warriors already dead on the ground. The faces stare up at me, blank.

Noemi. Beautiful red hair flaming around her, eyes unseeing.

Venna. So like her sister in death. Face beautiful, frozen like ice.

Siegrid, dismembered. Her fearsome direwolf, Genicos, curved around her, as if protecting her even now.

Stark. Stark.

My eyes flutter, and I pull away from that thread, heart pounding. I reach out again, follow a different path forward.

Death.

Fire.

Destruction.

Each path ends the same.

Until…

Shadows. Anassa and me, and shadows everywhere. The Siphons in retreat.

I gasp and wrench myself away from the visions.

“I need to ride out and meet the Siphons head-on. Unleash my shadebending on them,” I say, voice shaky. “It’s the only future where we beat them back.”

Siegrid’s response is instant. “No.”

I bristle. Don’t punch her throat. Don’t punch her throat. Don’t—

“If you’ll recall,” she says dismissively, “military matters fall under my authority as Sovereign Alpha. I cannot allow the queen to risk herself in direct combat, especially when you lack battlefield experience beyond the controlled environment of the Trials. You have no control over the shadebending, even still. You could get killed—and you could kill our people, too.”

I straighten my spine, lift my head, and lock eyes with Siegrid. “You and I both know that foresight is imprecise, but over and over again, all I saw was death and destruction. This is the only possible solution that was offered to me.”

I pull the crown from my head and study the opal, gleaming in the firelight. The nightmare of my visions presses in again, and I squeeze my eyes shut as a wave of tiredness washes over my body.

Silence, as the group takes that in.

“I’ll go alone,” I offer up quietly. “That way, no one else will get hurt if my powers are out of control.”

“Meryn,” Noemi says on a soft gasp. “No.”

“Absolutely fucking not,” Stark snaps. “You cannot be serious. You’re the queen. Alone on the battlefield, facing down our enemy?”

I look at him imploringly. “Stark—if we lose this whole area, our nation will starve. What is one woman compared with the hunger of thousands?”

“You’ll go with her, Stark,” Siegrid says tersely.

We both turn to stare at her. “What?!”

“You know that the Sovereign Alpha has the ability to shadebend, too,” Siegrid says. “Because of our family’s powers, Stark will be protected. He cannot be endangered by your strength.”

A dark look comes over Stark’s face. “How do you know that for certain?”

“I just do,” Siegrid says snippily.

Another terrible thing about Siegrid: She deliberately withholds information from Stark. I’ve had enough of secrets and information withheld for a hundred thousand lifetimes.

“While Meryn wields her shadebending,” Siegrid continues, “you will keep an eye on the Siphon movements. If you sense that the queen is outmatched, you will protect her and bring her back to our camp immediately.”

“Of course she’s going to be outmatched,” he barks at her. “One woman against an entire regiment of Siphons and their immensely powerful general?”

I hold up a hand, stilling him.

While the foresight visions are hard to parse, I know what I saw. And I know I’ve barely dipped a toe into the deep, spiraling pool of darkness that lives inside me. It’s begging to be unleashed, whispering at me to open myself up to it and let it take control.

“I can do it,” I say quietly.

His jaw ticks. “Or you die.”

“Or I die,” I agree. “Maybe we both do. But if I don’t attempt it, our deaths are a certainty.”

“In that case,” Siegrid says, now fully won over to my side of the argument. “Shall we discuss details?”

Stark shakes me awake before dawn, just as planned. The tent is dark and cold; the fire in the brazier burned down to just coals. He heads out to ensure that Cratos and Anassa have everything they need, and I dress hurriedly, pulling on layers to ward off the chill.

I slip into the other room of the tent, stoking the fire there with extra logs, then turn to wake Saela.

I can’t go to battle without saying goodbye.

And there’s something else I need, too.

“Saela,” I whisper, lightly touching her shoulder. “Wake up, sis.”

Her eyes snap open, and she yawns, sitting up. “Meryn?”

“I want a hug before I go,” I say, keeping my tone light and refusing to let my fear or my nerves about the upcoming battle show. Not to her. “I have to go fight. I’ll be back soon, I promise.”

Venna and I had a long talk last night, and she promised to look out for Saela, however she can, should the worst happen.

Saela nods, and in the dim light, I can’t quite make out her expression.

I pause before my next question, wishing I didn’t need to ask it.

“Saela, can I borrow Mother’s necklace? Like with the crown, I’ve felt it amplify my powers before. I think it would be helpful for today.”

Saela nods and slips the teardrop gem out from under her shirt. She wraps her hand around it once as if for luck before unclasping it and handing it to me.

As it settles around my neck, my hands twitch with an electric burst of energy. The shadows surge in my veins, ready to be directed. With the necklace and crown combined, I’ll be a force to be reckoned with.

Saela gets out of her nest of blankets on the couch and stands. Then she moves quickly to our pile of bags and scrabbles through them, casting things to either side.

“Saela?” I ask, brow furrowing. “What are you doing?”

She doesn’t stop, just says in a monotone voice, “I must go to him.”

“Go?” A chill runs down my spine. I cross to her in two big steps. “Go to whom, Saela?”

She stands, slinging a pack behind her. “Killian. He calls me.”

I freeze in shock and then lunge forward to grab her hand. She’s trying to slip out of the tent flap and into the cold.

“What the fu—what are you talking about?!” I hiss.

My heart leaps into my throat. Not now, not after all this time. Not when he’s finally gone silent in my own mind.

Saela pulls against me, struggling mindlessly. My arms tighten around her, and I want to scream.

The sire bond. It must be the sire bond that Aldrich mentioned finally affecting her. Because of…

The necklace.

I’d put it on her almost immediately after she turned, hoping it would protect her. And it did, it seems—in a way I’d never predicted.

I wrench the necklace from my neck and force it over Saela’s head.

The moment the opal touches her skin, she sags in my grip and then turns to me, confused. “Meryn? What happened?”

“I—” Horror stifles my words.

Killian. That fucker.

My breathing returns to normal as Saela’s expression remains unmistakably her.

“Saela, listen carefully. I need you to keep that necklace on at all times, all right?”

Her eyes widen in fear, and she swallows.

Taking a deep breath, I lean down so that our eyes are level. Then I tuck her hair behind her ear and kiss her on the cheek.

“Just promise me, okay? I’ll explain everything later, but I was wrong about me taking the necklace. You need it. Do not take it off while I’m gone.”

She nods in silence.

After another tight hug, I force myself to leave. As I go, I reach out mentally to Venna, letting her know about the necklace so she can keep an eye on it.

Then I catch up with Stark where he’s waiting with our wolves. Anassa greets me with her teeth bared—she’s edgy, riled up, and desperate to get out on the field.

Stark sits astride Cratos, decked out in full battle leathers. The layers of leather and padding emphasize his muscular arms and shoulders, the broadness of his chest. The two of them together are an inky black silhouette against the dawning light. A vision of strength and power.

“You ready?” I ask both him and Anassa.

Stark merely scowls at me. I know he’s still furious that I won the argument, that we’re charging off on this possibly foolhardy mission.

But I also know that he won’t let anything happen to me—not while he’s still standing.

“Let us go rain death upon them,” Anassa growls.

24

MERYN

Stark and I ride toward the Siphon encampment without fanfare.

Obviously, the point is for us to surprise the Siphon forces, so it doesn’t make sense to make a big scene out of it.

Still, it’s a little anticlimactic.

I keep reaching up to touch the opal in the wolf crown for reassurance. The amplified power it provides is writhing and alive in my veins. I’m glad for its strength, though I don’t love that I’m relying on it so heavily.

Our route takes us past some of the fields and farms we’re fighting to protect. It’s beautiful in the dim light: softly rolling hills, mist hanging over them in the chill morning air. Rows of pine and oak separating property lines.

Even the ramshackle farmhouses look romantic at this time of day, patterned with shadow.

Then the wind changes, blowing the smoke from the battlefields back toward us and shattering my illusions of an idyllic Nocturnan countryside.

“We are going to stink like charred firewood,” Anassa complains. I grin into her neck, hanging on tightly as we speed toward the front line.

“Sounds like an improvement from dirty dog,” I retort.

Anassa huffs, offended. “As a being with a far superior sense of smell, I can assure you that you are lucky my scent masks your own.”

The lighthearted back-and-forth tapers off as we slow down and move more quietly and cautiously. The risk that we’ll tip our plans to any Siphon scouts increases as we approach.

We ride past mazes of ditches and lines of spikes, in place to help slow further Siphon advancement.

My heart breaks to see just how thin our defenses are. There are nowhere near as many fighters here as there should be, Bonded and foot soldier alike.

A sparse group of Daemos riders and wolves is on patrol, and they each salute respectfully as they see their Alpha and their queen pass. Here and there, groups of foot soldiers take shelter, weapons close at hand in case of another attack.

We take our time traveling down the line, silently letting soldiers and Bonded see us, recognize us.

Even if it takes us a little longer, being visible is part of the point, whether or not Stark and I are successful today.

Whatever happens, we need to show our forces that their queen and her leaders were willing to put their lives on the line for them. They never got that from their previous rulers.

Morale is too low to miss this chance. I can only hope it makes a difference.

And that we live long enough to see if it helped, either way.

As we finally turn to cross our defensive lines and head into Siphon territory, I call up the rifting I’ve been practicing, channeling it through the crown.

I can hide our presence in this dim twilight. Stark and I blend in and out of the shadows, moving closer and closer to the Siphon ranks.

“I better be able to call my power when the time comes,” I say worriedly to Anassa.

If I can’t get the shadebending to activate today, this is basically a suicide mission.

“You will,” she replies calmly.

We’re crossing the no-man’s-land between our lines now. The earth here is scorched, dry. Trees are burned or broken, and there’s nowhere to hide.

I put all my focus into rifting, wrestling with light and shadow to keep us as near to invisible as I can. Meanwhile, Stark creeps up on the first Siphon sentry we encounter, circling around silently. Death incarnate.

In a single smooth strike, he removes the Siphon’s head.

The dim light brightens a bit more as we move, and I nudge Anassa faster. Her nose alerts us of another Siphon close ahead of us. I skirt around a copse of burnt-out trees, coming up on the Siphon from behind.

Something alerts her to our presence, and she whirls around, drawing her sword.

A sharp sweetness hits the air as she tries to call her Siphon magic.

But I’m faster. A throwing knife to the throat silences her, protecting our secrecy. Then Anassa and I dart forward to remove her head.

We continue onward that way, picking off anyone who could give warning.

Energy zips through my veins. Anassa and I hum with grim satisfaction. Riding alongside Stark and Cratos, delivering death to our foes?

It feels good.

Finally, the sunrise is almost upon us, the sky turning purple and yellow.

“It’s time,” I say over the bond.

Then I drop my hold on the magic, exposing us.

Anassa and Cratos take off, moving at full tilt toward the Siphons’ lines. We must look like streaks of white and black against the terrain, we’re moving so fast.

We’re already amid their camp when a cry goes up from someone who spots us. Shouts travel through the camp, and horns sound. Siphons scramble from tents, grabbing weapons and pulling on armor in a hurried rush.

But they’re too late.

Their unnatural speed aids them, but it’s not enough to stop the death we deliver. Stark and I move in tandem, slashing throats as one Siphon gets close, then another. My knives have a life of their own, directing my arms in a deadly dance.

We reach a clearing in the tents that looks to be about the middle of the camp, and I touch minds with Stark: “This spot is perfect. Cover me?”

“My pleasure.”

He and Cratos whirl around to cut down the next attacker. Then four more Siphons close in, and the two of them become a whirlwind of blades and teeth, movements too fast and dizzying to follow.

Anassa helps, smacking down with her massive paw a Siphon who gets too close to me. She decapitates him in one vicious bite.

Meanwhile, I reach inward to that place in my heart where the shadows dwell, praying this will work. I sink deep into focus like Siegrid and I have been practicing.

I saw myself in the foresight vision.

I know I can do it. I saw it.

For a moment, nothing happens as I struggle to block out the sounds and sights of fighting around me.

The spot where the magic lives is like a psychic bruise deep inside me, tender and potent. My body remembers the shadows activating, dancing to my will.

Still… nothing happens, and I let out a frustrated growl.

Is this it?

Have I condemned us to death, all because the useless Sturmfrost Queen can’t get her powers to work when she needs them?

The spike of irritation and anger sends a little tendril of shadow out from that secret, locked-up place inside me.

It’s just the smallest whisper, but still…

“Use it,” I hear Anassa through my focus. “You are not Siegrid. You are Meryn Sturmfrost, Queen of Nocturna. You are my rider. And you and I do things our own way. Do not stifle your anger because someone told you it wasn’t polite or proper. Anger can change the world when wielded correctly.”

I grit my teeth. Anassa is right.

Fuck Siegrid and her stupid fucking calm.

This is what works for me.

I channel every piece of myself that burns with rage. The flame of my fury is locked deep away, eternal and aching.

But it’s here, always with me.

It is me.

Images flicker across my eyelids.

Saela behind bars, then drenched in blood, face pale as a ghost.

Izabel’s glassy eyes, her body betraying her. Convulsing on the floor.

My mother, lost to the grip of visions she never got a chance to understand.

Anassa, alone for centuries, orphaned by the Siphons, waiting endlessly for a bond that might never come.

Alistair Brightbane’s cursed blue eyes on Killian’s beautiful, lying face.

Something cavernous opens inside me, a depth far beyond what I’ve realized before. I can sense, on the edges, Killian’s influence. If it weren’t for this bracelet on my wrist, I could cleave the world in two.

Still, it’s an overwhelming, terrifying amount of power.

And then… it’s as if the sunrise starts to reverse itself.

All across the camp, shadows twist and turn and dance as they meet and combine and turn into rivers of darkness. The pitch-black power comes from all around us, rushing and roaring over the farmlands and scarred battlefields and into the Siphon camp.

I reach out my arms, letting the magic fill me. The power is an icy bonfire inside my chest. Cold flames lick out into my arms, my hands, down to every fingertip.

It’s so easy, now that I’m not resisting. Too easy. I hear a half-crazed laugh and realize it’s me making the sound.

“Now, Meryn!” Anassa pulls me back to my task.

I flex my hands, ropes of darkness wreathing themselves around my body.

Suddenly, it’s too much.

A yawning black pit opens behind my eyes, and my vision blurs. My control starts to slip as more and more shadows gather themselves to me, streaming over the ground and the tents and the Siphons around us like water, and I can’t seem to—

“I’m here with you, Meryn!” It’s Stark this time, in my head. Stark’s voice, Stark’s strength holding me.

Lost in the darkness, I look toward the sound of his voice, reaching toward him with every piece of myself. Just like how I reached for him at the campsite.

Only this time, a shadow-spun link begins to form between us.

Finally, a piece of my soul sighs.

It’s beautiful.

A bridge of shining darkness arcs between us, made of glittering ropes of shadow. They braid and twist as they reach him.

And… connect us.

I don’t know what’s happening or how. All I know is that we’re suddenly bound—the shadows tie us together, wrapping around our souls and pulling tight. So tight we might never part.

His anger becomes my anger. My fury becomes his. Every breath brings us closer in our minds.

The river of our mental connection has contracted. There’s no downstream. There just is. Stark and me, intimately connected in a way that shouldn’t be possible.

“Anassa, what is this?” I shout at her. “Is this your mate bond?”

“No,” she responds, her tone confused. “I do not understand this connection.”

I breathe in, and it’s his breath in my mouth. My eyes flutter open, and I see double: my vision and Stark’s intermingled.

It’s strange and overwhelming, but it’s also so right.

“Don’t dive into your darkness alone,” he says or he thinks—or I say it, or I think it. I can’t tell, anymore, where one of us begins and the other ends.

But I understand what he means. I can sense it, too: He can carry my power. He can wield it, if only I let him have it.

Can I make that choice, to give up a piece of myself? Can I truly trust him with it?

Yes, my soul screams in return.

“Have it,” I think.

His mouth is my mouth as he breathes in the shadows. I’m intensely aware of the rub of his fingers together; it’s like a featherlight touch on my own hand. The touch of his long eyelashes on his cheek are like a kiss on my skin.

I gasp. My body is alight with heat and pleasure.

And so is his. I’m in every inch of him. His muscles tightening, the flex of his hand on his sword. The hot desire that burns so bright it’s blinding.

He’s in me, too. Sensing the way my body responds. The tempest of need that whirls through me, dangerous as an ice storm.

Our link completes, our overlap total.

Dark power erupts between us.

The power flows through me and into him and back to me.

We no longer need words to communicate—we are bound so close together that his thoughts are my thoughts, his desires my desires.

I grasp on and align my mind with his.

Together we PUSH.

The world loses all sound and color. Time suspends.

And then with a resounding roar, darkness streams out from us in all directions.

The shadows spread and then bear down, down, in crushing pressure. Every Siphon in a hundred-foot radius of us is suddenly shrieking, their bodies slammed into the dirt.

The magic rushes on, stretching farther and farther. Reaching more and more of the enemy.

The unrelenting pressure pushes in on me, and on Stark, our minds intertwined. I grit my teeth and fist my hands and push more. All around me swirl the sounds of armor cracking and skulls smashing and screams cutting short.

I scream in pleasure and pain, the power and connection overwhelming.

Stark’s voice melds with mine.

And then together as one, we let go.

The power dissipates.

Light leeches back into the world.

I flutter my eyes, sight slowly returning to normal as our minds detach and we snap back into ourselves.

Everything near us has gone quiet. Deathly still.

I keel over on Anassa’s back as the last of the power leaves me and exhaustion floods in.

“What was that?” I mind-speak to Stark, the barriers between the four of us still fuzzy. “What the ever-loving fuck was that?”

His face is confused, wondering. “I… don’t know. That connection was… I don’t know.” We stare at each other. “And then, with your power, it came through me, and together, we could control it, tame it.”

My cheeks flush at that. There’s an echo of our connection, his skin burning hot, the swipe of his tongue across his lips. I shiver.

Anassa chimes in, “I have never heard of this before. But perhaps it is knowledge lost to the Sturmfrost Queens of old and their wolves’ mates?”

I file that away to think more about later, when we aren’t in the middle of a war front.

Everything around us is calm in its horror: mangled bodies. Pools of blood and smashed heads. Metal armor split open and flattened. Broken tentpoles, ripped fabric, and scattered weapons dropped by destroyed hands.

“Guess our theory was right,” Stark observes. “Crushing their skulls completely works just as well as decapitation.”

I let out a choked laugh, the unreality of it all overwhelming.

A few survivors from a distant part of the Siphons’ camp are moving now, assembling. They’re far off, and I squint to try to make out what’s happening.

“They’re regrouping,” I tell Stark. “There’s a force off to the left that’s forming up, more organized this time—”

“I see them,” he cuts me off. “Do you think you can summon the shadows once more when they get close? Do you think we can do—that—again?”

My mind is still numb from the effort, but I set my jaw and focus inward, finding that anger at my core and pulling at the shadows again.

Everything in me strains. It’s as if they are reluctant, or maybe my call just isn’t as strong in my exhaustion.

Finally, that pool of darkness awakens. The shadows start to gather, streaming in slowly, and I grind my teeth, using everything in me to focus my control—

“Meryn,” Anassa’s voice interrupts my focus, and the shadows drop, dispersing back into the landscape around us.

“What is it?”

“They’re retreating.”

Stark and I watch in confusion as the group we spotted moves away from us.

I’m keenly glad: My body is a wrung-out rag. Calling that power again made me feel as if I would burn into ash.

It doesn’t make sense, though. Yes, we wiped out dozens of the enemy, maybe even hundreds. But the fighting force here was at least thousands strong, from what our intelligence gathered. They wouldn’t just give up, would they?

“Something isn’t right,” I tell Anassa. She agrees.

More Siphons emerge from other distant parts of the camp, but none approaches us. Instead, they move off toward the larger group, away from us.

I know better than to see weakness where there is none. It’s my trick.

There’s eerie silence. It lurks in the battle smog, heavy and intrusive. I curl my lip and stare at the retreating line, trying to make out what they’re doing, what’s happening.

Then they part, flowing like water.

And I see it flickering there, traveling down a wide row between distant camp tents.

A white flag waves against the pink-gray sunrise and the crimson-drenched encampment.

A flag of peace.

Immediately, my insides writhe and warp with anger. Cratos and Stark move closer, and I notice absently that Cratos’s fur is wet with blood. Stark is just as filthy as his wolf. There’s a spill of blood down his neck, as if he suffered a deep cut near his ear that Cratos quickly healed.

“This could be a trap. You can’t trust it,” he says sternly.

My lips twitch upward. “I know that.”

He looks surprised, then relieved, then amused. All this in subtle twitches I’m somehow able to read.

He’s right, anyway. It’s likely a trap—every bruised and wearied part of me screams it is—but we’re ready to face it together. And if this grants me crucial time to regain my energy, prepare for another blast of magic, so much the better.

The fluttering flag and its bearer move closer to us. We stand and wait, unwilling to give up our position. With everything around us flattened, we have a clear line of sight should anyone try to suddenly attack.

The sun’s early rays strike the figure’s shining armor, glinting and startlingly clean in contrast to the muck and blood on us and all around us.

A woman, I realize. Her dark hair is bound tight, bearing an ethereally beautiful face. She’s almost upon us, and I stare at her prominent cheekbones, delicate jaw, slender neck. Her rich brown skin reflects the oranges of the sunrise.

So much beauty wrapped around something so deadly.

She’s more than a mere soldier, I can tell immediately. She holds her shoulders back the same way Siegrid does, as if she owns the ground she walks upon by virtue of the touch of her foot.

This must be the Siphon general we heard about.

She comes right up to us and doesn’t flinch when Anassa snaps her teeth. She stares, then cranes her head to look up at us. She plants the white flag into the ground by her feet, and her hands fold behind her back.

That subtle motion looks like an insult on her, like she’s telling us that even if we decided to attack her now, she wouldn’t need her hands ready to destroy us.

A bead of sweat slides down my spine. Her nostrils twitch like she can smell it. But instead of baring her fangs, she dips her head. It isn’t a sign of deference.

It’s barely an acknowledgment.

“I am General Ruby Navarro, representing King Lucien Brightbane of Astreona as his ambassador,” she says in an alluringly silky voice. “You are the queen, are you not? King Lucien has a ceasefire proposal for Queen Meryn Sturmfrost.”

Shock ripples through my body, nearly knocking me off Anassa.

“You’re joking,” I blurt out, my eyes sliding over to Stark. Confusion lights in his gaze as well.

Five hundred years of war paused with its first ceasefire? When the Siphons have the ability to gain more ground in Nocturna than ever before?

I quickly recover and put some metal in my voice. “What is the meaning of this?”

Ruby arches an elegant brow. “Our battle is not with you, Your Highness, nor with your people,” she tells us plainly. “It’s time for Astreona and Nocturna to unite against our common foe.”

She tilts her head so that her eyes darken with malice.

And she hisses his name like it’s a curse. “Alistair Brightbane.”

25

MERYN

Lord and Lady Grunfall have a long-abandoned country house right near the border between Nocturna and Astreona. It’s been ravaged by the never-ending war. But it’s far enough from the current major zones of conflict that it seems like a safe zone.

For… peace talks.

Thankfully, we were given a day to consider our next move. Not that I used the time for thinking—instead, I slept like the dead thanks to the effects of the intense magic Stark and I had wielded.

I haven’t had time to think about that, yet, either.

Stark and Siegrid agreed to accompany me to the meeting, and the three of us move at a steady lope toward the manor house. I focus on Anassa’s labored breathing beneath me and occasionally sneak glances at Stark and Cratos when I know Siegrid won’t notice.

These things keep me grounded. So does the birdsong.

Stark and I haven’t talked more about what happened out on the battlefield. That… connection between us. I can’t stop thinking about it. But we’ve all firmed up our mental walls now that the immediate threat is gone, so I can’t tell if it’s still on his mind.

The ruined Grunfall manor comes into view, and I notice it’s on a slight rise with sight lines in all directions. It would be difficult for anyone to approach undetected, whether Bonded or Siphon.

If this is to be an ambush, it’s not catching us by surprise.

I insisted on meeting outside, of course. If this whole thing turns out to be an elaborate trap, I refuse to be cornered inside the crumbling walls of this decrepit ruin.

Currently, I’m giving it seventy-thirty odds in favor of ending in blood.

If Ruby pisses me off, though, it’s shooting up, hundred-zero.

We draw up under the shadow of the manor’s tower. Siegrid dismounts first, Genicos falling into step behind her.

I glance at Stark again. He’s waiting for me. When I dismount, he follows. Then he’s at my side, hand resting on the dagger at his hip.

An elaborate courtyard spreads out before us. It was clearly once beautiful—an extended colonnade, a withered gazebo. A dried-up dip in the terrain hints at what was once likely a little pond.

Now, it’s all overgrown and disheveled. Weeds strangle the lingering plants. Crackle-dry ivy clings to the columns. There’s a stone bench near the empty pond that’s on its back, feet up in the air.

In the center of it all is a massive stone table. It’s been cleared of debris and dug out of the vines. And sitting at it is an eerily gorgeous woman I recognize.

Ruby is perched in a stone chair, her legs crossed at the ankles, her chin high. Her black hair is loose around her shoulders, and the subtle waves of it complement the sharper lines of her face. She’s out of armor, and her bright-colored clothes are perfectly tailored. She wears two gold hoops on each ear.

Behind her are two attendants, just as stony as the table before them. They’re more humbly dressed and don’t look at us at all as we enter the courtyard—a feat, considering the size of our wolves trailing behind us.

Ruby rises to greet us. We exchange curt nods before we take our positions. I sit across from her, while Stark and Siegrid remain standing directly behind me on either side.

I affect an air of calm as I turn to look Ruby directly in the eye. “Your terms?”

Ruby doesn’t blink at my brevity. “Astreona’s true enemy has never been Nocturna or its people, but Alistair Brightbane specifically. He has used your throne to challenge King Lucien’s rule for five centuries. Now that a new Sturmfrost Queen sits on the throne, King Lucien sees an opportunity to reforge a once-flourishing alliance and focus on our common enemy. We can make the ceasefire permanent.”

I carefully maintain my diplomatic mask. But internally, I’m letting out one long, disoriented groan. It’s borderline impossible to believe her.

The Siphons are literally bloodsucking monsters who feed on humans to survive. For centuries, they’ve been trying to take over our country so they can feast on Nocturnans.

Fresh prey, that’s all we are to them. And now she’s trying to claim that we could somehow be allies?

But then, the last six months have taught me that history is written by the people in charge, and the rest of us need to read between the lies.

So… I’ll keep listening.

I pinch my lips together and ask, “After years of terrorizing us, why would Astreona suddenly offer peace? What do you truly want in return?”

A small, knowing smile plays across Ruby’s lips. It looks like I’ve passed a test. “In exchange for an immediate ceasefire along all borders, you must agree to travel with me to the city of Brightbane to meet with King Lucien and formalize the alliance.”

Stark explodes, slamming his arm down on the table in front of us, both protective and threatening.

There’s a low growl in his voice as he bites out a sharp, “Fuck off.”

I’m torn between heated satisfaction and the knowledge that he probably shouldn’t threaten an ambassador.

Ruby’s gaze shifts to him and then returns to me lazily. “I suggest you call off your muscle and consider the precarious position of your kingdom.”

Anassa growls menacingly, and Ruby flinches, ever so slightly. The direwolf ends the growl with a mocking bark.

I smirk. “You should be aware that Anassa is the muscle here, and she does not like to be tested. She considers Siphon tongue a delicacy that she’s dying to try.”

“Queen Sturmfrost,” Ruby goes on, gathering herself, “it’s vital that you understand the position you find yourself in.” She spreads her long, perfect fingers over the rough stone. “You have lost the entire Phylax pack to Alistair, which has left your throat unprotected. As such, our fangs linger perilously close. No clever tactics—not even the power of your direwolves—will render your current military situation tenable. And forgetting the borders we share, we know a looming civil war brews within your own kingdom.”

I lean forward, pinning her down with my own searing stare. “However, you are the one who wants something from me. Do you intend to win my cooperation with threats, General Navarro?”

“No,” she says. “I hope to convince you by reminding you of reality. If you want a ceasefire and to give your citizens reprieve, you will travel to the city of Brightbane to discuss the alliance with our king. If you do not, we will assume you are not interested in our partnership. We will enter Nocturna anyway and hunt down Alistair through methods of our own designs, starting by clearing out the village of Weisenstat to ensure that it is not harboring the traitor or any who are loyal to him. You grow grain in this area, do you not? Can your people survive without it?”

“Huh, that sounds quite a bit like a fucking threat,” I reply icily.

She presses her full lips together. “I assure you it is not meant as one. We do not want to enter your sovereign nation without your permission. But if we cannot come to an agreement, we will.”

“Give me one good reason not to slice this bitch’s head off right now,” I hiss at Anassa through the bonds. “Seriously, I need you to be the voice of reason because I am about to lose it.”

Stark is burning with anger behind me, too, and it’s reaching me and intensifying my own.

“Her tactics are discourteous, but I sense sincerity from her,” Anassa says. “The offer seems genuine.”

“So, what, we travel to the far ends of our enemy nation at the beck and call of their king, leaving our country leaderless? All in the hopes that whatever awaits us there will be better than risking their wrath?” I pause, mulling this over. “I think I should use foresight.”

“That may be wise,” Anassa says. “As long as you remember the visions aren’t complete.”

Closing my eyes, I let myself fully enter our bond, tapping into my Strategos power. It’s easier this time, after using it so recently. Like a pathway I’ve trod before. But the visions come swiftly… and brutally.

If I don’t agree to go with Ruby…

Burning fields. The village in shambles.

Children wandering around soot-covered, barefoot, through the rubble. Crying for their parents. Crying for food.

Immediate destruction and misery.

And if I do agree to go…

The baking sun. A golden crown, not my own. Blood, in a slow drip down someone’s neck.

It doesn’t seem great, either, but it’s a whole lot less sinister.

My throat tightens as my eyes fly back open.

The misery of my people can be avoided.

“I can make a choice that staves off that future,” I say to Anassa. “But how do I know that it won’t result in something worse happening further into the future? Further than I can see?”

Anassa is silent for a moment. Eventually, she says, “You do not, and you never will. These are the decisions that you must make as the leader of your country. All you are able to do is make the best decision for the moment with as much information as you have, and then live with the consequences.”

I want to groan. “Great. As someone known for her totally unimpulsive decision-making, I’m very qualified for this job.”

Anassa huffs at my side. “This is why you humans require direwolves. We are not as irrational.”

“Yeah, I’m really glad I can get advice from someone who sniffs butts.”

She nips at my ankle, and I finally look back to Ruby. “Your position is clear. I’ll need to confer with my advisors before making such a momentous decision.”

Ruby bows her head in a slight acknowledgment. If she’s frustrated, she doesn’t reveal it. She sounds uncaring as she says, “The offer expires in twenty-four hours, after which hostilities will resume at full force.”

I rise from my seat. “Twenty-four hours,” I acknowledge.

Unexpectedly, Ruby’s expression shifts to almost… amusement. Immediate red flag. When she stands, I tense slightly.

“To help the queen consider our proposal, I have a gesture of goodwill to present,” Ruby says. She nods to one of her attendants, who disappears around the side of the manor house. My hands are in fists as he returns moments later with another figure trailing behind him.

My whole world tilts sideways.

For a second, it looks like the crumbling manor has finally given in to its own weight and toppled over. I feel like it has, like its stones have crushed all the air out of my lungs.

I can’t maintain composure. A small sound rips from me. Wounded. Lost.

The sound of a heartbroken little girl.

Standing before me is my father, who I know has been dead for eleven years.

He’s been turned into a Siphon.

26

MERYN

There was never a body. There was never body. There was never a body.

It’s all I can hear. All I can think. I believed he was dead, and now he’s standing before me as a Siphon.

He looks exactly the same. Except, not.

His features are sharpened. He hasn’t aged a day in the years since I last saw him. The same dark hair, the same aquiline nose, the same stubborn chin. It’s Saela’s chin. But his eyes look a little larger. There’s something more handsome about him after all this time.

I can’t take it. I can’t.

My magic reacts to the storm of emotions in me. It starts to rip me apart from the inside, seeping from my pores and circling slowly around my fingers. The garden darkens.

It takes everything left in me—everything his death left behind—to maintain control.

Anassa senses my turmoil. It rages over into her, spilling through our bond, and she immediately releases a deep warning growl meant for the man standing before us. She paces closer, baring her teeth, ears back, as she positions herself protectively beside me.

His eyes—eyes just like mine—widen at the dark tendrils of magic reaching for him, at the shadows eager to strangle the life from him. The man I once knew raises his hand in a placating gesture like he’s telling me he won’t hurt me.

But it doesn’t matter, because the sight of it hurts me more than any blade ever could.

The moment he lifts his hands and holds his palms flat, I see it, and a crystal-clear memory returns to me.

Mother, pregnant with Saela, sitting in our tiny kitchen. She’s weeping over a tiny box. I asked to see inside, and she refused. I was young, and I didn’t get what was so important about the box. Not yet.

It would be months before I finally understood that there was no body to bury. That the only part of him left in the world—the only thing left—was contained in that tiny box.

A single finger, as if that could be enough. As if anything could be enough.

Looking at him now, I see that missing finger on his left hand, and I want to scream.

I grip Anassa’s fur for control. Shadows hiss around me.

“Everyone, leave us,” I command, voice rough.

I can’t do this with all of them watching. With Ruby leering, enjoying the chaos she’s created. With Siegrid frowning, disapproving of my show of emotion.

This needs to happen without witnesses.

Siegrid and Stark make no move to leave until I open our mental connections and explain that the man in front of me is supposedly my dead father. Siegrid tenses. Stark immediately takes a step closer, nostrils flaring.

I can tell he doesn’t want to leave me to my pain. But he also trusts me to protect myself. Even so, he doesn’t leave without boring a hole through the back of my skull with his glare.

“I’ll be just beyond the manor house wall, if you need me,” he promises.

Siegrid inclines her head toward me. “I will head back to the base. Resume duties there.”

“Queen Sturmfrost,” Ruby warns, “please remember that you have until tomorrow evening to decide or the battle resumes full force.”

Then she and her attendants withdraw. Cratos’s and Genicos’s heavy footsteps echo over old stone.

And Anassa and I are alone with him.

The man who resembles my father.

The instant we’re alone, I draw my dagger and step forward, shadows wreathed around me.

“Who are you?” I snap. My voice trembles with barely contained ire. “My father died eleven years ago in battle.”

“Meryn—”

“Don’t say my name!” I shout. “Are you like Killi—” I stop short, smarting. “Are you like Alistair? Are you a Siphon in there who took over my father’s body?”

Lines are blurring. Something broke when I saw Killian’s eyes roll back. When I watched him turn into someone else. The crack deepened when I realized how ghostly Saela had become. It’s difficult for me, now, to believe that the people I love—whom I once loved—are even real.

My dagger is pressed to his chest, tip aimed at his heart. And Anassa looms behind us, growling so deeply that it rumbles through me even though we aren’t touching.

But he speaks calmly. “I’m your father.”

I shake my head. “Prove it.”

“How?”

“Tell me something only my real father would know,” I demand.

He doesn’t hesitate. Immediately, as if calling up the memory from the very surface of his soul, he says, “On your ninth nameday, I took you hunting in the woods south of Sturmfrost.”

My jaw tightens until my teeth creak.

He keeps going. “You were such a quick learner. Unafraid, even though I was worried that breaking down an elk would scare you. I told you that it would feed us, your mother, the neighbors. And you understood, even though you were only nine. You were so determined to help.”

My eyes are stinging. I don’t want to cry. I don’t want to feel this way.

“Then the very next day you caught a tiny rabbit in your snare. But you couldn’t bring yourself to kill it. You begged me to release the little creature. Said you couldn’t see the point in hurting something so beautiful and young.”

The memory sears through me like a fire in my chest. Goddess, I forgot this part until now. Blocked out the full truth of this moment when I thought back on him.

I wanted to remember only the good parts, the father who spent special time alone with me and made sure I was fed.

“You told me I needed to toughen up,” I grind out. “To become realistic about the world. You snapped its neck.”

He smiles lightly at that. “We had rabbit stew, and your mother turned its pelt into a warm hat for you.”

A shudder passes through me. My memories of him had become glossy, sanitized. With a mother as sick as mine, the good moments with Father grew and blossomed until they blocked out the bad. He became a hero in my mind.

I tighten my grip on my blade and refuse to drop it. But I speak coldly and calmly now, no longer desperate to tear him apart. More intent on getting answers.

“The story’s true, but the merciful, innocent girl you remember died when her father did.”

He sighs, running a hand through his hair.

“That child was replaced by someone who had to grow hard to survive. So I guess in a way, you got what you wanted.” I look at my dagger pointedly, as if to say, I’d kill the rabbit now. I’ll kill you now. “You might not like whom I’ve become.”

Then I step back and let my anger run free. My shadows surge forward. They take hold of his limbs and force him back, seeming to read my intention. He doesn’t fight it as the dark tendrils shove him into the stone chair behind him and restrain him with tendrils of darkness.

Good. He’ll be under my control if he wants to talk. Anassa rumbles approvingly, moving forward to stand at my side.

“If you’ve been alive this entire time, where have you been for the past eleven years? Why did you never return to us?” My dagger is still in my hand. I can’t let go of it. But I let my other hand come up to wind through strands of Anassa’s fur.

“My battalion was ambushed, and I was critically wounded. They left me to die on the battlefield. But—” he glances down at my magic, swallows, then meets my eyes “—Ruby found me. She offered me transformation instead of death. And I was in so much pain and so afraid. I know fathers aren’t supposed to admit it, but I was afraid. And I accepted.”

A missing father. A terrified man. An unwanted Siphon. Nothing feels real.

“I believed I was protecting you by staying away, that returning to Nocturna as a Siphon would have put a target on your backs. And truth be told, I found the idea of leaving my sire to be… unwelcome.”

I scoff. He abandoned us because he didn’t want to leave behind the beautiful Siphon general who turned him?

“I knew you and your mother were strong enough to manage without me,” he says with unearned confidence. “That you would be fine.”

“Fine?!” I shout.

The anger is back, and I watch the shadows tighten on him. Relish his look of fear. I have so much hurt in me. So much hurt. And he’s here, and it’s like I finally have somewhere for it all to go. I want him to hurt.

“Mother was pregnant when you ‘died’!”

His eyes widen. “What?” I get the sense that for the first time in this conversation, I’ve surprised him. Which means he didn’t even bother to find a way to check up on us, not once in the past eleven years.

“Your disappearance shattered her mental stability. I had to become both a sister and a parent. I had to think about things, to do things no child should have to think about or do. My sister’s life was on my shoulders. Do you even care? Do you even care that your wife is dead now?”

His lips purse, and he glances away. When he looks back at me, something like regret is in his eyes.

“Meryn, the way I’ve been dead to you all this time, it felt the same way for me. You and your mother were part of a life I couldn’t return to, no matter how much I would’ve rather been with you. I had to make peace with that. I had to move on.”

The rage bubbles up in me again. “Move on? Like, to another woman?”

His gaze trails over toward the building, to where Ruby left with the attendants. “Ruby and I, we’re—”

“Stop,” I say, holding up a hand, nausea rising.

“It’s how we figured out who you were. Ruby received intel about the new queen of Nocturna, that she had been living as a commoner named Meryn Cooper. There couldn’t be more than one Meryn Cooper in Sturmfrost. I told her right away that you were my daughter.”

“Isn’t she a little young for you?” I snap, petty. “That woman can’t be more than three years older than me.”

His hands tighten around the armrests of the chair. “She’s four hundred years old. Kind of the other way around, actually.”

Gross. I turn from him and start to pace, my mind a whirling frenzy of anger and confusion. Anassa nudges me with her snout, then turns back to glare at my father.

“I’m sorry to hear about Nathalia—both her death and her mental health. I’m sorry for the burden my absence placed on you. And I’m—”

His voice cracks, and I turn back toward him. I get the sense he might be fighting back tears, but he swallows them down.

I wish I felt satisfaction, watching him almost cry. That my outburst did what I thought it would. That I was done hurting. But all I feel is echoing numbness laced with simmering anger.

“I’d like to know more about your sister,” he finishes quietly. “What’s her name?”

I stop pacing, moving back to Anassa’s side. We watch him in silence. I tell him nothing.

“You hate me?”

Still, I say nothing. Anassa and I are motionless statues, staring him down.

He shuts his eyes and clenches his jaw. If this hurts him, too, good. Then he takes a shaky breath and says, “Please don’t let how you feel about me turn you away from Ruby’s offer.”

I click my tongue and pace away from him again, frustrated. I start to flip my dagger in my hand to expel some of the excess energy.

“Astreona is nothing like what Nocturnans have been taught,” he implores, begging me to believe him. “Humans live there peacefully along Siphons, not as prey but as citizens. If you would only come to see it for yourself, you would understand how different reality is from the propaganda you’ve been raised on.”

Reality. Propaganda. Who is this man? His existence is a lie. How can he speak truth?

“You can trust them. Astreona and King Lucien will be good allies,” he tells me.

I catch my dagger’s hilt and grip it hard, glaring at him. “How can I trust you when I don’t even know you? You’ve been absent for half my life. What right do you have to give me advice about alliances and rulership after abandoning your own family?”

My anger seems to be getting to him—his hands tighten on the armrests again, and the glassy look has come back to his eyes. “I know… I have no right to your trust, but I ask you—beg you—for a chance to earn it. To get to know you again. And to meet the daughter I never knew existed.”

Anassa’s voice cuts through the chaos roiling inside me. “Taking Saela into Astreona might actually benefit us. If any kingdom would know how to help a newly turned Siphon control her hunger or possibly even reverse the transformation, it’s Astreona.”

I pause at that. The possibility of helping Saela weighs heavily on me. My mind pivots away from my father and toward my sister.

He watches me as I think, but I just let him stare. Let him linger in the pain. Let him wait and fruitlessly hope the way I once did, before the tiny box arrived.

It becomes clear to me quickly that I’m not going to find any meaningful answers in this state. I need to consider it all in depth.

I breathe deeply, calming my heart rate. My shadows are still writhing around my father, trapping him in place.

With each deep breath I take, they loosen their grip, until finally they dissolve and fall away.

“Well done,” Anassa says, noting my increased control over my powers.

I’m in no place to appreciate the achievement. “Get out of my sight before I end you for real this time,” I say. My voice is too level because of everything I’m forcing down.

His brows twist up. I can see that he believes me. That he feels like a struggling rabbit in a snare. I might have spared him today, but my mercy has limits.

He rises slowly from the chair, his expression heavy with regret. I can’t care. Can’t pity him. He left the weight of an entire family on a kid’s shoulders.

Did he think this was going to be some touching, grateful reunion when he came here?

After everything I’ve been through because of him?

I wish he’d actually died on that battlefield.

He takes one last lingering look at me. He’s memorizing my face. I let him look. Let him see how dead the love I once had for him is now. Then he turns and strides toward the manor house, where his monstrous lover, Ruby, and her bloodsucking attendants wait for him.

Only when he’s gone do I let my pain show on my face, when there’s no threat that he’ll confuse my agony for girlish longing. My composure cracks, and my magic breaks free again. The shadows around me surge and writhe.

They’re searching for him. For the source of my pain. They want to snuff him out.

Rage, grief, and a lifetime of loneliness threaten to overwhelm me.

I want to cry now. Scream.

But the tears won’t come. My voice won’t work. My nails dig into my palms, and none of the emotion will move. It’s all just lodged in my throat, choking me to death.

It’ll explode and ruin me if I don’t find an outlet.

I stalk back to where Stark awaits my return, Anassa padding behind. Stark pushes off the rubble when he sees me coming, his expression serious. My entire body is taut with painful, barely contained emotion.

“I need to hurt something,” I tell him.

“I can help with that,” Stark says immediately, already turning to lead me away from the manor and prying eyes, Cratos close behind.

And I follow him, shadows and ghosts trailing in my wake.

27

STARK

Meryn takes off on Anassa like an arrow from a crossbow.

I leap to Cratos’s back, and we follow behind, speeding up as Anassa pushes herself faster and faster. Their bond is a loop, sending their tumult of anger back and forth endlessly.

I don’t know exactly what happened in that broken-down castle courtyard, but Meryn’s emotions are far too strong to stay contained. They’re leaking through the mate bond—a potent cocktail that makes my muscles tense up, eager to spring into action, eliminate the threat.

We speed past forests and farmland, up and down hills.

Meryn’s tangled, messy feelings start to manifest physically: dark tendrils of shadow wrapping around her, twisting and curling.

“Anassa’s rage is all-consuming,” Cratos shares. “She’s bearing what she can from Meryn, but they’re both close to the breaking point. We need to intervene.”

I send him silent assent, and he picks up his pace until we’re running next to Anassa and Meryn, wind whipping by us.

Out on the battlefield, I could sense her getting pulled under by her power. I don’t understand what happened next. But the door she opened in her magic somehow opened to me as well.

If I hadn’t helped her shoulder it, she might not have come back from the edge.

I haven’t wanted to think about everything that came along with it: the overwhelming connection between us and the insistent, excruciating desire that coursed through me like a sickness.

And now she’s teetering on that cliff once again.

Meryn turns her head toward me, her hazel eyes anguished.

“I’m here,” I tell her. “Don’t carry it alone.”

She isn’t opening up to me, though. When I test the boundaries between us, her mind is closed off, a walled garden.

Cratos guides us into dense woods, leaving the dirt farm paths and rolling hills behind. Anassa is still bristling, snarling as we slow to a walk.

We reach a clearing, and I slide down from Cratos’s back, turning to watch as Meryn dismounts. She stumbles toward me, then suddenly stops, eyes wide.

And lets out a ragged scream of frustration.

The sound tears through the woods, cracking the peace of this wild spot like the strike of a hammer. Birds rise from the trees around us and take flight, and Meryn’s shadow magic swirls and sparks after them, like an echo of their discontent.

Behind us, Anassa is just as worked up, hackles raised. She snaps at Cratos, who bites right back. The two of them circle each other and then bound off, working their aggression out their own way.

“Let it out,” I command, leveling Meryn with a look. I know there’s more there, raging. I know because I can feel it inside her, just barely caged.

The next sound that rips from her throat is a growl, almost animalistic. And then the shadows around her surge, shooting out in every direction.

Darkness rushes through the forest like a wave. All around us, tree trunks creak, a few crashing to the ground in a clamoring echo of Meryn’s pained cry.

The darkness flows right over and past me, but it whispers against my skin. A few tendrils linger as the rest of her magic expands and pulses. It murmurs in my ears, rifling through my hair, itching at my skin like anger embodied.

And still, it’s building in her, not fully released.

I’ve been trying so hard to be on good behavior.

I’ve stayed calm, controlled—for her. To help her, to be the quiet voice for her, the refuge in this storm.

But maybe that’s not what she needs.

Maybe she doesn’t need a steady, silent anchor she can moor herself around.

Maybe she needs to be met where she is, violence with violence. Maybe she needs someone who has the strength to ride the wave of her ferocity with her.

“Hit me,” I demand.

She steps toward me, neck craning to look up, eyes searching in their wildness. Her breath hitches, chest heaving. “What?”

I lower my face toward hers. Whatever she sees nearly makes her flinch.

My hand wraps around her throat, gentle but a warning all the same. I try not to stroke the tattoos I’ve marked so carefully into her delicate skin.

“I don’t like to repeat myself, princess. I am not a very patient man. Stop fucking bottling up your feelings. You need help to get them out? I’m going to tell you this one last time: Hit me. Hurt me. I can take it.”

In fact, I’m craving it. Her power on me, her fist on my face—the pain would be a great distraction from the torment of her presence.

She tilts her chin, always so fucking stubborn. “Or what, Alpha?”

I put my mouth to her ear so she can’t miss a single word, and she stills at the movement. “Or I’m going to take you over my knee and spank you like the obstinate brat you are.”

Meryn shoves me hard and draws back quickly, her lush pink lips popping open in surprise. It takes all of me not to stick a finger in her mouth and see how she’d react, if she’d close her wet heat around it or bite me viciously.

Several obvious emotions cross her face in quick succession: insult, outrage, and then wrath.

But her cheeks are flushed, eyes glazed with clear arousal.

Interesting.

Before I can provoke more from her with just words, she finally acts. Snarling, she flashes a hand in my direction, unleashing an impelling blast.

I dodge it, but the blow still hits my shoulder. My savagery rises to answer, my own power coiling like a predator inside me. I take a few steps back and lift my arms, giving her a moment to brace before my magic slams into her.

Her magic rises up to meet mine. The shadows from her shadebending power form a wall in front of her—acting on their own in response to her fury, I suspect. Our power collides, two waves of force impacting each other and crushing everything between them.

Her shadows explode outward, hissing up toward the treetops and streaking along the verdant forest floor.

Meryn’s lips curl into a menacing smile that lights me on fire. The shadows gather for another blow, and without hesitation, I lash out again and again.

The second blow is harder. The third, harder still.

Vibrations shake the trees around us, leaves and pine needles falling in a shower of green.

We circle each other, feet moving, stances ever changing. We attack from different angles, catching each other’s power and pushing back. The song we dance to is the pounding drum of our furious heartbeats, resounding in our ears.

The pulse is escalating, getting faster and faster with each clash until it’s a relentless onslaught of my magic slamming outward, hers meeting it blow for blow.

There’s a change in her face the moment before she pulls a dagger, darting toward me.

She winks in and out as she approaches, rifting like a Kryptos. I let go of my grip on my power and pull my own knife, waiting for her to step in close.

Meryn ducks under my last impelling wave and darts in. Her slash comes close to me, but I’m already spinning to the side. My body lights up with wicked satisfaction.

We both drop into fighting stances, just like in our hours upon hours of training in my office. Even as I relish the fight, some part of me catalogs her stance, her angles. Noting for later what she still needs to work on, how to guide her and make her better.

She slashes forward, and I bring my knife up against hers. Metal screeches on metal, glinting in the dappled forest light.

My body, my mind, is tuned to her. She’s so busy that she’s lowering her walls, and the mate bond connection from our wolves is seeping through. I sense her need for more, and I come at her with a flurry of blows.

She responds with a menacing grin. This beautiful, feral woman will either be the end of me or the start of a beginning that I don’t know how to face.

Our limbs meet, our daggers slash. I don’t hold back. She doesn’t want me to hold back. The sensation is electric.

We fight until we’re drenched in sweat and struggling through blows. I disarm her, dagger spinning from her hand, but in the same breath she draws another knife from her hip and strikes at me again.

I hiss as the blade skitters along my side, drawing a line of blood.

She hesitates, wondering if she’s hurt me. Taking advantage of it, I whip back toward her.

We exchange blow for blow, each of us landing one or two, dodging and blocking the rest.

Eventually, I have her on the back foot and get inside her guard. I disarm her again and press forward, aiming another blow. But I’m not anticipating her dirty tricks.

She hits me with an impelling blast from the back. It knocks me in the shins, and I stumble.

Meryn presses the advantage in half a breath, knocking me over and pinning me. Her hand presses into my throat, applying just enough pressure to declare victory. I swallow, her fingers on my neck. Her eyes follow the bobbing movement, then flick back up to mine.

Her body is pressed close, warm, her chest heaving as she pants. A bead of sweat rolls down her chin and falls to my chest. I want to lean up and lick the other beads from her skin.

Does she taste as sweet as she smells?

I stop straining against her hold, dropping my dagger. Then I wrest my hands from her grip and catch her waist, pulling her closer. Pulling her into me.

This is a dangerous fucking game I’m playing.

Meryn’s eyes lock onto mine, and electricity surges between us. “What was that yesterday, Stark?” Her voice is quiet but heated. “What happened between us, with my power?”

It takes all my strength to look away from her lips, moving so close to mine.

“I don’t know,” I admit.

Cratos didn’t know, either—the only thing we could agree on was that it existed separately from his and Anassa’s mate bond. It’s something that seems uniquely tailored to me and Meryn. And for the past twenty-four hours, I’ve been trying so hard not to fixate on it.

On the way it felt to be united in our minds and what it unleashed in both of us.

“Should we try it again?” she asks tentatively, and I nearly throw her off me.

I don’t know what I’ll do if that connection comes rushing back. If it once again surfaces my fascination with her, the pull I’ve tried so hard to bury since the moment I first saw her fight. When I saw the untamed fire in her eyes and hungered to free it. I wanted to revel in its burn, just lucky enough to be in its heat.

I ache for her, and I hate her for it.

I hate myself for not being good enough for her, for bringing out the worst in her.

I absolutely fucking loathe the Sovereign Alpha for issuing a demand that I need to stand against. For putting me in a position where doing my duty—protecting Meryn—means denying myself the thing I want the most.

And despite all this, I open my mouth, and what speaks is my yearning. “Yes.”

She’s calmer now, and yet she doesn’t need her anger to trigger it. She must sense where the tie between the two of us lives, because I can tell the moment she lets her walls back down.

That dark connection between us reforges. Her power rushes in, my mind opening to receive it.

To receive her.

It’s intoxicating.

I’m inside every inch of her, while still at a remove, watching her through my own eyes. I sense the way the heat of my hands on her waist is affecting her. Feel the hitch in her breath as she studies my mouth, then raises her eyes back up to mine.

Sensation, everywhere. Power, too. Our minds are twined together tight.

And I can no longer hide the desire coursing through me.

I watch as she realizes the depth of it. Her heart starts to pound for a different reason, nipples hardening.

I know the moment she starts getting wet for me.

Gritting my teeth, I resist.

The only way to protect her from Siegrid—and from me—is to resist this pull.

Fuck, why did I let myself give in to this? In to my need to touch her, to hear her moans and know I’m the cause?

She squirms against my hold, as overwhelmed as I am. Her ass drags across my crotch accidentally, and as I grow half hard, I sense her registering it. The blood rushes down to my cock, and she senses that, too.

With a dazed moan at the back of her throat, she rubs herself against me again—intentionally this time.

And again.

Her face flushes that pretty pink again. I can feel her hot breath as she pants, the heave of her chest. Her arousal and mine intermingle until they’re at a fever pitch.

Slowly, Meryn lowers her face to mine, then pauses. Holding back, not crossing the line. I can almost taste her desire, hot and wild.

Her mouth falls open.

Fuck it.

I’m done denying myself.

I surge up, flipping us over so she’s beneath me, and bring my mouth down to hers.

28

MERYN

Stark kisses like the world is ending and I can be his savior.

It’s worship edged with danger.

His mouth is rough on mine, needy. I can taste his desperation—or maybe it’s my own. I can’t even tell anymore.

I thought if this finally happened, I’d be sated, quenched. But the opposite is happening. The furious pounding of my heart doesn’t quiet. It gets louder, as if he’s just tossed fuel on a fire.

His tongue is in my mouth, and I just need more of it. More.

I pull him against me, mouth and chest and hips. His fingers dig into my skin, and I shiver.

Arching slightly, I bite his lip in a delirious plea. He lets out the same hiss of pain I heard earlier and bites me back hard enough to draw blood.

The iron taste slips over our tongues, oddly euphoric.

The final brittle layer of my anger and pain and shame breaks open, shattering into a million pieces, leaving behind only the burn of desire and want.

“I can’t feel it,” I pant, pulling away from Stark, knowing that I’m not making sense. My mind is so muddled between his and my own. I don’t know where he stops and I begin anymore.

He grinds himself against my core, so rigid that I gasp. “This? You can’t feel this?”

He does it again, and I throw my head back against the ground hard enough that it smarts, my entire body lit up with exquisite, torturous sensation.

“S-stop,” I stutter, and he comes to a halt on top of me, frozen.

Through our connection, I sense dismay ricocheting through him. Rejection. I reach up quickly, putting my hand on his stubbled cheek.

“I can’t untangle my own emotions right now,” I tell him quietly. “I want to feel you. Fully. As myself. I’m going to close the connection first. Is that… is that okay?”

I hear my voice through his ears, how it’s tinged with a bit of fear—my own wariness of rejection. Will he still want me without my own hunger inciting him?

“Do it,” he says, and then grinds against me again so I can feel how hard I make him, with or without the way our minds are intertwined. “Quickly.”

With a forceful mental push, I shove him out of my mind. Then I’m back entirely in my own body again.

Alone with my own aching, pulsing need.

And I need to ask him something. “Noemi. Is she… ?”

“Like my sister,” he says, voice gravely. “Nothing more.”

Thank the fucking goddess.

Stark leans back down, his face so close to mine. I catalog his appearance: his long, dark lashes framing eyes filled with a need mirroring my own. The rough stubble surrounding his full lips, lips that I’ve now tasted, lips that I crave on every part of my body.

“Tell me what you want, Meryn,” he growls.

The sound of his voice rumbles through my trembling body, breaking me and remaking me. My core clenches tightly.

Have I ever been asked that? Ever once in my life?

Tears spring to my eyes, and I look away from him, unable to deal with how much it means that someone cares.

Stark grabs my cheeks in his large, tattooed hands, forcing me to meet his demanding gaze. “Tell me.”

What do I want? Him, of course, but that’s not what he means.

In this one place in my life, I want to surrender. To be safe to do that without the risk of losing myself entirely. I want to give into passion without possession. To be wholly somebody’s without feeling like I’m only theirs.

“I want—I want you to be in control,” I tell him, working slowly through my own desires.

Stark makes a low hum of approval, his eyes growing hooded with dark satisfaction. “I’m more than happy to boss you around, princess.”

He leans closer, his breath hot on my ear. The sensation of him hovering over me is so delicious that it takes everything to not arch against him again.

“But surely you know you’re in control here,” he growls.

A mewling, frenzied sound rips out of me. “Say it again,” I beg, heat coursing through me.

“You are always in control, Meryn. Now spread your fucking legs.”

I do as he demands, going slick at the command. He recaptures my mouth with his.

The way he kisses me is wild. Unleashed and raw. He takes my bottom lip between his teeth and worries it there, sending sparks through my whole body.

One of his hands moves to my hair, twisting silver locks and pulling gently, firmly. Testing. Making sure this is what I want.

“More,” I tell him, and he pulls harder.

Fuck. I press myself into his chest, moaning into his mouth.

His other hand traces down my body until he finds my breasts, cupping them through my clothes. I whimper, and he reaches down to rip my shirt out of where it’s tucked into my pants. Then his calloused hand slides up my torso.

Stark yanks down my breast binding and rolls my nipple between his finger and thumb. I gasp, moaning.

“More,” I beg again, and he shoves my shirt all the way up, exposing my breasts to the cold air. Then he continues to play with one nipple while he sucks the other into his mouth, through his teeth. The combination of pain and pleasure pulls another moan out of me, louder this time.

He pulls back, gaze unyielding and heavy with need. “Strip,” he commands.

And yet, I know this is not like with Killian. If I wanted something else, Stark would accept it.

Fuck, it’s so hot.

I do as he tells me, tossing off my jacket and then pulling my shirt off over my head. The breast binding goes next. Then I wiggle out of my leather pants until all I’m left in are my briefs.

I hesitate, even with the ache at my center. Are we really doing this?

“Strip,” he says sternly, the uncompromising tone of his voice coiling deliciously in my gut. I do as he tells me.

And then I’m entirely bared to him, spread out on the forest floor like an offering.

I’m not even self-conscious about it. Everything in this moment is right.

He leans back to look at me, and my whole body flushes at the primal heat in his gaze.

Stark spends a moment just staring, and I can tell he’s cataloging it all. My heavy, heaving breasts. The patch of dark hair between my thighs, which are spread for him. The glistening wetness between them.

Then he moves toward me again, capturing my lips in a forceful, pleading kiss. I moan against his mouth as he draws closer, as the rigidity of his cock presses near my core.

“Use me.” My words come out whiny. I’m so keyed up that I’m nearly incoherent.

He laughs darkly, pulling away from me. “Isn’t that my line, princess? And I thought I was in charge here. Get on your hands and knees.”

A thrill sparks through me, and I do as he says, the dirt and grass biting into my knees. Anticipation builds as I wait to hear his pants come down, wait for him to slide into me.

Instead, I nearly jump when his warm hand strokes down my back. He pushes firmly, forcing my torso down to the grass. I press my face into the ground, stretch my arms over my head.

Whatever is happening here is literally filthy, and I’ve never been so turned on in my life.

Stark wraps his strong arms around my thighs, and I gasp as he yanks me backward… toward his waiting face.

Heat sears through me as his firm, hot tongue slides along the entirety of my slit.

“Stark,” I moan.

It starts slow, like he’s learning my taste. His stubble is beautifully rough against the apex of my thighs. As he strokes over me, his hands come up and grip my legs, pressing them wider, opening me up farther for him.

And then Stark reaches up and flicks my clit while plunging his tongue deep inside me.

“Oh fuck,” I almost scream.

He lets out an answering groan, the rumble of it against my core nearly bringing me to the edge. He starts to rhythmically strum at my most sensitive place with his long, expert fingers while plunging his tongue in and out of me.

I rock my hips back against his face. “Please, please,” I beg. He’s already giving me everything I could ever need, pushing me to an orgasm faster than I’ve ever felt. “I’m gonna—”

Stark pulls his face away from me quickly, and I nearly start to cry in frustration. “Why—?”

Grabbing my hips, he flips me onto my back, the scratch of the grass rough against my skin and only heightening my longing. His face is flushed as his dark gaze combs my body. His lips glisten with my need.

Then he growls, “I’ve dreamed of this moment for too long, princess. I need to watch your face when you come. Pull your knees up.”

Dazed, I do as he says, holding my knees tight to my shoulders, exposing myself entirely to him once more.

Stark’s long, rough fingers start to tease at my entrance. I cry out his name and can’t stop my hips from rocking to his touch.

“Please.”

He lifts his face to smirk at me wickedly and then, without warning, he sinks two big fingers deep inside, stroking and twisting. I almost levitate off the ground, overwhelmed with sensation and wanting more, more.

Stark’s mouth goes to my clit, and he sucks hard. He lets his teeth graze over me before giving quick, gentle strokes with his tongue, teasing me. Driving me wild as he fucks me with his fingers. I push into him mindlessly, and he reaches his other hand up to play with my nipples again.

I’m whimpering, begging. I’m not thinking about anything other than his hands and his tongue and the intense sensation lancing through me, pulling me apart.

“Stark,” I whimper. I reach down and fist my fingers in his hair as the cresting wave starts to take me.

“Stark. Stark. Stark.” His name, over and over, a prayer on my tongue.

Muscles start to tighten. I can’t stop. Can’t stop any of it. Don’t want to. My thighs burn, and my heart beats so hard that it jumps from my lips in a desperate little, “Please, please, please. Stark.”

We make eye contact as I come, pleasure cresting from deep inside of me and washing over my whole body. His tongue doesn’t let up, teasing and licking. The world splits into fractured light, sensation pulling me apart in a thousand little pieces and then putting me back together again.

I tighten around his thick fingers, trembling and shaking, my whole body pulsing with wave after wave of pleasure as it refuses to let go of me.

I think I black out for a moment at the intensity. When my senses return, Stark has me tight in his arms, his body wrapped around me where I lie on the forest floor.

Birdsong starts up again, and the wind rustles through the branches above us, making spots of sunlight dance on our skin.

I turn to look at Stark, still dazed. He’s watching me carefully, as if determining what I need and deciding what to do next.

I want to undress him, to do for him what he’s done for me, but he pushes my hands away when I try.

“Just lie back,” he says, his dominant Alpha voice coming back out. I give him a half smile as I fall lazily back against the leaves.

We lie there and watch the sun dapple the forest, Stark’s hand stroking through my hair and down my side.

Eventually, I sense that Anassa is returning. Stark and I stand, and I quickly pull my clothes back on. He’s gone quiet, contemplative.

Broody.

There’s a bit of an awkward distance between the two of us, and I can’t figure out what’s causing it. We don’t have time for a big conversation about feelings, though.

Astreona is waiting for their answer.

29

MERYN

Back at Weisenstat, the war tent is dimly lit by a brazier. The glowing illumination casts shadows over the canvas that flicker and tremble. But I’m steady as I stand above the war table and stare down at various maps of the border region.

They’re all marked with the current positions of both Nocturnan and Siphon forces, and none of it is good.

Siegrid doesn’t mince words. “The Astreonan offer seems like a trap. A ceasefire in exchange for the simple act of handing them our queen?”

Stark shifts beside me and leans his hand on the table, his eyes flicking over the maps. Kryptos Alpha Hannelore watches us quietly, her attention flitting from Siegrid to me and Stark and back again.

“I agree that it’s blatantly suspicious,” I admit, “but let’s acknowledge the reality here.” I punctuate the statement with a gesture to the bleak maps before us. “What alternative do we have?”

Siegrid’s face is stony. Hannelore nods, her brow tight.

I straighten and shake my head. “This ceasefire is necessary right now without Phylax to help hold off Astreona. They have the upper hand entirely. And if they decide to direct more forces here and take Weisenstat, all of Nocturna will suffer.”

“Final assessment?” Siegrid presses.

“We are outnumbered and outmaneuvered,” I explain, “especially with the Phylax defection. We could choose to go down fighting, and then what? There would be more Nocturnan deaths, and they will still enter our country. We want Killian’s head. So do they, apparently. Why let them achieve that at the cost of our people’s lives, when we have the possibility of doing it together?”

To my extreme surprise, Siegrid merely crosses her arms and says, “I agree.”

“You do?” I blurt out.

“I do,” she says. “I don’t see any other option. But we need to present our own terms. You are not stepping foot across the border without a high-level hostage from their end. We need someone important to them to be kept under our watch in order to guarantee your safety.”

It’s childish. I know it’s childish. She’s the right choice for political reasons, but my reasons are entirely personal. “Take General Navarro herself. We’ll only accept if she agrees.”

Siegrid nods. “Then tomorrow, we’ll let them know and you will travel to Astreona.” Her eyes dart to her son. “Stark will go with you. I can direct the Daemos forces in his stead with the help of his Beta.”

Stark says nothing, his face stuck in its typical, unreadable scowl. I can’t imagine that he’d stand by while I traipsed off into an enemy nation by myself, but… no reaction at all?

Pushing it out of my mind for now, I say, “My sister, too.”

Hannelore starts. “Surely the princess would be safer here.”

Siegrid gives me a heavy look—as one of the few people here who knows about Saela’s condition, she knows my sister cannot stay here without me.

“It’s fine,” the Sovereign Alpha says. A calculating shadow passes over her eyes, and she tilts her head as if listening to someone—likely counsel from Genicos. “Take Venna and Noemi with you as well. Venna is loyal and gifted; she will be useful. Noemi is, shall we say, more diplomatic than you are. She may be helpful in the Astreonan court.”

Another surprise from Siegrid, but I’m not about to argue.

I couldn’t leave Venna behind, not with Izabel’s death still so fresh. And while I still don’t know Noemi well, I can’t deny that she’s tactful and smooth, qualities that might help.

Although—is that why Stark is suddenly withdrawing from me? Because of her?

I reach out urgently to Anassa and ask, “What’s the deal with Stark and Noemi? Stark said she was like a sister to him, but now he’s gone all silent on me. Cratos must’ve told you something, right?”

I sense Anassa’s distaste before I hear it in her voice. “He has told me, yes.”

“Anassa,” I beg. “We promised to be honest with each other.”

Anassa huffs. “I am being honest with you, but there is a difference between honesty and gossip. Direwolves do not gossip. It is an idle, lazy human trait. If you are curious about their relationship, you are welcome to act like the queen you are and simply ask them.”

Fucking wolves. Shaking myself out of my petty jealousy, as Anassa would call it, I refocus on the conversation at hand.

“I suppose you’ll manage in my stead?” I ask Siegrid, my tone edgier than I mean it to be.

She nods. “With constant communication to you, my queen. I will not make any decisions without your direct instructions.”

That’s a relief, although part of me knows she’d gladly take the power for herself.

With everything decided, the Alphas all bow and head out. For a brief moment, Stark and I are left alone in the tent.

His dark gaze is heavy on me.

I’m trapped by it, unable to speak, unable to look away. My heartbeat accelerates, and I forget what I’m supposed to be doing, where I’m supposed to be going. Fuck, is this how it’s going to be every time he looks at me now?

And then he turns abruptly and walks away.

What is his deal?

Irritation sparks, coupled with an ache in my chest. Was it foolish, opening myself up to him like that? Leaning into the connection between us, embracing it? It felt like the right choice at the time, but now I’ve been left reeling.

I’m too exhausted to chase after him, though.

I return to the sleeping quarters, where Saela is already asleep. My stomach twists as I sit beside her. It’s unfair that I’m about to change her life yet again. She’s just as caught up in this mess as I am, only she has no one but me to help her through it.

I just hope I’m not fucking up.

Taking a deep breath, I gently rouse her. She looks up at me, bleary-eyed, and mumbles my name.

“I have some news,” I say.

The frantic movement riddled through the camp the next morning matches my insides. There’s a resting sense of wrongness.

It was my decision to go, but the reality of our impending journey to Astreona, a land that has for centuries been enemy territory, is difficult to confront.

I don’t let my second-guessing show on my face, though. Too many eyes are on me. News has clearly spread through camp.

“All right, Sae,” I tell my sister, and lace my fingers together. She knows the routine now and braces her foot in my hands. At the same time, she clings to Anassa’s fur and lets me launch her up onto my direwolf’s back.

Then I pat Anassa’s side and stare up at my sister. Her shoulders are hunched, and her hands are worrying at Anassa’s fur. Since I told her about our father being alive and the inevitability of meeting him, she hasn’t spoken much.

Or at all, really.

I tried to assure her that she didn’t owe him anything and that I would keep her safe. It’s hard to tell whether she really heard me when she hasn’t lifted her eyes any higher than her own boots since this morning.

Distraction didn’t even work. I tried to draw her into a conversation about the Goddess Tears. After what happened when I took her necklace off, I’m itchier than ever to find out more about them.

The Mother Priestess said she thought the Tears had been lost to the Siphons. So… does that mean we might finally find our answers in Astreona? Maybe the Astreonans will know more about the metal that makes up the now-broken Dire Blade, too.

Or even… my bracelet.

But even these normally thrilling mysteries did nothing for her.

Reaching up, I gently adjust a strap on Saela’s travel pack. “Are you okay?”

She shrugs and stares toward the horizon.

Everyone else assembles and mounts their direwolves—Venna and Noemi. Siegrid. Hannelore, who is coming along to the handoff as extra muscle. And, of course, Stark.

Who still won’t look in my direction.

Apparently, I am a very regrettable lay. The pain of rejection has subsided, and now his gorgeous, broody face provokes annoyance alone.

I’d be burning with humiliation if my sister weren’t trembling like a leaf in front of me.

An hour later, we meet the Siphon delegation outside the agreed-upon meeting point outside Grunfall’s ruins.

The Siphons are clustered around Ruby’s tall, graceful form. With dismay, I notice they’re on horses. Siphons can move at impossible speeds, though it stands to reason that they can’t run long distances and need some form of transportation.

But horses are so slow.

I’m already bristling with agitation as the midday sun warms my leathers, and I urge Anassa toward the Siphon half of our cute little abomination of a group.

“Whatever you do, don’t eat any of them,” I tell her aloud as we approach.

Anassa sends a current of annoyed amusement back my way.

Venna scoffs as she draws up beside us. “Are you reminding Anassa or yourself?”

I laugh. “Both of us, obviously.”

When we’re close enough, Ruby half-heartedly bows and cranes her neck to look up at me.

“Queen Sturmfrost, this is Elias.” She gestures to a Siphon man who steps out of the gaggle of Ruby’s attendants. He’s tall and bronze-skinned and has that recognizable Siphon beauty. His hair is dark and shiny, cut short to his neck and exposing the dangling flash of an earring in his left ear. “He will be your guide through Astreona.”

“Nice to meet you,” I say. I only barely manage to get the words out without stumbling over them because another figure emerges to stand before our wolves.

It’s my so-called father, and I’m mad all over again.

Saela instantly recognizes him. How could she not? She must see herself in him—in his hazel eyes, his dark hair, his strong nose. And she’s trembling slightly.

For a tense moment, no one says anything.

My father’s presence settles over us, suffocating and unwanted. He takes a hesitant half step closer as his eyes move over Saela.

I quickly rest my hand on her shoulder, and she leans into the touch slightly. Her fingers are deep in Anassa’s fur, scratching through it as if she’ll find what she’s looking for buried somewhere within.

“I’m…” He clenches his jaw, and his lips press together. He seems to be struggling with this, but thankfully he gets a hold of himself and attempts an approximation of a smile. “I’m Fredrich, your father.”

Saela makes a small sound, halfway between a confirmation and a squeak of confusion. Anassa and I both immediately bristle with protective instinct, and I squeeze my sister’s shoulder to tell her I’ve still got her.

“Hi,” she says. Then she ducks her head somewhat shyly and focuses on Anassa’s fur.

She’s overwhelmed right now. I tug her braid gently in affection, then turn my gaze against my father. He bows his head, backing away from us.

Ruby approaches. Her attention shifts between Saela and me. And then, with alarming directness, she says, “It’s interesting that you have a Siphon in your party.”

I do everything I can not to tense and turn back toward the Bonded. To keep my blood in my face where it belongs. But I quickly do a mental run of the bonds to make sure Hannelore didn’t hear that comment.

“Who is her sire? Who turned her?” Ruby asks.

Her interrogation catches me off guard. It confirms that Astreonans can somehow sense what Saela is despite her outwardly human appearance. My back starts to sweat.

I quickly weigh the risks of telling the truth—that my sister was sired by our common enemy—versus lying. What would be safer for Saela?

“She doesn’t remember being turned.” Truthful—kind of.

“Hmm. Well, that’s worth taking into consideration. Sire bonds can be strong. Lucien can aid you in managing it,” she replies. “There are ways to block it.”

“No need,” I tell her. “We have a necklace that seems to protect Saela from it.”

Confusion flashes across Ruby’s face, and then she says, “Make King Lucien aware of that as well.”

Then Ruby turns and strides over to my father. She lithely wraps her arms around his neck, and the two of them proceed to engage in one of the most vomit-inducing public displays of affection I’ve ever witnessed. Father looks like he’s trying to gag her with his tongue. Ruby runs her hands down his back and squeezes his ass.

In front of his daughters?!

Saela makes a choked sound and turns away.

I’m green by the time they finally break apart.

With final arrangements in place, Ruby departs with Hannelore and Siegrid toward the Nocturnan camp. She leaves Elias and his group—mostly attendants and guards, plus my father and their sluggish horses—to lead my party across the border into Astreona.

The Siphons mount up, and their equine companions startle slightly and begin to bray as our wolves draw closer. I can’t blame them. They’re prey animals, and direwolves are the strongest predators out there.

If it isn’t an indication of incompatibility, I don’t know what is.

The gravity of what we’re about to do settles back over me. The jittery wrongness from earlier spiders up my arms as I rub Saela’s back. This will be the first Nocturnan diplomatic party to enter Astreona in five centuries.

That matters in a way that makes it hard to breathe.

Venna and Noemi fan out behind me on their wolves. Stark rides next to me, his presence like a silent, spreading shadow. I tighten my arms around my little sister and nod to Elias.

We’re ready to begin our journey into the unknown.

30

MERYN

Horses are baffling. They’re slow and can’t talk and won’t stop shitting everywhere. In the middle of walking, they’re shitting. Why?

Anassa growls her agreement as she steps around another stinking pile. We’re both on edge, and our slow progress is making everything worse. Even when Elias urges the horses into a brisker pace, it’s nothing compared with how fast we’d move at a direwolf’s natural speed.

I’m uncomfortable enough as it is, but I also have to keep reining in Anassa’s urge to sprint ahead or to kill and eat a few of the horses just to punish them for not being wolves.

It’s a bit of a feedback loop in my head, my frustration triggering Anassa’s and back again. It doesn’t help that my senses keep screaming that we are surrounded by our enemies.

My hand itches to take my sword from its sheath and decapitate Elias. We can make our way south on our own.

Saela shifts in front of me, and I remember that I’m hoping to keep relations relatively civil. At least until we can hear out their king and uncover everything we can about her condition.

I take a few calming breaths. It does jack shit. I’m going to bounce out of my skin.

For the first several hours of our journey, the landscape remains bleak and desolate as we travel over the wasteland separating our two kingdoms. My brain is constantly telling me I need to be ready for Siphon ambushes even though we’re literally riding with a few of them up ahead.

But we meet no resistance, even as we delve deeper into Astreona. Mostly because there’s nothing left to resist us, really.

Centuries of warfare have scarred the land here. There are only dried-up, ghostly trees twisting from the barren land and the burned-out husks of buildings every so often.

It matches everything I’ve been taught about this nation. An empty, inhospitable realm of death and darkness where Siphons lurk. No wonder they’re desperate to escape this place and take what we have.

It’s strange, actually being here. I spent months hoping to cross the border into Astreona while I was in the Trials, and now that it’s happened, nothing about the journey is unfolding the way I would have expected. Disorienting unreality settles over me.

The traveling atmosphere remains tense. No one speaks.

Eventually, we reach a small circle of ruined buildings. They look like little cottages. Cradled in the semicircle of their remains lies a small pond.

Elias reins in his horse. The creature’s tail flicks toward Anassa’s nose, who bares her teeth and rumbles. Elias glances at her, then at me.

“The horses need water. Do your wolves require the same?”

“I’d rather eat the horse and save us the time,” Anassa grumbles.

I snort, which clearly perplexes Elias, but I’m not interested in catering to his confusion. “Tell us when we’re moving again,” I say, and guide Anassa away from him.

We end up squaring off across the small, muddy oasis Elias found. Venna watches the Siphons like a hunter.

Stark lingers close to me, still silent, still avoiding my gaze. I’ve tried prodding at him mentally a few times, but he’s erected a wall against me, the prick.

He’s lucky we’re surrounded by company, because the moment we’re alone, I’m going to throttle him.

I catch my father glancing toward us as he strokes his horse’s nose, but he looks away quickly.

When we get back on the move, I start to worry about an entirely new threat: dying from boredom.

Then Anassa’s nose twitches.

“What is it?” I ask.

She pauses and bows her head, sniffing. I lean forward on her back, bending around Saela to see what Anassa is investigating. It’s… a tiny green sprout. A tuft of grass is struggling up through a fissure between two craggy stones.

That’s how it starts.

Soon, it’s all around me. The air becomes clean, fresh. Coolness gives way to a gentle press of warmth on my skin.

Heat. I’ve never felt anything like it before.

It builds as the clouds part, making way for the sun, and I start to sweat in my leathers.

The ground becomes greener. It’s only patches of grass at first. Then bushes. Saplings. Life reaches up out of the ruins and toward the increasingly hot sunlight.

We pass another ruin, but this one is covered in vines, a tree growing right up through the collapsed roof. Nature is suddenly everywhere, the smell of life hanging in the moist air. My lips part in wonder as a stream glints on the horizon, and Elias acts like it’s nothing as he guides his horse to slosh through the shallow, sparkling waters.

We crest an incline, and a hot breeze rushes up from below. My silver hair spins into my eyes as the valley below us emerges.

There are rolling green hills and lush vegetation as far as the eye can see. Continuing down the winding dirt road, it becomes clear that it isn’t all wilderness. The fields are cultivated, with distinct rows of crops and plateaus leveled out in some sort of irrigation system.

In the distance are small settlements. Towns. People, probably, living off all this greenness, tending to the land, breathing in all this nature.

This isn’t Astreona. It isn’t. It can’t be. It’s meant to be a wasteland. Desolate. Hideous. Inhospitable to humans.

Kryptos spies have infiltrated this country, pushed far past our border to collect vital intelligence. They’ve never reported anything like this.

But I’m seeing it with my own eyes: This place yawns wide with welcoming potential. The land is vast and verdant. It’s a damn pastoral dreamscape. Prosperous and beautiful.

I’m not the only one disoriented. Stark’s jaw is clenched hard, his eyes moving over the scenery. Saela keeps letting out little gasps as she takes in new sights. Noemi is literally slack-jawed.

Venna is the only one not staring around at the landscape, marveling. I urge Anassa forward until we’re riding beside her and Skaia.

“Not impressed?”

She turns to look at me, cocking an eyebrow. “Say again?”

“Not impressed?” I switch to mental communication, kicking myself for forgetting that this is easier for her when possible.

Venna looks surprised. “Impressed? By the barren wasteland populated by our enemies? Or do you mean by the scorching sun?”

What?

“But the… the greenery… don’t you…” Something is wrong, and I can see when Venna realizes it, too. A whisper of sweetness hits my nose.

These fuckers are using their magic.

Ahead of us, two of Elias’s Siphon attendants whisper back and forth. One of them cackles, the sound of his laughter grating on my nerves.

I still my expression and ride forward with Saela until we’re among the Siphons.

“Whatever you’re doing, stop it immediately.” I don’t have time for games, and I don’t think whatever is happening is funny.

One whom I’ve heard called Davide looks back at Venna’s confused face, and his lips twitch in a sneer.

“We thought you might like a little, ah, demonstration.” He gestures around us. “That girl is one of your little spies, isn’t that right?”

“If he doesn’t cut this condescending bullshit, this is going to be the shortest diplomatic mission ever attempted,” I say to Anassa. I don’t deign his words with an answer aloud, just raise my eyebrows.

He sighs. “Forgive us our little joke. It’s just that Hanlen here,” he indicates one of Elias’s other attendants, “is in the habit of showing a certain side of our land to your spies who think they’re hiding from us. Fooling their wolves is a particularly interesting challenge, since our powers only extend to visuals and not smells.”

Hanlen nods, and then his expression goes focused.

Behind me, Venna shouts and stabs at nothing with a dagger. She and Skaia whirl around as if fending off invisible enemies.

Now the entire party of Siphons is laughing.

“Illusion magic,” Anassa reminds me grimly. “It must be how they’ve kept this verdant land a secret from Nocturnans all this time.”

I turn toward Hanlen in rage, but Cratos is one step ahead of me.

He and Stark swoop in toward the Siphons and their horses. The next thing I know, Hanlen is on the ground. His horse gallops away from our group in terror, mouth frothing.

Hanlen’s right shoulder spurts blood where his arm used to be. He bellows in pain, convulsing.

Cratos tosses the mangled arm into the sky before devouring it in a single, sickening swallow.

Faster than my eyes can track, the rest of the Siphon party has dismounted, weapons drawn. Stark gives a shout as one charges toward him and Noemi, and Noemi sends a blast of Phylax shielding magic up in front of them.

The Siphon rebounds off the invisible barrier, then whirls around, looking for a way through.

Venna and Skaia have shaken off their confusion fast, coming to stand guard in front of me and Anassa.

Anassa’s ears are back, and she’s poised to run, should we need to protect my sister.

Skaia snarls at the handful of Siphons who stare us down.

I wrap my arms firmly around Saela, taking in the Siphons’ locations. Wondering how best to keep her safe in this mess. The shadows stir, and I reach for them, their slithering darkness coming to wrap around my arms.

“Peace!” my father shouts. He moves forward toward me and Venna, arms outstretched. “This is a truce, remember?”

The air is tight with tension as each of us looks to the other side to see who will move first.

Then Elias remounts, pointedly sheathing his sword. His authority curbs the Siphons, and they fall back, weapons returning to scabbards, though none of them looks happy about it.

My father kneels, tending to Hanlen, who moans in pain on the ground.

“Stop whining, we all know that a missing limb won’t kill you,” Venna snaps.

The one called Davide seethes next to Hanlen, staring at Stark and Cratos with obvious loathing.

“Consider it a demonstration,” I suggest, voice dripping with acid. “Of how we like to deal with spies in Nocturna. And Elias?” He meets my gaze. “If Hanlen wants to keep his other three limbs, you better instruct him and the rest of the bloodsuckers to keep their magic to themselves for the rest of our journey.”

Elias looks at me blankly, face eerily expressionless, eyes calculating. Then he gives me a toothy grin, fangs on full display.

“It shall be so, Your Highness,” he says.

We rest in two separate groups, pointedly keeping our distance while the Siphons finish tending to Hanlen’s wound.

Cratos licks his chops whenever he sees a Siphon looking our way. I can’t blame him, but it’s not exactly letting tempers settle.

“He cannot help himself,” Anassa says affectionately. “Tearing apart Siphons is what he was made to do.”

Not the most auspicious start to our journey.

The sun drifts lower in the sky, turning fat and honey-golden on the horizon. The late-afternoon light paints the valley in muted tones and soft shadows. The beautiful scenery is a stark contrast to the simmering anger among our divided party.

Finally, we all mount back up, settling into an uneasy truce. We travel in stony silence.

Elias guides us down into the valley. He informs me that we’ll rest for the night at a military outpost—a way station specifically designed for military travelers, with accommodations for horses.

“We’ll avoid entering the nearby town directly because the appearance of direwolves would likely frighten the residents. Our goal on this entire journey is for them not to be spotted, if possible,” Elias tells me. His eyes catch mine, and he adds, “There are many tales in Astreona of the savagery of your beasts.”

I bristle at his phrasing but cut off my retort. Diplomacy.

Once word gets around about what happened to Hanlen, there’ll be one more story circulating.

I can’t bring myself to feel any regret.

The outpost is small. There’s a large wooden building that looks like it’s meant for storage; a long, open-air stable; a cluster of drafty-looking stone structures; and a covered well in the center of it all. The place is mostly empty, likely populated only by the people required to keep it operational.

Upon our arrival, a few stable hands nervously shuffle up to accept the horses, glancing fearfully at our wolves before fleeing. A few others wander around the open complex, looking like they’re on their way to get jobs done. There’s the distinct, stinging scent of a blacksmith as well as cooking meat.

I keep my eyes on Elias as I help unload the wolves’ supplies and establish our camp. He speaks hastily with a few of his attendants, who rush off to complete mysterious tasks. After I have Anassa free from our travel bags, I glance back at Elias and see that one of the people he sent off is returning with a pair of fresh horses.

My curiosity flares.

I approach him with my arms crossed over my chest. “Going somewhere?”

“Davide and I will be going into town to procure additional food and supplies,” Elias answers.

“What Siphon tricks are they playing at now?” I ask Anassa.

She gives me the mental equivalent of a shrug.

“I’m sure you can understand why trust is thin among my party at present,” I tell him. “So I’d like to accompany you.” My tone makes it clear it’s not really a request.

“Not alone, you won’t,” Stark growls. His presence is at my back, and I turn to frown at him.

So it turns out he can speak. Eating my pussy didn’t make his tongue nonfunctional after all.

But he just gives me a look that says, If you think I’m letting you wander through a nest of Siphons without protection, you’re dangerously removed from reality.

Elias bows his head again and says, “You are welcome to join us.” His eyes wander briefly over my shoulder, catching on Anassa and the other wolves. “But the wolves will have to stay.”

“Fuck that,” I say furiously to Anassa.

“I agree,” she replies. “I would prefer to come with you. But I also understand that might not be possible if you are to visit a Siphon town relatively unnoticed.”

I nod. I’ll do it. But I don’t like it.

Davide steps forward, smoothing his elegant hand along his horse’s flank as he joins us. His eyes are pale, his stare intense. “I will send for additional mounts.”

My sister elects to stay at the outpost with Venna, Noemi, and… our father. I’m torn about whether it’s safer for her to stay with them or come with me and Stark.

“I will keep watch over her,” Anassa assures me.

Turns out, there aren’t many horses available beyond the exhausted ones the Siphons rode here. They manage to find only one additional mount for us.

I end up having to share a saddle with Stark.

He wordlessly offers me a hand after mounting, and I let go as quickly as I can after settling onto the horse’s back. His hands rest briefly at my hips before releasing me to hold the reins.

Even that momentary touch sends heat spiraling through my body.

How fucking annoying.

Despite the tension and drama of the day we’ve had—which should have me on high alert—I struggle to focus on our journey into town. My body keeps registering the press of Stark behind me, his arms on either side of me.

I’ve been doing my best not to overanalyze what happened between us, particularly in the wake of his sulky silent treatment. If he’s going to ignore what happened, then fine, two can play that game.

But the contact between our bodies keeps resurfacing memories. My hips repeatedly press into his, ratcheting up my body temperature.

His lips. His hands. His mouth, for fuck’s sake.

I keep my gaze frozen ahead of me, not wanting to show any weakness to Elias and Davide.

Weakness like the sparks that shoot through me every time the horse’s movement jolts us, thrusting Stark’s body against my own.

It doesn’t help that every time I bounce backward, I can tell I’m having the same effect on him.

So much for protecting me from dangers in the Siphon town ahead. I’m not sure I’ll survive another five minutes without kissing or killing the man behind me.

31

STARK

I’m surrounded by enemies I can’t kill, riding a silent creature vastly inferior to Cratos, and yet the woman seated in front of me is going to be the reason I go insane.

Right now, I should be carefully noting the landscape we ride through. Every moment I spend in Astreona is a chance for intelligence gathering that could make or break our position in this war.

Instead, I’m fighting the urge to deliberately hold Meryn tighter to me. To press her shapely ass against my stiffening cock through the thin fabric of her trousers each time the horse jostles us up and down.

This is the last thing I fucking need—Meryn in close proximity, pushing me closer and closer to a perilous edge I’m trying to avoid.

Yesterday was a mistake, plain and simple. That mental connection took us both to a frenzied place, feeding off each other’s sensations and riling each other up. We were out of our right minds.

Once it was over, all I felt was regret.

Regret that I might have pushed her into something too fast, too soon.

That she might not be able to trust me after.

That I let my control slip and endangered her, moving her closer to the snare of whatever Siegrid is planning.

That I now know the sweet, tangy taste of her slick heat, and I know I can’t ever have it again.

To protect Meryn, I need to stay far the fuck away.

Her ass bounces back against my dick again just then, as if to mock my resolve. Desire rips through me, and I knock my head back, suppressing a groan.

Is this why people like horses so much?

“What did you say?” Cratos pipes in from back at the outpost. His feral curiosity floods me. “Are we eating the horses?”

“There is no ‘we’ in eating horses, and please leave them alone,” I grind out. “A Siphon arm is enough forbidden meat for one day. Stop fantasizing about snacks, and keep your eyes on Saela.”

Cratos grumbles as he cuts off our connection.

We make our way out of the fields. The dirt road turns to gravel and then paving stones as we enter the village.

The town is nestled on the slope of a green hill, with narrow cobblestone roads winding throughout. Smoke lazily drifts out of chimneys. Houses are sturdy and well maintained. Everything here is bizarrely fucking idyllic.

There are overflowing garden plots between the houses. Even in the Bonded City, you didn’t see stuff like this; our climate is too inhospitable for it. Here, it seems the citizens just grow whatever they want.

The contrast between this place and the towns in Nocturna is startling.

The people we see on the streets look different from commoners in Sturmfrost, and it takes me a minute to realize the difference: They look well fed.

I thought Astreona was supposed to be the shithole, not the other way around.

Still, my teeth remain on edge, muscles tensed and ready for movement.

Meryn looks around her, noticing much the same. “Davide,” she calls out quietly, and he reins in his horse until he’s beside us.

I want to punch the self-satisfied smirk off his face. It’s clear he sees the effect this well-kept town is having on us.

The man turns, eyebrows raised. “Yes?”

“Who lives in this town? Siphons or humans?”

He shakes his head. “Like everywhere in Astreona, the population is mixed. But this particular town is predominantly human.”

Meryn stiffens in my arms, and shock rumbles through me. We heard from her father that humans and Siphons live together in Astreona—a total mindfuck after forever believing that they’d all been wiped out here.

But the population is mixed? They live among each other? They’re less segregated than Nocturna.

Or…

My mouth twists in distaste. Or the Siphons just like to keep their meals close, like well-kept cattle. Until it’s time for slaughter.

The same thoughts are clearly running through Meryn’s head. “So the humans here are at the Siphons’ mercy?”

The people we see walking around the streets seem remarkably calm, given that their predators live among them. A man who looks human and a woman with obvious Siphon beauty cross the street ahead of us. The Siphon bows her head to listen to something the human is saying.

Almost as if they were… friends.

Davide’s tone is bored, but his words remain polite. “Not exactly. While all Siphons drink animal blood as basic sustenance, human blood is superior and preferred. But we’ve found solutions that work for all parties. You’ll see. Just ahead…”

After a few moments, our horses round a bend and break into a wider thoroughfare that climbs up the slope of a hill.

Davide lifts his hand and points toward a large building structured almost like a temple, with tall windows and a large arch dominating its facade. Hanging from the crest of the arch is a bright red lantern that paints a long stretch of the street in its color.

“That is an establishment where humans can voluntarily sell their blood and are compensated generously for their service.”

My hackles rise. So this is the thin veneer of civility they’ve painted on top of the brutal truth. They have these humans whoring themselves out as blood bags.

And what’s to keep the Siphons from taking what they want any time? These complacent-looking humans would be sitting ducks.

Davide has the nerve to look entertained by my distaste. “Blood is also available for purchase in most markets,” he notes, “although fresh is always best.”

Something’s been bothering me. “What of unwilling Nocturnans? Like children? We know their blood is powerful for you, considered valuable.”

Elias has slowed to listen to our conversation, and he scowls. “Drinking from a child is a crime, both legal and moral.”

Meryn and I exchange looks. We know the Nabbers in Sturmfrost were working at the behest of the king, but still…

“Stark and I were part of an operation into Astreona a few months ago. There was an old temple at the border. It was mostly abandoned when we arrived, but it was clear children had been kept there.”

A line forms at Elias’s brow. “A temple… Oh! Yes, we rescue Nocturnan orphans.”

Meryn’s face flushes, and my hand tightens around the dagger at my hip.

“Excuse me?” she says, voice low and tense. “You what?”

Davide crosses his arms. “Just as he said. Look around you. You know what your own country is like. When we find Nocturnan orphans at the front, we rehome them with families in Astreona. It is better for them.”

Rage washes through me. The fucking gall.

Meryn, to her credit, doesn’t immediately stab them. Her mouth flattens into a thin line. “Right. Your king and I will be discussing that, then. My citizens belong to my country.”

“Every word of this could be a lie,” I caution Meryn.

“Obviously,” she says, her response testy. I wonder if she’s filled with regret about what happened between us, too. “But it’s still helpful to understand the lies they wish to tell.”

Meryn’s very familiar with lying Siphons, of course. I don’t need to remind her to be distrustful.

“How do Siphons control themselves?” she asks. “I mean, specifically, keep from turning all the human donors into Siphons as well.”

He laughs. “You make it sound…” Davide’s amused smile fades. “Ah. Apologies. You truly know very little.”

“I know some,” Meryn says. Her voice stays light, but her body tenses, violence only just suppressed. “But I’d wager that neither of us knows much about the other’s culture. So perhaps you could keep your opinions on my knowledge to yourself.”

Davide is silent, and Elias breaks in smoothly. “Please accept my apologies on behalf of Davide, Your Highness. We will endeavor to answer your questions without further comment.”

Or what, I wonder? How would Davide be punished for souring the negotiations between Meryn and their king before they start?

I entertain myself by imagining several lethal options.

Davide looks as if he’s smelled something rotten, but he answers the question regardless. “Transforming humans into Siphons is actually quite rare and strictly regulated. There would be no logic in converting our primary food source, and maintaining proper population balance is considered essential to Astreonan stability.”

Meryn scoffs. “Big words from an army that transforms our Nocturnan soldiers into bloodsuckers at whim.” I know she’s picturing her father’s face and remembering the stories I’ve told her of our own soldiers turning against us at the front, ripping apart my comrades with their teeth.

“We sometimes transform grievously wounded Nocturnan soldiers like your father, but otherwise, becoming a Siphon requires formal application and approval through established protocols. And field transformations are evaluated and documented for population records. Of course, accidents do happen, especially in the heat of battle,” Davide says stiffly.

Meryn and I are quiet as we both take that in.

Everything we’ve ever been taught about Astreona was deliberate misinformation carefully constructed and maintained by generations of Nocturnan rulers. Rulers who were actually Siphons themselves, all controlled by Alistair.

And all with the aim of rallying Nocturnans against Astreona.

There’s so much we don’t know. How can we possibly stay on even ground in any negotiations between our kingdoms?

While my thoughts churn, we reach the market Davide was speaking of, and each of us dismounts their horse. Elias hands a coin to a young boy waiting at the entrance to the square, and he leads our horses away.

“Feel free to wander, Your Highness,” Elias says smoothly. “Our streets are safe for you, though I recommend you stay close so as not to get lost. We’ll meet you back here in a short while.”

“Should we be worried that they’re going off alone?” I ask Meryn.

“No, fuck them. I want to explore.”

Elias and Davide step into the market, headed for an awning marked in red. As they begin to haggle, their words blending with the sounds of other market-goers, I turn to Meryn—only to see her stalk off down a side lane.

Maddening woman. What now?

With several long strides, I nearly catch up to her. She turns down another alley and is briefly out of my sight.

When I round the corner, I’m not ready for her attack.

Meryn pushes me roughly into the building wall behind me. There’s a quick flash of silver, and then cold steel presses into my throat.

She’s drawn a dagger on me.

I stare down at her, holding myself still. Letting her hold the blade to me. For now.

Heat lashes in my veins. It turns me on way more than it should—the kiss of the steel on my neck, brandished by a woman I’ve tasted.

“What the fuck is your problem?” she hisses.

I raise an eyebrow. “Right now, my problem is that the person I’m supposed to protect is holding a knife to my throat,” I say coolly.

She scowls. “You know that’s not what I mean.” Meryn forcefully shoves her other hand into my chest, holding me tight against the brick wall.

It’s the only point of contact between our bodies, but the heat of her is just inches from me.

Blood rushes to my cock, making my pants tight. I can’t shift to adjust the pressure, not without Meryn’s knife cutting into my skin.

Fuck, I wish I didn’t respond to her this way.

“You’re really going to do this?” she asks scornfully. “Just pretend that what happened between us in the woods never occurred?” Her anger brings a flush to her face.

I try to suppress the memories, but her words bring them right back. Her legs parting for me. The taste of her on my lips, wet and wanting. The way she squirmed when I worked her with my mouth, teased her with tongue and teeth.

The way she begged me to order her around and the way I loved it.

The compliant woman from the forest has been replaced by someone ferocious, and I’m just as hard for it. Still, I say tautly, “It’s for the best. We should both pretend it never happened, my queen.”

Meryn growls in anger. “I’ve had a lot of unkind thoughts about you over the past six months, Stark Therion. But I never took you for a coward!”

The pain in her voice lances through me. She’s right, of course.

I’m being a coward, and that’s not like me. But her presence does something to my fucking head that makes me not think straight.

With a quick hand, I knock her dagger away from my throat. Then I spin her around, reversing our positions as I slam her into the brick wall. My hands go to her wrists, pinning them above her head.

For a long breath, I let myself lean into her. My cock is hard as a rock, the friction and warmth delicious as I press into her lower belly. Her answering moan is small and desperate.

“You’re right.” My voice is low and gravelly. “I should’ve told you right away that it was a mistake. I wish I could pretend it didn’t happen, princess. Don’t you see how you’re torturing me?”

I thrust my hips against her, and she moans again.

“The thought of you, bare for me in the woods, doing everything I told you to like such a fucking good girl? It’s driving me insane.”

I let go of one wrist and grab her chin, angling her eyes up toward mine. Her mouth parts, her gaze slightly glassy.

“You’ve been an unhealthy fixation from the moment I laid eyes on you,” I continue, voice low. “And now I’ve tasted you and discovered my favorite flavor. You haunt me. You consume me. And it’s sheer agony, because whatever that was, it cannot happen again.”

Her face darkens, and she tries to yank her wrist out of my grip. I don’t let her go. We can’t leave here until she understands.

When she looks back to me, she’s pleading. “Why not, Stark? If that’s how you feel, why not? I really do not have the space for getting my head fucked around by another man. And if it was not absolutely clear, I want you. I’ve been fighting it, worried it was our wolves’ mate bond, but I’m done lying to myself. So speak.”

I open my mouth to tell her about Siegrid—how the Sovereign Alpha wants us to get married so that she can proxy-rule the throne. Suddenly, though, it sounds so stupid. Meryn would never let anyone tell her what to fucking do.

Who gives a shit what Siegrid wants?

And it surfaces the true reason I’ve been fighting against this pull.

“I’m wrong for you,” I tell her bluntly. I let go of her wrists, stepping back a few inches. “Meryn, you… you could be the greatest queen that Nocturna has ever seen. You need to be with someone who nurtures the best parts of you. Not someone who pulls you down into the dark and relishes every moment.”

She opens her mouth to argue, so I hold up a hand.

“No. I’m serious. Think of the ruler you want to be. Think about who will be ruling by your side. Do you think the common people or the nobles would ever accept me? A depraved butcher whose name is whispered in fear? A person who sees you grappling with your power and urges you to seize it, fuck the consequences?”

I watch the emotions play across her face, like clouds across a sky, and charge on.

“You need to be with an equal. Not someone who’s thought of as a monster. It’s better that we stop this now while we still can. Because I can tell, Meryn—I know what it’s like to be ruined. And kissing you tastes like leaping toward destruction. If we keep this going, neither of us will survive the consequences.”

Meryn turns her face away from me then, and I ache at the loss of her heated gaze. Her jaw twitches, and there’s a sheen where tears form in her eyes.

It’s as if a direwolf were tearing out my still-beating heart.

I hate to be the person making her cry when every part of me screams that I’m meant to guard her, mop up her tears. But this is the only way to protect her in the long run.

To protect us both.

Because she will live to regret me, and I don’t know that I’d ever be able to let her go.

She turns back toward me and catches my eye again, tears bright and shining.

“It destroys me that you don’t know your own worth, Stark,” she snarls. “I wish I could go back in time and cut off the hands of every single person who ever hurt you. Everyone who made you believe that you had only one purpose, one kind of value. You are a million times more than what you’ve been told.”

Meryn draws a shaky breath, and I realize I’ve been holding mine, transfixed by her words.

“Besides, if you’re a monster, what am I? If you’re depraved, I am, too, you fucking asshole. You don’t get to claim my worst actions as yours. I make my own choices. And this thing between us?”

She steps in close, reaching her hands up to cup my face. And with her touch comes connection—she opens herself mentally, and it’s faster than ever this time, sliding into that place in our minds.

Our two heartbeats are one, stoking urgency and passion and some other emotion that hurts to look at closely, like the blinding light of the sun.

“What is this, Stark?” comes her voice in my head, her eyes alight with sorrow and wonder. “This isn’t just the mate bond between our wolves, and you know it. You alone are capable of joining with me like this and sharing my power. What are you if not my equal?”

Meryn’s breath is my breath, and I’m drowning in her, pulled under into a sea that I can’t name.

And then we’re interrupted by a harsh shriek.

Meryn startles. It’s a woman in danger—we both know it instinctively.

Our minds separate, and we snap back into ourselves as we both wordlessly take off toward the noise.

We tear down the alley, and as we round the corner, both of us already have blades drawn.

The source of the scream is obvious.

A blonde woman lies prostrate across a set of stone steps in front of a home. Two Siphons are above her, both with fangs out—one pale-skinned and reedy, the other thicker with a malevolent smile. The door to the home hangs open, and I catch a glimpse of scared eyes as a little boy peeks out and then backs away.

The pale one is inches from ripping into the woman’s flesh when Meryn’s voice rings loud and imperious. “Stop! What are you doing?!”

He looks up at us, and Meryn blanches at the look of cold indifference on his face.

“We’re collecting rent from our tenant.” He shakes his head as if annoyed by the interruption. “She’s late on her payment, so we’re taking our arrears.”

His thick friend looks on lazily as the reedy Siphon leans back in for a bite. The woman is sobbing, quaking in fear. Everything about this is wrong.

“Like fuck you are!” My daggers move before my mouth finishes the words.

And I liberate the pale Siphon’s head from his shoulders. It hits the paving stones and bounces once before rolling into the gutter.

The woman screams again as she is drenched in blood—a long, high wail.

The thick Siphon looks at me and Meryn in offended shock. “Who the fuck do you think you are?”

At lightning speed, he grabs Meryn, hands wrapping around her skull in clear warning. Poised to snap her neck if I make the slightest move.

I freeze, assessing what to do next that won’t trigger his violence.

Just then, Elias and Davide race down the alley toward us from the other direction. “Unhand her at once,” Davide snaps.

The Siphons stand off, all three with fangs bared.

“Consider this an order from your king,” Elias says coldly. He reaches into his tunic pocket and pulls out a golden brooch, a sun with wavy rays.

Nobody moves for a tense moment. Then the Siphon man reluctantly steps backward, relinquishing his grip on Meryn and pushing her away. Clearly, the brooch must mean something—the symbol of Lucien Brightbane, perhaps.

“Our friends are new in town,” Davide interjects, conciliatory. He hands over two of the bags in his arm to the disgruntled Siphon. “They don’t know any better. Please take this with our apologies for your inconvenience.”

Elias grabs Meryn’s arm and drags her away from the scene as I follow. “Unbelievable,” he mutters under his breath. “Killing a civilian the minute I let you two out of my sight.”

He finally lets her go once we’re several streets away.

“What the fuck, Elias,” Meryn grates out.

Elias and Davide exchange a look.

“Here in Astreona, if humans can’t make payment owed by coin, Siphons are well within their rights to take blood payment instead. That landlord wasn’t breaking any law.” Elias’s face is impassive as he explains this barbarism.

I clench my fists. So much for this country being better than Nocturna.

Meryn is shaking in anger. “So you’re saying we just left that woman with a Siphon who’s going to feed on her without her consent! And it’s allowed.”

Elias crosses his arms. “It’s a payment. What’s not allowed is enacting your own sense of justice without any regard to the laws of the country you’re visiting. Moreover, someone is dead, and that human woman you thought you were helping will be held responsible for it.”

Meryn’s face reddens. “What does that mean?”

When no response comes, she stalks away in anger.

We all remount our horses in silence. Meryn sits as far forward in the saddle as she possibly can and manages to avoid touching me the entire way back.

By the time we get to the stables, wrath radiates off her. It’s a surprise she hasn’t summoned her shadows. I slide off the horse first and offer her a hand, but she swats it, getting down on her own.

She turns to walk away, but then stops and advances on me, her face an unreadable mask.

“You are a broken man,” she says tersely, speaking nothing but the truth. “The shattered pieces of me recognize the shattered pieces of you, and that’s why I am telling you: I will give you time.”

I want to tell her no again. But she’s worn my control so thin, and maybe she sees that on my face, because she presses onward.

“I will give you time, but it won’t be forever. So think about what I said. Take the leap, Stark. Maybe it will end in destruction. Or maybe it will end in two wrecked people finding a way to build something new in the rubble.”

She stalks off, leaving me in the horse-shit-reeking, hay-strewn stable. The mare we rode whinnies at me.

“On her side?”

It says nothing, of course. Useless beast.

Could Meryn be right? If every part of me screams to close the distance between us once again, would it really be so wrong to give in?

32

MERYN

Days pass. We share meals. We stop for water and supplies. We turn in for night after night on uncomfortable cots. The weather gets warmer the farther south we go, and eventually Elias has to venture into the city of Dawnspire to get lighter clothing for all of us. It’s a welcome relief, and yet still not enough.

I’ve never experienced heat like this before, and the way my body is responding is just… rude.

Sweat. Constantly. Without any exertion involved.

Throughout it all, I keep my wrist covered, even in the lighter clothing. I don’t need the Siphons to know about the engagement bracelet—at least not yet. Maybe I can get answers for its removal here. But I want that conversation to be on my terms.

Every once in a while, though, I swear it tightens. And my brain turns unwillingly to Killian. In my daily check-ins with Siegrid, she tells me that we’ve heard nothing from him since the Phylax defection, and I’m on constant edge.

The landscape throughout our journey continues to transform around us, becoming increasingly arid. The lushness gives way, replaced by long stretches of dusty path and withered bushes. The flora changes, too, growing more vibrant—sharp-petalled and burst in shades of reds, oranges, and yellows like resilient flames.

The small towns we pass through are increasingly elaborate and ornamental in their architecture. The building material changes, shifting to red clays, bricks, and tiled roofs.

Stark and I avoid each other entirely, except for when we sleep. It’s been massively uncomfortable, and everyone has noticed. Venna stays by me, and Noemi goes everywhere with Stark.

I wonder if she’s relishing his attention entirely on her, and then I kick my own ass for caring so much. And I wonder what she thinks of the two of us sleeping together. Does she care?

Venna catches me staring at them together and says, “Sheesh, what did Noemi do to you? You’re looking at her as if she mutilated Anassa.”

“She would never get close enough,” Anassa sniffs. “Do not drag me into your unreasonable human drama.”

I make an excuse—sand in my eye, nothing to do with Noemi—and try to shore up the defenses around my heart.

But, of course, I can’t help caring. Not now that I’ve had a glimpse of everything we could be together.

Stubborn fucking man. Control freak.

Thinking about Stark and control makes my insides twist all over again, the heat building inside me worse than the constant onslaught of the sun.

At one stop, I stumble upon Saela sitting with our father in a quiet corner of the courtyard of the outpost. They’re curled up side by side on a low stone barrier that divides the courtyard from the building shoved up alongside it. They’re deep in conversation, bent toward each other.

I watch them interact, unmoving.

Saela speaks with him openly, her hands fluttering as she talks. Our father listens raptly, nodding occasionally. Saela seems almost like her old self.

Or, at least, as close as I’ve seen her since Killian.

I try to understand the exact composition of the awful swell of emotion inside me. I’m still furious at our father. But there’s something else beneath it, watching them together.

It glints like fresh snow. There’s potential. There’s weight. There’s beauty. There’s quiet.

Saela’s never truly experienced a parent’s undivided attention and interest. Our mother’s mental illness prevented Saela from forming the kind of maternal bond I shared with Mother when I was young, before it all changed. She could never trust our mother and gradually learned to stop going to her for much of anything.

And I tried, but…

It’s just good, seeing this. She’s happy, and it’s my job to protect that, even if it also makes my heart heavy.

There’s a shuffling sound, and I glance over to find Noemi passing by. She notes what I’m observing and says dryly, “Fathers, am I right?”

I let out a tight laugh.

She bites her lip in hesitation and then says, “Look, we don’t know each other well. But from one damaged daughter to another, I can tell that your father is trying. Don’t forgive him if you can’t, but just… keep that in mind.”

Her counsel loosens something inside me.

As Noemi walks away, Saela notices me watching them, and her expression instantly closes off. Her shoulders lift, she ducks her head, and she scoots away from Fredrich as if she were caught doing something forbidden.

It hurts. I don’t want her to feel guilty for finding happiness, regardless of my own complicated relationship with him. It isn’t about me.

“I’m going to see if the wolves want to be brushed,” Saela says to the ground.

They really, really do not. But remarkably, both Anassa and Cratos have given in to Saela’s adoring ministrations. Saela has taken to brushing them daily with horse-grooming tools she snagged from one of the outposts, and so far neither of them has bitten off her hand.

“Primping time,” I warn Anassa, and she growls in my head.

“I shall let Cratos know to go for a run. His patience for this has disappeared. She tried to tie a ribbon on him yesterday.”

As Saela heads off to find Anassa, I move swiftly toward my father. “I’m going to ask you a question, and you’re going to answer honestly.”

“Of course I will,” Fredrich says with a softness that pisses me off more.

I run my fingers through my hair and stare down at my boots. “Is there any possibility, any procedure or magic, that could reverse what’s happened to her? Could Saela ever be human again?”

Even as I ask the question, I know its answer. But a part of me just needs to hear it.

For the vibrations of the spoken words to shatter the resistance in my soul.

“I thought that… maybe in Astreona, where Siphons originated, there could be some unknown cure,” I say.

He’s silent. I know what I’ll see, but I lift my eyes anyway. And at the sight of him, my last fragile thread of hope snaps. It’s genuine, unfettered sorrow in his eyes.

“No,” he says. He shakes his head. “No, there’s no way to reverse the transformation. Once you’re turned, it’s permanent and complete. I… searched.”

I shut my eyes and let it kill me a little inside. Just for a few breaths.

And then, because I want to dig a knife into him, I say, “Perhaps you didn’t search hard enough.”

When I walk away, the pounding of my heart in my ears almost drowns out the ache in my chest.

The next day, we finally arrive at the city of Brightbane.

We crest the last hill, and immediately our party stops moving, halting in stunned appreciation.

Brightbane rises from the valley floor like something from a dream, constructed primarily of a distinctive pink-white stone that seems to glow in the sunlight.

Unlike the practical, dark buildings of Sturmfrost meant to keep out the cold and cling to what little sunlight we get, this city features sweeping arches, delicate spires, and ornate facades.

It’s all wide-open spaces meant to catch and channel breezes. There is so little rain here that there are buildings with open roofs. Vast green spaces are sheltered within the city, bordered by protective walls—trees to grant shade and relief from the stony heat.

Through the center winds a canal where people glide in small pleasure boats, the water glistening in the sunlight. The spires scattered around the city would snap under the weight of snow back home or crack off in our blizzards.

Here, they reach up bold and delicate and sew wisps of clouds in the blue sky.

Dominating the cityscape is the royal castle, built in the same white-pink stone as the rest of the sprawling glory before us. It’s perched atop the highest point, a winding road circling the hill it uses as a throne.

The magnificent structure is surrounded by terraced gardens. Its walls feature countless arched windows and open-air balconies. A moat wraps around the castle’s base, fed by the canal. Three narrow bridges connect the castle complex to the rest of the city.

As we approach the city’s outskirts, Venna blurts out, “This is insane.”

“Is that… a good thing?” Davide asks, a single brow raised high.

“I have no idea,” I reply, raising my eyebrows at my friend. She shrugs.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” I ask Venna mentally.

“That Izabel would have loved this?” There’s a wistful note in her voice, and her lips purse, eyes glistening. “Cities have no right being this beautiful. I think if she’d seen Brightbane, she would’ve insisted on moving here permanently, bloodsuckers be damned.”

“It’s nice to think about it through her eyes,” I reply. “It makes me feel less like a hostage walking toward near-certain death and more like someone on a romantic adventure.”

Venna nods, and I wish we could stay on this hill forever. This is the first moment we’ve been able to reminisce in a bittersweet way since Izabel’s death. The first time we’ve shared a thought about her together and not just smarted at our loss.

“If I may suggest,” Elias interjects, shattering our peace, “it may be a wise idea to leave your direwolves in the wilderness beyond the city walls and proceed on foot. While the citizens of Brightbane are accustomed to many unusual sights, direwolves might cause unnecessary panic among the populace.”

I bristle immediately. There’s a difference between parting with Anassa in a small village. This is the seat of King Lucien’s power. I need my damn wolf.

Answering violence rises in Anassa.

But Stark speaks before I can. Forcefully. “We will absolutely not be parting with our wolves.”

Elias shrugs. “Very well, then.”

We make our way through the towering city gates and into the winding streets. Immediately upon entering, the air cools. The structure of the city works to ease the heat—the stone all around us, the breeze channels, the fruit trees planted for shade, and the sparkling water.

Beside us, Cratos emits a long, weighty sigh of relief. His black fur is probably worse than Anassa’s.

Details reveal themselves that I couldn’t make out from above. Carved fountains on every other street corner, burbling with cool water. Bell towers that don’t seem to mark the hour but rather chime with constant, tinkling sound. Tiles dot many of the buildings and roads, their bright colors arranged in geometric patterns.

I’m distracted by the sights, at first, but I soon realize that we’re getting a lot of attention. Citizens gasp in fear when they see us coming. Mothers pull their children behind them and hurry away. Shopkeepers hurriedly close their doors.

I feel as if I’m a walking nightmare, back to being a scary story in someone else’s mind.

I ignore it as best I can.

It helps that Anassa doesn’t even slightly care that these people are afraid of her. She bares her fangs at them as we go, reminding me that it doesn’t matter what they think. They’re the enemy.

After a punishingly slow procession, we finally reach the castle’s main entrance. Elias halts his horse before the beginning of the bridge. The water of the moat trickles gently, fish flashing close to the surface.

“I will lead you through the gates, and then we will part for now,” Elias says. “It was not as awful as expected, traveling with you.”

Stark’s mouth twists, and Noemi just stares at him. I sigh, wishing we could have ended the journey on a high note.

“Ready, Sae?” I ask, rubbing her arm to distract myself from the awkwardness.

“Yeah,” she says, leaning forward so she can peer down into the sparkling waters as Anassa pads after our guides.

The tall gates loom over us. They’re covered in swirling gold patterns and glinting precious stones. There’s a symbol above them—that sun with wavy rays again.

Waiting for us in the center of the open gates is a gathering of people. Siphons, most likely, judging by how pretty they are.

Is one of them this King Lucien? I scan the crowd, but nobody looks more regally decked out than the rest.

A man steps forward with his hands clasped neatly before him. He’s tall, immaculately dressed in a long, flowing robe patterned with cherry-colored blossoms. There’s even a ribbon tied around his throat.

Actually, a lot of them have ribbons. Astreonan high fashion, maybe.

The man’s pitch-black hair gleams in the light. He arranges his face in a polite smile, then bows only his head. Shallow. “I am Felippe, the Royal Chamberlain of Brightbane Castle.”

Royal Chamberlain. King Lucien sent the chamberlain to greet me rather than greeting me himself. A gaggle of politicians and servants stares up at us like they have no idea how insulting this is.

I scowl. “And where’s your king?”

Felippe presses his lips together like he’s restraining a smile, and his voice twists with something close to amusement. “The king wouldn’t personally greet visitors at the door. You will see him when he summons you to his presence.”

His choice of words, particularly summons, immediately sets me on edge. Anassa silently growls over our bond.

I can’t figure out if they’re intentionally offending me.

Elias lets out a piercing whistle. It startles Felippe, who scowls at Elias.

Our guide spins his finger in a circle. “Our job is done.”

Then Elias turns to look at me, and for the first time since I’ve known him, he bows entirely at the waist. Low and deep. When he rises, his eyes linger on me. Then he and the others march their horses through the gates and into the castle courtyard beyond.

Felippe looks disoriented. Whatever just happened—whatever Elias just did—it meant more than I entirely understand.

“He showed respect where it was deserved. When you required it,” Anassa tells me.

I slowly smile. Felippe’s confusion makes more sense. Elias elevated me when Felippe was closing me into a box. My smile drops when I realize that my father is still here, lingering at the back of our group.

Maybe they’re not sure what to do with him, either.

Stark strides forward on Cratos. A few of the people skitter back out of teeth-range. “We need accommodations for our direwolves. Are there suites with connected terraces or a similar space where our wolves can stay close with easy outdoor access?”

One of the women in Felippe’s entourage titters. “We don’t keep pets indoors here.”

Cratos lurches forward, snapping his teeth. His fang catches the very edge of the woman’s neck-ribbon, unfortunately dyed a deep crimson color. As the ribbon flutters down, it looks almost like blood.

The woman isn’t the only one who shrieks, and I note that Stark takes his time calming Cratos and urging him back a step.

His expression darkens as he coldly says, “Direwolves are not pets. The failure to consider appropriate accommodations for the wolves shows disrespect not only to them but especially to Queen Meryn and Anassa, who have traveled all this way at Astreona’s request.”

Stark’s voice carries with it a threat. Respect or decapitation. Your choice.

At the severity of Stark’s tone and the wolves’ reactions, Felippe quickly bows in apology—much deeper than before. It makes me think he never actually intended to insult me.

He might just be ignorant, which is easier for me to forgive.

“There is a back garden adjacent to the castle that leads to the mountains beyond. We will immediately prepare it as suitable accommodations for the direwolves, with direct access to the Nocturnan quarters,” Felippe says hastily.

Noemi steps in then, dismounting Ephyse. She flashes her pearly, beautiful smile and says in the tone I now recognize as coaxing, “Thank you for your solution, chamberlain. If you would be so kind, my friends and I would appreciate being shown to our rooms. We’ve been traveling for many days and would like to refresh ourselves.”

Felippe straightens and nods. “Yes, of course.” He lifts his hand and snaps loudly.

One of the men behind Felippe steps forward hesitantly. “I can… lead you there. To the gardens,” he says. “The wolves, I mean.” He’s clearly terrified.

Venna leaps from her wolf’s back before reaching to help Saela down. Stark swings from Cratos as gracefully as ever, but even that does little to distract me. I slip from Anassa’s back and share my unease.

She turns her head and nudges her nose against my chest. “I will be moments away, should you need me. Always.”

My jaw is tight as I watch her go. Cratos catches up to her and presses against her side, and their tails brush together with their steps. At least they’ll have each other.

And as for me? Stark is already at my shoulder, arms crossed over his chest, staring at the group of Astreonans like he’s daring one of them to try to throw a punch at me.

He still wants to protect me—even if he doesn’t want me. I sigh.

Felippe leads us through the elaborate courtyards and corridors, and I can’t shake the sense that despite coming here voluntarily, we’re essentially hostages.

It doesn’t matter how lovely it all is.

It doesn’t matter that there’s a waterfall inside or that the architecture casts delicate shadows and reflects off the water.

Prisons can be pretty.

The Astreonans’ attitudes suggest they view us as barbaric curiosities. I can’t imagine what they’d have thought if we’d shown up in our furs. Moments after I have that thought, Felippe confirms my worries in a notably condescending tone, as if he were speaking to children.

“We’ve done our best to set up the rooms to your liking, but I’m sure things are a little different here than what you’re used to back in Nocturna. Here, we sleep in beds, not in the woods with our animals.”

I let out a scoff. When I look at Stark, he seems just as disbelieving.

What fucking stories have they heard about us?

I consider correcting him but decide it’s not worth the effort at the moment. I’m used to shrugging off condescension, so I do what I always do. I absorb the blow and store it for later, in case I need this little twinge of pain to add some extra force to my own strike.

We arrive at a spacious suite of rooms designated for our party. There’s a large, lushly furnished common area surrounded by adjoining individual bedrooms. A huge rectangular skylight streams light down over woven rugs.

A shallow pool of still water is carved out of the stone floor. The archway that leads to a balcony reflects perfectly on the surface of the pool. There’s even delicate tilework in the basin.

“The sleeping arrangements will be as such,” Felippe tells us, unfurling a scroll. “The first room will house Venna. The second, Noemi.” He pronounces her name entirely wrong—Nummy. “Third, er, Stark. And the last two will belong to Queen Meryn Sturmfrost and Princess Saela, respectively.”

Felippe turns to my father, who has remained silent since we arrived at the castle. And he dismissively says, “You may now return to your home in the city.”

My father bows deeply, and Saela lets out a shocked, “Oh!”

She looks at me, eyes wide and pleading. Her hands come up to her chest, clutching just over her heart.

I’ve never been good at denying my sister something she wants. And to my great annoyance, I find that I can’t even deny her this.

“Wait,” I say begrudgingly. My father startles as he looks at me. “Do you… can you stay? Are you free to stay?”

His mouth opens and closes like a fish searching for air. Eventually, he says, “I have no other obligations at the moment.”

Ugh. That settles it, I guess. I look to Felippe and say, “My father will remain at the castle as an official emissary between our kingdoms.”

I can’t watch him walk away. I can’t have that happen to Saela, knowing intimately how it feels.

“I will arrange accommodations for him as well, then,” Felippe says. “You will be summoned for dinner later.” He moves to the door and pauses there before turning back. “I almost forgot to ask. Do you eat your meat raw like your animals do?”

Confirmed that he’s just an ignorant piece of shit, then.

Stark’s hands curl into fists, but before he can snap like Cratos, Noemi steps forward to defuse the situation. Her smile doesn’t reach her eyes as she explains, “We eat our food just like any other humans.”

She emphasizes the word humans, intentionally highlighting the distinction between us and the Siphons. The implication is clear—they should serve us like they do any of their nonbloodsucking guests.

That is, assuming they ever have humans here as their guests, instead of just as subservient staff members or willing blood bags.

Felippe informs us that servants will arrive within the hour to help us prepare for dinner, then he finally takes his leave.

The instant the door closes behind him, Venna’s polite mask drops. She turns to me with a glint in her eye.

“Can I please go spy on these assholes?”

33

MERYN

It’s bliss not being covered in sweat and grime for the first time in ages.

The bathing chambers are as luxurious as the rest of the castle, as are the clothes we’re provided. The garments are still strikingly different from our usual attire—Astreonan clothing of such fine quality that I can’t move for fear of ripping the delicate fabric or tugging on one of the sewn pearls.

The women in our party have all been given lightweight gowns with intricate lacing up the backs, long sleeves, and high necklines. It must be court fashion, though it seems impractical in this weather.

I guess if you have the luxury of living in an enormous castle designed to funnel breezes and can afford servants to fan you, you don’t have to worry about beating the heat.

Studying my reflection in my room’s gilded mirror, I finish doing the best I can with my hair. The bright red of the dress is a more vibrant color than I’m used to wearing. The fabric makes me look as if I’ve been flayed.

Daintily flayed.

Leaving my room, I take in the rest of our party.

Stark in Astreonan clothing stops me short. He’s in loose-fitting pants and a tunic made of a similar lightweight fabric, all in shades of blue. The pants are a darker navy, but the shirt is a bright light blue, like a clear sky on a sunny day. The contrast between the bright color and the deep darkness of his eyes makes me swallow, hard.

His tunic has long sleeves and a high collar, and they cover up the majority of his tattoos so that just the ones on his hands and the top of his neck are showing.

My mind fills in the blanks without my permission. I want to map the course of those tattoos as they dip down to his chest, spread across his abs, and lower…

I turn abruptly and head into Venna’s room to see if she needs any help.

Venna is hurriedly dressing to make up for lost time. She was busy scouting the castle while the rest of us prepared.

Siphons at the war front may know how to identify our spies and see through their skills, but it’s evident that things are much more lax this far from Nocturna. Her Kryptos abilities made her quick and undetectable as she mapped potential escape routes.

According to her report, no one saw her.

“And it just seems like a castle,” Venna says.

“Yeah. I’ve thought that before,” I scoff, remembering what we found lurking beneath our own castle’s bones. If there were secrets hidden by Siphon magic, would Venna be able to tell? Would any of us?

Alarmingly, it seems like we’ve all gotten used to the hint of sweetness in the air from their magic. I don’t even notice it anymore.

“But there are guards posted at all the exits—ostensibly for security. Though it feels more like containment. Here, Meryn.”

Venna taps my thigh, and I lift my leg and pull my skirts up to my hip. She bends and straps a sheath to my leg, then slots a dagger into it.

I do the same for Venna, slipping the leather into place against her skin.

It’s easy to hide blades beneath flowing skirts, which is good because we’re absolutely not going into this completely unarmed. Trust in our hosts is justifiably nonexistent.

I could always use shadebending if things go topsy-turvy… but I trust myself with knives almost more than with my magic.

We emerge back into the main room as a knock sounds at the doors, loud and insistent. I sigh. Somehow even their knocking sounds rude.

“Ready?” I check in with the rest of the group.

“As we’ll ever be,” Noemi replies.

“I know I’m as likely as any of you to be the one who slips up here, but we should try our best not to throw a wrench in negotiations before we know what’s on the table,” I say grudgingly. “No matter how much we want to throw caution to the wind and let our wolves run wild.”

I brush my mind against Anassa’s at that, and she sends me a rush of support. “Good luck. But should you need me to run wild, my fangs are eager to destroy our enemies.”

My mouth twists. I look around—it’s clear everyone else is talking with their direwolves as well. I wish they could all accompany us tonight.

Saela gives me a tight hug. She’s going to take dinner in our suite; political negotiations are no place for a child, especially ones that could devolve into violence.

Fredrich—I still can’t quite think of him as Father—has offered to stay with her. I tried not to let it hurt that Saela seemed excited about this.

Moving from my sister, I open the door and reveal a perfectly composed Felippe. If he’s annoyed that we kept him waiting, he doesn’t show it. He’s standing so straight I wonder briefly if there’s a metal rod surgically implanted along his spine.

“Good evening. You have been summoned for your dinner audience with King Lucien.”

Summoned. A ripple of irritation runs through our group.

Felippe, meanwhile, looks us over, clocking our transformation from travel-weary to dinner-ready. It’s clear from his sneering expression that he finds us lacking.

We follow his brisk gait through the castle’s glorious halls. Venna glares at Felippe’s back like she’s imagining ripping the rod out and shoving it into his eye socket.

He leads us through a series of increasingly ornate corridors—painted silk hangings fluttering in the warm breeze, tilework glistening in dozens of clear pools, statues of long-feathered birds in flight in the stone alcoves—until we reach the royal dining hall.

Felippe bows only his head as two servants push the tall wooden doors open in perfect synchronization.

The space they reveal is stunning.

The ceilings are high and arched, covered in intricate mosaics. It looks as if we’re walking under a star-soaked night sky, the constellations a swirl of shining gold leaf and glinting precious stones. Along the far wall, enormous windows offer panoramic views of the city below and the desolate yet beautiful desert beyond.

Several members of the Siphon court are already seated at the long, dark, polished wooden table laden with glittering dinnerware and wineglasses, including Elias, who gives me an insincere smile as we enter the room. They’re all glittering with jewelry and embroidered finery. Beautiful, like all Siphons.

And at the head of the table…

King Lucien Brightbane.

I know it’s him instantly, even if he’s nothing like I expected. His skin is smooth and pale. Flawless. I’m aware he’s ancient, but I was unprepared for how young he appears, physically.

He doesn’t look any older than Stark. Late twenties maybe.

His hair is white-blond and shoulder-length, tucked behind ears laden with golden earrings. The light locks frame a face of such perfect symmetry it seems almost unreal. Impossible, as if a master sculptor shaped him from ivory, smoothing his features with both hands in careful caresses—sharp and high cheekbones, full lips, a strong chin.

He’s beautiful to an almost painful extreme.

Lucien lounges with casual elegance in an elaborately carved chair, the back curving around his shoulders. A gold crown is perched atop his head. It’s formed of twisting metal spikes that look both beautiful and lethal. They frame his face like rays of sunlight.

I stifle a breath. It’s the crown I saw in my foresight vision, when I was trying to decide if we should accept Ruby’s offer.

Though seated, Lucien’s height is evident. One long arm is draped over the table before him, his heavily ringed fingers playing at the stem of his crystal glass. His broad shoulders are clothed in midnight-black fabric adorned with subtle gold embroidery.

Black. Bold choice for a land of seemingly eternal sun.

He’s clearly paid careful attention to his appearance. The black fabric complements his pale complexion. His golden jewelry draws out the strands of blond in his nearly white hair. The rings on his fingers are heavy but vary in design so as not to overwhelm the shape of his long fingers. But none of the trappings holds a candle to his eyes.

Their familiar glint sends a cold current through me. They’re a piercing deep blue, and despite the difference in shade, looking at them shoves me straight back into Killian’s arms.

At least Lucien’s eyes don’t play at innocence, I note. From first glance, it’s easy to see that he’s cynical and cunning.

I hope he doesn’t stretch things out longer than necessary. I’m not in the mood to play games.

King Lucien’s gaze is on me as he tilts his head back and speaks from his seat. “Welcome. It’s been quite a few years since I’ve met a Sturmfrost Queen.”

The casual reference to Queen Chiara, paired with that note of amusement in his voice, sends another shiver down my spine. He knew her. Personally, most likely.

What’s ancient history to me is mere memory to him.

I reassure myself by focusing on the subtle press of the dagger against my thigh.

Before I can respond, Stark steps in front of me, angling his body as though he’s preparing to block a weapon’s blow.

“Stand up and greet her properly, then.” His tone is cutting.

Lucien’s attention shifts lazily to Stark, a sharp grin spreading across his face. “Ahh, yes, and as usual, the queen has brought a protector.”

There’s a brief pause during which he spins the tip of his finger around the rim of his glass. Then he stands.

The way he unfolds his tall frame and moves through his bow is deliberate. It’s practiced. Careful. But it’s also slow and shallow.

Once again, I can’t tell if I’m being disrespected.

As he rises to his full height, something glints on his crown. I narrow my eyes.

Cradled in the center is an opal similar to the one in my mother’s necklace and my own crown, and in the Mother Priestess’s ring.

Another Goddess Tear?

My heart starts to pound in my ears. What does it mean that another Tear is here in Astreona?

Lucien’s smile doesn’t reach his eyes. Or even the entirety of his lips. His features aren’t very yielding. “Why don’t you come sit at my side so that we can speak properly?”

“Take the opposite end of the table,” Stark advises over our bond. “Mark yourself clearly as his equal.”

I could. But then, I’m here to find out what Lucien wants. Hear what he has to say.

It’s going to be difficult enough sharing private words with him with the way the sound bounces back down from the vaulted ceilings. I don’t want to have to yell at him about how our kingdoms have been trying to murder each other for centuries and pretty please won’t you stop that?

I touch my hand to Stark’s arm, then take the seat next to Lucien. Lucien looks pleased.

His many earrings flash as he sits, and his robes fan out around his lithe body. Stark immediately thuds a little ungracefully into the chair on my other side, placing himself between me and the rest of the Siphon court.

Once Venna and Noemi are distributed along the table, Lucien subtly signals his servants, and they open a door down at the end of the hall, allowing two armor-clad figures to enter.

Starks leaps out of his chair, ready to protect me.

“Just some light predinner entertainment,” Lucien says to us, his tone somehow both mocking and soothing. “A tradition here at my court. Don’t be alarmed.”

Their armor does look more ceremonial than practical. Golden breastplates, tinkling silver mail sleeves that end at the elbow, shining helms. The warriors—both women—draw their swords to salute their king, who claps politely. The rest of the court follows suit, so I put my hands together once before letting them fall in my lap.

Neither of the women is wearing a helmet. My eyes narrow as I study the shorter one.

I gasp. It’s the human from the Siphon town, the one we tried to save. She catches me gawking and blushes, ducking her head.

“What are you playing at?” I snap at Lucien, gesturing to her.

He blinks slowly at me. “A Siphon died. It was her fault. She neglected to make a payment, and then she resisted when her landlord came to collect. His blood is on her hands.”

Stark slams his fist on the dinner table, and a delicate glass tips over, clanking against a plate. “His blood is on my hands. I’m the one who killed him.”

Lucien lightly shrugs a shoulder. “Alas, you are a diplomatic representative of a foreign nation. She is one of my citizens, who was raised with our laws. If she had not broken them repeatedly, it stands to reason that the Siphon would still be alive.”

My mouth tastes like ash. If we hadn’t intervened, she wouldn’t be here. But… how could we see what was happening to her and not try to stop it?

“So you’re going to have them, what, fight to the death to whet our appetites?”

Lucien rolls his eyes. “Don’t be so dramatic, Queen Meryn. As I said, it’s just entertainment. No one needs to die here tonight.” I can’t help but read the subtext there. “She had a choice between this or imprisonment, and she chose to fight. Now if you don’t mind, I’d like the show to begin.”

The two women square off as servants enter carrying platters of food.

The dishes are elaborate and colorfully presented, different from any food I’ve ever seen, even as a Rawbond in the castle.

The aroma is enticing and unfamiliar. The heady sting of spice fills the air—on grains, meats, and fish—coupled with the gentle sweetness of foreign fruits, which have been sliced and arranged to look like flowers. There are deep purples and mouthwatering reds. Pale yellows and rich greens.

But my eyes keep drifting back to the human we doomed to this humiliation.

Servants set the food down in front of us as the mock-battle begins.

They are clearly used to such dinner entertainment; their hands are steady while serving cold soups and pouring a thick golden liquid that smells bracingly alcoholic. They entirely ignore the grunts of the fighters and the loud clangs as swords clash.

The human woman comes out surprisingly strong, slashing rapidly and putting her opponent on the defensive.

It’s hard to watch: I’ve seen fighters like her before, people down on their luck and in over their heads. Her speed smacks of desperation.

She lunges, taking advantage of an opening, and nearly nicks the Siphon woman, but the Siphon dances back just in time. Her sword catches a corner of the Siphon’s sleeve and cuts effortlessly through the fabric. The breezy slice of material drifts slowly to the floor.

I watch as the Siphon presses forward, at first meeting blow for blow and then suddenly speeding up faster and faster.

“Siphon contestants are required to give humans a two-minute head start before using any powers, to even the odds,” Lucien says conversationally. “Sintar is one of my favorite fighters.”

Sintar no longer holds back. I watch her advance with impossible speed, her movements a blur in my vision. She’s forcing the human back toward our table. A few of the Siphons at the end of the table scoot chairs back as the pair draw close to the chalked boundaries, just feet away from the diners.

My stomach yawns with dread as I see how mismatched the fighters truly are.

Is this meant to be entertaining? There’s no contest here.

This poor woman. Her son’s face floats forward in my mind, scared and worried in the doorway of their home. Who’s looking after him while his mother is here serving as the king’s amusement?

Violence for sport. It’s all too familiar.

The human slips to a knee after a maneuver from the Siphon too swift to follow. I wince as Sintar draws blood, two slashes in rapid succession. A cut across the human’s right cheek and then the left.

How far are they planning to take this? I reach for my dagger, ready to draw.

But just as I move to rise, the fight comes to a halt as Sintar draws third blood, a thin slash across the back of one of the human’s hands that makes her drop her sword.

The human holds her palms up in a clear sign of submission.

The Siphon courtiers applaud again, a few of them calling out compliments to the victor. Lucien looks pleased.

My stomach twists in nausea.

“A good fight,” he says. “That human lasted longer than most against my champion.”

As he speaks, another procession comes from the servants’ doors, but this time their hands are empty.

Half a dozen beautiful men and women, all dressed in scantily flowing garments that leave little to the imagination, enter in twin lines on either side of the table.

One of the women, a curvy brunette with heavy-lidded eyes, approaches Lucien and settles gracefully onto his lap. His ringed hand moves over her thigh and up to her hip. I watch the display with bewilderment, wondering if this is some weird Astreonan sex thing.

Maybe it’s normal here for people to have an orgy or two before dinner starts, just to work up an appetite?

I turn to see that the victorious fighter, Sintar, has been offered a chair at our table.

Strangely, her defeated opponent is settled on Sintar’s lap, their heavy breastplates removed and cast to one side. Sintar is laughing and chatting with the Siphon to her right, idly twisting her fingers in the blonde hair of the human woman in her lap. The woman’s eyes are vacant.

It takes every part of me not to race to her side, pull her out of Sintar’s lap, and ferry her out of this castle.

Lucien smiles at his champion across the long table. She looks up at him, and he gives her a nod and raises his glass to her.

“Take your right as victor,” he proclaims. “Well done, Sintar.”

The human woman closes her eyes, holding herself still. Blood drips from her chin, still leaking from the twin cuts on her face.

And there’s another glimpse from my foresight vision—blood dripping down a neck.

I watch in horrified paralysis as Sintar lifts the woman’s wounded hand and laps up the trail of blood in one long lick.

“Enjoy your meal,” Lucien says to me then, his deep blue eyes locking on mine in a challenge. He bends his head toward the gorgeous woman in his own lap.

And then sinks his fangs into her neck.

34

MERYN

I can’t look away. Alongside my instinctive horror is a brutal, morbid curiosity. The woman’s head tilts back. She sighs with apparent pleasure, her expression transforming into ecstasy as Lucien drinks deeply, his amused gaze still on mine.

Around the table, the other Siphons similarly begin to feed from the humans who have joined them, treating the activity as casually as we might regard cutting into a steak.

Sintar brings her head up after feasting at her human’s neck. She runs her fingers across the woman’s bloody cheek, then lazily licks each finger. The human is now languid, sprawling across Sintar’s lap.

The fate we thought we were saving her from, playing out in a far more demeaning and public way.

It’s not surprising, theoretically—of course we know they drink blood.

And Elias did claim, on the road, that many humans are… willing participants. Even the woman from the town technically consented to this over other punishment.

Still, my cheeks grow hot with anger and dismay.

Something about this is so rude.

My friends agree. Stark’s chair screeches only slightly, like he was about to get up and act but just barely managed to stop himself, remembering our mission here. Venna’s hand moves to where her weapon is concealed, though her face remains carefully neutral.

Noemi’s face has drained entirely of color. She stares at Lucien in hatred and revulsion. It’s obvious enough that the Siphon next to her is glaring at her.

I can’t blame her. The woman in Lucien’s lap sinks further and further into her euphoric surrender—so much so that she lets out a soft moan. It’s a lustful scene and disturbingly similar to watching King Cyril play with his “companion” on his lap.

The air grows warmer. The sounds of the feeding are… distractingly wet. And as the humans give in to whatever’s happening, they all start sighing or letting out small moans.

It’s hard to imagine that my sister may one day feed in the same way.

In fact, she and our father might be feeding the same way at this very moment. I suppress a shudder.

The woman on Lucien’s lap gasps lightly as he removes his fangs. He reaches up and presses the pad of his thumb to his lips, then drags it over his bloodied mouth, licking it lightly as if to avoid wasting a drop.

Then those blue eyes dart down to my untouched plate of food. “Not fond of your host’s offerings?”

He’s implying I’m being rude, but he just sucked a woman’s throat in front of me for thirty seconds straight, so who’s he to talk?

“No,” I tell him coolly. “I don’t trust the food.”

Lucien chuckles. “Do you truly think I would have Elias bring you all this way just to poison you?”

He doesn’t wait for my response before reaching around the blissed-out woman in his lap and plucking a piece of meat from my plate. He reclines back in his chair and nudges the meat against the woman’s lips, who parts them and bites down.

I grimace as she chews. Lucien looks back, sees my disgusted expression, and bares his fangs in a grin like it’s funny.

“See? The food is fine.”

I lean forward and narrow my eyes. “Are you finished making a spectacle of yourself? I’m ready to talk about why you brought me here.”

Lucien sighs and mutters something under his breath. Then he runs a gentle hand down the woman’s arm and says, “You may go, sweetness.”

She smiles at him, bows her head, and stands to leave, swaying slightly. And when she does, so do the other humans, all standing and shuffling out at once—some in less than straight lines—toward the exits.

The human woman stands up at the end of the table. She picks up her breastplate and sword, movements slow and uncertain. My gut twists.

“What will happen to her?” I ask quietly.

Lucien waves a hand. “Oh, she’s fine. She’ll sleep it off and then be returned to where she lives.”

My eyes burn, and I start to truly hate him.

Lucien leans toward me. He’s not smiling any longer. His eyes are serious and clear.

“Alistair Brightbane is my older brother, but I inherited the throne instead of him. This entire war has been his vengeance. He wants to conquer Astreona and take back what he believes is his birthright.”

I stare at him, agape, sickness building in my stomach.

Five centuries of war, he’s trying to tell me—countless lives lost, endless hours of grief-stricken tears, a conflict that has shaped the entire history and culture of Nocturna—all stem from a family dispute over succession?

A squabble between brothers.

All the sacrifice and suffering my people have endured, the system of exploitation and oppression our false kings built around the war effort…

Could this possibly be true? That none of it was truly about protecting Nocturna from bloodthirsty monsters?

If Lucien’s being honest, we were all nothing but expendable toy soldiers. Pawns in a power struggle between immortal brothers who cared nothing for how many lived and died at their whims.

Shock passes through the communication bond. Everyone heard Lucien’s words echoing from the vaulted ceilings. Everyone’s grappling with the same loss and anger.

“Tell me I misheard that,” Venna begs. “Surely, surely, this entire war hasn’t been so meaningless.” Her voice silences the quiet conversations being shared by the other Siphons.

Lucien glances down the table at her, something in his gaze heating as he assesses her. Is he going to scold her for speaking out of turn? My hand creeps toward my dagger again, but eventually he says, “What is war if not a meaningless battle of egos?”

“How dare you?” I snap. “This may have felt meaningless to you, but we’ve lost so many lives. People with loved ones who believed they were sacrificing themselves for a greater good.”

I can’t think about my father. I can’t.

“And how do you expect me to believe this?” I ask. “You’re telling us that our entire history, everything our country knows, is a lie. Not just some of it. All of it. But you’re the ones with mind-control powers, not us.”

Lucien puts his elbow on the table and his face in his palm, looking at me with a bit of boredom, like I’m being dense. “Yes, that’s true, I suppose. But the Siphon on your throne had mind-control powers, too, did he not? Why would we also use them against you?”

I press my lips together. Yes—Alistair used blood magic and mind control to erase the history of my family line.

“To what end are you accusing us of using our powers against you?” he continues. “You think we’re the ones who have lied to you throughout history? Or do you think I’m trying to trick you right now at this moment?”

Before I can get a word in edgewise, he continues onward, his voice drawling.

“As with your accusations that I’ve poisoned your food, I think you’ll find that tampering with your mind would go against my purposes. Why would I have brought you all this way to persuade you to work together, if I could have just had my standard-bearers alter your minds back at the border? Besides, you seem to have a complete misunderstanding of how the power works. I forget how little you Nocturnans know.”

Would it be considered rude if I stabbed one of these fine forks through his hand?

“Enlighten us,” I say through clenched teeth.

Lucien pauses. I wait. If he’s going to earn our trust, he needs to be willing to share information with us. Real information.

Giving a dramatic sigh, he finally responds. “The type of power you’re thinking of, like Alistair performed, requires incredible magical strength and constant replenishment. Most Siphons are only capable of creating illusions, as vanishing as smoke. Yes, some of us have a level of mind control ability, but only over those who are under a thrall or those we’ve recently drunk from.”

Thrall. The word wriggles into me like a parasite, sinks under my skin.

His eyes glint with self-assured amusement. “The spies that have crossed our border over the years, for instance. We capture them, drink from them, alter their memories, and send them happily back to your country.”

“What you said—under a thrall?”

“A unique connection between Siphon and human that requires an exchange of blood from both parties. But enough magical theory. I understand why you don’t want to believe me, so why don’t you let me show you?” Lucien says. “Let me convince you that we’re on the same side, Meryn Sturmfrost.”

Stark leans toward me protectively as Lucien reaches up and lifts the sun-bolt crown from his hair. It glints as he brings it forward.

“Put it on,” Lucien says.

I eye the Tear in the crown. It looks identical to the two I have—the one in my crown, the one around Saela’s neck. “What is this?”

“Surely you know these jewels have power?” Lucien says with a little smile.

That’s one of the few things we’ve successfully deduced so far. The crown seems to give me more magical strength when I wear it, as did Saela’s necklace. The Tears clearly have some magical properties to them.

But Saela has come up empty on any other information about them.

“Yes, I’m aware.” I want to ask more, find out if he has information about the Tears that we don’t. This is not the time for me to show Lucien any weakness, though. “I’m asking you what you’re doing.”

“And I already told you,” he replies, keeping his offer aloft, “I’m showing you what you want to know.”

I still don’t trust him. The magic in the stones is ancient, and so is he. Lucien might know how to use his Tear against me somehow. But his eyes are keen. He’s seen how badly I want answers, and he knows I’m going to accept.

So I stop fighting it. Reaching up, I untangle my own crown from my hair and pass it to Stark for safekeeping. Then, I take hold of Lucien’s.

The moment the metal settles over my head, I plummet. It’s just like it was when I first put on my crown, if slightly less violent, slightly blurrier.

I can’t make out nearly as many details as I did when I witnessed Queen Chiara, but judging by the pale stone and regal furniture, I’m in a room in the Astreonan castle.

Staggering slightly, I float out of my skin, then settle back into my bones.

Just as I get my bearings, there’s a soft moan from behind me. I spin around, thinking someone is wounded or dying. Readying myself for the pain of tragedies long past.

But it’s not pain I heard.

My mouth drops open and my hand flies up to block out the scene before me. I’m in a lavishly decorated bedroom, the candlelight low and flickering.

And Lucien is in flagrante with three other people on a massive bed.

There’s a woman to his left, a man to his right, and another woman between his legs. They’re all naked, and it’s just skin and bodies and sweat.

Seriously? I want to scream. The fucking bastard took me to a vision of an orgy.

What is wrong with this guy?

I knew I was right about him. He’s messing with me. Of course he is.

He’s hundreds of years old and probably bored.

I spin back around, covering my heated cheeks with my hands and trying to unsee and unhear all of it.

The moment I turn, the door in front of me slams open against the wall so hard it bounces back and rattles. A dark-haired, older-looking woman is at the door.

“Your fa—” She gasps and stumbles back as if she’s been slapped. Then she lifts her hand to protect herself from the visual assault the same way I did. “Lucien! For crying out loud!”

Lucien chuckles from his bed as the man kisses down his neck, clearly unbothered by this woman’s sudden presence.

She keeps her eyes skyward and sighs deeply. I have the sudden suspicion this is a common occurrence.

“The king has called an emergency council meeting. You need to come right away.”

“Everyone hear her?” Lucien replies with a smile, letting his head drop back briefly before lifting it again. “It’s time to come.”

“Right away,” one of the women giggles out. The other woman lowers her mouth between Lucien’s legs again, enthusiastically following orders.

The older woman gives up and pins Lucien with her glare. Her hands curl into fists, and her delicately arranged hair quivers against her cheeks.

“Lucien. I don’t have time for your frivolities. Your father needs you, now. It’s about Alistair.”

Lucien immediately sits up. His smile is gone. His bedmates complain, moving away from him. His chest rises and falls a few times as he stares at the woman in the doorway, then he’s shifting to stand.

I curse under my breath and turn my eyes away as he quickly dresses his admittedly chiseled body. His partners have started back up, apparently unbothered by his absence.

I’m grateful to leave them behind as Lucien follows the woman’s hurried gait down the halls. They don’t exchange a single word all the way to what looks like a formal audience room with a throne on one end of the space.

I can’t make out much detail beyond the blur of long banners waving in the breeze from a wide-open balcony that stretches the length of the room.

A man sits on the throne, flanked by guards and attendants. He’s much clearer than his surroundings, with white-blond hair like Lucien’s and the same sun-bolt crown that brought me to this vision. He appears older than Lucien, maybe in his fifties if he weren’t a Siphon, and shares none of Lucien’s playful, feline charm.

This regent is serious. Angry, maybe, though it’s hard to tell whether the deep lines between his brows are just always there regardless of his mood.

The king—Lucien’s father—doesn’t greet his son as he arrives. He watches Lucien as he strides up toward the throne to take a lower seat beside him.

I follow Lucien, studying the tense expression on his face. It’s the same look he got in his eyes when he told me about Alistair’s vendetta.

Serious, clear, penetrating. He looks more like his stern father when he stares forward like this.

The doors burst open once more. Guards appear dressed in sparse but elegant half-plate armor, dragging with them a disoriented-looking man.

Their prisoner looks so much like Killian I almost recoil. He has the exact same sweetly deceitful eyes, the same shade of dark blond hair, the same pointed features. My stomach knots.

The guards throw him down onto the pale pink stone floor. He cries out on impact and remains kneeling as he lifts his head.

Stay on all fours, dog, I growl internally.

“There’s been a very serious accusation against you, Alistair,” the king says, staring down at his son icily. I’d freeze over entirely if that look were directed at me. “It is said that you have been creating thrall bracelets.”

That word again. Thrall.

Alistair looks up at his father with blatant shock on his face. “I… Father, I would never do such an abominable thing!”

His voice cracks. His eyes well. He looks so vulnerable and afraid. Earnest. He looks like he isn’t lying.

The king nods to the guards. Through my vision, they move in a blur, reappearing moments later with additional people. Several men and women stand around Alistair, their expressions all grave.

The guards step forward and pull up the sleeves of the men and women, exposing bracelets on all of them—gold, with bloodred jewels at their centers.

My stomach bottoms out. My horror spills through the vision in a wave, staining everything in its color-drained dread.

Thrall bracelets.

Identical to the engagement bracelet shackled to my wrist.

The scene goes on despite my terror. Lucien leans back as if to create space between himself and what’s happening. His upper lip curls, and I swear he’s sharing in my revulsion. I don’t know what it all means yet, but the look Lucien wears is a warning.

Alistair’s face drops. His trembling, terrified act vanishes just as quickly as Killian’s kindness did. He straightens and shakes his head.

“Fine. You’ve caught me. But it’s for the good of our kingdom, Father.”

The king raises his hand abruptly. “I have no desire to hear your lies. You’ve broken one of the foundational laws of Astreona, and in doing so, proved once and for all how unworthy you are of your royal name. You are to be exiled, and your brother, Lucien, instated as heir to my throne.”

Lucien whirls on his father, eyes widen with clear panic. “Wh-what?!”

“You cannot do that to me!” Alistair bellows. “I am your heir! Your firstborn! This is—”

“Quiet!” the king shouts. His voice moves like violence. Fast, fast, and then a heavy impact that settles over the room and starts to bruise. “This is how it will be. Alistair, I don’t ever want to see you near Brightbane again.”

Alistair’s hands curl into weapons.

“I’m sorry it had to come to this, Father,” he intones, blue eyes glinting for an instant before he shuts them.

I blink, and then the people wearing the thrall bracelets are glazing over, shivering, convulsing. Within the space of a moment, they explode into frantic motion, attacking everyone close to them.

Fangs flash. There are screams. Guards turn weapons on their captives.

Lucien bolts to his feet, watching the scene with wild eyes, and then runs to protect his father, the king.

But he’s too late. His father’s attendants have already turned on him, thrall bracelets flashing on their wrists. One of them fends off the loyal guards. Another draws a long dagger and swiftly beheads the king, face eerily dispassionate.

Lucien reaches his father just as it happens, catching the body as it slumps down over the throne, pouring blood. He howls in anger. Then he draws his weapons and strikes down the attendant who, I gather, acted not of his own accord.

In one smooth motion, Lucien snatches the Astreonan crown from where it fell to the ground, placing it on his head.

Suddenly, there are a dozen Luciens, each racing forward, sword upraised, in pursuit of Alistair. I’ve never seen Siphon magic like it, illusions so real and vivid, and visible to everyone at once.

It must be the crown amplifying Lucien’s power, I realize, and shiver.

I’m not the only one taken aback; the guards and attendants under Alistair’s control scatter and shout, confused by the convincing image of their prince attacking from all sides. Alistair barks orders at them, veins bulging in his face as he fights to maintain control of his unwilling army.

Here and there, I spot the real Lucien as he slaughters more of Alistair’s thralls. Lucien’s speed seems to have been buoyed by the crown’s powers as well. He moves so fast I can barely see him. He tears through their defenses with ease, cutting short scream after scream. Blood runs thick across the marble floors.

Alistair frantically summons more of his thralls to stand between himself and the line of advancing Luciens.

“You don’t want this, brother,” Alistair says almost gently, backing toward the door. “You and I both know it’s too much responsibility for you.”

He’s back to acting humble and misunderstood. How quickly he spins from personality to personality.

“You’re meant for a life of pleasure and luxury,” Alistair continues. “Give the crown to me, let it be my burden.”

Lucien stares directly at his brother, eyes like ice as he cuts down another two thrall warriors. “Not a chance, you sadistic asshole.”

Alistair’s face contorts in a snarl. “You will live to regret this, Lucien. I promise, I will take my throne back. No matter the cost.”

And before Lucien can reach him, Alistair whirls away, vanishing out the door.

35

STARK

It happens in a heartbeat. One moment, Meryn is settling Lucien’s golden crown on top of her silver-white hair.

The next, she’s crumpled over, her stunning face slack.

My stomach plummets.

I leap out of my chair just as she falls and catch her drooping body. Her head hits my lap—but it came so close to smashing onto the stone floor.

Fuck. Hot panic seizes in my chest.

There’s a screech of chairs as both Venna and Noemi leap up, blades drawn. All the Astreonans look at us in offense.

My hands tighten roughly around Meryn’s limp arms.

She’s dead, my brain shouts at me. She’s dead, and it’s your fault. You couldn’t protect her, just like you couldn’t protect Noemi.

You let her die thinking you were a coward.

But—her body is still warm. And her chest moves up and down in slow, steady breaths.

“Cratos,” I reach out. “Is Anassa okay?”

He confirms that they’re both fine, and my tense muscles relax ever so slightly. This is exactly what happened when she first put on the Sturmfrost crown.

I start to breathe again. Thank fuck. I still have time.

Her words from when we crossed the border have been on incessant repeat in my head.

I know what I am. I know what I’m capable of. I’ve never shied away from my reputation because I’m proud of it. It was earned through the labored destruction of all the softest parts of myself.

And those words—What are you if not my equal?—have unraveled everything.

The idea of tainting her rule, of corrupting her ability to lead righteously, has haunted me. But… what if her darkness doesn’t need to be shunned, but tamed?

And what if I can help her tame it?

Lucien Brightbane smirks down at us. The terror this caused me has… amused him. My fists clench as I contemplate punching that expression clear out of his kingdom.

“She better not have so much as a fucking bruise on her body,” I hiss. “Or there will be consequences.”

He doesn’t even flinch. “Consequences, hmm? Yes, I’m sure you’re used to doling those out. You’re famous here, too, you know, Alpha Stark. Should there be consequences for all the tattoos you wear? All the people of mine whose lives you’ve taken? The one you just took after crossing my border, or how about the mass casualties you and the queen wrought before our ceasefire?”

I scowl, and he dares to laugh.

“I suppose we can call that all in the fairness of war,” he drawls. “But I’m not afraid of you, if that’s what you’re hoping.”

“No,” I say, “I expect you’re not. But you should be afraid of her.” I incline my head toward Meryn. The red of her dress looks so much like the gruesome spill of blood. “You have no idea what she’s capable of, and I hope for your sake that you never find out.”

That’s a lie. I’d love to watch her explode his head.

Lucien’s lips press into a thin, calculating line as he looks more closely at Meryn—who chooses this moment to stir.

“Stark.” She swallows and tries to sit up, but I hold her firmly.

“You collapsed the moment you put on Lucien’s crown.” The words come out rote, a soldier reporting to his commander. But inside, I am burning. “Your body went rigid before crumpling to the floor. I caught you before your skull hit stone, but you have been unresponsive for several minutes.”

“I’m fine,” she tells me in a rush. She grabs my arm and squeezes tight. Hard so that it hurts. “Stark, I’m all right.”

My hand sifts through her hair, curling into a fist briefly, pulling a little. I knew she was okay almost immediately, and still—relief rushes through me in a wave.

“Get me up,” Meryn grumbles. “I look like an idiot down here.”

Guiding her upright, I wrap my calloused hand around hers and bring her with me as I stand. Her legs are slightly shaky.

Her hand stays in mine as I lead her back to her seat. Noemi and Venna watch us closely. Watching the Astreonans. Tension still hangs thick in the air.

Meryn’s fingers tremble slightly as she reaches up and pulls Lucien’s crown from her head. She turns to Lucien and then thuds his crown down on the table.

He just smirks in response.

One more fucking smug upturn of his mouth and I’m going to cut off his lips. He might not be afraid of me, but I bet this vain prick fears being hideous.

Lucien settles the crown back over his perfect white-blond head of hair. He sighs as he does it, as if it’s heavy.

“What was that bracelet in the vision?” Meryn asks. “The one Alistair was using on those people.”

I stiffen. “Bracelet?”

“Just like mine,” she responds grimly.

Lucien reaches up and rubs his crown with two fingers, just above his ear. Then he lets his arm fall limp into his lap.

“My brother has always been the most powerful Siphon I’ve ever encountered. But,” he says with a weary sigh, “to explain, you first need to understand that all Siphons possess blood magic that allows us to create thralls, as I mentioned earlier. It’s not just a blood exchange; it binds the humans to us.”

My gut twists. I knew they could turn humans, but this? Binding people to them?

Sick fucks.

“An exchange,” Meryn repeats placidly. “So two ways?”

“Yes, reciprocal drinking is involved—the Siphon of the human’s blood, and the human of the Siphon’s. Just a bit, not enough to turn them.”

I’m clenching my jaw so tight that my teeth start to ache.

Lucien continues. “The bond gives the Siphon a degree of control over the human. This is different from creating a mental illusion. It allows one to compel the human to do things. But it naturally has limits. The thrall connection requires regular renewal through fresh blood exchanges and weakens significantly with distance.”

He leans closer to Meryn. His body language is relaxed, but his eyes are intense. Any closer and I’m going to impel this whole fucking dinner table over.

“Most important,” he says, “the creation of a thrall traditionally requires consent from both parties.”

Meryn’s eyes narrow. “Sounds like a great deal for Siphons. What do humans get out of this supposedly consensual exchange?”

I’m wondering the same thing.

“Heightened senses,” he replied. “Not quite at the level of Siphon powers. But they’re able to move faster, see farther. Taste, smell, and hear better. Touch is particularly heightened, which has particular uses for humans.”

His smile takes on a pointed edge, and his meaning is very clear.

My eyes dart across the table to Noemi. She’s gone pale, revulsion written across her face. She’s clutching her dinner knife so tightly that her knuckles are going white. She’s as repulsed as I am, and I wish for once that we were in the same pack so I could check in on her.

“Understood,” Meryn says stiffly.

Lucien leans back again, his eyes growing slightly distant. “Alistair discovered through experimentation that he could create a piece of jewelry that worked like a thrall bond but with none of the natural limits. These ‘thrall bracelets’ maintained their power indefinitely and allowed for complete control over a human’s mind regardless of distance. And the humans received no benefits from it.”

Meryn’s face instantly pales, and my blood runs cold. We both know what this means.

“The jewel at the center of each bracelet is created by mixing a human’s blood with a Siphon’s, but since the human doesn’t have to actively drink the Siphon’s blood to establish the connection, it enables nonconsensual bonds—as long as the Siphon can acquire the human’s blood, by any means, they can create a bracelet.”

Meryn looks dizzy.

“Did he have your blood?” I demand, violence starting to hum to life in my veins.

“Tons of it,” she replies weakly. “He was always… caring for me. Wiping my blood up after fights or training. Tending to my wounds.”

It takes all my control not to race back to Cratos and return to Nocturna to hunt him down.

We’re going to invent new ways for Killian Valtiere to die.

Shadows start to stir around the edges of the room. Lucien’s eyes slide over to them and narrow, assessing.

“Now is not the time, princess,” I tell Meryn, trying to snap her out of it. Her power is thrilling, but the person she wants to harm isn’t here.

She takes a breath and the shadows abate, but she looks wrecked. “It was from the very start,” she whispers into the bond. “From the very beginning of our relationship.”

Lucien reaches for his glass. After a long sip, he continues, swirling the golden liquid.

“Of course, such magic was immediately outlawed throughout Astreona as an abomination—a fundamental violation of autonomy. But it didn’t matter to Alistair. He continued to create thrall bracelets in secret, eventually leading to his exile from the kingdom.”

Meryn seems entirely unable to speak.

“Do you know how to get them off?” I ask him tightly. “Is it possible?”

Lucien shakes his head. “Only the creator can remove them. If the wearer can get it off themselves, by any means, they die. It’s one of the many reasons they are outlawed.”

The corruption in our magic. The way he’s using Meryn’s shadows. It’s all going to stay until he’s dead.

Fuck.

At least he doesn’t seem to have any compulsion powers over her. If he had, surely he would’ve forced Meryn to come to him by now.

Meryn’s eyes go to her wrist and linger there.

I’m not the only one who sees it.

Lucien grabs her hand, face full of suspicion. In one swift move, he yanks up her sleeve, exposing the bracelet to the entire table.

An immediate shock wave rips through the room.

The Astreonans recoil, averting their eyes and darting away as if Meryn’s a plague victim and they don’t want to breathe her air. The only exception among the court is Elias, who glares at the bracelet on her wrist.

Noemi and Venna and I all shift closer to her.

A tense moment of silence follows, followed by a white blur.

And then there’s a blade at Meryn’s throat.

One pounding beat of my heart he was sitting in his chair, the next, Lucien stands over Meryn with a dagger pointed at her jugular, his fangs bared, his eyes burning with malice.

I’m on my feet almost as quickly as Lucien, drawing a concealed blade.

“Hurry!” I send out a pulse to Cratos.

Lucien looks predatory.

He does a nice job of pretending to be insouciant, but I was waiting for the feral creature inside him to come out. Finally, I see it. The true danger lurking beneath his bored, playful veneer.

“Unhand her immediately,” I snap. “My direwolf is on his way, and kings taste just as good to him as anyone else.”

Noemi and Venna also have their weapons fully drawn, but Lucien doesn’t seem bothered by the various blades pointed at him or the threat of a fully grown, battle-tested direwolf closing in.

His grip on Meryn tightens, pinning her to her chair. “If the queen is here under Alistair’s control, she is a danger to all of us, including you. The thrall bracelets give my brother complete dominion over the wearer’s mind.”

That doesn’t make any sense. Meryn’s bracelet doesn’t seem to work that way.

While Lucien is talking, Meryn curves her wrist, angling her own blade slowly. Lucien tenses as it presses firmly against his side, right between his ribs where a simple shove would plunge it into vital organs.

His eyes widen; he wasn’t expecting her to bite back.

“This is a really fucking poor example of diplomacy,” she says, lip curling. “I’m not a thrall. I would be aware if I didn’t have any control over my own mind. Whatever Alistair did with those bracelets, mine works differently.”

Lucien scoffs. “Would you be aware?”

“She’s telling the truth,” I say.

“Killian has influence over my powers, not my mind,” Meryn replies coldly. “He can sap some of them away from me and access the pack bonds.”

Lucien pauses, brow relaxing slightly. And then he fluidly steps back.

The dagger leaves Meryn’s throat, and I drop mine at the same moment. Distantly, I sense Cratos’s pace slow.

Lucien sits, and the Astreonans follow. Not without staring at the rest of us like we’re the aggressors, though. Meryn lifts her hand and lowers it, and Venna and Noemi return to their seats just as the Siphons did.

I don’t move. I stay standing right next to her, rage still coursing through me.

When Lucien sits, he stares at her for a few seconds.

Then he calmly says, as if he didn’t just threaten Meryn’s life, “I’ve never seen a bracelet work this way before.” He’s studying her anew. Reconsidering. “I’ll need to consult with our librarians about this.”

“I have another question,” Meryn says, finally taking her seat, as do I. “Your father, in that memory, looked to be in his midfifties. King Cyril—all the kings before him, in fact, who harbored Alistair—also looked middle-aged. But you’re hundreds of years old and you look young. How does it work?”

“I’m a thousand years old, actually,” he says snidely. He points to the rings in his ears. “We wear one for every hundred years.” I see now—five rings in each ear, ten total.

Elias wears one, so he must be a hundred years old. Ruby wore four; four hundred years.

“Thanks for the fashion lesson, but the aging?” Meryn says.

Lucien leans back in his chair. “The Siphon aging process is different from the human one, yes. We age at the same pace as humans until we’re in our early twenties, and then it slows greatly. However, our appearance depends on the quality of the blood we drink. With human blood, you can stay young and handsome forever.”

He waves a hand at his own extremely punchable face.

“Debatable,” Venna mutters into her food, and he sends her a scathing look. Good to know: Insulting his vanity gets under his skin.

“And if you don’t drink human blood?” Meryn prods.

Lucien eventually takes his eyes off Venna. “If you drink animal blood exclusively, yes, you will age. Your lifespan is still longer than an average human, but you will be weak. My father was an ascetic whose only mode of pleasure was self-denial. We never saw eye to eye there. I suspect the Nocturnan kings did the same in order to fool the public.”

Meryn takes a breath. “There’s a lot for us to learn about Siphon powers.”

Another amused, seductive look comes over Lucien. “If you have questions, my personal chambers are always open to you, Queen Meryn.”

Something territorial and furious bursts to life in my gut.

Lucien’s teasing glance darts to me, his grin spreading.

I hope his personal chambers are open to me, too—because I’m going to cut his eyes out while he sleeps. He’ll still be alive, but he won’t be able to look at her like that ever fucking again.

Meryn ignores his innuendo. “Okay, so you’ve shown me the truth. What are you proposing?”

Lucien leans forward, serious again. “Nocturna and Astreona do not need to be enemies. Our true enemy is Alistair Brightbane and his vessel Killian. I propose a permanent ceasefire and for our nations to become formal allies in the fight against him.”

Meryn blinks, unimpressed.

I slam a fist down on the table again, rattling all the stupidly gilded silverware, and Lucien lifts his brows. “Did you have something you wanted to interject, Alpha?” he says lazily.

“That’s it? A ceasefire and we become allies? That’s basically the exact same thing your general said to us at the border. Why the fuck did you drag us all the way out here?”

“Stark,” Meryn warns. “We need to hear him out.”

Lucien takes a sip of his golden liquor. “You had to experience Astreona if you were ever to believe that you’d been fed lies for hundreds of years. Plus, I had to see your queen for myself and judge her, of course.”

He lingers on the word see for too long. The nerve of this asshole.

We glower at each other.

“Alpha Stark makes a good point,” Meryn says coolly. “I am enticed by the idea of a ceasefire and becoming allies, but I was expecting more from you. Do you have a plan for how to deal with your brother and his current host?”

Lucien leans his head on his palm, a catlike expression on his face. “Queen Meryn, if you want more from me, I promise I am very giving.”

Before I can stand up and take a swing at him, Meryn reaches a hand down and grabs my knee, squeezing hard. Her touch on me after so long ignites a swirling, impossible need. “Ignore him. He’s just toying with you.”

“He’s toying with you, and that I cannot stand.”

Meryn relaxes her hold on my knee, and I want to grab it, hold her more tightly to me.

“King Lucien is testing boundaries like a rude child. If you let him rile you up, he’s just going to get worse. Cool your fucking head, Daemos, before you start a diplomatic incident.”

“It’s cute how you do that,” Lucien says, a smug smile creeping back onto his face. “You’re talking, aren’t you? I can tell by the way you keep glancing at each other. Not as subtle as you think.”

Meryn’s eyes slice back to him, sharpening. “You’re right. I’m not subtle. What I am is increasingly irritated.”

The shadows in the room start to sway again. So much for not letting him rile us up.

“So, do you have a plan or did you seriously just bring us here to judge me?” she continues. “Because my country is on the brink of tearing itself apart, and I’d really rather be there, muddling through this whole leadership thing, than here, watching you put on sword fighting shows for your own amusement and experiencing repulsive visions of your orgies!” Her voice breaks on the last word, shrill.

The whole room goes silent.

Lucien sits back in his chair, letting the points of his fangs show as he smiles widely. “Sorry to hear you didn’t enjoy it. You are my plan, Queen Meryn. I’ve been a beloved ruler for hundreds of years because I know how to delegate.”

My brows furrow. What is he trying to say?

“Be direct,” Meryn demands.

Lucien straightens and says, “If you agree to work together, I will give you complete control of the Astreonan forces. They are yours to command.”

36

MERYN

Complete control of the Astreonan forces.

He’s joking, right? He has to be joking.

Or he’s not joking. He means what he said. And it’s just part of a plot that I can’t quite see or understand.

After Lucien’s absolutely ludicrous declaration, I tell him that I need some time to think about it. That I’d like to take a walk to clear my head.

I’m not the only one who needs some air, though. Stark’s dark emotions have been roiling at the surface of my brain from the moment I woke up from that vision. I need to move, and I need him to move, too. His edginess is seeping into me over our bond, winding me up.

We set out from the southern gate of the castle, passing through gardens and then across one of the bridges that leads us away from the castle complex.

We don’t talk as we move. Frustration runs hot between us, through me and over to him and back to me. It fuels our movement, and we pace faster and faster through the city outskirts until our walk is almost a run.

Once we leave the cobblestoned streets of Brightbane behind, I take a deep breath and speak.

“Stark.” He looks my way, but neither of us slows down. “Set your anger aside, if you can. What do you think I should do here?”

Stark’s voice is full of thinly veiled tension when he responds. “I don’t trust their king at all. This could still be an elaborate trap. I don’t see how we could possibly take him at his word.”

We pass out of the city as we walk, into the wilderness, a rough and stony wasteland that separates Brightbane from the scorching desert beyond. The sun is starting to set, and the rays paint the landscape in reds and oranges and yellows. It looks like another world.

We skirt around a large rock outcropping, and I wind down to the left until it’s at our backs, shielding the city from view. I sink down to my haunches. Right here, all we can see is rock and scrub and the sun’s dying rays, no city spires in sight.

The city of Brightbane could almost be just a tale from a storybook. Almost.

I chew on my lip, thinking over Stark’s words. “I agree. But I’m trying to think it through. A trap? For what? It’s clear Lucien hates Alistair. Wants him dead, once and for all. We’re united in that goal, at least.”

Stark steps over to stand beside me and leans against the rocky surface at his back. “And after Alistair is dead? Once the entirety of the Astreonan forces are inside our land? What if his end goal is to take over Nocturna for himself? How will you possibly turn back his armies at that point?”

Fair enough. I gaze at the horizon, eyes unseeing. “Does he strike you as that ambitious, though?”

That surprises a laugh out of Stark. The sound warms me, even as anxiety still swirls in my gut.

“No, I suppose he doesn’t,” Stark concedes. “It seems like he barely even wants to be king of his own country.” He sighs. “Still, we don’t know him at all. We’re basing this on impressions from a single meeting. We don’t know the truth of his personality or his actual desires.”

I nod and look up at Stark where he looms above me. “You’re right. I think… I think we should hold him off, then. At least for a couple of days. Then I can spend some time getting to know him, find out his real intentions, before we commit to any course of action.”

Stark’s face darkens.

“What?” Why does he look like he’s about to kill something?

And why does that idea make heat instantly bloom between my legs?

Stark grunts. “The idea of you getting to know him…”

For fuck’s sake. “Get real, Stark,” I snap, rising back up to face him directly. “I’ve made it perfectly clear how I feel about you. You’re the one holding back. You have absolutely no right to be jealous of anyone, especially over something this absurd.”

Stark just looks at me, face impassive. Frustrating, stoic man. Suddenly, he’s the last person I want to be talking to.

“Fuck this,” I mutter. I brush off my clothes and turn to go. “Thanks for the counsel. I’ll see you later.”

I start to leave, but my progress is cut short by his hand encircling my wrist. Stark’s fingers close tight around my arm, and I’m pulled back into him.

I let out a small, surprised sound. His warmth on my skin is doing funny things to my heartbeat. I briefly collide with his chest as he yanks me back, and the places where we touch are searing, branded.

When I look up at his face, his eyes are dark, intense, aggrieved. My mouth goes dry.

“Meryn,” he starts, voice gravelly. “For a brief second tonight, I thought we’d lost you. I was worried that you were gone and that I didn’t have a chance to tell you—you are everything.”

My heart pounds, blood rushing through my veins. Heat gathers, low and dangerous in my belly.

“You’re tenacious and headstrong and so fucking powerful that even thinking about it gets me half hard.” His voice is husky, and his eyes pin me in place. I can’t look away. “And that you share that power? That you open yourself up to me and encourage me to use it with you?”

He swallows, and I’m drawn to the movement of his neck, so close to my lips. I want to lick the stubble showing there, trace his tattoos with my tongue. I clench my jaw and meet his eyes once more.

“I’ve never known someone like you, Meryn Sturmfrost. I spent so long hating you and resenting your existence—all the time I’ve fucking wasted being mean to you with the excuse of trying to make you stronger. And it never broke you down.”

At that, I can’t stay silent. “I’d never let you break me, Stark Therion.”

His low laugh goes straight to my center. “No. You wouldn’t, would you? You sank your sharp edges into me instead. You broke me, princess—but in the best way. You’ve taken the vision I have of myself and destroyed it before my very eyes. If I’m a bad man—you make me want to do bad things for the right reasons. You are my right reason.”

His words stoke the heat inside me until I’m burning with it. I’d do anything, damn the world and everyone in it, just to get his mouth on mine.

There’s still a distance between us, though. I can almost taste it, the way he’s holding himself back, at a remove.

“And yet?” I ask, barely choking out the words around my desire.

Self-consciousness flickers across his face briefly and my pulse picks up. He’s exposing a side of himself to me that no one else gets to see.

“Are you sure?” The words come out quiet, slow, and they make me ache.

My heart twists for this gorgeous, brutal, vicious, thoughtful man—who has rarely had someone choose him for him.

Pressing closer to him, I relish the heat off his body, the tight hold of his fingers on my arm. His breath roughens as I move in, and my skin is alight with the sensation of his nearness.

I can’t go another minute without his skin under my lips.

“Let me show you how sure I am, Alpha Stark.” My voice is barely a whisper, but I can see the instant effect it has on him, see his eyes darken with lust. “Maybe you’ll believe me then.”

And without waiting for an answer, I reach my free hand up and rip open his shirt, the flimsy Astreonan material tearing under my hands.

Then, finally, my mouth and teeth are on him. I’m fucking ravenous. His neck, his stubble. The swirls and jagged lines of each tattoo. I use my free hand to trace each one, licking and nipping each shape as I move downward.

Stark groans, and the desperate sound makes me instantly wet.

The muscles of his chest harden at my attention, his nipples becoming two sharp peaks. I trace the line of his pecs with my lips, lost to the sensation of his hard skin under my mouth.

And his scars. Those scars that cover almost every part of him. I give each one special attention, reveling as his muscles tense and release under my ministrations.

His abs are a wonderland of tattoo and scarred skin and rock-solid muscle. I drag my teeth down, over the hard ridges, and I’m rewarded with a gasp above me.

Smiling against his skin, I yank my other hand from his grip, finally. I dip the fingers of one hand under his waistband, using the other to undo the clasps holding it closed. Each clasp reveals more perfect muscle. Dropping to my knees, kissing the V of his muscles that leads straight down to his cock, I nearly lose my mind in anticipation.

And yet nothing could have prepared me for the sight of him when I finally free him from his pants. Hard and huge and velvety, standing straight up between us.

He’s gorgeous.

I wrap my hand around the base, my fingers barely touching, and give an experimental pull.

Stark curses and thrusts into me, just slightly. I bite my lower lip and look up at him. He’s staring down at me, his eyes on mine, mouth slightly parted in wonder.

I’m on my knees for him, but I’ve never felt more powerful in my life.

My insides clench tightly as I imagine being filled by this glorious, primal man.

Slowly, enjoying every moment, I lower my lips to the head of his cock. Once, twice, I swirl my tongue around him, then lap up the bead of moisture at its tip. My thighs tighten at his taste, salty and warm and masculine. Stark lets out another groan.

I tease him with the flat of my tongue, licking down his shaft and back up again.

And then I can’t make myself wait any longer. Hungrily, I take him into my mouth, his girth almost overwhelming me.

His hand comes down to grab my hair, fingers lacing themselves through silver strands. He tightens his fist to pull up my head and then relaxes again, and my mouth sinks down another inch.

Fuck.

I moan around his cock, my eyes shutting with pleasure and satiation. He fills my mouth, and I open wider, letting the head nudge the back of my throat. I lift up and then sink down again, fast, almost gagging as I take him deeper.

His hips buck just a little, nudging the back of my throat again, filling me more completely. I see stars. I moan again, deep and senseless. Then pull up, sucking hard, only to sink my head back down again and again.

“Get up.”

His order is rough, but controlled.

What? Doesn’t he like this? I pull my mouth off him, standing slowly, uncertain.

His face is flushed, eyes dark with promise.

“Turn around,” he says then, and my body remembers taking his instruction in the woods. My skin goes molten. I comply, shaking with need.

There’s the telltale whisper of a dagger leaving its sheath, and I don’t even have a moment to process my confusion. A millisecond later, the laces along my spine are all loosening at once.

His dagger clatters against the sandy stone at our feet.

He just cut me out of the dress, slicing through the ties in one smooth swipe. I swallow another moan at the image, aching to turn back around but waiting for his next command.

“I need to be inside you,” Stark says then, his breath ghosting against my neck. His calloused fingers slide inside my panties and yank them down to my feet. I fight to stay standing as my knees weaken at his words. “You’ve been taking the draught, right?”

“Yes, yes,” I say hurriedly. Our party made sure to bring enough of the contraceptive draught we all take when we departed for this journey. Just in case. “So you believe me, then? That I’m sure?”

He licks the back of my neck, and a moan tears out of me. “I’ll believe you when you show me how wet you are. Bend over, princess.”

His brusque order lights me on fire. I slowly comply, holding my own ankles and flushing as I imagine his view. My bare backside, presented for his pleasure. My center, aching for him.

“Show me that you’re ready for me.” His hands skim up the insides of my thighs and then stop just short of my aching need, torturous. Through my legs, I watch as he kneels behind me. Pleasure lashes through me as he presses his mouth to my slit and licks me front to back, lapping up my wetness.

I arch and cry out, already half senseless.

“You’re dripping,” he murmurs, and the movement of his lips and the low buzz of his voice send tremors through me. He presses his mouth to my clit, and I moan, then again when his tongue circles me, teasing me with intensity.

“Wa-wait,” I stutter out, and he stops beneath me, his breath still hot on my tender lips. “I need to hear you say that you believe you won’t ruin me. That you’re not going to walk away from this again.”

He presses a kiss deep against my slit, and I fight back a moan. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Then he stands, and I nearly weep at the loss of his heat at the center of my thighs. He grabs my upper arm, his hold deliciously tight on me, and yanks me up to standing, too.

Stark puts his mouth next to my ear, the warmth of his breath sending tingles from my head to my toes. His huge body is wrapped around my back, and his throbbing, insistent cock presses into my lower back.

“But I am absolutely going to fucking ruin you, princess, starting right now.” I go breathless, boneless. “Turn around.”

I comply faster than thought, spinning around to face him, bare skin against bare skin. He pivots me until my back is to the rock outcropping, and we step back together until my flushed skin hits cool stone.

“I’m not going to be able to hold myself back with you, Meryn,” Stark warns me. His eyes search mine in the gathering darkness. I reach a hand up and bring his mouth to mine in answer, crushing my lips to his. He pulls away, and I gasp.

His rough hand comes up to palm my breast, fingers tweaking around a nipple, making me writhe against him.

“Fuck. You unleash me, Meryn. You make me lose control.”

“Good,” I reply, my voice breathy with want. “I want to break your control. Show me what it looks like when you’re unleashed.”

The sound he makes then is primal, pure desire voiced. I arch into him just hearing it. I want him. Goddess, I want him. My hands come up to his bare shoulders, and I cling to him as he brings his mouth back down to mine.

We devour each other, and I mewl into his mouth as his hands move to cup my ass, pulling me up and into him. His cock brushes against my slick folds, and I cry out, the sound disappearing into his mouth.

He rubs himself through my folds again and again until I’m whimpering.

Then he maneuvers me until the thick head of his cock is teasing at my entrance. I shiver and clench, aching for him.

“Goddess, Stark, please,” I cry into his lips, nonsensical. “Please, please, I need you inside me.”

Something in him breaks as I beg. His large hands pull me down onto him, his cock sliding into me, fast, filling me, making me whole. His size makes my eyes water. I gasp and pull back to look at him, wrapping my legs around his back.

Stark’s gaze is glazed over, heated. He glances down between us, watching where we meet, and slides slowly in and out of me. “You’re so tight, but you take me so well,” he murmurs, mesmerized, continuing to slowly push in and pull out, fucking me lightly.

My chest heaves against his, my hard nipples scraping against his skin. “I was made for you.” The words come out whining, needy.

His eyes snap to mine. “No, princess. We were made for each other. Now hold on tight.”

I do as he says, and he gathers me up in his hands. Then he yanks me up and then back down again, sheathing himself deeper inside me with each thrust until he’s buried to the hilt.

I’m making noises now, sobs and groans and incoherent pleading. Stark’s cock is filling me in ways I didn’t know I needed, so deep that it’s everywhere.

He sets a punishing rhythm, erasing all thought from my mind until all I am is this, here, us.

I throw my head back and realize with a jolt that he’s put a hand behind my head to shield my skull from the rock behind us. The thoughtful care for me—even as he’s fucking me roughly and desperately—careens me closer to the edge.

Stark nuzzles my neck and then nips his way down to my collarbone, fucking me senseless all the while. The night sky wheels above me, stars making trails of light against the dark. I shut my eyes and give myself over to sensation.

Stark’s rhythm speeds up, and I press my face against his neck, gathering and tightening as the world narrows down to just us. The pull of him inside me, the push as he fills me deeper and deeper—

One more thrust and I’m lost, my orgasm exploding through me like a snowstorm.

He holds me as I shudder, keeping himself deep inside me as I clench around his cock again and again.

It’s only when I start to come down that Stark picks up that rhythm again, thrusting into me as he pulls me down to him. Impossibly, he grows even harder inside me. I’m moaning into his ear, repeating his name, insensible, as he speeds up toward his own climax.

Then he’s shouting as he spills inside me, filling me with pulsing wet heat.

We pant and cling to each other, sticky with sweat, the cool breezes of the desert around us only just finally starting to register.

“Stark,” I murmur, and he pulls back to look at my face. The depth of emotion I see there scares me and settles me all at once.

I close my eyes and let my cheek rest on his shoulder, humming with contentment. Stark holds me close to him as his breathing slows, then slowly pulls away, finding what remains of our clothing. I push his hands away as he offers me the fabric, and he understands what I need without me asking.

Stark lays the layers of clothing down on the smoothest part of the ground and then gathers me to him.

Soon enough, I’m cradled by him again, bare skin to bare skin. Warm. Safe. Sated. I breathe in, and it smells like him—deep and musky and amber. I breathe out, and he shivers from the caress of it. The steady stroke of his calluses over my hip sends me to a quiet sleep.

It doesn’t last long.

I can’t have been asleep for ten minutes when sensations tear through my mental bonds—panic, fear, and excruciating pain. None of it’s my own.

I lurch awake, crying out.

Stark’s hands are on me, pulling me close like he’s going to shelter me from it.

“Meryn, focus,” Stark reminds me.

I blink rapidly and squeeze my eyes shut. My consciousness races along the bonds, seeking out the source of the suffering.

“It’s… Noemi,” I choke out.

She’s hurt. Her pain and terror are shrieking over our connection so loudly it’s like I can hear her screams from here, bouncing off the craggy stones all around us.

I’m on my feet and reaching for my clothes as I call Anassa. She tries to soothe me, but I won’t have any peace until I know Noemi’s safe.

The direwolves make short work of the distance Stark and I traveled by foot. We’re already dressed, my dress held together haphazardly by what’s left of its ties, Stark snatching his dagger from the sand, as our wolves sprint into the clearing.

“Back to the castle,” I tell Anassa shakily.

She snarls, channeling my fear and anger. “Get on.”

37

MERYN

We ride hard. My concern for Noemi is a great distraction from  the ache between my legs.

The half hour’s journey Stark and I took from the city lasts maybe five minutes on the way back—and costs the city of Brightbane several low-hanging structures and a pen of pigs that was set loose as we barreled straight through everything in our path.

By the time we’re past the gates and waved inside by the guards, Anassa is panting and her muscles are shaking from the prolonged full-on sprint. I jump from her back, checking in with her as I race up the pale stone steps of the palace.

“Just get to the girl,” she says.

Stark runs past me and slams the doors open. I march through, out of breath and hand on my dagger’s hilt, eyes scanning the hall before me. My father whirls around, startled by our sudden entrance.

Fredrich’s eyes widen when he sees me, and he rushes toward us.

“Where’s—?”

“Saela is safe in her rooms.” My surprise that he knew the question before I asked it stuns me into silence, and I let him take my arm and guide me down the hall at a clipped pace. “I’ll return to her once I’ve taken you to them.”

Noemi’s agony still tears through the bond, but it’s now been joined by Venna’s alarm and anger. Shouts echo through the high halls as we draw closer. Dread sinks into my bones.

“Where are we going?”

“The king’s personal chambers,” my father replies.

I curse inwardly and reach for Stark for some semblance of calm. His mind meets mine, and he soothes me as best as he’s able while feeling halfway murderous himself. Even then, Noemi’s emotions are devastatingly violent, gouging deep into the bone inside my skull.

There’s a shriek ahead, and I lurch into a sprint again. Then comes what sounds like furniture crashing and armor scraping against stone.

I turn the corner and stop dead in my tracks.

To think, I left with Stark precisely to avoid causing a diplomatic crisis.

It’s chaos. Royal guards are restraining Noemi, who fights against them. She has a deep scrape over her brow that’s pouring blood down the side of her pale face.

Venna is rifting, disappearing and reappearing in different places around the room. Each time she steps out of the darkness, the guards startle and whirl, their faces taut with concentration as they try to track her movements.

At the center of it all is Lucien. He stands in a casual, lazy lean against the ornately carved entrance to his chambers. He looks as if he’s posing for a portrait, not like he’s watching diplomatic relations break down before his eyes.

And he’s bleeding. Everywhere.

The entire front of his silk robe—egregiously drawn open at his chest—is dyed scarlet with it. There’s a deep wound at his shoulder, already healing but clearly serious.

His expression as he watches Noemi struggle is strange. The top half of his face looks amused, like a cat toying with a mouse. The bottom half is twisted with what looks like cold anger.

I immediately push a deafening order through the bond. “Stand down.”

Noemi and Venna freeze in place, bodies locking up but faces still communicating obvious anger. There will be time to talk through all this—afterward.

I step forward. Lucien’s guards part before me. The king watches as Stark and I approach. He clearly takes in the ruined state of my dress and the way Stark’s shirt hangs open from where I tore it off him.

“Sorry if we interrupted something,” he drawls.

“Tell me what happened,” I demand, ignoring him.

Multiple voices begin speaking at once. Lucien raises his hand, and they’re strangled silent.

“It would seem that this one”—he gestures to Noemi—“somehow tracked my movements and gained access to my private chambers, then proceeded to lie in wait with a dagger coated in poison.”

He pauses to just barely curl his upper lip at her before his gaze cuts back to me.

“When I entered my bedroom, she ambushed me and managed to wound me deeply before my guards responded to the commotion. I assume then you informed that one”—he gestures at Venna—“that one of your own was in grave peril, because she came running to point more weapons at me. And thus, the very standoff you see before you.”

My gaze flicks to Venna, who nods.

Noemi, still restrained but no longer struggling, spits out words as if they’re poisonous. “You deserve to die.”

I am shocked by how wild she appears. Since the moment we were first introduced, Noemi has only ever given off a sense of calm, purposeful elegance. Whoever that woman was, she’s gone, replaced by whatever has been living quietly underneath the surface this whole time.

“I refuse to stand by and watch him parade women around like cattle!” she shouts, wrenching in the guards’ grip. “Feeding off them as if they’re nothing but meat!”

Her gaze darts to me and then to Stark. He moves purposefully toward her, hands up as if he were facing a feral direwolf.

Noemi sucks in a quick breath, and she doesn’t use it to yell again. But the rushed exhale of her words carries so much emotion that she may as well be screaming.

“How can you seriously consider an alliance with evil, perverted beasts who treat humans like this?”

A cool chuckle slips between Lucien’s lips. He drags a fingertip through his own blood where it’s drying on his skin, a soft smile emerging.

“You thought you could kill me? A thousand-year-old Siphon king who has survived five centuries of assassination attempts by much more formidable opponents, including my own brother?” He scoffs and examines the blood on his fingers, rubbing it with his thumb. “It’s insanity. You are truly lucky I found your attack more entertaining than threatening or you would already be dead.”

A pulse of rage explodes from Noemi, and Stark’s fury is white-hot in my mind. I lock it out of my consciousness, sending up my mental barriers for the first time tonight. I need all my focus on Lucien. Right now, there’s genuine anger behind his amusement.

He either can’t hide it entirely or doesn’t feel the need to.

“What is she playing at?” I ask Stark along the bond. “You know her best. Explain to me, seriously—why is she jeopardizing the entire reason we’re here?”

“You need to ask her yourself,” he responds, eyes meeting mine from where he stands, still close to Noemi but not instigating anything with the guards who restrain her.

His mind, brushing mine, is full of regret and guilt.

“Just… trust that she has her reasons for acting this way,” he continues. “It doesn’t excuse it. I blame myself for this; I should’ve considered the position we were putting her in by bringing her here.”

What does that mean?!

When Lucien’s eyes are on me again, he straightens and stands at his full height for the first time since I arrived. His tone sharpens, losing its rolling, sigh-like quality entirely. “This is no way for guests to treat their host, especially when that host is considering a historic alliance that could end centuries of war.”

Considering. It’s a veiled threat. A warning that he’s still powerful enough to snatch peace away and unleash his army on us without a Phylax in sight to protect our front lines.

Well, there’s one Phylax in sight, I guess. Assuming she survives the next ten minutes.

Venna, Stark, and I exchange glances, each looking to the other to see if anyone has some semblance of a plan.

Before I have time to open communication for the three of us mentally, Lucien flicks his hand, and his guards start to move. Two start to march Noemi away, and the rest disband to take up stations along the hall.

“Lucien,” I snap.

He raises an annoyed brow at me.

“Let me speak to her in private,” I say. After a long moment, I tack on, “Please.”

I’m not in the habit of begging for basic courtesies, but I would like to avoid Noemi losing her life on this trip.

“Fine,” he says with a sigh. He points to a small room off the entrance area to his chambers. “You can take my office. The guards will wait outside.”

Noemi rips free from the hold on her arms, her green eyes still blazing as she stomps into the office, like she isn’t the one in the wrong. I follow her, glancing back at Stark. His concern is written all over his face. He doesn’t want her hurt, either, but he knows she really fucked up.

Noemi immediately goes to a slouchy leather armchair and throws herself into it, then buries her face in her hands. Her shimmering red hair falls around her in protective waves. She starts to weep.

I close the door quietly behind us and move closer to her… but not too close, in case she decides she hasn’t stabbed enough monarchs tonight.

“What’s going on?” I ask gently.

She looks up, her face blotchy and streaked with tears. “I’m sorry, Meryn—I’m so sorry. I saw him with that woman tonight, and maybe she agreed to be there, I don’t know, but something about it felt so nonconsensual. I snapped.”

I nod to encourage her to keep going, but I also know what she means.

The humans in this country don’t appear to have much of a choice. Those in charge make the laws, and those laws are amenable to Siphons, with little regard to how a human might feel. If a Siphon can drink your blood as payment of debts owed or as a prize after winning an unfair fighting match… how free are these people, really?

Sure, it looks like the humans enjoy the sensation of… being fed upon, as much as the thought makes me sick. But I know all too well that pleasure and coercion can go hand in hand.

Bright blue eyes flash in my mind at the thought, and I shiver.

Noemi’s cheeks flush with a bit of color—which, of course, only makes her prettier—and she clasps her hands tightly in her lap. “You need to know something. During my time in the Bonding Trials, I was King Cyril’s chosen companion.” The word comes out bitter, filled with disgust.

No. My stomach drops to my feet.

“As I’m sure you’re aware, being his companion could be sort of a competition between some of the women. There was a level of status involved in being chosen. However, I was not given a choice.”

She looks away from me now, her eyes getting glassy again. Noemi worries her bottom lip between her teeth for a long moment before continuing.

“My father, Lord Eisenfall, arranged my selection with the king—years before my Trials, in fact. Cyril saw me once in person when I was twelve and told my father it would be beneficial to his fiefdom if I was… encouraged… to vie for his attention during the Trials when I was of age.” She glances back at me, and the steel has returned. “There were zero conversations about feelings or consent. I entered the Trials, newly eighteen and accepting of my fate. If I did not perform to Cyril’s expectations, my father would be displeased.”

My stomach is a twisting, writhing mess, and I want to cry now, too—for the girl she was, who had to endure that.

For the woman she is now, who lives with it still.

“My father controls an entire fiefdom, Meryn. A large one. You know as well as I do that all the power we have from being Bonded means nothing when a noble lord snaps his fingers. And I—”

She cuts herself off, looks to her feet, and swallows. Then she looks back up, her face anguished. “He’s awful, I know, but he’s my father. Some fucked-up part of me just wants to make him happy.”

I reach out to her, grab her hand in mine. We just sit there in silence for a moment.

Noemi’s expression hardens as if she’s turning herself into a shield. She slowly disentangles her hand from mine and turns it into a fist. “I don’t want any other women to go through what I went through.”

“I know,” I tell her. “I feel the same way.”

My mind drifts once again to Killian, of what happened between us. It doesn’t compare with the grooming and rape Noemi experienced.

After all, I thought I was consenting at the time.

But it was coercion. Our entire relationship—a relationship built on lies and manipulation—violated my autonomy. For the first time, I’m finally admitting that to myself. My eyes burn, and I swallow the heat down.

Our abuser is the same person now. Alistair was in Cyril, and now he’s in Killian.

“We’re going to get him, Noemi,” I tell her, my voice as sharp as a dagger. She nods, and I can tell she knows we’re not talking about Lucien. “We’re going to make him pay. We’re going to make the right person pay for what he’s done. But we’re not going to be able to do that without Lucien’s support.”

Her lips press into a thin line, and then she says, “I know. What do I do? I fucked up so badly.”

“You need to apologize. Sincerely,” I tell her, and she lets out a sound of distress. “I know, he’s fucking insufferable. He’s going to draw this out as much as possible. It’s the only way, though.”

She nods. “Okay. Thank you.”

I turn to leave, to take her back out to him, and she says, “Meryn?”

There’s a small smile on her lips when I turn back around. “You and Stark. I’m glad.”

I startle. “I—what? You are? How did you—”

“Please,” she sniffs. “I’ve known him since he was a boy. He can’t hide things from me.”

I pause, hesitant. I know Stark isn’t romantically interested in Noemi, but I’m still not sure where she stands. “And you… you’re sure it’s fine? I mean, you weren’t, you never, um…”

She interprets my awkward stammering and waves a hand, laughing. “Yuck, no. It’s not like that between us. We kissed one time as teenagers and were both thoroughly repulsed off it for good. It was like licking a shoe. I like women, actually.”

Wow.

Obsessing over their relationship has taken up so much mental space, and I could’ve just asked her.

“Guess you were right,” I admit begrudgingly to Anassa.

“You have learned wisdom about some things and not others,” Anassa helpfully responds.

“And I suppose you absolutely could not have told me at any point that they weren’t interested in each other? Too much idle human gossip for you?”

Anassa lets me feel her amusement. “Oh, no, I just enjoyed watching you ruminate in circles. It was endearingly unreasonable.”

Mangy bitch.

I offer Noemi my hand, and we both drop our smiles, remembering that there’s a Siphon king outside that door who likely wants Noemi’s head for what she’s done.

As if in answer to our thoughts, there’s a banging at the door.

“Time’s up,” comes Lucien’s voice, sing-song yet somehow also deadly.

Hopefully, he’ll be open to a solution. Because I’m not going to let Noemi be killed for what she did, no matter how grievous an error it was.

If Lucien wants Noemi dead, he’s going to have to go through me first.

38

MERYN

It takes begging, and a little bit of humiliation for all of us, to get Lucien to accept Noemi’s apology. Eventually, he relents and sends us all off to bed. I can tell he’s going to hold this one over me, though.

He seems like the kind of person who enjoys having an upper hand.

Stark and I collapse into the bed in my room, and I expect sleep to take me quickly after all the events of the day.

It doesn’t, though. There’s too much on my mind.

The thrall bracelet and everything I’ve learned about the Siphons. The possible alliance with Astreona, and what Lucien might gain from it. The Tears.

My thoughts keep returning to the Goddess Tears. How did Lucien and I end up with matching jewels in our crowns? Something about it feels very much by design.

And then back to Killian.

I’m going to need all the power I can get if I’m going up against him, if Alistair is as strong as Lucien claims.

Which then brings me full circle back to the Tears, and the one hanging around my sister’s neck.

At some point, the sun rises, and I’ve still barely slept. A finger traces my jaw.

“Something is bothering you,” Stark says.

How long has he been watching over me as I tossed and turned? I curl closer to him.

“I think I need the Tear that Saela is wearing,” I whisper. I wish I could bottle the peace of this moment, vulnerable but safe in his arms. “The Tear in my crown made me so much more powerful on the battlefield, and when I put the necklace on for that brief moment at the war camp, I felt it amplifying my power, too. But…”

“It’s protecting Saela,” Stark supplies.

I fiddle with the button on his shirt. “I can’t let Killian’s influence reach her, but I need that power if we’re going to defeat him. Before we left the front, Ruby said there were ways to block the sire bond.”

Stark’s brow just barely tightens. “There is one person here who might have some answers for you.”

I roll over onto my back with a groan. “I know, I was thinking the same. But I’m not sure how eager he’ll be to help us this morning after we just tried to assassinate him last night.”

We both contemplate the absurdity of that statement for a moment.

“He let Noemi live,” Stark points out. “He made you grovel for it, the bastard, but still. That’s not the action of a monarch who’s willing to walk away from this peace negotiation.”

I turn that over in my mind. “You’re right,” I admit. “He’s been insufferable and insulting, but he’s actually been fairly cooperative so far. Ugh, I was really hoping to go a few more hours without seeing his dumb face.”

Stark gets out of bed, and I follow him reluctantly, throwing on a set of clean clothes.

I need to talk to Saela. She should be the first to know what I’m thinking since the necklace is in her possession—and keeping her safe.

My eyes are bleary from lack of sleep as I push open the door to our shared living room and then stop dead in my tracks.

Saela and Venna sit on the couch, speaking slowly but conversantly in sign language. Saela looks so comfortable—or at least she did until I arrived.

I didn’t realize she learned so much sign language, and so quickly. Then again, she’s always picked things up fast.

“Good morning, you two.” I try to remember the signs I saw before they cut off their conversation, but there were too many words I didn’t recognize.

Saela looks up at me, blushing.

She’s clearly hiding something, but for the life of me, I don’t know what it is. What were she and Venna talking about?

Venna rises. “I’ll let you two get ready for the day,” she says, moving to leave.

“Wait. Venna, can we talk first?” I say. “Walk with me?”

She nods and follows me away from my sister’s prying ears, into the palace corridor. I aimlessly turn us left.

“What was that? Is Saela okay?” I blurt out. “It felt like she was hiding something from me just now.” I glance sidelong at Venna’s face as we walk.

Venna presses her lips together, inhaling deeply. “That’s between the two of you, Meryn,” she says. “I don’t want to get in the middle of this.”

I stop short. So I am missing something here, after all. “If she has something she needs to talk about, she should talk to me. I’m her sister! She shouldn’t sneak around, keeping secrets by using a language I can barely understand.”

Venna sighs in obvious irritation and turns to me, eyebrows raised. “Well, Meryn, whose fault is it that you haven’t moved past basic signs yet?”

I bite my lip and pivot to look out the window behind me, studying the courtyard just beyond. My body burns with shame. I know she’s right. It’s not something I’ve prioritized enough, not like I should have.

“Look,” Venna says from behind me, voice kinder than I deserve. “Saela is going through some things that she feels like only I will understand.”

My eyes flood with tears unexpectedly, and I blink rapidly to clear them. “What things?! She should know that she can always talk to me about anything!”

“Can she? Be honest with yourself, Meryn.” Venna puts a hand on my shoulder, and I turn to meet her gaze. The look she gives me is piercing, but not unkind. “Do you know what it feels like to be marked by difference? To be made to feel like some essential part of you is unwanted? Can you put yourself in that perspective?”

I swallow down the lump in my throat.

Venna lets her hand drop from my shoulder, taking a step back. When she speaks again, her voice is weary.

“Saela is excited to be in a place where she fits in, where she’s not seen as a problem but as something common. And she doesn’t know how you’d take that.”

It stings. I’m such a fucking asshole.

I’ve been holding so tight to the idea of the future that I’d imagined for us, one where we grow old together. One where we pass through all of life’s important moments at each other’s sides.

It’s everything I strived for with the Trials. Finding my sister and returning our lives to normalcy.

But Saela’s normal has changed. And instead of accepting that, I rejected her new existence. Over and over and over again.

Venna turns back toward our rooms, then looks over her shoulder to see if I’m coming. “I’m always happy to talk, Meryn. But if you want to hear more from your sister, you need to have that conversation with her yourself and be open to her. See her for who she is, not who you want her to be.”

Goddess, I hope I can heal our relationship. That she’ll forgive me and learn to trust me again.

“Understood,” I say.

Venna stops dead in her tracks, and spins back toward me. “Wait, before we’re in front of innocent ears… you and Stark? I know you didn’t cut yourself out of your dress last night.”

My face heats. I didn’t tell Venna about what happened between Stark and me outside of Grunfall, or everything afterward. It felt like it would betray him to gossip about it, at least until he’d decided one way or another.

Well, his decision is made.

“Yep,” I say. “That’s happening.”

Venna smirks. “Nice one.”

I pat her on the back. “Thanks, that means a lot coming from the Kryptos Killer.”

Venna and Saela both want to come with me to ask Lucien about how to block Saela’s sire bond. It doesn’t surprise me: They’re alike in many ways, including their desire to learn everything they can.

I could probably benefit from being more like them.

Stark is torn between joining us and staying with Noemi, who is still recovering from her adventures of the previous night. I assure him that we’ll be safe without him and that I’ll call him mentally if we sense the slightest bit of trouble.

I’m glad when he acquiesces. Something tells me we’ll get more out of King Lucien without him there.

Saela’s interest turns to full-on excitement when we hear where the king is spending his morning: the Astreonan Royal Library. I smile, watching her light up at the news, but I can’t shake my undercurrent of guilt and sadness, too.

When it comes to Saela, all I’ve done lately is make mistake after mistake. What would it look like to get it right?

Felippe shows us the way to the library and throws open the massive wooden doors with exaggerated pompousness.

My amusement is cut short, though, when I see the room beyond the doors.

Calling this a library seems like an understatement. It’s a damn temple to books. Saela gasps next to me as she leans back to take it in.

There are multiple stories of books and scrolls—connected to one another by tall, narrow spiral staircases—all packed into shelves carved right out of the castle’s pale stone. The massive space is ingeniously lit, with high windows above the books. Then lower, where exposure to sun would tarnish the pages, a system of mirrors has been set up to reflect off one another, bouncing light around the space in a way that protects the books but still floods the rooms with sunlight.

Lucien’s earrings glint in that light as he leans over the large, polished wooden table at the center of the room. Old books and scrolls are laid out before him.

“I didn’t take you for the studious type,” I comment as we step close enough for his proximity to start to drain my joy.

His smirk holds strong. “Normally, I’m not. After all, what else is there to learn after a millennium?” He sighs and slides a book toward me. Saela leans in with me to study the sweeping handwriting while Venna just studies him, frowning.

“These are documents about the creation of thrall bracelets. I’ve been attempting to determine why yours works so differently.”

“And?” I ask.

He caresses a page lightly. “The answer still evades me. I suspect it may have something to do with your direwolf bond. These have only ever been tested on humans. Or perhaps he designed it in some way I don’t understand, with the intention of targeting your powers.”

“So there is something you don’t know,” Venna says lightly.

“Ha,” he says, shooting her a look before turning his intense gaze back to me and my sister.

I wrap an arm around Saela’s shoulders, pulling her in close. “Speaking of uncomfortable connections with Killian and Alistair, there’s something you need to know. My sister has a sire bond with Killian. He’s the one who turned her.”

Lucien’s upper lip curls, and his fingers tighten around the manuscript. “And you chose to keep this information from me?” There’s thinly veiled wrath in his voice. Venna moves closer to me and Saela, hovering protectively.

Lucien’s sharp blue gaze darts toward my sister. “Can you hear him?”

Saela shakes her head as I pull the Tear from the shelter of her top. “This necklace seems to have some sort of protective power,” she explains. “It blocks the connection.”

Lucien and Venna both study the necklace. A spark of recognition lights Lucien’s eyes.

“Interesting,” he murmurs. “I wouldn’t have thought… but then, how can you know for sure?”

“We do,” I interrupt. Saela doesn’t look nervous when I glance at her. “She was without its protection briefly. It’s been tested.” I can tell he’s trying to determine whether he should believe me, but I don’t have the patience. “What do you know about the Tears, Lucien?”

Lucien shuts his eyes and runs a fingertip along his brow as if smoothing away a thread of pain. Then he reaches down beneath his own clothes and lifts the chain around his neck with that same finger.

At the end of it dangles another Tear pendant, glittering with power. It’s a reflection of Saela’s, just as our crowns mirror each other.

A disbelieving noise escapes me. “I guess I wasn’t the only one withholding information. You didn’t feel like revealing this at dinner last night, when you were crowing about how the jewels have power?”

His smile turns sharp, and I know I’m going to hate what comes out of his mouth next. “I only like to show you mine when you show me yours.”

Venna rolls her eyes.

Childish prick. How did he make it a thousand years without someone getting irritated enough to cut off his head?

Ignoring his teasing, I ask, “Are you more powerful when you wear it? Does it enhance your Siphon magic?”

He rubs his thumb over it and bows his head in a nod. Then he speaks under his breath. “I wonder…”

Unexpectedly, he grips the stone, lifts it over his head, and holds it out to me.

Hesitantly, I take it.

The moment the jewel settles against my palm, my power rises in a writhing answer to the stone’s silent call, just as it did when I tried on the other necklace at the war camp.

“Your intoxicated expression tells me it works for you,” Lucien says. His head is tilted to one side like he’s trying to find the right angle to see into me.

Saela, wide-eyed, is too busy digesting this new information to notice the interested gleam in Lucien’s eye. Venna clocks it, though. I make a mental note to discuss that with her later.

“So your crowns help you control your respective powers, the necklaces give you protection, and both of the Tears make your magic stronger,” Saela recites. “I wonder how strong a person would be if they had all the Tears on them at once.”

There’s another Goddess Tear, though. The one the Mother Priestess wears. Probably worth keeping that a secret from Lucien—for now, at least.

I hold Lucien’s necklace back out to him reluctantly. “I’m going to need Saela’s Tear if… if we’re going to face off against Killian and Alistair.”

We haven’t discussed his proposed ceasefire yet. He doesn’t know I’m going to accept it, although surely he must assume I will, given how favorable the terms are for me. Either way, when we meet Killian on a battlefield, I know we’re going to need all the strength we can get.

Lucien smiles as he slips his Tear back on. “If only you had a millennium of experience at your disposal to solve this little problem for you.”

Venna rolls her eyes again, and Lucien sees it this time, looking at her in curiosity. I get the distinct feeling he’s not used to people being unimpressed by him.

“Siphons tend to be particular about consent,” Lucien continues eventually. “Over the years, we developed items capable of blocking a sire’s power. Most commonly fashioned as jewelry, actually. Saela can simply trade what’s around her neck.”

“Another necklace?” Venna looks doubtful. “What proof do we have that this will do what you say?”

“Not to mention, I don’t know if I’m comfortable handing my sister enchanted Siphon jewelry she might never be able to take off,” I add, lifting my bound wrist for demonstration.

Lucien shrugs. “Consult your father if you require reassurance. They’re quite commonplace.” He leans his hip against the table, and the smirk comes back out. “It seems to me this is the only way for you to get your Tear back.”

“Is that what your ten centuries are telling you?” Venna says dryly.

“Loudly and clearly,” he confirms, and turns away from us, reaching for another manuscript.

But nothing about Lucien’s motivations is clear at all.

In the same breath I have that thought, pain gathers at my temples.

It’s a normal headache, at first.

Then Lucien says something, and I can’t hear him even though he’s just across the table from me.

Saela says my name, I think, and Venna dashes toward me. But they both seem far away.

It’s coming from the mental bonds—a scream that’s growing progressively louder by the second until my vision whites out and the noise and pain disconnect me from my body entirely.

Suddenly, I’m looking at the world through Siegrid’s eyes. I’m in her head somehow. There’s a swirl of fury and confusion. Despair. Hate. Such burning hate. She’s atop her massive wolf. And she’s in severe pain.

A lance pierces her side, the shaft of it deep in her body. She’s struggling to stay astride Genicos. He’s attempting to heal her, but the wound can’t heal while the weapon is still lodged in her body.

Siegrid gives another scream of anguish and rage. All around us, Nocturnan forces are engaged in a desperate fight. Nobody can stop to help her.

She hates the pain clouding her mind.

She hates her own weakness, letting herself fall into so much danger.

But more than anything, she hates herself for failing to anticipate this. Him.

This is not a Siphon attack. In the sea of churning, struggling, and dying bodies, I see that our forces are fighting against… Phylax. They have plenty of commoner soldiers on their side as well.

Siegrid grits her teeth through the agony and orders her troops to regroup. If the defensive line falls…

Well, they’ll lose the whole front.

They’ll lose the kingdom to him.

Wind picks up, blowing smoke into Siegrid’s face. She stares through it, watching a figure emerge as the smoke clears with the wind.

Tormun, the Alpha of Phylax. He’s massive on his wolf, rippling, hefting an enormous mace that shouldn’t be possible to wield on wolfback. His arm strains under the weapon’s weight as he lifts it, his oddly dulled gaze set on Siegrid.

His wolf crushes a Strategos wolf under its weight. That mace comes down on his opponent’s skull, killing them instantly, the wolf’s rider screaming under their own mount’s corpse. Tormun is going to break through, and Siegrid will not allow that to happen.

With a shriek, she rips the lance from her side, the pain rushing in like wildfire. Genicos howls at the shared pain, even as he strains to heal his rider.

He’s trained for this. He’s healed her a thousand times, and he will again, she knows it.

Tormun is almost upon them. And there’s a pest at his side.

Fucking Jonah.

Everything sinks into the blur of mounted battle. Siegrid’s wolf collides with Tormun’s, snapping and lashing out. Her blade deflects his first strike, and the shock wave vibrates up her arm, jarring the wound in her side and making her cry out.

She may not be physically stronger than Tormun, but she’s far more skilled. And now, Genicos’s magic is working on her; her flesh knits together, her strength returning.

Siegrid strikes out savagely, scoring a long wound across Tormun’s massive thigh. He falls back with a shout. His wolf is panting and bleeding.

Pressing her advantage, she gathers her Daemos magic and pushes it out toward Tormun with a shout. But the corruption in the pack magic hits her then—I can feel her pain and confusion as the impelling blast doubles back on her, rebounding and sending even powerful Genicos reeling.

Siegrid struggles to right herself on Genicos’s back, keeping her eyes locked on Tormun, who is closing in once more.

But then. Jonah. She wasn’t paying attention to him; she dismissed him as inconsequential.

He follows the powerful motion of his wolf’s body and brings his sword with him. It slots beneath Siegrid’s armor, and white-hot agony explodes as the steel pierces through vital organs.

I feel it all.

Siegrid’s blood floods her mouth. She wonders, in a moment of bizarre silence when all the shrieks and howls around her fall away, whether her son taught the boy how to angle his blade just like this.

Genicos attempts to heal her, but his strength is depleted from healing her previous injury, and the blade is still deep inside her.

The wound is mortal. She’s going to die.

She knows it, too. In her final moments, she wonders if she taught Stark enough about everything that comes next for him. If he’s prepared to become the Sovereign Alpha and for what—who—comes along with that role.

Siegrid looks down at the blade. She grips the hilt weakly like she means to draw it and use it. But she can’t find any more strength. She’s spent it all.

She regrets it, their relationship.

She thought if she kept him at a distance, she could shield him from it somehow.

She hopes she made him strong enough.

Siegrid slides from her wolf’s back and lands in the bloody muck on her side, the sword still stuck in her. Her wolf howls in anguish. The sound echoes over the battlefield, and devastation echoes back over the bonds. Her fading consciousness registers one final, ruinous sight.

The central command post is up in flames, cinders disappearing into the sky.

Everything goes black.

I’ve never been so close to death before. Never.

I gasp. Air pummels my lungs painfully. My hand whips up, searching for the blade I so clearly felt enter my body, but there’s nothing there. There’s nothing.

My eyes dart around. I’m looking for Siegrid’s wolf, Genicos, where he fell next to her, his life snuffing out.

All I see are the scattered documents spread across the library table. A sob tears out of me, and then I’m on the floor. My entire body shakes with the aftershocks of Siegrid’s death, like I’m experiencing her death rattle for her.

Saela drops onto her knees next to me, grabbing my hand, her face pale with fear.

“Meryn, talk to us,” comes Venna’s voice, as if from far away.

“What happened?” Lucien says, tone urgent. “What happened?”

Through my tears, I struggle to form words. My voice breaks pathetically as I finally manage to force it out.

“Nocturna has fallen.”

39

STARK

Noemi is staring vacantly at a pile of breakfast cakes and pastries when I find her in the common area. She looks fucking terrible; I assume she barely slept last night, given the circumstances.

I don’t think she’ll snap again. But I told Meryn I’d keep an eye out, just to be safe.

“Not hungry?” I come up behind Noemi and set a hand on her shoulder lightly, trying not to startle her.

Noemi turns and gives me a weak smile. “Just hunting for something I recognize.”

I turn to the platter. Glazed pastry twists are twined with sticky pastes and syrups of various colors. Some of the treats are studded with unfamiliar fruits or seeds.

I select one at random and hand it to her. “Here. Can’t be any worse than Gertie’s kitchen experiments. Come walk with me.”

The rear of Brightbane Castle is a gigantic maze of courtyards and gardens. We make our way out, and the sun blasts down on us like a furnace as we pass through the stone archways, even though the hour is still early.

The intense southern light makes the colors look kind of unreal: so many shades of green and pink and orange from the unfamiliar plants and flowers surrounding us. A complicated fountain gurgles at the courtyard’s center, tiled in a bright mosaic design that depicts many-colored fish.

Even the stonework is delicate. Archways and walls are carved with intricate patterns and shapes that must have taken stoneworkers a lifetime to create.

I guess if you’re a Siphon, you don’t mind waiting a century or two for your construction project to be complete.

It’s all a little over the top—but then, so is their asshole king.

Noemi keeps pace with me, but she’s uncharacteristically quiet, slowly pulling pieces off her pastry and popping them into her mouth.

We pass under another arch and into a smaller courtyard with no flowers, just deep green grasses and trees, thick and lush. The stonework here is all painted in blues and greens, giving us the impression of being underwater. The trees cast a little more shade, keeping the air cooler, adding to the effect.

I glance left at Noemi again. Her drained, tired expression makes me want to punch something.

My biggest regret is how I couldn’t protect her from what happened during her Trials. I was already serving at the front—already Alpha, for that matter.

The Daemos instructor that year was one of my Gammas. I told him to keep an eye on her, to watch out for her even though she wasn’t in our pack. I made it clear to him, or at least I thought I did, that she was my family.

Maybe it was too culturally ingrained in him, the way the king chose a companion. Maybe he looked at that frightened eighteen-year-old girl and somehow saw a woman eager to please her regent.

I can’t ask him for his reasoning. After I found out what happened, I enthusiastically divorced his barely functioning brain from the rest of his body.

Couldn’t undo the harm Noemi suffered, though.

“Mimi,” I ask now, hoping that my concern won’t shut her down further. “Are you okay?”

Noemi tilts her face up toward me. Her eyes are red and puffy, the circles underneath dark and ominous.

She’s stopped walking, and I stop, too, staying silent to give her space to answer.

“I thought I was okay,” she says finally. “I’ve done a good job just… not thinking about any of it. You know how it is at the front. There’s always some new crisis, some battle or defensive strategy, that needs your full attention. I could block it out and not deal.”

She ducks her head and gazes down at the patterned pathway beneath our feet.

“Even when we were home with my family,” she continues, “suffering their disrespect, listening to that awful misogynistic song about women’s tears, getting hassled by my cousin… it felt outside of me somehow. Like something that happened in another life, to someone else. Some version of me that I used to be.”

Noemi looks around and then finds a seat on a shaded bench a few feet away. The tree above it has slender branches covered in silver-green leaves that cascade like a waterfall.

She toys with her pastry, eating some but letting most of the flakes drift to the ground.

“I know that Lucien isn’t… isn’t him,” she continues. “Maybe he’s just as bad, or maybe he’s an excellent ruler, who knows. But seeing him with that woman—suddenly I was back in Cyril’s lap in front of everyone, having to smile through what was happening to me because if I didn’t, I would die.”

My jaw clenches tightly, hands curling into fists. She’s barely wanted to talk about this since it happened, and who could blame her?

“All of it came rushing back. Just as strong as it was then. Turns out, I hadn’t moved on. I hadn’t left those feelings behind. They’ve been living inside me this whole time, festering and rotting.”

Her voice breaks on rotting, and I put my arm around her shoulders. Wishing I could somehow make her pain and trauma physical so I could battle it, defeat it for her. She lays her head against my shoulder and sighs.

“I wish I was strong like Meryn. That my hatred and anger could fuel me and drive me to vengeance. But mostly I’m exhausted. I’m tired, Valstark. I’m so tired.”

I take her hand, squeezing it between mine. “Surviving is its own strength, Mimi. You made it out. You’re here. That’s enough.”

Her body relaxes just a little bit next to mine. We sit on the bench together, gazing at a tiny blue-and-white bird that whizzes through the ferns in front of us, wings moving so fast we can barely see them.

“You know what Great-Aunt Gertie would say, right?” I ask, hoping to make her smile.

“What? ‘Don’t grow a gray beard’?” she guesses, and I laugh. Noemi’s face lightens a little.

“I never understood that one, did you?” I ask. Some of Gertie’s sayings were full of wisdom, once you figured them out. Others would just remain an enigma.

She muses, “Gray beard… I don’t know. Seems a little more helpful for men than women.”

“She had the weirdest sayings. No, I was thinking of ‘don’t let someone take the butter—’”

“‘—off your slice of bread,’” we both chorus, and Noemi even manages a soft chuckle.

She holds the remains of her pastry up in front of her face, examining it. “Pretty sure this thing is chock-full of butter. So maybe I’m doing okay.”

Noemi faces me, and the lines of pain in her face have eased up, at least a little. Something tight loosens in my chest at the sight.

“You know, the pastries here aren’t half bad,” she concedes.

I stand, offering her a hand. Just as she’s closing her fingers around mine, a searing, shooting pain shatters my vision.

I double over, hitting the ground heavily.

Distantly, I can feel Noemi’s palm on my back, can vaguely hear her calling my name. It’s as if I’m hearing her through layers of snow or from a long distance, echoed and distorted.

My vision blacks out completely.

When it comes back, it takes me a moment to realize it’s returned.

I’m fully surrounded by shadow.

Some kind of enemy magic? Killian using Meryn’s magic somehow?

Ignoring the pounding in my head, I raise both hands to gather up an impelling burst, ready to slam the shadows away and identify the threat. But… something is wrong.

I’m tapping into my power, pulling on that energy that lives inside me, but it’s strange, unfamiliar.

The well of power is deeper, so much deeper, than ever before. It’s strong and heady, tempting me to draw on it, fill myself with it, and damn the consequences.

It’s almost like being on the battlefield with Meryn, when she was channeling her overwhelming powers through me. And yet totally different, too, because while that power felt like Meryn in my head, it was completely and undeniably hers…

This power is mine.

I’ve always been strong, of course, adept at channeling the Daemos pack powers. But now it’s practically bursting out of me. And it’s something more.

Then from nowhere and everywhere: voices.

I spin around, squinting through the shadowy landscape, trying to figure out where they’re coming from, but it’s strange; they don’t seem to have any specific source. They’re just there in the twisting darkness around me, snatches of whisper, pieces of sound.

Floating by like wisps of wind or mist.

There’s the sound of someone crying, sobbing. Another cry—then a scream of pain. The sounds coalesce into battlefield noises, shouting and screaming and wailing and the clash of weapons.

And a clear full sentence: “The Sovereign Alpha is dead!”

My knees go weak.

Dead? Siegrid is… dead?

I fight to stay standing in this shadowy place as I realize what has happened—the intense mental links into other riders’ minds, riders from every pack and not just Daemos. The newfound power, strengthened Daemos magic, but also something else entirely, something I barely understand yet.

Siegrid is dead. I’m the Sovereign Alpha now.

Closing my eyes, I focus, then push it all away.

The light of the garden is almost blinding after that darkness; after a moment, my eyes adjust and I see Noemi squatting next to me, her face pale and etched with concern.

She has both hands on my shoulders and is repeating my name: “—all right? Valstark, can you hear me, are you all right? What’s happened?”

Even though the daylight is back, that raging power whirls through me still, stirring up my blood, asking to be used.

The rivers of pack bonds are there, too, within reach. I’m used to a single dark tributary to my pack, one stream branching off to each individual. But now four distinct pathways push and pull as I inwardly examine them, with countless individuals connected.

It’s so broad where they come together, like a sea instead of a river, and the sea is churning, violent. As if cast into sudden darkness by a deadly storm.

Noemi catches her breath as she senses what’s happened, too. From a distant part of the castle, the direwolves begin to howl.

I reach out to Cratos and meet his grief and resolve:

“Yes. The Sovereign Alpha is dead. You are the Sovereign Alpha.”

Confirming what I already know deep in my bones, deep in that shadowy place that now lives inside me.

“Siegrid is dead,” I say aloud, my voice calm, strange to me.

The riot of darkness inside continues. It’s as though there’s only a thin layer between that place and the bright daylight world outside of me. My inward vision and eyesight are divided by the merest boundary that could easily break.

Then Cratos is with me in my mind, supporting me through it, lending me strength.

I flex and tense my muscles and then, one by one, relax them. I slowly straighten.

Noemi and I settle heavily back onto the bench behind us. Now it’s Noemi’s turn to regard me with careful concern. More than anyone, she knows: Siegrid and I never had a familial relationship, not really.

I’m not sure what to feel.

I knew this day would come, of course. But Siegrid always seemed untouchable, almost godlike in her power and control. I never believed she could truly be felled, I realize. Certainly not this soon.

There may not have been any great love between me and Siegrid, but she was a powerful commander, an institution among the Bonded. Her loss is like a tilting of the universe, an imbalance. I will mourn her, I realize with a whisper of surprise.

Like a soldier mourns a respected commander.

“I’m okay,” I assure Noemi. “The transition was… unexpected.”

Doubt still lingers in her eyes, but she nods and lays a comforting hand on my arm.

I study the lines of her face, thinking—Siegrid may be dead, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have family. I have Noemi, for one. Cratos, of course.

And Meryn. Most of all, Meryn.

Meryn… If my magic reacted so strongly to Siegrid’s death, what might hers have done?

40

MERYN

The shocked silence in the library makes my ears ring.

Then comes mournful howling from a distance. It’s Anassa, Cratos, Skaia, and Ephyse. They’re far outside, but their pained wails are loud enough that I suspect everyone in the city of Brightbane can hear them.

I shakily pull myself up to my knees, bracing myself against the table, then sink into a chair. Anassa’s voice is instantly in my mind.

“I am conferring with the wolves and will let you know more information as soon as I have it.” Her heartbreak comes through the bond, fierce and aching, a wretched mirror of my own.

“They’re really gone?” I ask, even though I know the answer. That was too horrifically vibrant to have been anything other than real.

“They are gone, Meryn.”

I lean heavily against the armrests on the chair and gulp in a few more breaths of air to steel myself.

“What do you mean Nocturna has fallen?” Lucien asks quietly, his voice serious and deadly.

“Killian has broken through our defenses. He overtook our camp. My Sovereign Alpha, the leader of our military, is dead. He has control of the front on our side.”

Venna lets out a pained noise. She stumbles, losing her balance, and ends up sitting down on the floor with her head in her hands.

Lucien sinks slowly back into his own chair as Saela wraps her arms around my neck, hugging her face into my shoulder. She crawls onto my lap, and I hold her tight against me.

My shirt grows damp, and I realize she’s crying. Am I crying, too? My hand goes up to my face and finds tears there.

I’m so shaken that it didn’t even register.

“Meryn—” Lucien starts, but I hold up a hand to cut him off.

I need to get in contact with the Alphas at the front. I need to know what’s happening. Who’s still alive.

Goddess, why didn’t I see this coming? Why wasn’t I using foresight constantly to protect our troops? Why did I let myself get so distracted with Astreona that I lost focus?

Closing my eyes, I seek out Egith’s unique mental signature, paring down my thoughts until I’m narrowed in on just her. The bonds are in chaos after the death of the Sovereign Alpha, and I have to mentally push through the turmoil.

When my thoughts finally touch hers, there’s a strain in her mind, the crisis still unfolding all around her.

“My queen,” Egith says, her thoughts tense and distracted and laden with pain.

“Are you safe?”

“I am,” Egith confirms. She shares glimpses of the scene around her—packmates racing ahead through woods and trees, several carrying wounded foot soldiers with them on their wolves. “The battle is lost. I’m in retreat with a group of survivors, but the situation here is still tenuous, Your Highness. I’ll reach out again soon once I have more to report.”

Before I can respond, our connection is cut off. Just a result of the extraordinary stress Egith is under, I hope, and not something new going wrong.

Either way, I need to let her focus on her surroundings, shouldn’t distract her further until she’s in a safe place.

I open my eyes. Lucien stares at me over my sister’s head, his expression unreadable.

Venna glances up from the floor. “Are they okay?”

“No.” Shifting Saela around on my lap—she’s really too big to be here these days—I say, “It appears I no longer have a country to offer you in our alliance, Lucien. My remaining troops are in retreat. If you would like to work together, I need your help more than ever, but Astreona will have to be the driving force.”

Lucien rises from his chair to pace back and forth behind the table. “What is he playing at? Why take the border from you? It’s been centuries of war, and my bastard of a brother hasn’t been able to successfully take any significant ground in Astreona, and that’s with a full army at his disposal. Surely he won’t try to accomplish that now, not with even fewer Bonded at his back.”

“I suspect this is more Killian’s doing than Alistair’s,” I tell him. “I don’t think he’ll press into Astreona. He wants to make me feel culpable for the loss of life so that I return to him.”

“Is it working?” Venna asks, a sharp edge to her voice.

Right now, it’s hard to feel anything beyond sorrow. But I refuse to let the blood that Killian caused stain my hands.

I lift my chin. “No. Lucien, are you on our side, or are you not?” I hope desperation doesn’t color my voice, but without his support, there will be no recovering.

Lucien studies my face carefully before speaking. There’s something in his cunning eyes that I do not like.

At. All.

“We can keep our alliance,” he says.

The pause that comes afterward drags on for eternity. There are strings attached to that statement, but he’s not leaping to define them.

“If?” I finally relent.

His smile gives me chills. “If you marry me.”

I stand so quickly that Saela doesn’t have time to right herself, and she goes tumbling to the floor with a squeak. “Mer!”

“Sorry,” I mutter at her, and then turn on him. “Fuck. Off.”

Venna scoffs. “Insane.”

Lucien’s feline smile only grows. He’s clearly not deterred by my reaction.

Once again, another game. And this time, my people’s lives are on the line.

I can’t. I just can’t.

He’s absolutely serious, isn’t he? Yet another man trying to control me—and my kingdom—by claiming ownership.

Stark might have been right; maybe taking control over Nocturna once Alistair was out of the way was his plan all along.

The library darkens. My fingers curl into fists, and the darkest shadows at the edges of the room start to distort and reach for him. Lucien’s eyes move over the creeping black. He assesses for a moment.

Then he steps out of the way of one of them as if it were a dirty puddle.

“You don’t like my proposal,” he drawls.

A scream gathers in my throat. He’s three seconds away from being torn apart by shadow magic, and he’s not even slightly afraid. Nothing this man does makes sense.

“Perhaps I should elaborate. Make my case,” he says, stepping away from another slithering shadow. “I have something you need—my army. You have something I want—your Tears.”

Saela’s hand flies to her necklace. “You can’t have them!”

Bravo. “What she said,” I respond coolly.

“You misunderstand. I want assurance that the four Tears will always be evenly kept between our two countries. If we are united in marriage, you cannot conspire to take mine from me. Nor would I be able to take yours.”

There’s a hint of a threat there.

“Plus, if we are bound, the common people in both our countries will be more willing to accept and understand this ceasefire. We would rule both countries together,” he adds, as if that makes his proposal more palatable.

My stomach twists at the mere thought of this. I could never accept him.

He must read the distaste on my face, because he continues, “I would advise you to seriously consider this opportunity. Weigh your options. Think about how eager you really are for my help.” He smirks at me from across the table. “Besides, am I really so bad to look at?”

“Yes,” Venna and I say at the same time.

Lucien chuckles. “Harsh.”

Fucker.

As much as I would like to wrap shadows around him and throw him out of the library’s window, I can’t risk truly offending Lucien by declining him immediately.

“I will take your offer into consideration,” I say tightly.

In my heart, though, I know I could never accept him. Not when every part of me screams out for Stark.

Stark.

Fuck, I need to find him, need to tell him about Siegrid. Does he know already? Have the powers of the Sovereign Alpha passed along to him?

I bow my head to Lucien and then gesture to Saela and Venna that it’s time to leave. “We’ll discuss this more later,” I tell Lucien. “I need to find my people.”

My person.

My thoughts are so tangled up: There’s Lucien’s proposal, which felt too much like an ultimatum. The nightmarish fact that Nocturna is back under Alistair Brightbane’s control. The loss of my top general…

Whom I admittedly fucking loathed.

Still, Siegrid was one of my most experienced and trusted commanders.

I open a connection with Stark, but keep things simple, not wanting extra thoughts to leak over and not trusting myself in this turbulent state to be precise. “Where are you?”

“I’m on my way.”

Almost immediately, I can feel Stark’s presence barreling toward me through the castle halls. Hurriedly, I shore up the barriers between my mind and Anassa, Cratos, and Stark, not wanting news of the proposal from Lucien to slip through before I’m ready.

It’s no surprise that things are leaking through the mate bond again; both of us, and our wolves, are reeling after Siegrid’s death.

Even if Stark’s relationship with his mother was strained, weighted down with years of hurt and abuse, this must be a terrible shock for him.

Saela, Venna, and I are halfway back to our guest rooms when he catches up to us. Our bodies pull toward each other like magnets, each seeking the other. Venna gives me a knowing look and keeps Saela moving toward the guest suite.

“Are you well?” Stark pulls back and grips my shoulders, studying my face. “You’re still new to your powers as queen, and this is such a disturbance.”

Bemused, I grab his hand and pull him to the side of the hall, where a small windowed alcove with a half-circle window seat overlooks rooftops of the west wing of the castle.

A disturbance? Who the fuck calls their mother’s death a disturbance?

“Stark,” I say, searching his eyes. “How are you? What can I do? I’m so sorry.”

He stiffens almost imperceptibly, and his voice is controlled when he answers. “Don’t worry about it, princess. We’re Bonded. A violent death is our inevitable end.”

I almost recoil from him. He sounds so removed. But maybe that’s how he needs to deal with this. If he’s able to grieve Siegrid… I have to think it’s tangled up in a lot of other complicated emotions he may not be ready to face.

“You’re the Sovereign Alpha now,” I say lightly. “Is that… are you ready for it? Do you know how to use your powers?”

Stark’s gaze darkens. “I’ll master them swiftly enough.”

He stares past me, as if fascinated by the rooftops outside. That’s strange enough right there for me to know he’s not as stoic about this as he’s pretending to be. It’s definitely bothering him.

But when he looks back to me, there’s steel in his gaze. “You saw what’s happened, I assume? We need to return to Nocturna immediately. Every moment that we waste here is a moment that bastard is consolidating his power. Let’s get back there, face him, break him before his hold is complete.”

Typical Daemos, always ready to rush into battle. But this doesn’t seem like a reasonable solution.

“Give me a moment,” I tell Stark. “I need to check my foresight in case it offers us clues about what to do.”

He nods, and I close my eyes, dipping into the deep reserve of power that lives inside me.

What would happen if we returned to Nocturna immediately?

Images swim before my eyelids. Flashes of battle: direwolf tearing down direwolf as Bonded kill Bonded. Noemi, pierced by an arrow, lying in the dirt. Venna, bleeding from multiple wounds, dragging herself toward me. Shadow magic clashing, rebounding. Countless dead.

Stark falling. Cratos, howling a long note—and then cut off. Killian turning his gaze to me.

I pull myself away from the vision, nausea bubbling inside me at the gruesome sight.

And… what if I accepted Lucien’s aid? And his marriage proposal alongside it?

I see myself in a wedding dress, decked with jewels and gold. Lucien’s fangs glinting as he smiles, taking my hand. Beautiful Siphons press close to me wearing false smiles, congratulating me, kissing my hand, my cheek.

Blood drenches my vision. Blood spilling from Lucien’s mouth as a silver sword runs him through from behind, piercing his neck. His crown clatters to the floor, where rivers of blood flow from the dying Siphons all around us. Blood coating Stark’s face—he lies motionless at my feet, eyes unseeing. Killian, hands drenched in red, laughing as he turns to face me, sword raised high.

NO.

I pull at my magic, stretching and forcing it. What else? There has to be another path. I push past the visions of death, straining toward what’s beyond.

Salt water fills my nose, my mouth. I blink and shudder. My eyes open, and the water is gone: A rocky shoreline takes its place—and a tower, dark and ominous, stretching up and up. A flash and I’m inside the tower, walls moving in on me, crushing, crushing.

A female body—whose? Mine, Noemi’s? I can’t tell, but it’s unmoving.

Stark bent over it, shouting. Then: an empty chamber, with a shining jewel sparkling at the center of a spiraling mosaic.

The vision ends, and I gasp back into my body. Stark’s hands are on me at once, grounding me, helping me come back to myself. My throat is parched, my head pounding.

Placing my forehead against his chest, I breathe in his deep, male scent.

“I need to tell you something,” I croak out. “Lucien asked me to marry him in exchange for his support against Killian. He says he’s worried that I’ll try to take his Tears from him for power and wants to ensure that there remains a balance.”

Stark stiffens underneath me.

His gaze turns shuttered and closed off, and there’s an instant lump in my throat.

Is he about to tell me I should do it?

41

MERYN

Will you accept him?” His calm voice covers a dark storm within.

I rear back with the limited strength I have. “No!”

His jaw clenches underneath his dark stubble.

“If I were thinking like the Sovereign Alpha—” His voice catches, and I think again that emotion is brewing under the surface for him, thoughts about Siegrid’s death he’s not sure how to voice yet. “If I were a better Sovereign Alpha, I would tell you you should do it. You should marry someone politically meaningful, especially if it would save our country.”

Stark’s eyes meet mine, and now I’m the one who can’t breathe because there’s so much written in his gaze.

The weight of last night’s words linger between us. He did want that for me at one point—to be with someone he thought better fit the image of a queen. I thought we moved beyond that.

Is he going to reject me again?

“But?” The word comes out of me as a whisper.

“I’d damn every last soul to stay by your side, Meryn.”

My cheeks heat, and something in my chest breaks open wide. I reach up to his face and draw a finger down his jaw, then kiss him gently. He responds with hunger, his tongue licking into my mouth like he needs to taste every part of me.

Eventually, I pull away, resting my forehead against his. “Well, thankfully for the citizens of Nocturna, you don’t have to make that decision. I can’t do it. Even if I wanted to, which I don’t. The foresight showed me that if we get married, it would still end the same way: Killian wins and everyone I love is dead.”

Stark’s posture changes, ever so slightly, as he takes in how serious I am.

“Did you figure out the path forward?” he asks gruffly.

I shake my head, confused. “I had three visions, but only one seemed viable… And I couldn’t understand it. You, Noemi, Venna, and I were at some ancient tower near a sea with our direwolves. Does that make sense at all to you?”

I don’t mention the body I saw. It might not come to pass…

Stark squints his dark eyes in thought. “A tower? No.”

“Me neither. But I do think Lucien is right about one thing,” I continue. “Whatever Killian is doing now, it’s something different from before. He can’t be thinking of invading Astreona, not with his depleted forces. There must be something else going on.”

Stark nods, caressing my side. The comfortable, possessive gesture lights a fire in my belly that I fight to ignore.

“Stark… I need you to stay out of my bed tonight.” Alarm sparks in his eyes as I continue. “I need to go into that dreamworld and confront him. It’s the only way.”

He bows his head, takes a deep, angry breath. “I hate the idea of leaving you alone with him.”

“I know,” I say quietly. This can’t be easy for my fierce protector. “But we need to know what he’s planning, and if he’ll give me a hint, it’s worth the discomfort. Don’t wake me, even if I seem distressed.”

Stark’s jaw twitches. “You can’t ask that of me.”

“Fine.” I breathe out, frustrated but grateful. “I trust your judgment. Just give me enough time to see what I can get out of him. Let me make the risk worth it.”

He eventually agrees, and night arrives too fast, my dread about this evening making the hours move quickly. After washing and saying good night to Saela, I head slowly into my room, my feet dragging, every part of me protesting what I’m about to do.

Stark has positioned himself in a chair by the window, a hair’s breadth from Anassa’s sleeping position on the floor. Not that she’s asleep; she’s as alert as Stark is.

Two dangerous predators, ready to go in for the kill.

My guardians, united in my defense.

It’s the first time I’ll be sleeping without Stark within arm’s length since he started helping me with these dreams. Even when we were barely talking on the road here, he stayed by my side.

The emptiness of the bed echoes the dread in my mind as I slip between the light sheets, all that’s required in this strange, warm country.

Through the darkness of the room, I can sense Stark’s eyes on me intently, like heat from a flame. His posture is alert, ready, despite the late hour.

Smoothing the sheets over me, I close my eyes, letting myself relax into the pillows. I wasn’t sure if I could allow myself to sleep, knowing what I’m about to face. In the end, it’s not a matter of willpower; after two full days of wakefulness and the trauma of witnessing Siegrid’s death from behind her eyes, I’m utterly exhausted.

I fall into darkness.

Then I’m wrapped in that shadow landscape once more. The darkness seems more substantial, somehow, than the last time I was here.

A dark chuckle is the only warning I receive before Killian emerges from the twisting shadows.

His face and body are as beautiful as ever, but now the sight only makes me want to retch.

“Has my kitten finally come out to play?” His voice is gentle, his gaze a lover’s tender caress. “Where have you been, beloved?”

I stand stock-still, quickly strategizing. I came in here ready for a throw-down confrontation. But Killian has launched immediately back into this sad-boy manipulator schtick.

He’s trying to play me. Or maybe he’s buying tickets to his own show. It’s hard to tell with him.

One thing’s for certain, though: If I come at him swinging, he will respond in kind. So, as much as it twists my stomach, I need to handle this differently than I planned.

“I’ve been trying to reach you,” I lie, the words making my mouth taste sour. “For weeks. Stark’s been doing something. He’s been keeping us apart. But he’s so busy right now, with everything that happened at the border—he couldn’t stop me tonight. Are you okay?”

My voice is urgent and concerned, but he doesn’t quite trust it.

“Am I to believe you were sitting around, worrying about me?” he purrs.

I step toward him, forcing my facade into something pleading and weak. “Of course I was worried. You were right, Killian. About everything. I’m in over my head and don’t know how to lead, and now I’m stuck in Astreona, a hostage. You and Alistair are so much more powerful—the border skirmish proved it. I need you. Please. Please forgive me. I-I’m scared.”

Tears spring to my eyes, and I know he’ll read whatever he wants out of them. It’s like popping a blister, saying these things to him.

Killian steps closer, too, cautious optimism written across his handsome, devious face.

“What happened?” I ask. “Why did you attack the Bonded troops and take the border?”

He reaches out a hand toward my face. I steel myself for his touch, hoping that by pantomiming intimacy I might get him to reveal more than he intends. I track the motion of his hand with my gaze, like watching a snake as it coils to strike.

As he reaches for me, something glints, shining even in this consuming darkness. I narrow my eyes, trying to make it out, and then lose focus as I register his next words.

“That was all Alistair,” he says quietly, stroking my cheek. I desperately want to turn and bite his hand like Anassa would. “Personally, I don’t think there’s such a need for bloodshed. But he wanted to punish those who were loyal to you. And he wanted to send a message to his brother.”

“A message?”

“He wants Lucien to know that he’ll never be defeated. And he wants to keep you both out of Nocturna while he… searches.”

I blink. That’s new. “For what?”

Killian ignores my question, his arm sliding down from my face to wrap around my waist. I shudder, but then lean against him, hoping it seems like a shudder of passion, of love.

“Do you see it now, kitten? I am not the problem. Alistair and Lucien are the ones destroying our world. But together, you and I can defeat them. You can help me get rid of Alistair and his brother, and then I can rule both nations with you at my side.”

Egotistical dickhead.

Instead of telling him what I really think, I say, “How? Alistair is so powerful. Lucien, too. How could we ever hope to defeat them?”

He pulls his hand away from my waist, and I almost sigh in relief. But then he holds it up toward my face, and I stop breathing entirely.

He’s wearing the Mother Priestess’s signet ring.

Killian has a Goddess Tear.

“What is that?” I ask dumbly, although I know, I know.

He straightens in pride, his smirk growing. “It’s from the Faceless Goddess. And it has incredible powers.”

My head is spinning. Saela was right. “What kind of powers?”

Killian draws back with a flicker of suspicion. “I’m not sure I should tell you that, beloved. You’ve been hard to reach for so long. I’ll show you the powers when I see you in person again.”

Rapid calculations pass through my brain. He’s right to be distrustful, of course. So I need to give him something. If he got that ring from the Mother Priestess, she’s surely told him how my necklace is another Tear. But he may not know…

“Lucien has one, too.”

“I know,” Killian says, uninterested. “His crown.”

“No,” I say more urgently. “He has a necklace, just like I do. If it has magic like your ring does, maybe I can figure out what it does. Bring it to you.”

Finally, the suspicion abates, and a small smile grows across his face. “Okay, kitten. This one provokes worship, just like a god would. It’s how Alistair and I turned so many to our side—its powers go beyond Siphon mind control, without the usual limitations of blood magic. He thinks there are more out there. He wants to find them so he finally has an advantage over his brother.”

“And what do you want to do?” I ask breathlessly.

“I want to find them and use them against Alistair and Lucien. It’s the only way, I think. What’s stronger than an ancient Siphon? The power of a god.”

He’s right.

And he has a head start.

Fuck.

“Tell me what to do,” I say needily. “How can I help you?”

He strokes my cheek again, drawing closer. Ugh, I recognize the softening look in his eye. He’s going to try to kiss me soon.

“You always did like it when I told you how to behave, didn’t you, my good girl?”

Foul.

These kinds of words sound so right coming out of Stark’s mouth, when I know we’re in an equitable power exchange. When I’m a willing participant in the dynamic.

Killian just wants me to lack any agency or choice—in all parts of my life.

Unable to say anything, I just nod.

He better hurry the fuck up. The shadows are starting to stir at the edges of this realm, and I’m not sure how much longer I can pretend.

“Stay put where you are, as awful as it may be. Try to convince Lucien that you’re on his side, and when the time is right and I’ve found more Tears, I’ll summon you. I’m not yet sure how many more remain. You’ll need to bring his crown and necklace, of course.”

“Of course,” I mumble. Then, inspiration striking, I lift my wrist and the engagement bracelet on it. “And this? Lucien’s told me about these. Thrall bracelets. Are you… am I… a thrall? Are you able to compel me?”

Killian takes a sharp breath. “No, Meryn. No, of course not. I want you to have autonomy. I want you to choose me. After I found out about the thrall bracelets, I worked closely with Alistair to develop a new one for you to target your powers, not your mind.”

The way his brain works is appalling, plain and simple.

Wanted me to have autonomy. Does he seriously fucking believe himself?

The scary thing is, I think he does.

“Why?” I ask, a bit of my edge creeping into my tone. “Why use a thrall bracelet at all?”

“So we could be equals, kitten.” His voice is a slow purr as he steps even closer, his chest to mine. My body tingles with the wrongness of it. “How could we be together if we didn’t share your power?”

And once again, I’m thinking of Stark. Who I have to beg to use my power. Who helps me use the darkness inside me instead of yanking it away for himself. Who never takes from me.

My true equal in every way.

Killian leans his head toward me, finally coming in for that horrible kiss I’ve been dreading, but I take a step back.

“Stark’s coming now. I can feel it,” I lie. “Hopefully, I can come back here soon.”

Then I let go of all the anger and pain this conversation has provoked inside me. The shadows start to swirl violently. The dark tendrils are almost alive, stroking against my face, my neck, curling like fingers. I shudder and shut my eyes.

There’s no immediate escape, though. It’s never easy to get out of here. It’s like I’m drowning in the shadows, being consumed by them.

Raising my hands, I steel my mind, giving a forceful push.

Please, please let me out of this place.

Something in the darkness seems to hear my pleas, because I’m whipped into a vortex and then there’s silence.

I open my eyes with a gasp.

Hours have apparently passed; it’s morning, light coming in through the high arched windows and painting the room in a jarring gold. Stark sees me awaken and runs to my side.

“Are you okay?” he asks. “What happened?”

“He has the fifth Goddess Tear, the one the Mother Priestess wore,” I tell Stark, my voice shaking. “And he’s looking for others. There are more of them.”

42

MERYN

Stark and I dress quickly and then wake the others. Within thirty minutes, Saela, Venna, and Noemi are gathered with us in the common space of our suite. My father heard the commotion and came to join us. I didn’t quite have the heart to tell him to go the fuck away.

I’m still shaky from the intensity of my encounter with Killian and work to steady myself. The room is garishly unlike anything back home, full of color and tilework and sumptuous fabrics, but the familiar faces of my closest companions help to ground me.

“I know I haven’t shared these details with all of you, but I’ve been able to contact Killian through my dreams.” I fill them in as quickly as I can, answering their questions before summarizing what I learned last night.

“He’s searching for more Tears.”

Unlike Stark’s stony expression, Venna’s alarm shows clearly. “How many more could there be?”

I shake my head. “I have no idea, and neither does he. What I know for certain is that when I consulted my foresight yesterday, the only viable path showed us going to a tower. I think I saw us finding a Tear there. So there may be at least one more out there, in that tower—wherever it is.”

I don’t let myself think about the woman’s body in my vision, or Stark’s agonized shouts. How all my visions ended with death—and this one was merely the least bloody.

“The one Tear he has already gave him enough power to conquer a whole kingdom. If he gets more…” Noemi lets her voice trail off. The implication is clear.

With enough power, we might not be able to stop him, alliance with Astreona or no.

Panic begins to crush in at the edges of my heart, my chest growing tight. But then, Saela’s eyes light up with joy—she looks just the same way when she’s figured out a difficult math problem. “Wait a minute.”

“I’m waiting.” Her simple excitement chases some of my panic away. I smile, breath coming more easily.

She jumps up. “I think there’s something…” She hurtles across the room, disappearing into the next chamber.

“Sae?” I call after her.

“There’s something! I saw it!” she shouts back. Venna makes a small, amused sound.

When my sister reappears, she has one of our mother’s tattered journals in her hands. She plops back down on the couch and cracks it open with intention, flipping quickly through the pages. Our father leans over to read alongside her, then pulls back, a startled look in his eyes.

He must’ve recognized our mother’s handwriting.

“Well?” Noemi asks.

“Give her a minute,” I say, kneeling before my sister. I look up at her, content to watch her in action.

Finally, she slaps her hand down on a page and makes an excited sound, kicking her feet. She turns it around and holds the pages open to me. “See? Look, look.”

I reach out and trace my fingers over the image there.

Ramblings are scrawled around the picture, but that’s not what Saela wants me to see. In the center of the right page is something that looks like a six-pointed star or a geometric flower, but each of the points is in the shape of a teardrop. In the center of it is another tear shape.

Saela is breathless. She leans forward to look at the image again, then turns a hopeful gaze toward me. “Do you think… ?”

That these are the Goddess Tears? My eyes burn. Yet another way our mother wasn’t insane, maybe. She knew.

“Maybe,” I tell my little sister. She clearly wants so badly to believe in our mother’s strength. I want that, too. “It’s possible. Seven.”

“Seven total. Which means he can’t go around gathering dozens, at least,” Saela says.

Noemi lifts her head, and her eyes flash. “Seven tears and a tower.” She grabs Stark’s arm and pulls at him insistently. “Stark. The song.”

It sounds like nonsense until Stark’s expression shifts with recognition.

“Is this some Bonded thing I never learned about?” I ask.

Noemi steps closer to me, bright hair shimmering in the morning sunlight. “My father, Lord Eisenfall, loves this awful song about a man’s unfaithful wife. She cheats on him with his brother, and when he discovers it, he drags her away and locks her in an inescapable tower where she cries seven tears! Seven precisely.”

“It would be a stretch to call that a coincidence. But it’s also just a song,” Venna pushes, clearly worried we’re getting our hopes up.

“Unless it’s not,” I say.

“You think it’s based on the truth?” Venna asks.

“I’m thinking anything is possible. Yes. What if… what if the Faceless Goddess was the wife? What if she was locked in this tower?”

Stark scoffs, crossing his arms. “So, suddenly you’re a believer?”

My mind is racing. Am I looking for connections where none exist? Or are we finally putting the pieces together?

“No. I don’t know. Whatever these gems are, they clearly hold a wealth of power. But whether that means that the Goddess was—is—real… who knows. For now, our main problem is finding this tower from my visions. We won’t find answers unless we can track it down somehow—and find out if there is a Tear inside.”

Stark crosses his thick arms across his chest and sighs deeply, his eyes rising to the ceiling.

“Yep,” I say. “You know who we have to ask.”

Twenty minutes later, I’m standing alone in front of Lucien’s chambers and trying to determine what words could possibly trick him into relative honesty. I push the doors open without knocking, and his guards don’t even try to stop me.

I wish they had.

The door swings open to reveal Lucien with an intoxicated, hungry look in his eyes and lips painted red with blood. He sits in a decadent dining room chair, but instead of a table in front of him, there’s a voluptuous, scantily clad woman sprawled across his lap.

One of his hands is wrapped around her midsection, keeping her from falling. Her head is thrown back, expression blissful, giving Lucien full access to feed from her throat.

Lucien looks up as the doors slam open. His eyes lock on me as he dips his head to sink his teeth back into her. The woman moans as he drinks deeply. My stomach tightens in an uncomfortable combination of disgust and fascination.

It’s easier to forget that I’m dealing with my enemy when I’m not looking at him devour his prey.

I ignore the sensation, stalking up to him, refusing to be intimidated.

“Lucien. We need to talk.”

Reluctantly, Lucien breaks away from his meal, and the woman’s eyes flutter as she comes back to herself, clearly dazed. With a twitch of his head, Lucien signals a servant, who trots over to take the woman’s hand and gently help her up and out of the room.

“Yes?” Lucien inquires, but his eyes are still glued on the woman’s generous backside as she slowly departs, the shimmery material of her dress concealing nothing.

I sigh. “Eyes over here, Lucien.”

He meets my gaze with an amused grin and a sweep of his tongue over his stained lips. “You know, it’s considered very rude in Astreona to interrupt someone’s meal. If you’re going to cut in, you could at least offer your own neck instead.”

“I’d rather eat glass,” I shoot back in annoyance. “We’ve stumbled onto something major about the Goddess Tears.”

He sighs and sits up like I’m boring him. “Something major,” he mocks with false excitement. “Let’s hear this revelation, then. Wow me.”

His ego hogs the entire room, but it slowly reduces in size the longer I speak. He even looks intrigued. Worryingly intrigued. The hunger in his eyes is sharper and more focused than what I saw with his fangs deep in that woman’s neck.

Killian’s poisonous words—about how powerful Lucien is and how he must be stopped, too—slither back into my brain. Am I putting trust in yet another beautiful royal who is bound to betray me?

“Well,” Lucien says, leaning back in his chair. He braces his thumb beneath the point of his chin and skates a finger along his jaw. “Consider me wowed.”

“Do you know anything about a mysterious tower near water?” I ask.

He tilts his head. “What will you give me?”

I roll my eyes. “Lucien.”

He chuckles and stands. “It’s mostly legend. There’s an island in the sea that may hold the tower your vision showed you, but we’ve never been able to get through to it. Bring Elias here,” he instructs a servant. “And tell him to bring the maps of the Bloodthorn Sea.”

“Bring the rest of my party as well,” I add.

In no time at all, we’re all gathered in Lucien’s chambers, a pile of maps spread over the large, polished wooden table before us. Lucien gives Noemi a wide berth. Elias’s earring glints in the light as he leans over the table. He’s carefully setting out document after document.

Saela is practically vibrating, eager to get her eyes on them. Stark, Venna, and Noemi are watching in steely silence. My father wasn’t invited to this gathering, at least.

“This is the one,” Lucien says, gently guiding Elias to the side with a hand on the man’s shoulder.

It’s a large map, multiple feet across, and it’s incredibly detailed. Lucien’s fingertip traces the line between our kingdoms briefly. He sighs. Then his hand glides over the map and settles on an area in the Bloodthorn Sea.

I lean one hand on the table and squint as Lucien taps the spot twice.

There are islands there, I realize. Three of them clustered together tightly off the coast of Blumenfall. I’ve studied a lot of maps of Nocturna and Astreona since becoming queen. I wanted to understand the land I was ruling.

But I don’t think I’ve ever seen these islands recorded before.

“One of these islands is where we believe the tower stands,” Lucien explains. He straightens and rests his hand on his hip.

“What’s this note mean?” I ask, pointing to the symbol beside the islands.

“It means it’s unexplored. Or…” Saela considers her words for a moment. “Uncharted, basically. The person who drew this is telling us that the shape they drew here might be incorrect.”

“That’s right, actually,” Elias says, sounding impressed—and surprised. Condescending jerk. But Saela doesn’t notice his tone, just perks up under the praise.

“And it remains uncharted because the island is shrouded in impenetrable mist,” Lucien tells us.

“Mist,” Venna repeats, skeptical.

Lucien’s eyes settle on her. “Mist. Fog. Particularly low-hanging clouds. Whatever you’d like to call it,” he says, and flashes her a smile. Then he turns back to the table at large. “People have attempted to land there numerous times over the centuries. Because?” Lucien gestures to Elias.

“Because it would be a great position for approaching Nocturna by sea,” Elias answers.

“Exactly.” Lucien nods to Elias. “Yet every expedition has ended in total disaster. Tragic disaster,” he says like he’s not very put out by said tragedies.

“What… sort of disaster?” Venna asks hesitantly.

The vision of that dead woman in the tower presses into my eyelids. Which of us was it? I blink it away.

“The sort of disaster that inspires legends of specters of sailors reaching out of the unmoving mist to drag people to their watery deaths,” Elias says, bored voice in contrast with his lurid statement.

“Legends, of course.” Lucien chuckles. “Though, the mist is strange. There could be enough wind to fully fill sails, but the fog won’t so much as stir. It simply… hangs there.”

“So. Magic?” Stark says.

“Who knows?” Lucien sighs. “Probably.”

“But someone has sailed close enough to see the islands,” Stark points out.

“Indeed. And those who’ve managed to sail close enough have reported glimpses of a massive tower through brief breaks in the mist,” Lucien replies. “Elias.”

Elias turns away from the table and pulls out another massive leather folio. He returns to the table and begins to carefully extract several yellowed sketches, each looking more delicate than the last.

The sketches are all rough drawings, looking to be done by different hands, of a tall stone tower rising from jagged rocks.

When I lean down to study the drawings closer, I can make out the detail in the tower’s peak. It looks almost like another natural rock formation, as if it’s sat there atop its island and been carved by the sea and the wind together.

Except at its very tip, there are symbols.

They’re messily scrawled and not perfectly accurate—whoever recorded them must have seen them for only a second. But even so, they’re clearly recognizable to me. To any Bonded.

I fight down a gasp and hover my hand above the most detailed sketch, tracing the four symbols with my eyes.

“What? What is it?” Elias asks.

“Oh shit,” Noemi says.

“These are the symbols of the four direwolf packs,” I tell them, then point to each in time. “Strategos, Daemos, Kryptos, and Phylax.”

Elias picks up the paper and studies it. The Bonded break into strained conversation. They’re clearly confused and worried.

“Anassa,” I reach out. “Do the wolves know anything about this tower?”

There’s a pause, and I can tell Anassa is thinking. Then, “No, it is not in our histories. But clearly it belongs to our land. Or to the Bonded.”

I tilt my head, thinking.

“What is it?” Venna asks. I share Anassa’s comment with the group.

“Maybe…” Saela traces the tower with her finger, pausing on each pack symbol. “Maybe it takes the magic of all four of your packs to break through the fog.”

I look around the group, my skin tingling with anticipation. “You’re right, Sae. It may take that. And… look at us.”

One Strategos, one Daemos, one Kryptos, one Phylax.

Noemi starts to laugh. “Well, then, Killian and Alistair are screwed. If it’s true, they won’t be able to reach it. They don’t have any Strategos or Kryptos on their side.”

Until he uses his new powers of persuasion on members of those packs.

I checked in quickly with Egith this morning. She and the remaining forces are heading to Blumenfall, and they have Ruby with them—which is beneficial for us since she’s important to Lucien.

However, there are still the retired Bonded and those not on active duty. I also connected with Aldrich, who told me that Killian’s forces are known to be en route to Sturmfrost. How long until the city, and the Bonded City, are all under his control?

“We should attempt the journey right away,” I say. “It feels weirdly fortuitous, and we might have a limited time before Killian figures it out.” I turn to Lucien, who’s wearing his scheming expression, head tilted back, eyes narrowed, arms crossed over his chest. “Do you have a boat we can use to get there? And assuming the answer is yes, is it fast?”

Lucien just stares at me for a long moment, that scheming look continuing, and I really, really don’t like it.

Then he lifts a finger and says, “Yes, but I have one condition.”

Of course he does.

“What is it?” I ask warily.

“You will need someone to captain that boat, and I happen to be an excellent sailor. So Elias and I will personally accompany you on this expedition.”

He stares at me unblinking, and for once I can read his thoughts clearly.

Right now, we each have two of the Tears.

If I find another one in the tower, and he’s not there with me, the power balance between us will tilt in my direction. We may be at a truce, and we may have a common enemy.

But the basic fact stands that our countries have been at war for centuries.

Neither of us trusts the other.

Neither of us wants the other to be more powerful.

Stark’s hands curl into tight fists, tattoos curving around his knuckles. But I smooth my hand over his under the table. His fists don’t release, but they also don’t violently smash Lucien’s nose.

Small victories.

“And after the tower? If we discover a Tear there, what then?”

Lucien cocks his head. “Well, I think that would be all the more reason to formally solidify our alliance, don’t you?”

My blood curdles. He means marriage. This will be just another thing to use as a bargaining chip against me, to force my hand.

I swallow so I don’t spit in his face instead. We need Lucien’s resources and possibly his knowledge. And definitely we’ll need his Tears around if we go up against Killian and Alistair—not to mention his army.

So I take a deep breath, resigned. “Put your finger down. You look stupid. But fine. We’ll go together.”

After some hurried conversations about travel logistics, everyone heads out of Lucien’s rooms to start packing for our journey.

I still don’t share with the group that one final detail from my vision: the woman’s body I saw in the tower, her face obscured.

It might not have been one of us. Or perhaps I was wrong and the woman lived.

I try to convince myself, but behind my thoughts lurks a darker truth: One of our party will die in this search.

43

MERYN

Meryn?”

My sister pokes her head into my room hesitantly as I finish shoving clothing into my packs.

My heart catches in my throat at the look on her face: vulnerable. Scared, even.

I understand what Venna was saying, how important it is to see beyond Saela’s changes and accept her as a whole person—one who has a place in this world. How I haven’t been making it easy for Saela to confide in me about what she’s going through.

But that doesn’t make it any less heartbreaking to see the hesitance in her face as she comes in to talk to me.

“Come sit,” I say, hopping up to the foot of my bed and patting the mattress beside me. She does, and I pull her close, ruffling her hair.

“You’re my hero, you know that?” My voice comes out choked with emotion, and I swallow. “You’re brilliant, the way you put things together. We’d be lost without your help.”

Saela is quiet. I pull back to look at her. I would have thought she’d be excited about putting the puzzle pieces together, figuring out what we have to do next to ensure the rest of the Tears stay out of Killian’s hands.

“What is it, Saela?”

“I know you always want what’s best for me, and you always want to protect me,” she says, and I start to brace myself. She speaks fast. “But I’ve been thinking about it, and I know you might not like this, but I think I should stay here. I… want to stay here in Astreona, at least for a little while.” She’s staring at her feet now. “I want to learn about what it means to be a Siphon.”

I take a deep, shaking breath. I want to find some way to rationalize around it, to twist reality enough that it would make sense for Saela to come with us.

But I know—I know—that taking her would put her in harm’s way, and I owe her better. I have already endangered her so many times. Taking her to the front with us, and then deep into what I thought to be enemy territory.

I can choose to let Saela stay here, far from the conflict, in the company of other Siphons.

In the company of our father. Whatever my feelings toward him, it’s clear he has a genuine affection for Saela, and she wants to get to know him, too.

I lift Saela’s face. Her eyes are as teary as mine, and I can’t stop the strangling hug that follows.

“I don’t want to leave you,” I whisper to her. Saela lets out a hiccupping cry and hides against me. My shirt quickly wets with her tears. I smooth my hand over her hair and speak to reassure myself as much as my sister, “It won’t be for good. I promise I’ll be back for you.”

Saela nods against me and says, “I can literally wait forever for you, so try not to die. Okay?”

My laughter starts to ease the crushing weight of emotion. “I’ll do my very best.”

Saela pulls back just enough to look up into my eyes. “And Meryn? Make Killian pay.”

I clench my teeth, cup my sister’s cheek, then say, “I’ll do my very best at that, too.”

By early afternoon, our group gathers in a garden courtyard under the shade of wide-leafed trees. The air is balmy, with a slight breeze that rustles the colorful plants. A fountain with a fish-tailed woman is trickling away, sparkling with turquoise light. The idyllic scene is in sharp contrast with the mixture of reluctance and urgency twisting in my gut.

Cratos, Anassa, and Ephyse lap from the water as they wait for everyone else before we depart for Bloomfang.

Saela and our father have joined us to say goodbye. I let Saela fawn over Anassa, who is aching over this goodbye almost as much as I am, and level my father with a glare.

His lips thin, and then he nods to a secluded part of the garden. I brush past him, and he follows me there.

When I’m certain we’re out of hearing range of everyone else, I turn on him, my voice a furious whisper. “You’d better be the best fucking father anyone’s ever had for her. You have eleven years to make up for, and she’s really going to need you right now.”

It’s agonizing, leaving her here with him—the father who has been alive and well this whole time, the father who chose not to come back to us.

The lines on his face deepen. “I know that you and I may never… recover. But I take getting to know my other daughter seriously. I’m going to make sure the time we have counts.”

“You promise me?” I tell him. “Because if I have even the slightest sense that you’ve neglected her while I’m gone, you’ll be dead for real and you’ll wish it was as quick as it would be in battle.”

“I promise, Meryn. She’ll be safe and happy here.”

And even though I know a part of me will always resent him, I believe him in this moment. I don’t give him a hug goodbye. I don’t even say another word. I just nod and turn on my heel.

But then he grabs my wrist. His fingers are trembling slightly.

“Please,” he exhales in a rush. He fights to compose himself. “I know you’re eventually going back to Nocturna, to face him. Please try to make sure Ruby stays safe. To the best of your ability. Please.”

I stare at where he’s gripping me, and he hastily releases me.

“She really matters to you, doesn’t she?” The question aches to be asked.

He winces. It’s oddly reassuring seeing my own discomfort reflected in him.

“Ruby has been the most important person in my life for the past twelve years. What we have… it’s not just the sire bond.” He breaks off and looks away.

He’s staring straight into the past, and it clearly hurts him.

“The love I had for your mother was meaningful to me, and it was real. I hope you believe that. And I don’t mean to say that what we shared paled in any way because of what I have now. But my connection to Ruby is different. It’s written onto my soul. It’s a type of love I didn’t know was even possible until her.”

It’s hard, hearing those words from his mouth. To me, Ruby is still the bloodsucking Siphon who stole my father away from us at a time when we needed him most. It’s nearly impossible for me to imagine her otherwise.

The emotion in his voice is genuine, though. I gaze at my father’s face, seeing for the first time a person separate from me, who loved me and my mother and who made mistakes of his own.

This man and I may never be close again. But for Saela’s sake, I will do what I can for him. I breathe out, and some of my resentment leaves me.

He may have been a bad father. But he doesn’t deserve to suffer because of it.

I catch his eye. “I’ll make sure our forces keep her well guarded.”

When I get back to the direwolves, Saela pushes the Tear necklace into my hand and gives me a sparklingly hopeful look. I slip it on and have to ask, “Still no sire connection?”

She shakes her head. “The blocker Lucien gave me is working.” She fingers the delicate gold chain at her throat, as if to make sure it’s still there.

I’m relieved to hear that even if I can’t be here to protect Saela, at least Killian still can’t reach her.

Saela turns, opens her bag, and produces the book about the Sturmfrost Queens and our mother’s journals for me. And she whispers, “In case you need Mother with you.”

I take the books and almost start to cry, but the moment is interrupted by Lucien, who comes swanning down the stairs.

“I’ve arrived, you’re welcome!”

Looking up, I scowl when I see what he’s wearing.

It’s a high-necked tunic of dark material—black but with hints of colors when it catches the light, like raven’s feathers—and glittery stitching, the shoulders curving upward like blades. The overall look makes his height and lean build even more striking.

It’s probably the least combat-ready piece of clothing I could imagine. The only thing it’s missing are billowy sleeves to get even more in the way.

Elias is better prepared, though his tight leather armor is still made to stave off Astreonan heat. Which is to say it’s got gaps in vital places. Even then, he’s still wearing a deep blue shirt beneath it. With billowy sleeves.

Astreonans really do like to wear things that flutter in the wind.

“What is he wearing?” Saela whispers to me.

I smirk. “He looks like he’s ready to dance with our enemies, not fight them.”

Saela giggles, but Anassa says, “Do not underestimate his capabilities.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I grumble. “Do you at least have warmer clothes packed in your bags?” I ask them both. “If we’re going to be north near Nocturna, you’ll need plenty of layers.”

“Yes, Mother, don’t worry; we won’t catch a cold,” Lucien says, eyeing me sharply. He approaches us with long strides. He clearly expects to ride with me, then.

Anassa snaps at him, emitting a rumbling growl and a loud bark. Lucien recoils slightly and frowns at her.

“Anassa refuses to seat you,” I say, trying not to sound amused. “It’s nonnegotiable.”

Lucien’s frown deepens. “Fine.”

His blue eyes scan the courtyard. Just as he turns, Venna rides in to join us, moving smoothly with Skaia. Lucien’s lips curl up at the corners, and he glides the tip of his finger over them lightly.

“I’ll ride with her.”

My fingers dig into Anassa’s fur as he approaches Venna. She looks down at him and raises a brow. He stares at her like he wants her throat under his fangs, and it makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

Venna doesn’t bat an eye, though. She lets him mount, sighing as if she’s agreed to some mildly unpleasant chore.

Elias looks to Stark, reads his responding scowl accurately, and moves to ride with Noemi. “I promise I won’t stab you,” she tells him sweetly.

Saela and I share one last bone-crushing hug, and then I mount Anassa. As we turn to ride out of the castle grounds, I look back at my sister, growing smaller and smaller in the distance.

All my instincts yell at me to turn around, grab onto her, and not let her out of my sight.

“Her pack will take care of her,” Anassa says, and the words sink in like daggers.

“But we are her pack,” I protest, heart aching.

“We are,” agrees Anassa. “But she also has a pack here. And where we are headed, we cannot keep her safe.”

Before we go through the gate to the city beyond, I see my father fold his arms around Saela. She leans back in his embrace.

I swivel to face forward once again, doing everything I can to ignore the voice repeating in my head:

She’s happy without you. She’s happy without you.

It takes us two days of hard riding at full direwolf speed to reach Bloomfang.

Lucien, despite constantly projecting the appearance of a spoiled king, travels well. He doesn’t complain about his lack of a feather bed and anyone to fill it. He drinks from the jarred blood Elias buys with only a slight grimace.

His self-obsessed comments grow tiring, but his presence keeps Elias in check. And, to my surprise, the company is more pleasant than we had on our ride into Astreona.

Stark and I are both sleeping poorly, though. My anxiety over what we’re doing—and the race to beat Killian—keeps my mind working at all hours. Stark spends his nights tossing and turning next to me, but when I press him about it, he shrugs it off. I have a lingering feeling that he’s still working through Siegrid’s death.

The landscape blurs around us as we move. It’s all withered desert and cracked dirt. And then, almost suddenly, the air grows heavier with humidity.

Life starts to return to the land, growing thicker and more vibrant.

By the time Bloomfang reveals itself to us, everything is once again lush and thriving. Anassa slows, and my breath catches.

The city is beautiful, with tall, pale buildings that from afar look like carved shells. It’s nestled in a lush green cove, with lots of roads winding around the modest mountain it’s tucked up against.

But it’s the sea that stops me in my tracks.

The sea.

I’ve never seen the sea before. It has no end. I knew that, in theory, but it’s different seeing it somehow. It’s a wide-open blue expanse of freedom.

The late-afternoon sun dances across its surface, like a thousand gold coins caught in a blue-black net.

I’ve never seen anything so beautiful.

“My queen,” Stark says softly.

I look at him and realize there are tears in my eyes.

His jaw tightens. His hair catches in the breeze—a cool breeze off the water, refreshing after our long days of riding in the sun. Even the wind itself smells different here.

I realize he’s asking me if I’m all right, so I smile and give him a hint of what I’m feeling over our bond.

His eyes immediately smile back at me. None of the rest of his face does, but I see it all the same.

We wind our way down into the city as one. Immediately, upon our approach, citizens scramble out of the way and cower from our wolves.

Others must recognize their king traveling with us, because they gather around and stare in wonder. Apparently, Lucien’s presence makes them feel safe enough to stand in the presence of direwolves.

As we draw closer to the harbor, the sound of seabirds crying fills the air. People shout and go about their jobs loading and unloading cargo. Bells tucked into towers ring in the arrivals and departures of ships. I wrinkle my nose.

“What’s that smell?” I ask.

“Fish,” Elias replies, also grimacing.

“And the sea, Meryn,” Noemi adds. “The salt water itself has a smell. Seaweed. Fish. But also just the brine of the water.” She would know; Eisenfall is also on the sea.

“And sweaty workmen,” Lucien adds unhelpfully, very obviously ogling one of said workmen as Venna rides past.

She turns to me and sends me is this guy serious eyes, which makes me smile.

“We’ve arrived,” Lucien says. He then unfurls his arm like he’s bestowing a great gift upon me, and I follow the length of it toward the farthest dock in the harbor.

There’s a magnificent ship floating there with a crowd gathered around it, staring and pointing.

It’s not as big as some of the cargo ships, but it’s got razor-sharp sails, a narrow but long hull with a curling prow, and its boards are painted in waves of cerulean, navy, and flashes of silver to imitate the glint of sunlight on the crest of a wave.

It’s large enough to accommodate our entire party, including our direwolves. Yet, to my untrained eye, it also looks as if it were designed for speed.

Noemi twists around, taking in all the sights. She jostles Elias in her excitement, who wobbles and nearly falls off, only managing to grip fur at the last second.

As we board the ship, something settles in me that’s been white-water churning since we left Brightbane. Or maybe even before that.

We’re on the narrow road that leads to Killian’s defeat. The razor-slim path that takes us to the tower and to the next Tear.

This is right. I know it is.

Whatever the cost.

The prow of our boat slices through the water, and I’m bent entirely over the railing, hair clinging to my clammy skin, insides roiling.

I squeeze my eyes shut as nausea gathers again, but I try to breathe through it.

It doesn’t work. My stomach surges.

There goes another bout of bile over the edge of the ship.

Shadows caress against my face, pulling my hair back so I don’t yak on the strands.

Groaning, I spit and lift my head.

“Are you trying to make me feel worse?” I moan at Stark. “It’s annoying how good you are at that.”

Stark merely smirks. He’s been the Sovereign Alpha for only about a week, and yet he shortly mastered shadebending—something I still can’t manage with any consistency. It’s as if he got some sort of nefarious tutor while I was left flailing.

Then again, he’s always been a master of control. The thought whispers some heat back into me, and the nausea starts to abate.

“Stupid fucking sea,” I grumble. “Fuck you, waves. Fuck you, boat.”

“You don’t find the sea as beautiful now?” Stark asks.

I wipe at my mouth and straighten. “I’ll never set foot on another ship as long as I live,” I grumble. He chuckles. I frown at him and sniff, “I look stunning, right?”

Stark assesses me for a moment. “I swore I wouldn’t lie to you.”

“Lie right now.”

“You are not even slightly green. Very lovely. The sea will settle soon,” Stark assures me.

I sigh and nod, staggering away from the railing.

When I turn, my eyes naturally settle on Lucien, and I’m immediately queasy again. He’s sprawled prettily across the helm of the ship, one hand on the ship’s wheel. Yet again, he’s wearing flowing clothes that ripple in the same breeze that fills our sails. Looking at him, we could all be on a pleasure cruise.

“Don’t,” I warn him.

His eyes light with amusement. He doesn’t listen. “The mighty queen of Nocturna brought low by simple waves.”

I glare at him through my misery. Stark strides past me, glower set on Lucien, and I have to catch him. “Stark,” I say weakly.

He pauses. His anger seems to amuse Lucien further.

“I said don’t, Lucien,” I remind him. “I want to let him kill you. And I think I might’ve vomited up whatever organ it was that produced all my restraint, so my reserves are dwindling.”

Lucien chuckles. “You’re fun.”

I sit on the deck, and Stark follows, arranging himself beside me. “We need his cooperation. None of the Nocturnans know how to steer this damn thing. You’ll have to settle for imagining his disembowelment,” I tell Stark over our bond.

He turns to stare at Lucien. Then, a second later, I sense the edges of his thoughts. Immensely violent thoughts. And slowly, still staring at Lucien, he starts to smile in a terrifying way that doesn’t reach his eyes.

Lucien’s own smile drops, and he moves as far from us as he can while keeping a hand on the helm, eyeing Stark like he’s worried he’s about to pounce.

“Sturmfrost, make him stop that.”

“No.” I settle my head against Stark’s shoulder.

Just then, Anassa completes one of her pacing rounds of the deck. She pauses before me, sniffing, and touches her nose to my cheek.

“I’m still okay,” I tell her. “And before you complain some more, I know you hate this.”

She huffs warm air at me, nudges me with her nose, then sets about pacing some more. She hasn’t settled once since we’ve been on the ship, except for maybe when she has to lie down to get some rest. And even then, she can only manage it curled up against Cratos.

We really are more similar than I ever realized.

Cratos, to his credit, is a lot more composed than she is. He’s laying near the masts where the rocking of the waves is less acute, his green eyes scanning the waves like he’s expecting a sea serpent to jump onto the deck for an easy snack.

I tried to convince Anassa that being at the middle of the ship would help ease the unsteadiness and let her relax, but she growled at me, at Stark, and then snapped at Cratos.

It’s midafternoon and I’m considering sitting down with Venna and Noemi for another sign language lesson. I’ve spent all my nonvomiting time on the boat concentrating on studying and improving, and Venna’s been a patient teacher. Noemi asked to join, too.

But before I can go find them, Lucien calls out from his position at the helm. “We’re approaching the coordinates!”

I grunt and sit up. Stark helps pull me to my feet, and I keep hold of his hand for a moment as I stare out at the endless blue.

Only, it isn’t so endless any longer.

The others all gather at the rail. We shade our eyes against the glare of the sun on the water. And it’s just… there.

A dense fogbank hangs over the sea. The sky around it is crystal clear up until a point, and then it darkens significantly.

There’s a strong wind. Our sails flutter, and the rigging whips as we’re carried closer to the fog. And yet that thick mist doesn’t move.

It’s as if someone pulled a cloud down from the sky and tied it to the waves. No, to the island.

A chill streaks down my spine, and my grip on Stark’s hand tightens.

“Haunting,” Venna says as she steps onto the deck, voicing what we’re all thinking.

That wall of white stretches endlessly across our path, and we’re about to be swallowed up. I swear I can hear whispers in the wind. Moisture gathers on my skin, cold and clinging.

“Do you… feel that?” I ask Stark.

It’s strange. The seasickness that has followed me since we left the harbor is gone. It eases up the moment the first tiny droplets meet my skin.

Now, I have a growing sense of awareness. Alertness. It’s like an instinct I didn’t know I had, pointing my eyes in the direction of the fog, willing me to listen to the wind.

“Yes,” Stark confirms.

Something pulls my eyes from him. I press against the railing, staring, waiting.

Out of the endless white comes the tower. We’re drifting closer to the edge of the fog now, close enough that the sun is lost behind its looming wall and our ship is drenched in shadow.

Even still, I can see the island. It’s a dark mass waiting for us, the jut of the tower unmistakable—as are the pack symbols carved into its face.

Elias gazes in wonder at the sight. I think it’s the first time I’ve seen his expression lack all artifice.

“It’s like legend brought to life,” he murmurs to himself.

We all stare at the foreboding tower in front of us as the mists around the top begin to clear. The black shape grows larger and larger, until it looks impossibly tall, like something from a fantastical story.

“Oh shit!” Lucien shouts. Sudden cold air rushes around us. I gasp and whirl. He yanks the wheel as hard as he can, spinning it so fast that the spokes blur.

“BRACE!” he screams.

44

MERYN

I turn wide eyes toward the island.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, massive spiked rocks spear out of the sea. They must’ve been hidden by the fog, but we’re in it now, the ship soaring toward them.

White water splashes up toward us as the hull groans under the weight of the sudden turn.

“Fuck!” I shout, staggering back.

Stark’s hand closes around my arm, yanking me. “Cratos!” he bellows, sprinting with me.

My balance is upset by the tilt of the ship’s deck, and Stark has to catch me and drag me back up. Cratos is on his feet, fangs bared, growling.

We reach Cratos right as the ship’s hull hits the rocks.

I cry out as I’m thrown to the deck, but Cratos is above me. He braces his massive body, using his weight and strength to ground the three of us. He sinks his teeth into the ropes hanging from the ship’s mast.

Stark holds me with one arm and clings to Cratos’s fur with the other. There’s an awful creaking, scraping sound as the ship glances off the stones.

A blur of white flashes past my eyes. I scream when I realize it’s Anassa writhing, her body flying over the deck, her claws scraping against the wood as she tries to resist the pull of gravity.

Her body slams into the railing, and she yelps, making Cratos growl and groan, though he doesn’t release his grip even then. Almost immediately, though, the ship starts to right itself.

Instantly, Cratos abandons us, rushing to Anassa’s side.

I pant, watching him worry over her, fear crystallizing in my veins. He literally bites her as if he needs to hold on to her.

Then she snaps at him and growls, getting back to her feet. I don’t have to hear their words to understand she’s telling him she’s fine and to stop being so dramatic. He nips at her ear, and she flicks it at him, her eyes seeking me.

I find my feet and rush to her. Unlike with Cratos, she lets me hold her. “Scared the shit out of me.”

“I hate ships.”

“You and me both.”

I lift my head. Stark leans on the railing, staring out at the jagged rocks. The rigging is squeaking and hissing. Lucien turns a lever that draws the ropes tight, dragging and folding the sails closed.

There’s a loud, metallic rattling sound as the anchor dislodges from its resting place.

“We can’t sail through that,” Lucien says by way of explanation. “There’s no clear path.”

I scratch Anassa’s face for a moment and then move to join him.

He’s right. The rocks we hit aren’t the only ones—the sea is covered in them. “No clear path at all?” I ask.

“Nothing I can see,” Venna tells me. “See the shadow in that open bit? There are likely more rocks just beneath the surface of the water.”

I grimace. The island is so tantalizingly close, but there’s still a vast stretch of white-capped water between us and its shore. Even if there were wide-open areas before us, if we tried to sail closer, more rock formations could emerge suddenly from the mist.

We can’t trust our eyes here.

“She’s right,” Lucien confirms, thudding down the steps from the helm. “Navigating any closer would risk the ship. We’re already in dangerous waters.”

“Are you all right?” I ask. There’s blood dripping from his arm.

He waves his hand dismissively. “Rigging bit me on its way up. Already almost healed. How are you going to approach?”

The debate immediately starts up, but Anassa’s voice cuts in. “There is only one solution to the approach. It is obvious, is it not?”

“What does that mean?” I ask.

“We swim.”

I choke and look up at her. “Excuse me?!”

“What?” Venna asks. “What did she say?”

“Anassa said we should swim. Which is ridiculous. And reckless. The water looks freezing, the distance is way too far, and, I’ll remind you, I’ve never swum in my life!” I yell, panic gripping me.

Growing up in perpetually frozen, landlocked Sturmfrost didn’t exactly provide much opportunity for swimming lessons. And death by drowning seems like an awful way to go.

But Anassa just lifts her head and plants her feet. It’s her I’m right, you’re wrong look, and it’s clearly convinced Cratos, who’s nudging at Stark’s arm until it’s slung over his nose. Get on, that means.

“Can direwolves even swim with all that fur?” I demand.

“They… can,” Stark admits, scratching at Cratos’s ear. His hesitation implies some negative previous experience. Great.

“That doesn’t mean they should!” I protest.

“Doesn’t it?” Noemi asks. “We need to get to the island.”

The debate starts up again. I am consistently on the side of hey, let’s not jump into the sea and drown. I’d really rather live a little longer, please?

But apparently, I’m outvoted.

“You can’t outvote me,” I snap, only partially joking. “I’m your queen.”

“I think we just did,” Venna says.

“We can bring our riders safely to shore. If the island is accessible only to Bonded, this may be our only way in,” Anassa insists.

I drag my hand over my face. “I’m going to kill all of you.”

“Not if the sea gets us first,” Venna says very deliberately to piss me off. I smack at her as she passes me, and she chuckles.

Lucien is lingering to the side, and I shoot him a look. “If you sail this boat away while we’re on the island…”

He puts a hand on his hip. “It would sort of defeat the point of sending you in there to retrieve another Tear if I just left you here to die, no?”

I narrow my eyes. “And my crown?”

Lucien leans against the railing. “I hardly think you should wear it swimming, do you? Enjoy the water; it should be refreshing after all that vomit.”

Scoffing, I turn to Anassa. She has a smug look on her face, her eyes blinking lazily like she’s just killed the biggest deer in the bunch. She loves getting her way.

“Mm-hmm,” I grumble, and start stripping my outer layers. The less clothing, the less water weight I’ll have to fight against to stay mounted.

Cold air lifts the hairs all over my body, and the mist immediately saps my heat as I rigidly climb up Anassa’s side.

“I hate this,” I tell Anassa as she approaches the railing. The others all mount up and gather at the edge of the deck now. “I hate this, and I blame you,” I tell her. “I think you just want to get off this fucking ship.”

She snorts at me.

Stark and Cratos approach. His eyes catch mine, and his intention ripples over the bond. It isn’t quite words, but it feels like, I’m with you.

“You better not drop me,” I whisper in Anassa’s ear. “I plan on dying in a much more heroic way.”

She huffs an amused breath, and then we’re launching over the railing. There’s a brief moment when we’re both flying through the air. I tighten my grip on her fur. We hit the water, and icy cold shrieks over my nerves.

The air rushes from my lungs, and I’m convinced I’m about to pass out.

Then the salt stings my eyes, and my mouth floods with the overwhelming, awful taste of it. I’m choking and gasping back to myself.

I lean into Anassa, bracing against wave after wave, my hands locking up on her fur. Her powerful muscles move through the water.

I can’t tell how fast we are or aren’t moving. As soon as one wave passes, leaving my eyes burning and my lungs crying out for air, another hits me like a suffocating blow. There’s no relief from the onslaught.

My mind goes as numb as my body, slowing by the second.

I try to keep track of the others in the swirling chaos, but they’re invisible behind the waves and fog. The jarring, freezing water keeps jolting me out of my focus when I try to find them through the bonds.

Rocks keep emerging from the fog like massive teeth, and I can sense the sea beneath me, yawning wide to swallow us up.

The waves start to come at another angle, and the current pulls us sideways, fighting our progress by dragging us in the wrong direction. The only thing keeping me sane is Anassa’s strength. She moves, cutting through the sea like a silver blade.

I trust her. All I have to do is hold on. Cling to her. Let her carry me to safety.

A high-pitched howl fills the air, and I’m instantly on alert, trying to catch a glimpse of its cause through the fog.

Noemi’s direwolf, Ephyse, is swimming backward, moving with the waves instead of against them. And Noemi is in the water, gasping and trying to scream.

They’re separated.

Noemi’s head goes under, then comes up again.

My alarm riots through the bonds. It cuts right through the brain fog and the fear, and my overwhelming, consuming need to protect Noemi rages through all of us. Anassa starts to turn, her muscles shuddering as she responds to my impulse.

Ephyse howls again.

I can’t see Noemi any longer. I’ve lost her. Anassa has, too, judging by the way she’s treading water, head swiveling, trying to use her nose even as the saltwater scent masks everything and the fog blinds us.

Then I feel it. The fear. The dark. The gasp for air that drags stinging salt water into her lungs.

Drowning. Dying.

The woman’s body from my original vision rises in my mind. Was it Noemi? Are we doomed to lose her?

I let out the scream she can’t. My voice carries clear over the waves. My senses blur with hers for a moment, and my hands start to loosen in Anassa’s fur, waves battering at me, threatening to drag me down with Noemi.

And then comes a crippling pain in my arm. Light. Noemi is fading, blood is seeping into the water, but she’s being lifted.

“MERYN!”

Anassa’s voice slams me back into my body. I was slipping away.

I choke and tighten my grip on her again. “Noemi. She—”

“She is safe.”

I gasp and turn, blink rapidly against the sting in my eyes. Cratos’s massive body plows through the waves at a speed that should be impossible. Stark is on his back, holding on with a single strong hand, leaning forward to reach Noemi. She’s entirely limp with an arm clamped in Cratos’s teeth.

She’s bleeding, but she’s still alive.

Ephyse lets out a desperate whimper, swimming close to Cratos to try to nudge Noemi’s limp body up toward Stark.

Anassa begs me to focus. She can’t hold out forever. I throw myself at the mercy of my direwolf, letting trust take over.

The fear never entirely fades, but I can tell the shore is getting closer.

The entire swim should have taken minutes, but with the current fighting us and the cold fire of terror burning me up from inside, it seems like it takes hours. Years off my life, really.

We break through a particularly dense patch of fog, and suddenly the island’s shoreline appears right before us, much closer than I thought we were.

Relief floods me. Even if I were to fall from Anassa now, she’d be able to retrieve me.

I start to slump against her back as she makes one final push for the island. Once we’re in the shallows, she finds her footing on the rocky bottom and stands. The weight of her soaked fur must be punishing, but she pushes herself up all the same and staggers toward the beach.

Clinging weakly to her neck, I try to encourage her, to give her my thanks, to communicate how fucking impressed I am with her.

She rumbles and collapses onto the pebbly shore. I slip from her back and thud into the loose, rounded, dark rocks, lying there like a waterlogged corpse and relishing the sweet, sweet solidity of the ground.

I’m gasping for breath, and my entire body is trembling, but without the waves attacking me, I can focus enough to sort through the communication bonds in my head. All four of us are alive.

Exhausted, but alive.

Through salt-stung eyes, I see the others struggling to shore. Venna’s wolf is barely swimming, but Cratos is there, lending his strength, pushing him along. Stark is already on shore. He has Noemi under his arm.

She’s bleeding still, but she’s conscious again, retching sea water onto the stones. Ephyse finally reaches her, bending down to focus on healing her arm.

“Come closer,” Anassa urges, concerned.

She nudges me with her nose and licks me, and I understand why she’s afraid. My body is turning blue, and I can’t stop violently shaking. I’m fairly certain I’m on the verge of hypothermia.

I cough and groan as I try to crawl closer to Anassa, hoping her body will lend me some warmth. She attempts to pull me in with her paw and shifts to reach me better. But I just sort of collapse onto the stone, pulled down under the weight of my soaked clothes, face buried in her briny fur.

When she licks her tongue over my head again, warmth settles over me as if she just laid a blanket over me.

I open my eyes, surprised. Immediately, the bite in the air around me lessens. Heat suffuses my blood. The stones under my hands warm as if they’ve been sitting in the sun for hours despite the dense fog.

The water dragging me down evaporates, hissing and drifting from my skin in steam. Within moments, I’m entirely dry, as if I were never in the water at all.

I look around, baffled. The same thing is happening to the others. Their clothes and hair dry in seconds.

The wolves shake themselves as they withdraw from the sea, sending water spraying everywhere, but when they fall still, their fur is light and fluffy. Dry.

Stark meets my eyes, looking just as bewildered as I am. He smooths a hand down his dry clothes and shakes his head.

It shouldn’t be possible. Things like this don’t just happen. It’s magic like I’ve never seen.

It takes us all several minutes to recover from the shock of the swim and the subsequent magical recovery. Clearly, we’re in the right place. The island seems to be testing us, and when we pass the test, it rewards us. That much is clear.

But as I stand on the beach and look up at the tower, a gut-wrenching sense of danger settles over me.

This island is old, and it’s alive enough to recognize us as Bonded, to push back against us, to dry us off like a parent ruffling a towel over their children.

The others gather around me. I reach up to cup Stark’s neck.

“Thank you,” I tell him. He rests his hand over mine briefly, and I release him to turn to the others. “Move carefully,” I tell them. “There’s no way that was all this island has in store for us. I’m guessing it’s just beginning.”

The island is smaller than it appeared from the ship, but it’s no less ominous. It’s dominated by a rocky central hill upon which stands the tower. Up close, it looks less like a natural formation and more like it was intentionally carved from gray stone by a masterly hand. Steep stairs cut into the rocky hill leading up to a door.

The tower itself is weather-beaten, with slimy stains clinging to it where the sea spray meets its exposed walls. Yet its surface is remarkably intact, despite its obvious age. It rises at least twenty stories, like a lighthouse without a light, lost in the fog.

Lonely.

That’s what this is, sinking deep into my bones. Loneliness.

An ancient echo of the goddess, maybe, if our crazy theories are right and she really was here long ago.

As we climb the slippery steps toward the entrance, my eyes start to play more tricks on me. There’s movement.

It isn’t like my shadows, which are easy to track when one knows where to look for them. Here, my mind keeps registering motion, but when I turn to look at it, everything is utterly still.

I realize, gradually, that the stones themselves are shifting. I can’t catch the motion with my eyes. I’m not fast enough. But when I’m not looking directly at the tower, the patterns in the stonework slide and shift in my peripheral vision.

It makes me dizzy, and it makes me feel like we’re being watched. Followed.

“Just keep walking,” I advise the others, and they do. Our wolves move with care, their massive footfalls quiet.

The fog thins, and we can see the tower’s entrance clearly. It’s an enormous door made of a single, enormous slab of stone. Rectangular, with an uneven surface. Carved into the natural rock face, however, are words.

“What is this?” Noemi asks.

I step up to the stone door and crane my neck to read the inscription. A poem.

THE FIRST WALK PATHS THE LIGHT CAN’T TRACE,

THROUGH SECRETS WRAPPED IN SHADOWS’ GRACE.

THEY SEE THE CRACKS IN EVERY LIE,

AND STRIKE BEFORE THE WATCHERS SPY.

THE NEXT ERUPTS WHERE CHAOS BLEEDS,

THEIR WRATH THE FORCE THAT BATTLE FEEDS.

THEY BREAK THE LINES, THEY SPARK THE FLAME,

SO OTHERS LIVE—AND SPEAK THEIR NAME.

THE THIRD MOVE AS A SINGLE TIDE,

WITH SHIELD TO SHIELD AND STRIDE TO STRIDE.

THEY HOLD THE LINE WHEN OTHERS FALL,

A LIVING WALL, AN ANSWERED CALL.

THE LAST BEARS WEIGHT NO SOUL WOULD CHOOSE,

TO COUNT THE COST, TO RISK AND LOSE.

THEY DRAW THE MAP WHERE LIVES ENTWINE,

AND SHAPE THE FIELD BY GRAND DESIGN.

FOUR AS ONE, THEIR PATHS ALIGN,

A WOVEN FORCE, A FATE DIVINE.

“It’s about us,” Venna says. She looks at me. “The packs. Right?”

“I’m not sure,” I reply. “It seems like it? But either way, we have to keep moving.”

I take a deep breath and reach out. When I place my palm against the cool stone of the door and push, the entire slab starts to shift. It makes a wretched grinding, rumbling sound as it swings inward.

And yet… no resistance. More magic, then.

I step forward and stare down into the revealed space.

Down, not up. How perplexing. What kind of tower goes down?

There’s a spiral staircase, illuminated by an eerie bluish light that seems to come from the stone itself. The glow shifts around us, brightening and dampening like the tower is breathing.

“In we go,” I whisper. And I take the first step into the tower’s depths.

45

MERYN

The light dyes Anassa’s fur pale blue, as if we’re sinking into a pool of moonlight. It grows brighter the deeper we get. And the farther we descend, the thicker the air. It’s stifling.

I sink my fingers into Anassa’s fur.

“I don’t like this.” A pit of anxiety grows in my gut.

“It does not matter if you like it or not,” comes Anassa’s reply. “Focus on getting through it.”

I must, so I will—once again. The motto of my life.

Bizarrely, it comforts me more than gentle words ever could.

Even though this place is obviously ancient, the spiral stairs are wide enough to fit our wolves comfortably, which is only further proof that this place is meant for the Bonded.

The stairs descend down and down, impossibly deep. We’ve been moving for an eternity—accompanied only by the sounds of our breaths and our wolves’ claws clicking against stone—when we finally reach a landing.

It reveals a wider room carved from the stone of the island, pulsing with the same blue light. Ephyse growls quietly as he and Noemi pace toward the wall, glaring forward.

There’s a door. It’s circular and, like the door above, seems to be made of one solid chunk of stone. Instead of a poem, though, a symbol is carved into it.

The Kryptos symbol, as familiar as if it was hanging above the Kryptos common room back in Sturmfrost.

“Do we—?” I start, but almost instantly, the symbol blazes to life. It catches with heatless blue fire, which hurts a little to stare at directly.

This is another test, then. Kryptos. Will Venna have to pass it alone? Or can we all do it together?

Then comes a dampening in my mind, as if someone’s thrown a blanket over my powers and wrapped it tight.

“Stark,” I say, checking in to see if he feels it.

But I can’t reach him. I can’t reach him.

“Anassa?!”

“I’m here.” She bumps her shoulder against mine.

I swallow down a bubble of panic. “Is… anyone…”

“There’s something strange happening,” Stark confirms right away. “I wonder…” I watch as he focuses on something, fingers twitching. “No. I can’t draw on my shadebending power. I’d try impelling, too, if we weren’t somewhere deep underground where a cave-in could be lethal. But I suspect it would be the same.”

Noemi nods. “I can still reach Ephyse, but that’s it.”

Venna, meanwhile, is staring at each of us, bewildered. “I don’t feel anything different.”

I look up again at the illuminated Kryptos symbol.

“Venna…” I gesture at it. “If your powers are still intact, I wonder… maybe you’re the only one who can get us through?”

Venna and her direwolf ease forward. Skaia’s ears are pinned back with caution, but Venna has a stubborn look on her face.

The moment they step close enough, the door rumbles and rolls to the side. The cold blue fire bursts again, making the rest of us gasp and step back. The fire streaks along the interior of the room to illuminate a large chamber before going dark again.

Strange, shadowy shapes are farther in, but as the blue light fades, I can no longer see anything but shadow.

Anassa and I move toward the door, but Venna flings an arm out to stop me. She dismounts and looks around her feet, and I watch her, unsure what she’s doing. With a yank, she twists off one of the small buttons fastening the cuff of her sleeve.

Flicking her wrist, she tosses the button into the room.

It sails through the air, the dim light of this place glinting on the copper.

Nothing happens.

Then the button lands on the stone with a distinct clink.

Instantly, four jagged pieces of stone rip from the walls and race toward it, smashing into one another and the button in a clamorous crash.

Each of the shards looks about the length of my forearm and deadly sharp.

“Well, that’s fun,” I say shakily. Nobody laughs.

Venna looks back at me, mouth twisting. “We’re going to have to be quiet, I think. I wondered… well, I assumed it’d be either that or rifting. In some ways, rifting would be easier. I’ll go first—watch me, and do what I do. And once we’re in…”

She hesitates, and I take her meaning. “We won’t be able to talk aloud in there, will we? You think the room attacks in response to noise?”

She nods.

I swallow. Great. Just when our mental communication would have been most helpful, we’re left without it.

It’s lucky Noemi sat in on my sign language lessons on the boat, I realize. She’s picked up some of the basics, and in typical Stark fashion, he learned the language already and is far better than I am.

Still, Venna quickly reviews a few key phrases with us, to be sure we’re ready for any instructions she needs to pass along. All of us can, in turn, mentally communicate any instructions to our wolves.

Venna leans her head into the room farther, bracing her arms against the doorframe, but then pulls her head out and takes a step back, frowning. “It’s too dark to see much farther than where the button landed. I think we have to just… go forward.”

We dismount. Venna shows us the slow, quiet way she steps when she’s trying not to make a sound.

“There aren’t really any loose pebbles or pieces of gravel down here, from what I can see,” she instructs. “So just put each foot down softly, rolling it down to the ground, and take it slowly. I’ll go first and can tell you if the terrain changes.”

Lucky the island’s magic saw fit to dry us all off. We’d all be making wet squelching sounds for days with the amount of water our leather boots took on.

Anassa and Cratos and Ephyse have moved off to the side and are clearly getting a lesson in stealthiness from Skaia. Their claws, I realize. They’ll have to step differently to keep them from clicking on the floor.

Or risk losing a paw. I swallow.

At Venna’s prompting, we all check our clothing and packs to make sure nothing on us might jingle or clink as we move. We all removed everything unnecessary before diving into the icy waters of the sea, which helps.

We tighten straps and buckles around weapons, one of the only items we all did prioritize, swim in the sea or no.

Venna and Skaia step up to the door. Venna lets Skaia go first; easier to sign back to us without her wolf’s bulk in the way, I think.

Skaia moves as soundlessly as a shadow. As a Kryptos wolf, she was born for this.

Everyone holds their breath. But the Kryptos pair are masters of their craft. Venna and Skaia move farther into the room without a whisper of sound.

Before they disappear into the dim gloom, Venna turns her head to me, then flicks her hand down and across to say: “Follow me.”

Anassa and I creep in next, then signal back to Noemi and Ephyse. Stark and Cratos bring up the rear.

Venna and her wolf move at an agonizingly slow pace. I never could have been Kryptos, I reflect wryly. I’m much more suited for running headlong at problems, rather than coming up on them slowly and carefully.

Probably something I could work on.

Venna and Skaia look in every direction as they move, somehow able to spot the best terrain in the dim light that grows ever dimmer.

I get a flashback to the Ascent, Venna helping us navigate through tricky patches of ice. The memory is bittersweet, Izabel’s fierce determination bright in my memory.

Venna got us through that time. She’ll get us through now.

I realize I’m holding my breath and let it out slowly and quietly. The light gets lower and lower, but luckily, I can still make out Venna stopping short ahead of me.

My heart drums loud in my ears in the strangely silent space.

Venna swivels around and signs: “Something ahead.”

My skin prickles, and I strain my eyes trying to see the space ahead of us. But the gloom around us is almost complete; the blue glow has dimmed, and even Venna and Skaia are just shadowy forms ahead of me in the darkness.

“Skaia will still be able to see,” Anassa reassures me. “Kryptos warriors train for this—their wolves often have keener night vision than that of the other packs, and they learn to operate as the eyes and ears for their riders.”

All well and good for them. But what about the rest of us?

We all wait in silence, motionless, for Venna and Skaia to move ahead. Venna finally signs back to me, motions exaggerated so I can make them out, “Up and to the left is clear.”

I relay the message back to Noemi. Venna and Skaia start moving ahead, and Anassa and I follow. Anassa does her best to share her superior vision with me as well, though we’re unpracticed at the skill.

Soon, though, the space is too dark even for her. We come to a stop, and I wait for Venna to notice that we’ve halted since I can’t shout ahead.

What if she doesn’t realize? What if she leaves us here, and we’re stranded forever in this darkness?

I know that it’s not logical, that Venna would never abandon us. But still, my chest tightens in that familiar place where my panic lives. Like a giant hand grabbing onto the top of my lungs and squeezing. I struggle to keep my breathing quiet and even.

The space around us is so black. Endlessly black. So much like that nightmare realm where Killian torments me. At the thought, I can almost see his face, swimming up at me out of the darkness.

His mouth in a confident leer. His eyes, that eerie blue, staring at me…

“Slow down,” Anassa thinks to me, opening herself up until the rhythm of her own breath washes into me. Steady, even. I try to match it. My panic subsides, just a little.

Then from up ahead, around Venna, I start to see a faint blue glow.

What on earth… ?

Venna’s face becomes visible, and I see her look of intense concentration. She’s doing this, then. Somehow.

She sends the light behind herself and forward to provide some illumination to Skaia.

It’s not much, but it’s enough. We start up again.

The path she lights for us is winding, and multiple times I only see massive rock formations when they’re already right next to me. Like huge ships sailing right up to us in the gloom. One wrong step and one of us will crash into the rock.

Some of the obstacles are sheer and shiny, like walls of black gemstones. Others are studded with spikes as sharp as a direwolf fang and five times as long.

In the strange light, it looks like the spikes are reaching for us. I shudder and pause until the sensation passes, not trusting myself to move silently until I regain my focus.

Throughout, Venna’s steps are sure and even. I focus on her slow progress, the careful way she places her feet, and mimic.

Twice, Venna pauses and says in sign language: “Get down.”

The first time, the direwolves just have to duck down to avoid disturbing a fragile-looking series of stalactites above us. It’s uncomfortable, watching them hang their heads low, but we get through it unscathed.

Then a minute or so later, Venna gives the signal again, along with another word I don’t catch. I strain to remember the sign she’s making and then remember when I see what’s ahead: a tunnel.

Fuck.

I carefully signal back behind me, making sure Noemi and Stark and their wolves are prepared.

Anassa gets right up to it before realizing she’s not low enough to the ground. My body is tight as a bow as I watch her carefully move backward again so that she can get into position.

She crouches so low the fur on her belly brushes the ground as she moves. I let her go first so that she can move at her own speed in there.

Gulping, I decide it’ll be easiest to crawl as well. I ease myself carefully, so carefully, onto hands and knees, and then I inch forward. My heart is in my throat the entire way through.

If there’s any disturbance, if any of the wolves forget and lift their heads…

My ears play tricks with me, creating sounds when there are none. The meager blue light goes fuzzy in my eyesight.

My hands tremble, and I keep all my focus on my movement. Slowly, slowly. One inch at a time.

Finally, the tunnel ends, and we’re able to straighten.

Glancing up and past Venna, then, I think I can make out a door—yes, it’s an open doorway, and now Venna is passing through, now Skaia—

We’re all through a few moments later, breathing hard and brushing ourselves off. After the silence of the room behind us, our relieved breathing sounds loud and wild.

“Venna?” I reach out experimentally, and yes, the mental connection forms this time. Must be because the task is complete?

She looks at me, and only when I’m beside her do I realize she’s shaking. I reach out and take her hand. “Thanks.”

She huffs a breath and nods. “I nearly threw up.”

I hug her arm to my chest briefly. “You got us through that. You were amazing.”

Her eyes soften slightly.

“What was that blue light?”

She hesitates. “It’s… something I’ve been experimenting with, now that our powers have gone a little crazy. I still bend the shadow, like when I’m rifting, but instead of calling it toward me I’m pushing it away, so that any ambient light nearby rushes in.”

I shake my head. “That’s genius. Have you heard of any Kryptos ever doing that before?”

Before she can reply, the room we’re in erupts with burning red light. I jolt and cling to Venna’s arm. When I face forward, the Daemos symbol is burning with unnaturally red fire on the doorway.

And just like that, our mental link is broken. My magic is dampened down once more.

Cratos steps forward, a black silhouette against the bloody light. Stark looks back at us. “Ready?”

“That seems like a question you have to answer,” I reply.

His jaw ticks, and he turns without hesitation, approaching the door. It grinds open just the same, making my bones rattle. The chamber it reveals is similarly empty, long and narrow, but this time, we can see the opposite side. The far wall has another heavy stone door at its center. And it’s shut.

“Seems like we’ll have to figure out how to open that,” Noemi whispers.

“Daemos magic,” Venna says, following after Stark. “Maybe you’ll have to knock it down.”

“Without knocking the whole tower down on us?” I exclaim.

“Bad idea,” Anassa confirms.

“Quiet,” Stark says. He’s reached the center of the room now. He mounts Cratos, and the two of them do a lap of the room together. The red fire flickers around us, refusing to grant us any warmth. I shiver and look around the room, confused.

“You don’t sense anything?” Venna asks.

“No,” Stark replies.

“Wait,” I say, and turn. I squint up at the space above the passageway we just came from. “There’s writing above the doorway.”

The moment I say so, the door we walked through grinds shut behind us. My heart rate picks up again.

We’re entirely closed in now, trapped in both directions. The wolves growl and shift around nervously, tails flicking and eyes flashing. They’re made for wide-open spaces, not tiny, cramped rooms.

Venna reads the words aloud. “Strength is fire, and loyalty light—both make the hand that wins the fight.”

Instantly, the red fire catches brightly and climbs up the bare stone. It shouldn’t be possible. There’s no fuel for it to burn with. But then, none of this should be possible.

I watch in somewhat terrified awe as the fire starts to carve tens of symbols all along the walls.

They’re all hands in various positions.

A fist striking down, crushing a broken helm.

An open palm facing outward, as if begging for peace.

A hand holding a small, round mirror.

A hand engulfed in fire, rising high.

Two hands clasped together tightly, chained together at the wrists.

One is holding a crown tight enough to bleed.

“I think we’ll have to choose one,” I say.

There’s a rumbling sound from beyond the walls, deep in the stone. Beside me, Anassa tenses and turns. The flaming walls are pressing closer, dragging and scraping toward us at a steady speed.

“Stark!” I scream.

“We have to choose fast!” Venna shouts.

But he’s already acting. A pulse of his magic shatters through the room. His fists strike out on either side of him, and his strength slams against the stone. They groan and shudder, but Stark’s power holds strong. They’re only barely drawing closer now.

“Anassa, help him!” I plead.

Anassa moves first, then all our wolves throw themselves against the walls to help slow the crushing press of the stone around us. The rest of us immediately start scanning the symbols.

Stark lets out a growl, glaring forward, already breathing hard. The presence of so much of his magic in an enclosed space makes my ears pop and my eyes sting. His impelling strength channels in a deadly current above my head.

“It’s the hands clasped together. Right? Loyalty!” Noemi cries.

“What?!” Venna spins to look at Noemi’s face.

Noemi points at the symbol she means. “Do I touch it?”

“Wait, don’t! The chain makes it seem unwilling,” Venna says hurriedly.

My eyes scan over the symbols, trying to find one that makes sense. Strength. Loyalty.

We need a symbol that represents both. But there are so many, and my heart is beating too hard for me to think. I can’t focus on anything other than the pained sounds Stark is making.

“Meryn, this one?” Venna shouts, hand hovering over a symbol I can’t even make out.

My eyes are on Stark. He can’t hold out forever. I need to act. I need to help him.

“Work faster,” Stark growls. His arms are starting to shake against the strain. He’s the strongest Daemos alive, but even he has limits.

The walls start to win the fight against Stark. He screams in pain and bends over. His magic pummels through the room, turning my insides to paste. I sob, the panic gripping me in earnest.

And then I realize. Stark is staring at me. His dark eyes are on me, burning as though I’m the source of all this strength. He’s drenched in sweat. His features are set in a furious grimace. But his eyes are all mine.

Loyalty.

“It’s…” I stagger back. “It’s a crown. Find a crown!” Venna rushes to the one of a hand clenching a crown tight. And I cry out, “Not that one!”

It’s no different from the bound wrists. No, Stark would never hold me so tightly that I couldn’t breathe.

A true Daemos is still a member of his pack, subject to his Alpha, loyal to his leader even when his strength burns brighter than the rest. Stark is…

There’s another crown positioned above an open hand, palm up, fingers spread. An offering.

My fingers slip into its fire, an odd tingling sensation where it touches me heatlessly. Instantly, the walls fall silent and stop their ominous advance. There’s a brief moment of suspense, then they start to retreat to their original positions.

And with them, the door opposite the entrance yields.

All the fire dissipates, replaced by the soft red glow.

I wipe shakily at the tears on my face and rush to Cratos’s side. Stark is slumped over his back, breathing hard, arms shaking.

“Hey. Hey,” I beg, and touch his leg.

He lets himself slip from Cratos and stumbles to land on his feet. I grunt as I catch him, straining against his weight. But I don’t care. I wrap my arms around him and hold him up.

“I’m fine,” he pants. “We should move.”

“Two seconds,” I say. “We’ll call it an order, loyal Daemos.”

He huffs a weak breath, and his fingers tremble on the back of my neck.

Reluctantly, I part from him. I run my hands up along his arms to reassure myself, then I turn to the others.

“Sorry,” I say awkwardly.

Noemi grins. “It’s fine.”

“You didn’t smolder at me after my trial,” Venna teases, and I smack her as I walk past her to mount Anassa.

Cratos lowers himself slightly for Stark, and I hear him curse to himself when his arms don’t entirely bring him all the way up on his first attempt. Once he’s mounted, he scowls at me for watching him to make sure he’s fine. I roll my eyes at him as Anassa and I walk past.

We move together through the door. There’s yet another chamber, this one with a set of more spiraling stairs leading downward. I roll my head on my shoulders and urge Anassa farther into the depths.

After a few minutes of spinning stairs, we step down into a circular landing. This one looks more like a natural cave formation, maybe because of how deep we’ve come. The light is slightly different here.

The symbol on the door catches with golden flame. Phylax.

Noemi and her wolf creep forward slowly, but she doesn’t jump when the door starts opening for her. The chamber she reveals is vastly different from the other two.

I follow her out onto a ledge. “Oh shit,” I breathe out when I see the chamber. How is this possible?

46

MERYN

There’s a massive chasm before us. The bottom disappears into absolute darkness. Right before the stone walls slip into nothingness, I can make out a dense layer of fog. I can taste it on the air, too.

My mind briefly rejects this. Where the fuck are we? Under the sea? Who could have built this impossible place?

On the far side of the chamber is a ledge similar to the one we’re standing on. And bridging the two is a narrow, arched strip of solid stone, about wide enough for one wolf to cross at a time.

“Slowly,” Venna advises.

Noemi nods, and her direwolf edges one paw out toward the bridge. The stone bears their weight well, and another paw steps forward.

Another paw step.

Nothing.

One more.

Suddenly, twin lines of golden flames streak along either side of the bridge. The stone makes a sickening cracking sound.

My breath catches in my throat as I watch Ephyse pause, terrified that the wolf is going to tumble.

“Fuck, it’s unstable,” Noemi says miserably.

I immediately understand her anxiety and what her task will be. The bridge won’t hold our weight—not without her help.

The most skilled Phylax warriors at the front can pull off insane feats with their shield magic. Precision-blocking arrows from the enemy while letting ours through, for example. Shoring up our soldiers’ physical shields so that they’re impenetrable—even while the soldiers carrying them are moving.

That kind of skill is still far beyond me, despite the brute strength of my own magic.

“I can shore up the bridge, but I’ll need to focus,” Noemi says quietly, a slight tremble in her voice. “I think I can do this, but…”

I nod in encouragement at her.

Noemi straightens her spine and shuts her eyes, face straining. When Ephyse steps forward now, the bridge doesn’t make a sound. They move quickly, darting over the bridge with light steps. And when Noemi reaches the other side, she slumps with relief.

“It worked,” her voice echoes.

But then she turns back to look at us, and her smile falls. She’s already sweating, I realize. It must be sinking in just how much energy it’s going to take to get us all to the other side.

“You can do this, Noemi,” I tell her. I wish I could communicate with her mentally. I do my best to show my support in my face, thinking, You’ve survived worse than this and more.

Noemi’s face hardens. “Stark next, while I’m strong,” she says with some grit.

Stark shifts on Cratos, clearly uncomfortable with leaving me behind. But he can’t argue with Noemi’s logic. He and Cratos weigh far more than the rest of us. He waits for Noemi to nod, then he guides Cratos forward. They move quickly but steadily, keeping their bodies aligned. He makes it across, and I exhale with relief.

Noemi looks strained. She’s leaning heavily on Ephyse, panting. Venna steps forward.

“We weigh nothing compared with those two!” Venna calls. “Light as a feather.”

Noemi chuckles, and the creases on her face ease a little. “Ready?”

“Meryn next,” Stark snaps. “The Strategos trial is still ahead of us.”

What he means is, if Noemi isn’t strong enough to get Venna across last, we’ll still be able to reach the Tear.

I flash on that image of the woman’s body, broken, from my vision. Is this the moment? Was it Venna that I saw?

But, no. Fuck that.

“Go,” I order Venna when she hesitates.

“Meryn,” Stark growls. But I shake my head at him.

I couldn’t possibly leave Venna last. Not if it means there’s a chance she won’t make it. Not after everything that happened with Izabel. I need to see her safely across before I go, too—I’d never be able to live with myself otherwise.

Venna steps forward. Noemi grunts and starts crying silently under the strain.

Venna and her wolf are startlingly fast. Even so, when they get halfway through, Noemi falls to her knees.

My breath catches in my throat. Venna and Skaia freeze as the bridge makes another sharp cracking sound and then teeters slightly to the left.

Fuck.

Fuck.

The bridge sways back toward the right. Skaia fights to keep her balance, Venna tilting precariously from atop her back. Noemi’s face turns white from the strain.

I can’t move. My blood is hot panic.

The moment stretches on indefinitely.

Noemi shoves her palms into the ground and staggers back to her feet. A resolved look comes over her, and with a snarl, she releases more power.

The bridge straightens, and the moment it does, Skaia leaps across the rest of it.

Finally, I can breathe again. Venna buries her face in Skaia’s gray fur, and Noemi sits down hard on the ground.

“Take a break, Noemi,” I order.

Anassa paces along the ledge. Her anxiety spikes, but I don’t let it get to me. I have faith in Noemi. She’s stronger than even she knows.

“I’m… I’m getting you across, Meryn,” Noemi growls out. She takes a shuddering breath, and her eyes blaze. “I swear.”

I smile at her. “I know.”

Because I trust her to keep me safe. I trust her to provide the same protection she never got. It’s all the hurt she’s endured that makes her such a powerful Phylax. She knows what it is to be vulnerable.

She won’t let me fall.

Noemi nods at us when she’s ready, clambering back to a stand. Anassa steps out onto the bridge. We move steadily. The bridge creaks and crackles, and Noemi lets out an angry sob. I keep my eyes on Noemi the entire time, willing myself closer and closer.

Halfway through, she starts to falter again, just as she did with Venna.

Anassa and I still. The bridge isn’t moving much, but the slight tremble makes my stomach tumble.

Where does that pit end?

If we fell, would our death be quick? Or would we be injured but alive, doomed to slowly starve in this cavern where no one could rescue us?

Would Anassa turn on me if I was the only thing left to eat?

“Pull it together,” Anassa snaps, hearing her name in my mind. “The wolves can sense your disturbance, and it is making everyone weak.”

She’s right. Straightening, I look across to Noemi, trying to project confidence. “You can do this.”

She nods, sweaty face reddening. With an agonizing scream, she floods the bridge with power one last time.

We bolt swiftly across.

And then I’m suddenly at the opposite ledge, and Stark’s hand snaps out in a bruising grip. He’s breathing nearly as hard as Noemi is. Cratos’s teeth are in Anassa’s fur.

I reach for Noemi’s hand and take it, still letting Stark hold on to me.

“That was incredible,” I tell her. The weight of four people, sure. But four direwolves, as well, two of which are massive.

Noemi’s crying. “I’m… sorry. I—I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay, Noemi,” I tell her.

I don’t know what she’s apologizing for. Everything with Lucien, maybe. But it doesn’t matter. She’s one of us. “You’re done. Sit back and watch the show now.”

She laughs shakily and nods, following after me as I move toward the waiting steps.

The final room isn’t like the others, either. It’s dark and entirely empty save for a simple stone altar in its center.

I glance around. No inscriptions on the ceiling. No seams for pressure plates. No holes in the walls for spikes to shoot out from.

Just a dagger.

It glints on the altar, which is already ringed in a subtly flickering silver flame. I dismount Anassa and approach.

This room looks eerily familiar. Like something remembered from a dream.

My visions flash before my eyes again, the ones I saw using foresight—the tower. The waves. The body on the floor…

There’s an ancient script in the stone, carved so deeply that the words almost look burned into the surface. They’re written in a spiral along the rounded edge of the altar, and I start to read them aloud, circling the stone as I go.

NOCTURN’S CHILDREN MAY WALK WHEN CRIMSON CROWNS THE STONE.

LET STRATEGOS MAKE THE CHOICE, WHERE STEEL MEETS BONE.

A LIFEBLOOD WHOLE MUST ANSWER ITS CALL.

HESITATE, AND DEATH TAKES ALL.

A sacrifice. A dagger. Crimson crowning stone.

The meaning seems pretty damn clear. The vision I had of this tower, the body lying prone, Stark leaning over it: This is it.

The test where one of us must die, one of us children of Nocturna.

A part of my mind detaches at the thought, spinning away as if watching this from above. One of us must die.

Die. One of us must…

Fitting. A final sacrifice to prove our worthiness to whatever sick person put this series of deadly tests in place.

There’s a clicking sound, and a low hiss fills the air, interrupting my spiraling thoughts.

Tiny jets of smoke spew from the cracks where the walls meet the floor. A stinging smell fills my nose, like the spray of a skunk.

I cough and cover my nose, eyes stinging. “What is that?!”

“Gas. Meryn, I think… someone has to die,” Venna says, putting together the riddle as well. She steps forward and gestures at the dagger, face pale.

“Hesitate, and death takes all.” Noemi’s voice is full of dread.

Horror strangles me. The knife. It’s for me. This room demands blood.

I can’t simply cut my hand and bleed a little. It said lifeblood whole.

Someone’s entire life needs to be drained onto the stone. And if I don’t choose someone to go, we’re all going to die choking on noxious fumes.

How long do I have? Seconds?

“Take me,” Venna says quickly, gagging against the gas.

“Why?” I snap, my eyes stinging from the fumes. “So you can be with your sister?” She jolts. Probably thinks I’m being cruel. But I can’t stop to spare her feelings. She needs to hear it. “Right! Because Iz would want you dead, Venna. Are you serious?”

“Meryn!”

“Absolutely not!” I shout and pick up the dagger. There’s only one choice I can make. Everyone is struggling against the fumes now; they don’t even see me do it.

“Meryn, no,” Anassa shouts in my mind, reading my intentions. “There must be another way. Nocturna needs you.” Her mind opens to me: visions of her mother, father, killed for the throne.

Her lonely years in the mountains. Friends falling away, one by one.

Until nothing was left but her belief in the Sturmfrost line.

Her belief in me. Her yearning for me.

Tears stream down my face as I pull back from her mentally. If I’m going to have the courage to do this, I have to do it fast. I gulp a breath of air and then choke on the smoke, doubling over.

In my mind, again, clearer than ever before: my vision. That body on the floor. Stark, shouting in rage and pain as he leaned over it, obscuring the body’s face from view.

I think I knew as soon as I saw it.

“It has to be me.”

Anassa is silent.

“I can’t ask any of them to do this for me, Anassa.”

I show her what I’ve held back: the vision, the body. That glimpse of the future I held secret even from her.

She goes still.

Sorrow blossoms inside her, singing through her mind and into mine. It’s pure and true, swamping me until I gasp from the intensity.

“You did not tell me,” she says gently.

“I’m so sorry,” I tell her. “It has been the privilege of my life to be bonded to you.”

She agrees, then. To sacrifice herself, alongside me. To save Cratos. To save all of them.

My direwolf. My heart.

My heart…

My next breath doesn’t fill my lungs entirely because of the gas, but it doesn’t matter. I lift my head and look at Stark again, drinking in his strained features. He has his nose and mouth covered, coughing. Tears rise again, blinding me.

I’m doing it for him. This way, he can live. They all can.

“Take the Tear,” I tell him, voice strangled. “Get it to Lucien, and bring down Killian. And—Saela. Protect her. Please.”

Stark’s eyes widen until all I can really see are their whites. He sees what I’m about to do too late. He lunges for me, but for the first time since we started sparring, I’m faster.

I drive the dagger into my own breast.

Right into my heart.

Darkness.

Pain blooming bright and wild and hot. Some part of me is agonized as my lifeblood rushes out.

Screams and cries. It’s my friends. Stark.

I open my eyes, and I’m there: that shadow realm.

I almost laugh. I sacrifice myself for them, and I’m brought here?! Will Killian be here, too? Is this some sort of fucked-up afterlife?

Shadows rush around me, enfolding me. They lift me up until I’m weightless, floating in a sea of dark.

“Well done, my child,” comes that strange, booming voice.

I twist my head frantically—who is it? Is he here, whoever he is?

But all I can see is the pitch-black shadow magic twisting around me in all directions.

And then the shadows loosen their grip, and I’m falling down, down, down…

47

STARK

I’m not fast enough to stop her. Barely fast enough to catch her.

The dagger is buried deep in Meryn’s chest. Her face instantly leeches of color. As she stumbles backward, my arms wrap around her form. I’m screaming, my voice hoarse, incoherent.

All I want is to protect her—from herself, from others, from things we barely understand—and yet—

The room tilts.

There’s a sensation as if we’re all falling upward. I can’t take my eyes off Meryn’s crumpled form in my arms, my entire world reduced to the place where the dagger meets her flesh, but Noemi and Venna gasp, and they both go sprawling in my peripheral vision.

The room rights itself, and Meryn and I slam hard into the floor. The dagger in her chest heats and lights and then… disappears.

Blood spurts viciously from the wound, creating a red ocean that will drown me. My hands instantly cover it, as if I can somehow stanch the wound, but I know.

I know. Death and I are well acquainted.

She’s gone. Her body is cold. Her hazel eyes are wide and unseeing.

Agony rips through my bond with Cratos as he lets out a mournful howl, dropping to the prostrate form of his mate. My vision slips, blurs. A dull whine starts in my head, rising in my ears until it’s all I can hear.

Faintly, I’m aware of Noemi’s mouth moving as she says something—her hands on my arm, consoling.

I shake her off roughly. I don’t need her fucking consolation.

Heat burns behind my eyes, and I lie down next to Meryn, the violent red coating us both. My hands and arms are slick with it. It blooms across her front, pools beneath her, spreads out in a dark creep.

The room is shaking. No. I’m shaking.

Meryn.

What did you do?

48

MERYN

Darkness. I’m not moving, no longer falling.

But I’m separated from myself, as if Meryn Sturmfrost is a stranger. One I don’t envy.

And then I hear him. He’s whispering words I can’t make out, his breath uneven on my cheek. His arms are around me, shaking. His entire body, shaking.

Stark. Stark.

I’m alive. I’m alive, and so is he.

I slam back to full consciousness.

There’s a disorienting spinning sensation for a moment and an agonizing pain in my chest. I curl my fingers, testing them. There’s hot liquid under my hand. My blood, I realize. Finally, I get my lungs working.

When I open my eyes, my surroundings are blurry.

I blink rapidly. Slowly, Stark comes into focus. He’s still holding me, face close. And the anguish in his features makes me feel as if I’m dying all over again.

“Hi,” I say weakly.

He rears back as if he’s been slapped, searching my face with pure shock. The pain from moments ago slips into something disbelieving. His mouth drops open.

Stark’s hands, sticky with my blood, come to my cheeks—so gentle, as if I’ll disappear if he touches me too hard. “You’re here?” His voice is wondering.

“I’m here,” I say, reaching out to touch his own stubbled cheek.

He rips his face away from my touch, anger blazing across his expression.

That his emotions are so clear is a little threatening, actually—when someone normally so steady breaks, you’ve really fucked up.

“What was that?!” he roars.

I wince, and his grip on me gentles instantly. His voice doesn’t, though. The contrast between the two makes me dizzy again.

“You were dead, Meryn! How could you do that to me—to us? We all saw it. Even Anassa—she fell. She—” His voice chokes off.

I manage to turn my head to the side, and I see Cratos standing over Anassa protectively, eyes wild, lips curled back in a snarl.

Stark gets so angry, he stops talking entirely. His hands are still shaking as he helps me sit up.

I was dead.

Or I thought I was.

Or, I must have been for the magic to accept my sacrifice?

What happened in that shadow realm? What brought me back?

Stark lets me go and steps away, pacing over to his wolf. He puts a hand on Cratos’s snout, murmurs something to him. Cratos’s ears come forward, just a little.

They both stare at me, naked emotion still swirling in dark eyes.

I shy away from it, too disoriented to engage.

I look for my friends. Venna and Noemi are nearby with their wolves. Both stand far enough away that their boots don’t touch the pool of my blood. And we’re not…

We’re not in the chamber with the altar any longer.

We aren’t even underground, I realize. Light is coming in the tall, thin windows high above us.

Yet my blood still stains the floor so… this is where I fell. Somehow.

“Where… are we?”

When Venna steps forward, my attention is entirely on her. “That’s it?” Her glaring eyes are red-rimmed, her hands in fists.

“What?” I croak.

“What you did was shitty, Meryn!” she shouts. “We thought we lost you!”

I flinch and press my hand over my chest. The wound has healed completely, but there’s still a tear in my shirt and my entire front is bloodstained and damp.

“I…” I start, but I don’t know what to say. I did what I had to do. It was what the chamber required, and judging by our surroundings, it was the right thing.

“It worked, though?” My voice falls flat.

“No, you…” Venna shakes her head. Her voice breaks and becomes pained. Vulnerable. “We all thought you were dead.” She wipes at a tear before it can fall. “Dead. Again. I can’t… N-not…”

Izabel. She’s thinking about Izabel. Of course, she is. She just watched me die. I mean, I didn’t die. Or at least, not for long?

But that doesn’t make her grief any less of a maelstrom. She’s caught up in it, and it’s my fault. I brought it back, fresh as the first hour of Izabel’s death.

I can see it written all over her face.

“I’m sorry,” I manage, even though I’d do it again.

I would. To save their lives. To destroy Killian.

Anassa slowly stands and shakes herself. She pads over to where I’m still sitting in my blood. Her muzzle nudges closer, and I reach up to hold her. Her huge white paws are staining red with all the gore that spilled out of me.

Did she die, too? Did she see what I did?

I’ll ask her later, when… once this is over.

I bury my face in Anassa’s fur and find solace in the familiar warmth and scent. Her touch reassures me. It reminds me of the convictions that drove my actions.

Her actions, too. She was with me until the end. Ready to die for me, for our friends.

“Help me,” I tell her, the words laced with layered meaning.

She nudges her nose under my arm and anchors me as I push myself shakily to my feet. My toes are still a little numb, but I can stand if I lean on her. Stark takes a half step forward as if to help and then stops, staring down at my blood.

I take a deep breath and speak. “I know you think I was being reckless or selfish. But I just knew this was the only way. For Strategos, it was asking me to demonstrate my ability to act like a leader and sacrifice for others when necessary. Otherwise, we would have all perished.”

Stark looks up abruptly. “You couldn’t have talked to us? Let us work through it together? Damn it, Meryn!”

“I should have let you asphyxiate, breathing in gas while I explained?” I snap, defensive.

Cratos rumbles, and Anassa shows him her teeth.

“Stark,” I say, trying to calm myself. And I look directly into his eyes. “If I had taken that moment to discuss, if we’d all talked it out. Would you ever have let me drive a dagger into myself?”

He shuts his eyes, jaw tight.

I look at the others. “Would any of you?”

The answer hangs unspoken between us. Of course they wouldn’t have.

I did what I had to do.

“Just…” I sigh. “Tell me how we got here? What happened?”

They’re all silent for a long moment, then Noemi finally speaks. “When you fell, it was like we fell with you. It was strange… like we were… falling up. And when I hit the ground, we were in this room. We were here, and you were bleeding—”

Her voice cuts out abruptly.

I rub at my healed chest. “Let’s look around. Find the Tear. Get this done, and get out of here,” I say, stepping forward.

I’m eager to leave this behind. The emotion in this room is stifling, and I don’t blame them for it. I’d probably feel the same in their position. But it’s making me sick.

“We’re atop the tower now,” Stark adds, voice flat as if he’s placing a report in the command tent. “You can see the sky.”

I’ve noticed that. The rows of horizontal-slit windows high above us circle the round room, letting in a dim glow of sunlight. The air here is fresh, too. We’re no longer being pressed in by stone, like in that underground nightmare.

“We need to search this room,” I say, moving my eyes over the space.

There’s no one in here but the four of us and our wolves.

Something sinks in my chest at that realization. It’s probably delusional, but a part of me hoped we might find the goddess at the end of all this, here to guide us and help us. Ideally, waiting atop a shrine with her Tear cradled in her outstretched hand.

But all I see are dust motes swirling in the air.

Was she ever even here? Or did I read into that song too much?

My gaze drops to the floor, and my brow furrows. In the vision… I saw the Tear. It was in a circular room, like this one, but there was tile on the floor. A beautiful mosaic.

I pace to a part of the floor not drenched in my blood and scrub at it with my sleeve.

Slowly, dust and dirt start to come away, revealing a swirling tile pattern just like the one in my vision.

So it is here. Or I am where the vision showed me, at least. But where’s the Tear?

“I saw something like this when I used my foresight,” I tell them, words halting. “There was a room with beautiful tilework. And the Goddess Tear was in the center of it, waiting.”

This doesn’t look like the vision, though. The floor is so dirty. And the blood. There’s so much blood, more than I thought my body could possibly hold.

My stomach lurches as I get a small taste of what it must have been like for Stark and the others to watch me die and bleed out.

I shut that image away.

Stark, Venna, and Noemi all have their eyes on me, as if I know what to do next.

“The Tear should be here. It should be…”

I walk to the very center of the room, where my congealing blood still obscures the floor beneath.

Ripping a long strip of fabric from the bottom of my tunic, I swipe at the blood, searching. Where the fuck is it?

I look up at everyone, still crouching on the floor.

“I don’t understand…”

Noemi looks at me helplessly. Venna’s features are shuttered, distant. Stark just stares steadily at me.

Waiting. Waiting for me to do something. But what more can I fucking do?!

I died for this Tear, for fuck’s sake!

I sit and then lie back, not caring that I’m getting blood all over my hair and clothes again.

I stare up at the ceiling high above, heart racing.

Was it all for nothing? Or… did Killian get here first, somehow? Does he have it?

I’m exhausted. I can’t think. I can’t even make myself move.

Stark’s words come back to me then:

How could you do that to me?

Before I can stop myself, I start to cry. At first, it’s just a few tears pressing behind my eyes, but then, with a gasp, I start sobbing.

I don’t know what I’m doing. I’ve never known what I was doing. I just acted confident and expected the world to fall in place accordingly.

And now I’ve led them all here, far away from everyone who needs us.

For what? We’ve failed.

The sounds of my sobs echo in the round space, pathetic and embarrassing. Tears run down my cheeks.

My eyes are screwed closed, so I don’t notice it happening at first. Venna’s breath catches. “Meryn…”

Opening my eyes, I blink tears away, struggling to catch my breath, and push myself up into a seat.

At first, I don’t know what I’m seeing. It’s as if the room is rotating before my eyes, deep reds and purples falling away and new colors swirling together. Am I about to faint?

Then the image resolves in my mind.

The blood around me is dissipating. Each time a teardrop strikes it, more tiles clear, swirling around me and turning the floor into a shining rainbow of a colorful mosaic.

I suck in a breath, scrabbling to my feet.

More magic?

Another tear drips from my chin, down to the floor.

Wonderingly, I watch as the last of the blood clears, and the tiles around me spin back, like a flower opening. There, right at the center of the mosaic. Just like in my vision.

The opal.

My fingertips hover over it. Distantly, I hear the others saying something. But my senses are trapped, gazing into the Tear’s surface.

Reaching down, I hesitate, remembering the visions that accompanied both Tears in the crowns. I don’t have the strength to witness one of those right now.

Maybe after I’ve slept for about two days.

Resigned, I tear another strip from my clothing. Then I use it to cover my fingers as I close them down around the Tear.

I brace myself for a vision, but it doesn’t come.

So. Either it won’t for this one, or I was right, my skin has to come in contact with the gem.

I turn to face my friends, Tear in hand, and lift it up for them to see.

“It’s time to get the fuck out of here,” I tell them.

The reaction is muted. Noemi looks encouraged, a little. Venna just scowls at me. Stark turns away, mounting Cratos and starting toward the room’s single door.

We file out in silence. Even Anassa’s shoulders are slumped, her bloodied paws dragging.

The journey down the tower is confusingly mundane. We fought so hard to reach the top—by whatever strange magic lifted us into that chamber. I was expecting the descent to be equally mystical.

But as it turns out, all we really have to do is walk. There are even vertically slit windows in the stone periodically placed along the downward spiral so that we aren’t plunged back into darkness.

When we finally emerge onto the island’s rocky shore, everything is different. The fog that shrouded the island has nearly cleared, and Lucien’s ship is sitting anchored in calm waters just offshore. Its hull is completely intact save for the long scrape on its side inflicted by our initial brush with the rocks.

It looks as if it just sailed through perfectly still seas.

Elias leans over the railing on the uppermost deck, waving. “We thought you must have found something! About ten minutes ago, everything simply cleared up. The fog was gone, and the rocks became navigable. We were able to get through without any issue.”

Glancing at Noemi, I remember how the waves almost took her and feel a little bitter. I know the challenges we just endured were made specifically so that people like Killian couldn’t reach the Tear, but I hate that my people suffered so much for this.

I know my actions contributed to their suffering, too. I swallow down my guilt.

Lucien appears at the railing, draping himself over it like a big cat sunbathing. “How did the expedition go?”

Noemi scoffs. “Well, Meryn died, but otherwise fine.”

I clench my jaw briefly before lifting up the Goddess Tear for everyone to see, my hand still wrapped in cloth so it doesn’t contact my skin.

The gem catches the sunlight and sends rainbows dancing across the water.

“A success,” I say.

As we wade atop our direwolves into the surf and start our comparably pleasant swim back to the ship, my eyes lift and meet Lucien’s. He says nothing, just watches me, his expression placid.

But I can sense the Siphon king’s calculation behind his gaze and in the subtle tap-tapping of his finger against the railing.

With this additional Tear in my possession, I’m conscious the balance of power between us has shifted. I now have three of the seven Tears, and he has only two.

Is he going to let this imbalance stand?

49

MERYN

Once we’re settled back on the ship, we gather to consider our next move. I tried consulting foresight, but the only visions I received were confusing swirls of shadow.

Nothing helpful. Nothing directional. Maybe I’m too tired after what we just went through.

We all sit in various stages of exhaustion on the deck, our direwolves collapsed into puddles of fur in the now-blazing sun. Lucien gives Elias control of the helm so that he can join us on deck to confer.

“Isn’t it obvious where we go next?” Noemi asks.

She doesn’t seem pissed anymore, which is a welcome reprieve from Stark and Venna. Both of them will still barely look in my direction.

Venna nods, chewing on her bottom lip. “We’re close to Blumenfall, where the rest of the Bonded have gone. The last fiefdom still loyal to Meryn. We could join them there and use the Tear to bring Killian down?”

There’s an ache in her voice—she wants to be back with our friends and fellow Bonded, helping them in their hour of need. I don’t blame her.

Maybe it is time to make a stand now that we have another Tear. How can I call myself their queen if I don’t go back and help them?

There’s only one unclaimed Tear remaining. Surely, the combination of the five we have here can be enough to bring Alistair—and Killian—down?

“We are not going there,” Lucien says from behind me.

I turn to look at him. His mouth quirks at my glare, amused by my anger. Annoying prick.

“And that would be because… ?”

“This is my ship, and what I say goes,” he says.

“You sound more and more like a spoiled prince every day,” I reply, sinking back on my elbows and closing my eyes for a moment.

“I am a spoiled king, actually.” He pushes off the railing to approach the rest of us where we sit. “Blumenfall is out.”

“Why?” Stark asks, voice cold, rising to his feet to stare Lucien down. “The longer we delay, the more likely it is that the Siphon usurper brings the full force of his power down on our final remaining allies. Killian told Meryn that Alistair attacked them in the first place to punish her. Surely, he wants to see that through. We should strike while we still have the strength to do so. Or has this been your plan from the start, to delay our return endlessly until there’s no strength in Nocturna left?”

Lucien turns to face him, eyes flashing. “Settle down, wolf-boy. I’m here helping your queen find the power she needs to annihilate her enemies and reclaim her throne, aren’t I? May I remind you again that you’re standing on the deck of my ship?”

Our wolves have taken an interest in the conversation now that conflict is stirring, though they’re all still finding their sea legs again after our reprieve from the tossing waves. Cratos carefully comes to four paws, padding over to stand next to Stark. Two pairs of malicious eyes glare daggers at the Siphon king.

I should intervene, but my exhausted mind is stuttering to a stop. I struggle to find the energy to even stand and break up their fight.

To my surprise, Venna cuts in, rising to step between Lucien and Stark.

“Cut it out,” she says mildly, and her casual rebuke takes the temperature down a few degrees. “Can we all just pretend to be adults for a second? What do you propose we do next, Lucien?”

Lucien strides in my direction, squatting beside me and landing a hand on my shoulder. The touch is unnecessary. He’s clearly still trying to get a rise out of Stark.

“Alistair’s command of Siphon magic was enough to bring down Queen Chiara Sturmfrost at the height of her rule. He’s had five hundred years to perfect his corrupt magic, access to Meryn’s own power, not to mention one of these Goddess Tears, too. A gem that induces subservience, bends his enemies’ will until they worship at his feet, if we are to believe Killian.”

“Right,” I say tersely. “But we have five of the Tears, plus your magic and mine. If you’re too afraid to confront your brother, Lucien, I am more than happy to take your two and handle him myself. With that kind of firepower, I could personally wipe Killian right off the face of the earth.”

Lucien’s face turns savage, his fangs extending. The playful, disaffected mask he usually wears goes by the wayside. “No. That is not on the table.”

I sigh. Of course not. “Do you not want this to end?”

“Trust between us only goes so far,” Lucien retorts. “You heard your little soldier friend here”—he gestures toward Stark, whose face goes stony—“he was ready to turn on me just seconds ago. And now you expect me to hand over my crown and my opal necklace, two of the most powerful magical objects in all of Astreona’s history? No. We should head back to my kingdom.”

I throw my hands in the air. “Why?!”

“Because we can rally my troops before going into Nocturna. Alistair may still be looking for the final Tear, but we don’t know what it does. Better to enter with an entire army at our back.” He pauses, smiles. “Once we’re married, of course.”

I sputter indignantly. “Absolutely fucking not, Lucien. My apologies if I haven’t been clear enough about this, but we are not getting married. Ever. I’d rather face Killian alone and fail than doom myself to a life at your side.”

He sighs and drags his eyes toward Stark. “Is this about him? Surely you must see that this makes political sense otherwise. I wouldn’t care if you kept a lover. In fact, I’m an equal opportunist. I’d welcome you both into my bed if you’d like.”

Rage builds inside me. He’s making a joke out of everything, but I’m the one whose friends are dying in this war.

Without realizing it, I’ve reached into the pouch at my hip and I’m clenching the Tear from the tower in my palm. The fabric I wrapped around it has slipped off, and the tip of the opal bites painfully into my skin.

The opal’s warmth grows… and starts to burn.

I gasp, pulling my hand out from the pouch and staring at the gem in my palm. As I do, a band that has been tightly strung inside me snaps and breaks.

Shadows fly from my palm in the direction that my hand was pointing.

Toward the tower.

Halfway across the water, the shadows start to warp and change. The sight is somehow both beautiful and nauseating. It’s like looking at the pool of my blood in the tower when it evaporated and left the dazzling mosaic behind.

What is happening?

The darkness leeches out of the magic until it’s just waves of many-colored light, fractals of color, rushing headlong toward the island.

My jaw drops.

The beams of power—whatever they are—hit the tower, and there’s a loud sound like the chiming of a bell. Even from this distance, out in the water, the sound is so loud that it makes my eardrums ache.

The direwolves all rub their ears, whining. Elias comes racing down onto the deck, his eyes wide.

For a moment, nothing else happens.

Then the island starts to change.

Where only rock and stubborn moss were, plants appear, tangling and chasing one another like they’re racing to reach the tower first. Huge ropes of ivy and some climbing vine with massive red flowers twirl up the sides of the tower, like the red of a peppermint stick.

In mere moments, the rocky, desolate island becomes a lush and tropical paradise. Trees that should take decades to grow tall sprout and shoot up, instantly bearing fruit. We can even hear the lively calls of birdsong echoing across the waves.

“What the fuck,” Noemi whispers.

Lucien grabs my wrist, pulls the Tear from my palm, and holds it to the light. “Was that a power you had already? Or did this cause it?”

I swallow hard, struggling to make sense of what I’m seeing. “I… don’t know what happened.”

That was most decidedly not a power I had already. I just created something out of nothing.

Create…

I draw in a sharp breath, eyes flying to Venna and Stark and Noemi. “The coronation,” I manage to get out through my shock.

The three of them just blink at me in confusion. I start to pace, certainty building inside me. “During my coronation ceremony, I had to perform those rites with the Mother Priestess. She drilled me in them over and over and over. I’ll never forget the words.”

I point to my forehead. “With my power, I shall rule for all. Twice.” I point to Lucien’s forehead. “Two crowns.” My finger goes to my lips. “With persuasion, I shall speak to all.”

Lucien’s eyes light up. He’s getting it, even if the other three still look lost.

I hold up my right hand toward him, the one still holding the Tear. “I will keep my people first as I create.” Then I hold up my left hand. “And destroy.”

“Fuck,” Stark says in a low growl.

I point to my breastbone next. “My heart will aim to protect instead of harm. Twice. Two necklaces.” And I point to Lucien’s breastbone.

Lucien starts to laugh. Venna approaches me swiftly, cradling my right palm on her own as she inspects the Tear. “Do you truly think… ?”

“Yeah,” I say, mouth dry. “I think it’s been a road map this whole time. Which means the final Tear has the power of—”

“Destruction,” Lucien finishes. There’s a hungry eagerness to his face that alarms me.

“Destruction,” I agree. “So you’re right, Lucien. We can’t go to Blumenfall. But we also can’t go back to Astreona. If Killian and Alistair are still looking for this final Tear, we need to find it before them, or we’re all doomed.”

After that morose discovery, we all head to our chambers to rest. Stark is still barely looking in my direction, and I watch his broad back in retreat as he heads to his bunk room without me.

There’s a pang in my chest. “Is he ever going to forgive me for the tower?” I ask Anassa.

“Give him time,” Anassa says sleepily from where she’s settled with Cratos on the upper deck. “Get some rest.”

My small wooden room is quiet, apart from the creaks and groans of the ship around me. I tuck myself into my bunk. Every muscle in my entire body is exhausted. And yet my brain refuses to quiet, circling and circling around the meaning of the Tears.

Footsteps thud outside my door, muffled by the dark wood. I toss in my bed and shut my eyes, willing myself into slumber. But then my door swings open, no knock.

Stark steps into the room, his presence swallowing up what remains of the light.

“You’re here,” I say somewhat stupidly.

He stays in the doorframe, surveying the contents of my room. Since we’ve been on the boat, we’ve slept in his bunk room instead of mine. He hasn’t had to step foot in here, and I can tell instantly that he doesn’t like what he sees.

The entire contents of the bag I brought with me have been upended onto the floor—which is no longer visible. In my defense, there wasn’t much of a floor to begin with. The small armchair in the room is stacked with my mother’s journals and the book about the Sturmfrost Queens. And the slim dresser has several garments slung over the top of it, obscuring the drawers.

Stark’s already scowling face darkens.

“Okay, you know what, I didn’t invite you in here, so spare me the judgment,” I say saltily.

He crosses his arms over his wide chest. “I didn’t say anything.”

“You didn’t have to. I can hear your thoughts, and we’re not even mentally connected right now.”

In three large steps—carefully avoiding piles of clothes—he reaches my bedside. “Scoot over.”

Stark pulls his shirt off and then, to my utter shock, drops it onto my mess. He barely even grimaces as he does it. He leaves his sleep pants on and gives me an expectant look.

I slide over toward the wall, creating room on the mattress for him. “Are we going to talk about—”

“No,” he cuts me off, folding his huge body next to me in the tight space. “Not now.”

I sigh, looking into his dark eyes. Reaching up, I brush a lock of his hair out of his face and resist the urge to kiss him. “Why are you here, then?”

“Because we both need to sleep, and I wouldn’t be able to rest knowing you’re in here alone, possibly ending up in that shadow realm with him.”

He slings a heavy arm around my waist, and there’s nothing sexual in it; we wouldn’t fit well in this bed unless we were closely together.

My throat tightens. He’s so angry with me that he doesn’t even want to talk to me, and still, he’s here. Still, he’s looking out for me.

“Okay,” I say quietly, pressing my forehead against his warm chest, breathing in his deep, amber scent.

And in my mind, I think: You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me.

And: You make me want to become a person deserving of such devotion.

And: If I’m your right reason, you’re mine as well.

I don’t know if I send the words in his direction, but as I slide into a perfect, dreamless sleep, I’m sure his hand strokes my back.

It’s not quite sunrise when I wake; the light outside the porthole is the grayish blue of very early morning. Except, I realize, it’s gray because it’s raining. At some point in the night, Stark and I shifted positions. He’s fully underneath me now, and I’m sleeping on top of him as if he’s the mattress.

The seas underneath us are a bit choppy from the storm. It must’ve been a wave that startled me awake.

I reach out mental feelers for Anassa, who senses me and sends back without words that she’s safe. She and the other wolves are sheltered on the lower deck, out of the rain.

Another wave crests, rocking the room back and forth.

Rocking me back and forth on top of Stark.

Which is how I discover he’s very, very hard.

His shaft slides between the apex of my thighs, and even through his sleep pants, I can feel him so completely. A small, needy noise escapes the back of my throat.

This is wrong. I’m not going to dry-hump a sleeping man.

Bracing my weight on my hands, I lift myself gently so I can move off him without disturbing him. But I don’t get far.

One of Stark’s hands comes to my hip, pressing tightly into my bone. The other wraps around my neck and the tattoos he placed there, squeezing gently as he pulls me back on top of him. His eyes are still closed.

Is he… asleep?

“Stark,” I whisper. Nothing. “Stark.”

The boat rocks again, and the hand on my hip grinds me tightly against him.

I moan helplessly.

At this, his eyes finally fly open—sleep-dazed, yet heated already. He guides me across his length again, and I bite back another moan.

“We haven’t talked yet,” I protest half-heartedly. “You’re angry with me.”

“Am I?” His voice is gravelly and low. Stark cants his hips into mine, and I moan again as heat builds at my core. “Is that what you think, Meryn? Connect with me. Let me show you.”

The hand at my throat loosens as he strokes my skin. Closing my eyes, I reach for the mental connection that lives between us, the one separate from our wolves and their mate bond.

We’re both only half awake, and it takes me a moment, but eventually it snaps into place. I’m both in him and in myself, and I can feel his emotions so deeply.

My breath stutters in my throat. It’s not anger. It’s heartbreak.

He pushes a memory toward me. Me, covered in a river of blood, the dagger in my chest. I see myself from his eyes, and it’s so fucking awful.

I’m dead. I’m well and truly dead. My skin has leeched all color. I’m not breathing.

Stark’s hands, red with my blood. He’s shaking. He failed me, he thinks—in the end, he couldn’t protect me after all. This has been his absolute worst fear: that I would choose to do something to myself that he couldn’t stop.

And it’s come to pass, even as he’s been protecting me from—

I see another memory through his eyes. Me, alive and cleaned up, sitting on the deck of the boat as I try to figure out where to go next. I’m so beautiful through Stark’s mind. My silver-white hair shimmers in the sunlight. His heart twists as his vision roves over my face.

It’s hard to believe I’m here, after what he saw just hours ago. Even now, he looks at me and all he sees is that dagger in my chest, that blood on his hands.

He’s not used to feeling scared. I scare him, the vastness of this thing between us.

I take a steadying breath and then lock eyes with him. It’s dizzying, our vision still doubling over each other. “You didn’t fail me.”

“Yes, I did,” he responds immediately. “I should’ve sensed what you were doing; I should’ve stopped you before—”

“No,” I cut him off. “Other people’s choices are never your failures. It’s important that you know that. I made a decision that I deemed right. I would do it again to save the three of you. To give our country a future. That was my choice, and it was my privilege to make it.”

“And it’s my privilege to be your protector, princess,” he murmurs. “Why are you so eager to deny me that?”

I put my hands on his face, his stubble rough beneath my palms. Then I lean close until our lips are almost touching. “I would never deny you anything. You must see that.”

He surges up to kiss me, and I feel it all—sensing both our mouths together. Tasting his breath and breathing it. His hands on my hips and the softness of my skin from his perspective as he slides one palm up my nightdress.

Stark maneuvers quickly and flips us so I’m pinned underneath him. Then he shifts my nightdress up to my waist and yanks my panties down, tossing them onto the floor. He shifts his large frame off the bed, kneeling on the floor.

“Doesn’t it drive you a little crazy not to pick that up?” I tease him.

Stark’s eyes meet mine, his gaze heated and hungry. “I’ll show you what drives me crazy.”

He pulls my legs over his shoulders and leans in toward my center. I’m in him and in myself; I can feel both the weight of my thighs and him underneath me.

His hot breath is on my center, but I’m also the one breathing it out.

I put a hand on his forehead, stopping him. “Wait. This is too weird. Isn’t it?”

“I thought you said you would never deny me, princess. Don’t deny me the chance to show you how you look, how you taste. How you feel to me.”

Letting out a surprised laugh, I say, “You know what? Fuck it. Yeah, go for it.”

The words are barely out of my mouth, and Stark’s tongue is on me.

What the fuck.

50

MERYN

It’s an immediate explosion for both of us.

The pleasure is overwhelming on its own, but being in Stark’s mind when he delivers it—it’s so much, so much.

I can’t think. All I can do is feel.

The heat of his slick tongue, gently caressing my clit, teasing. The fireworks of sensation, my body melting. And Stark’s own pleasure in response to mine.

The feeling of him getting hard, his arousal like wildfire moving through him, his cock straining as he tastes just how ready I am for him. I moan and squeeze my eyes shut. It’s almost too much.

He pauses with his mouth against me, and I know without asking that the riot of our pleasure rebounding back and forth between us is excessive for him, too. But then he starts to move again, starting with small, languorous sweeps of his tongue.

Heat riots through me, sharp pricks of pleasure so intense they’re almost pain. I’m in him and in myself when his tongue hits me just right and my whole body melts.

He fucking loves that he’s the one driving me this wild, and the knowledge keys me up even more.

He pauses, then starts in again, lapping slowly across that perfect spot until I’m cresting that wave of pleasure. Then he pulls back.

Slowly, gently, achingly. Pause. And again. Pause. And again.

I’m drowning in it: the sensation of him keeping me at that peak, right there, of intensity, but keeping it slow, so slow. So that I never tip over, just teeter there, my body falling apart under his mouth.

His tongue is my own as he does this to me, and his heady satisfaction is mine. Delicious sensation rockets through me, building and building with no release, echoing in us both.

I gasp at the taste of myself under his mouth, tart and sweet like the strawberries from the castle greenhouse mixed with a delicate white emberwine.

“My favorite flavor,” his voice rumbles in my mind, and I groan, licking my own lips.

I know his actions before he does them. There’s a split second of anticipation before he moves his tongue again, and then makes me wait, again. And then fuck—

The moment he decides to reach down and touch himself beneath his pants, his hand stroking roughly. Goddess, it’s so good, so good.

He shares images with me then, of what he’ll do to me once I come, the wet heat of me, the way it’ll feel when he pushes inside—

I’m sobbing and moaning and writhing, insensible of anything but being in Stark’s mind and what he’s stoking in me.

I know the second before he brings his other hand up to touch me. Sense his own excitement as his fingers brush lightly through my folds, swirling through my dripping cunt, then circling my entrance with the pads of his fingers.

Taking his time, enjoying every single sensation his touch is causing in my body. Dipping an index finger in, feeling me clench around it, feeling myself as I am simultaneously filled and ravenous for more.

His tongue moves away for a moment, and I cry out for its loss. But then he’s pushing a second finger inside me and slowly crooking both fingers, just a little, then pulling out, pressing against my walls as I clench around him.

He’s learning the sensation of every single spot inside me, memorizing what it does to me, the heat that floods through me as he crooks his fingers again, a little more this time, and drags the fingertips down. As I near-levitate from the sensation.

His fingers leave me, and I’m too senseless to form words aloud. But he’s right there in my mind, knowing what I wish I could say. His amusement is like a caress.

“Doing okay, princess?”

“Fuck it all, Stark, you know exactly what you’re doing to me,” I manage.

Stark strokes himself, his arousal and mine mingling until I can’t tell one from the other.

He’s panting now, bringing himself closer so that he’s bringing me closer, and then he growls and bows his head back down to the apex of my legs, tongue stroking swift and perfect on that spot right there. He shoves both fingers back inside me, fast and hard—and then pulls back.

“I need—I need—” My thoughts are in pieces, words out of reach.

“What do you need, Meryn,” he says aloud. I’m in the movement of his mouth and hate that it’s not on my body. I’m sobbing, nonsensical, riding that edge, feeling his hand move up and down his cock, deeply aware of how hard he is for me.

I can’t put words together, just gasp. But Stark knows. He knows exactly what to do to get me right up to the peak, and he does it. His fingers, his mouth, the gentle brush of his teeth on my clit.

That spiraling pressure of pleasure and need and the buildup until—

He slows again. I’m crying now, tears of pleasure and frustration and want that leak down my cheeks and onto the mattress.

“Please, Stark,” I beg him in our minds.

“Please, what, princess?” he says back, his tongue back on my clit, and he slowly pushes his fingers back inside me as I sob and tremble beneath him. “I want to hear you say it.”

The pleasure is so intense it’s almost pain at this point, my body alight with wanting, on the verge for so long.

“Please let me come,” I whine, dignity gone.

In answer, he fastens his mouth to my clit and sucks, at the same time adding a third finger so that I’m stretched around him, so full.

I come apart.

I shatter into a million pieces, my body an explosion of pleasure that whites out my vision. Stark’s hand grips the base of his cock firmly as he rides it out with me, mouth moaning against my clit as my orgasm goes on and on and on.

“Keep touching yourself,” I half-gasp to him in my head, and he does. And my orgasm, impossibly, keeps going. He’s so close to exploding, and it keeps my own pleasure peaking endlessly.

“Stark,” I say in his mind, “Stark, oh, goddess, Stark.” He pants, biting down hard on his lower lip to keep himself from coming. All while he pleasures himself for me, giving me his pleasure as my own so that I’m still free-falling through my climax, sensation never-ending.

It’s only once I start to come down that he puts both hands to my hips, yanking me to the edge of the bed so that my legs straddle him. His cock finds that nub of pleasure, and the jolt it gives both of us at once buoys me back up until I’m thrashing and moaning again.

“Please, yes, please, please, please,” I beg him, and he’s right there in my mind, aware how impossibly close to the edge I am again.

He can’t deny me, not anymore. With one hand, he positions himself against my entrance, and then I lose sense of reality for a moment as he pushes inside.

Hot, wet, tight, he’s so close already—

Stark pulls out and then thrusts inside again. He’s in me and I’m in him, as my slick walls tighten around his aching cock. The pleasure is blinding, he’s almost—

He picks up the pace; I clamp my legs around him. What the fuck. I didn’t know it was possible to feel this good—

“Fuck, Meryn!” Stark shouts, and I come again alongside him, a firestorm rocking through me.

He slams into me once more, twice, and he floods me with his release. I’m in his mind, drowning in his ecstasy as he comes harder than he ever has before. His pleasure and mine bind us closer and closer together until I can feel nothing else.

White-hot waves crash over him, both of us trembling, struggling for air through the intensity of it.

Slowly, my mind comes back, still joined with his, and for a second neither of us can form words. The warmth and the shared bliss of what we just did runs through us both in small aftershocks, and Stark reaches his arms around me and picks me up off the bunk, all while keeping us joined together.

He carefully spins me around until he can lie back on the small bunk mattress, with me straddled on top of him. I collapse into his chest and almost lose it again when his cock twitches inside me.

“Meryn,” I hear Stark say softly. My head is pressed to his chest, and his heartbeat gradually slows.

He lifts a languid hand up to my hair, stroking it, trailing fingers down my back.

“Mm-hmm,” I reply, nestling closer in.

“Next time you get the urge to sacrifice yourself, just remember what you’d be giving up,” he says, and I snort.

“Nobody is allowed to die until we have had the chance to do that at least a hundred more times,” I agree.

“A hundred thousand,” he counters, and I smile against his chest.

We let our minds stay entangled as we lie there, two hearts beating, two chests rising and falling with breath. I know the moment that he drifts off into sleep.

The next morning, we all gather on the deck once more, staring out at the lush green island that used to be barren. The tower is now almost hidden by green. Everyone’s focus keeps drifting back to the explosion of life, as if by looking at the island long enough, it’ll give up its secrets.

Lucien stands on the upper deck. His arms are crossed at the wrists, resting on the railing. His dark clothes drape from a golden pin at his shoulder and down over the long line of his body. His pale hair and skin glow in the morning sun.

Lucien clearly intends his figure to be dashing, but it’s his eyes that steal my attention. He stares out at the endless expanse of water through eyes that match its waves in hue. I struggle to read what’s hiding behind his gaze.

He doesn’t look smug or amused. He doesn’t look frustrated or annoyed.

He looks… empty.

“Lucien,” I say, climbing the stairs to stand next to him.

He doesn’t even turn his head. I join him, leaning on the railing. The sound of the constant frothing of the water below us fills the air.

My seasickness still hasn’t returned. Perhaps it’s the magic of the new Tear. If so, I’m never giving it up.

I give up on trying to read his mind. “So are we in agreement about what we do next?”

His eyes slice over to me. “Well, since it’s pretty clear that marrying me for the strength of my army and the political sense it would make is not at the top of your priorities—”

Holding up a hand, I say, “Shut it, before tossing you off this boat moves to the top of my priorities.”

“We need to go find the final Tear.”

I nod. “Killian and Alistair cannot get their hands on the power of destruction. But we need to figure out where it is first. Which is a total mystery to me. Unless you’re holding on to some crucial piece of information you’ve been saving for this moment?”

He’s silent. His hair flutters in the wind, strands catching on the branches of his crown.

I guess that’s a no.

I sigh. “Have you ever gotten a vision from the Tear you wear as a necklace, like the visions we received from our crowns?”

Lucien straightens, pushing away from the railing slightly. Then he reaches up and dips his hand beneath the fabric at his breastbone and hooks his finger around the chain there. His Tear catches the morning sun, and rainbow light darts over his face.

“No,” he admits. “Never from this one.”

“It’s the same with my mother’s necklace,” I say. “I’ve been wearing it for more than a week now. Not to mention other times I’ve worn it, before the coronation. No visions. No revelations. Nothing.”

“You think the visions are going to lead to the last Tear?” Lucien’s voice is contemplative.

I shrug. “They might not. It’s worth a shot, though.”

After a pause, my mind jumps into motion. Lucien seems to notice and lifts a brow at me. “What if we switched the necklaces?” I propose.

“Switched them,” Lucien repeats as if I suggested we toss them into the sea.

“Exchanged them. Maybe the necklaces need to be worn by someone outside our particular family lines to activate the memories they hold?”

The eyebrow remains raised, but he shrugs.

“We’re running out of options,” he admits.

“Let’s go down to the lower deck,” I suggest as he lifts the chain over his head. If I’m going to faint again, like when I put on Lucien’s crown, I’d rather someone were around to catch me.

Someone besides the infuriating Siphon king.

He wraps the chain of the necklace around his fist twice as if to secure his grip on it. “Feeling separation anxiety from your loyal guardian?”

Warm satisfaction floods me as I look down on Stark, his face upturned. He’s watching Lucien closely for signs of treachery.

“Sure,” I say lightly. Not even Lucien’s taunts can upset the deep contentment I’ve felt ever since waking up this morning with Stark’s arm tight around me.

Down on the lower level, Lucien holds tight to his necklace, eyebrow raised. “Show me yours.”

“Ready,” I say, holding up my opal.

Lucien frowns slightly as we complete the exchange, necklaces settling on each of our necks. My heart thuds heavily as I wait for a vision to take me. I can tell that Lucien is bracing for just the same. His eyes are shut, his brow is drawn, and his head is tilted to the side just so.

But nothing happens. The Tear remains warm but silent in my hand. Lucien opens his eyes and glares at me like it’s my fault our magic rocks aren’t listening to him.

I think back to the coronation ceremony, the source of so many of my theories. For some of the anointments, the priestess gave me just one swipe of oil. If I’m right, and the one over my breastbone was meant to symbolize these necklaces…

She anointed me twice there, two firm swipes of oil.

It can’t hurt to try it. “This might sound kind of stupid, but what if I try wearing both necklaces? Maybe the two Tears have to be together? Like—maybe like they’re two halves of a whole?”

“Nice try,” he says dryly. “If you want to give me both necklaces, though, I’ll give it a shot.”

I grunt in frustration. “Where exactly do you think I’m going to take your necklace? We’re sort of stuck on this ship.”

He shakes his head, unwilling to budge.

“Look. How about we try it together?” I offer. “I think the chains are both long enough to go around both of our necks. Then neither of us has to worry about the other getting information first or whatever it is you think is going to happen.”

I’m aware it sounds desperate and weird. But we need more knowledge, and the Tears could hold the key.

He looks dubious, but he nods. “Sure, if it’ll make you happy, darling. Although if you wanted to get close to me physically, you could just say so.”

Lucien’s right; we have to get uncomfortably close to make this arrangement work.

Stark’s eyes are on us as we hunch awkwardly together, stretching our necks out to get our heads closer to each other without actually touching. Lucien has to hunch down even more since he’s taller than me.

From a few paces away, Venna snorts. “You look like two birds doing a weird mating dance.”

“You’re welcome to come over here and give it a try,” says Lucien. He manages a lascivious look toward her even in this awkward position.

I huff out an exasperated breath. “Ready?”

Lucien just holds up his necklace in answer, settling it around us. I put mine on top, and instantly—

I’m tumbling into a vision.

51

MERYN

So they were two halves that needed to be brought together. My smug satisfaction at being right lasts for only an instant before all my attention is on the visuals before me.

It’s different from the others I’ve experienced. It’s far less clear and far more… fractured. It’s like pieces of memories, rather than something coherent.

The first thing I see is a beautiful woman, but beautiful might not be a powerful enough word to describe her.

She’s radiant.

Her skin is gold and seems to glow from within. Her fine-featured face is framed by shoulder-length emerald-green hair. She exudes indescribable energy. In beauty, yes. But she has an air of peace, too. Gentleness brushes my skin as she cradles her pregnant belly.

I instantly know she isn’t human.

Part of it is her strange eyes, which are the color of sunlight through springtime leaves and have strange not-quite-black pupils that reflect the warm light around her oddly. But it’s just an instinct, also.

There’s a quiet knowing in my chest when I look at her that informs me she’s more than I am.

A fissure forms, breaking me away from her. Another scene comes into focus as I whirl through the past.

The same woman—being?—stands over a child. The infant looks entirely human, not sharing the woman’s ethereal glow. The woman drifts her fingertips over the child’s stomach as it sleeps, gazing at the baby with warmth in her eyes.

A man materializes beside her, appearing as if the space he occupies was a mirror someone abruptly tilted toward me to catch his reflection.

He’s tall and otherworldly, with black-blue hair the color of the night sky and skin pale as moonlight. His eyes glint as hers do, and shadows swirl around him, following the curve of his arm as he moves to rest it on the edge of the child’s crib.

His voice is deep and instantly makes my hair stand on end. “Our daughter can be the link to my wolves and rule over your humans, but you know you cannot stay with the child. She is of us but not one of us.”

There’s something familiar in his voice, something that rattles in my bones.

The golden woman’s face crumples with grief.

She weeps softly. As she does, she lifts her hands, palms up, and cups the air before her. She catches her tears as though she’s catching the shattered pieces of her heart.

I watch in fascination as her tears start to pool together and warble. They gradually crystallize, taking on a familiar glow. An opal.

The woman leans forward and places the stone on the baby’s chest with shaking hands. Through her sobs, she whispers promises that it will keep her child and her kin safe. That it will protect them across generations.

The man’s voice is colder than Mount Wolfsbane. His face doesn’t strain in the slightest as he watches her cry. “Say goodbye now, Lumina.”

My breath leaves my body. Lumina?

The vision shifts again. I can’t make out anything but a handful of figures. Above us all is the same man from before, with the dark hair and the shadows curling around his fingers. He stares down with the same unmoving expression.

Below him is a Bonded woman with a direwolf at her side. They’re both bowing before the dark-haired man. The Bonded woman has the child cradled in her arms, the opal now strung around the child’s neck.

“I do not trust the unbonded humans to do right by her. You will raise her, and you will protect her,” the man orders.

The Bonded woman bows her head farther, so far that she’s touching the ground. “As you command,” she says.

I gasp back to reality.

There’s a sudden sensation of falling, then I’m vividly aware of my feet in my boots and the deck under me. I stagger slightly and hit the railing, grunting in pain.

The doubled necklace chains yank tight around my neck, and I gasp and step back until I’m close enough to slip out of their bind. I pull the necklace that belongs to me up and over Lucien’s neck, hoping he’s gotten whatever he needs from his vision.

I have to blink rapidly to convince my eyes that I’m capable of seeing more than three feet in front of me, but when everything clears up, I feel almost normal.

Or, not normal.

There’s a deep, bone-rattling shock.

That name—Lumina—is the one from my mother’s delusions.

The one I’ve heard whispered in my own mind during vulnerable moments. I still remember a dark voice calling out the name on my first night as a Rawbond.

Is Lumina the true name of the Faceless Goddess?

And that baby, gifted with a Goddess Tear for protection, meant to serve as the link to the wolves, destined to rule over humans…

If that was my ancestor, the first of the Sturmfrost line, then I’m not just of royal blood.

Lucien is staring at his own opal necklace, face unreadable.

“Are you going to tell me what you saw?” I ask him, narrowing my eyes. Would he have seen the same vision as me? Or something completely different?

He presses his lips together, and then they curl up in a mockery of a smile. “Are you?”

We gaze at each other for a long moment.

Reaching into my pocket, I draw out the Tear from the tower.

“Perhaps this one also has something to show us?”

Lucien studies it. “It hasn’t given up its secrets to you?”

“Not yet,” I admit. Maybe this one also takes two of us, for whatever reason?

I hold up my hand with the Tear outstretched. Lucien reaches out to take it, and I clench my fingers down. “I’m not giving it to you. I just think… maybe we should both touch it?”

Lucien agrees without making any lewd statements this time. We both take a deep breath, and then his hand closes down over mine.

I’m yanked from the deck of the ship and into the sky, swirling, body tossed upside down and then righted again. I’m intensely nauseated for a moment and then light and tingly like I’ve left my body behind and I’m nothing but a memory.

I don’t see Lucien, but I sense his presence. We’re together, then, witnessing this vision as a pair.

The same woman from the other vision—Lumina—materializes out of the blinding sunlight. At first, she’s pacing on air, her dress flowing behind her. Then the room takes shape around us, board by board and stone by stone until I’m back in the tower room we just left.

It’s set up the same, except it shows no signs of age.

Lumina looks pained. She’s moving back and forth, rounding the room in circles like a trapped animal. Her fingers rake through her verdant hair repeatedly, and her eyes glint as she turns and turns again.

Suddenly, the space darkens. The shadows coalesce and knot together like writhing snakes. The man from the previous vision appears—though, like Lumina, it seems not quite right to call him a man. I know in my heart he’s something more. He’s just as handsome and cold as he was earlier.

“Nocturn!” Lumina screams instantly, storming toward him, skirts flying. “What have you done?! How did you manage this? You’ve weakened me!”

Nocturn. The name sends chills through me. Another name so often on my mother’s lips.

Nocturn’s children, written in the riddle on the altar. I read it as meaning the children of Nocturna, but maybe that was entirely wrong.

An echo of the name resonates through me, like a haunting chord.

I know I’ve never seen his likeness before.

But his voice…

It hits me: the voice in that shadow realm. The voice of my dreams that has plagued me since I first bonded with Anassa and set this all in motion.

Could it have been Nocturn all along?

In the vision, the corners of Nocturn’s mouth dip downward. His eyes are uninterested, though. Like he’s just discovered he has a nuisance to deal with.

“You’ve weakened yourself. I had nothing to do with it.”

“Myself?” Lumina exclaims.

“You were always so giving. It’s not my fault that your selflessness harmed you,” he says plainly. His frown deepens. “It’s ungodly of you.”

Ungodly. I knew in my heart, but even still, this confirmation sends a riot of shock straight into my bones. I start to tremble.

Gods. They’re both gods.

Lumina’s eyes shimmer. Her hands are in fists on her skirts. But she takes a deep breath and, somewhat more calmly, says, “Why are you doing this?”

Nocturn steps close enough to her that his boots pin the hem of her skirt. “You belong to me and me alone, and you will stay here until you accept that.”

Did she accept that? Is that why she’s no longer in the tower, why we didn’t find her there? She became his, and he let her out? Or did she refuse him and fight to free herself?

Lumina opens her mouth to scream again, but Nocturn dissipates into darkness in the space of a second. He dissolves and then dispels into the dark corners of the room. The darkness flares as he joins with the waiting shadows, then eases away slowly, letting the light back in.

Lumina falls to her knees, weeping, and my heart breaks for her. The rest of the room fades away because she’s all that matters. Her and this pain that I recognize so intimately.

He might be a far distant ancestor, but I hate him.

Her tears condense into another opal just as they did before. She stares at the jewel where it rests in the ruffles of her skirts, and her horror is a cold mist in the air. Shakily, she takes hold of it and lifts it to the light. It’s beautiful and yet hard to look at, the power in it searing in its strength.

“Weakened myself…” she whispers. Her face contorts with sorrow. “You know nothing of what it is to be a god, Nocturn.”

I snap back into my body and let out a strangled sound. I’ve fallen to the deck, and Anassa stands over me protectively. She nudges me with her snout, and I focus on her touch because it helps convince me that I’m not still drowning in Lumina’s suffering.

Lucien is on his knees, next to me. “You saw that?” he asks, seeking confirmation, looking at me intently.

“Yes.”

Nocturn. He trapped Lumina in that tower.

His voice is the one I’ve been hearing, I’m certain of it now. Nocturn must have been the one to set up that twisted test for us and the one who brought me back after I plunged that knife into my chest.

All along, it’s been him—his shadows haunting my dreams, making me think I was going mad back in Sturmfrost.

“It was never madness,” I breathe out. “Not for me, and not for my mother. It was always history. She was telling us our history.”

Lucien looks at me, nonplussed.

“I thought it was nothing. Just… mindless scribbling. But now… wait here.” I scramble to my feet and race down to my bunk belowdecks to grab my mother’s journals. Saela, wise Saela; she was right that I would need them with me.

I flip to the page I was thinking of, the one that shows those three names again and again. Lumina, Nocturn, Astreon. The line joins instances of the three names. It moves through Lumina’s name, Nocturn’s, Astreon’s and back again. An eternal joining. It looks chaotic because there are so many recurrences of their names, but it’s no accident.

“But who is Astreon?” I say slowly.

Lucien purses his lips and gazes up toward the sky. “Fine! Fine, I’ll tell you about the first vision I saw. If you’ll do the same.”

I roll my eyes. “I take it that means you saw someone named Astreon in yours?”

“Yes,” Lucien admits. “I think he may have been an ancestor. And… possibly Lumina, too. But then”—his voice grows in confidence—“I always knew I had the looks of a god.”

“Get over yourself for a single minute and focus,” I retort. “I saw a god in my vision, too. Nocturn. I think he may have been my ancestor. So Lumina was in romantic relationships with both Nocturn and Astreon. And that’s why Nocturn locked her away. For being unfaithful?”

I leave out the part where Nocturn’s been speaking to me in my dreams. I don’t need to share all my secrets.

Turning back to my mother’s journal, I scan it for any other clues that might lead us to the final Tear.

I skip through pages and pages of writing, Nocturn and Lumina and Astreon written over and over in tiny script.

Some of the pages are illegible, her handwriting too shaky to decipher. Some of them are wrinkled and washed out, maybe waterlogged at some point so that the ink ran in every direction.

I flip to a faded sketch that dominates the entire page.

The journal is full of sketches of this unearthly woman: the goddess Lumina, as I now know it to be. But something about this drawing feels more specific. More real.

“Stark.” I beckon him over. “Does this remind you of anything?”

He gazes down at the page, then up at me.

“The statue of the Faceless Goddess in Linsfall.”

Exactly. The one I saw when I traveled with Stark, when an inexplicable pull drew me to her likeness.

The one with the mysteriously warm hands. As if she were alive and holding me.

I snap the book shut. “I know where we’ll find the final Tear.”

52

MERYN

It takes a day to travel by sea back to shore—during which my seasickness most definitely returns. We make landfall south of Blumenfall, avoiding the cliffs that lead to the fiefdom itself.

Then we travel another day by wolfback, constantly looking over our shoulders. It’s grim to think that any soldiers or Bonded we run into will almost certainly be loyal to Killian, not to me. I’m a refugee in my own country.

Meanwhile, Lucien and Elias are miserable in the many layers of clothes we made them pack back in Astreona, just in case.

Venna, Noemi, and I enjoy teasing them about it. We have to take our pleasure where we can find it.

The entire time we travel, I wait for Egith’s terror to wake me in the night should Killian launch an attack on Blumenfall. I reach out to her constantly to ensure she and the rest of the Bonded are still safe.

And I pray, and pray, and pray that Killian hasn’t found the Tear before us. That he’s narcissistic enough to have trusted that I stayed put when he told me to.

Finally, Stark and I sit astride Cratos and Anassa, gazing upon Linsfall in the distance. It looks peaceful from afar. Small.

Standing here surrounded by nature and so far from civilization, everything seems so much more manageable.

But we know from Egith’s intelligence that the entire city has fallen to Killian.

Stark and I are proceeding without the others into the city. Our plan is to go unnoticed, slip in and slip out. Venna and Noemi put up some resistance when I explained the plan, but even they had to admit that Stark and I would be swifter and less likely to be noticed on our own.

I have my own reasons for wanting to leave them behind. Should this mission to retrieve the Tear fail—and Stark and I end up captive or even killed—at least two loyal Nocturnans can still carry on the fight alongside Lucien.

And I know Venna will make sure that Saela is safe, even if I’m gone.

From our perch above Linsfall, I give Stark a tense nod. “Let’s go.”

Cratos and Anassa surge into the expanse of dark terrain. We move along the edge of the forest at first, to maintain cover. I don’t have to use my Kryptos magic in the shadow of the ancient pines. We aren’t the only predators moving in the darkness of Nocturna’s woods; nobody else would be out at this hour.

But soon, the forest gives way and we’re close enough to the city gates that we slow, and I rift to shield us from view.

As we approach Linsfall’s gates, I know that Anassa and I are both thinking back on the first time we came here. How much has changed in such a short time.

That time, thick snow blanketed us as we approached the city, muffling everything around us and giving the streets a dreamlike quality.

This time, we’re just as cloaked, but instead of the silver-white of snow, it’s the deep blue-black of my power sinking us into obscurity, blending us in with the long fingers of shadow cast by pine trees and the dark of the occasional abandoned farmhouse.

I hold my breath as we draw up to the walls, Anassa’s and Cratos’s movements slower and more careful with each step closer to the gates. We settle in to wait, as close to the gates as we dare, needing another visitor’s arrival to mask our entrance into the city.

Rifting may hide us from view, but it doesn’t let us walk through stone walls. I haven’t dared attempt that yet.

The four of us are as still as statues as minutes pass into an hour, maybe more. Stark and I have our minds open to each other, of course, and talk occasionally to keep ourselves from going insane, but neither of us wants to remove our focus from staying hidden and alert.

Finally, a horse-drawn cart driven by two figures pulls down the road, slowly approaching the gates at a snail’s pace.

Both are swaddled in cloaks and furs to keep out the cold. I squint, attempting to make out their features as they pass less than a foot from us, but the thick layer of shadow surrounding me blurs my vision and I can’t make them out.

My teeth grind together as the four of us lie in wait, listening to the driver converse with the gate guards.

A man’s voice; he lists the goods in his wagon, wares they’ve brought to trade in the markets. One of the guards slips through a smaller door in the gates to examine the boxes piled on their cart.

Whatever he sees must satisfy him, because he signals to his comrade and the larger gates begin to grind open.

The driver flicks the horses’ leads as the gates widen enough to allow them through, and Anassa and Cratos move fast, silently padding to the rear of the wagon to slip in behind them.

My magic is so thick that the guards don’t even glance our way as we pass.

As soon as we enter the city, we turn down a side street, slinking away quickly. The two horses startle as we move, but the people don’t seem to notice anything amiss.

When they’re out of sight, I begin to breathe more easily.

Linsfall itself seems quieter than I remember. Is that Killian’s doing? What has he done to my country now that he’s reinstated himself as king?

“Just the lateness of the hour,” Anassa says, but her voice betrays a shade of doubt.

Our past visits were brief enough that all I remember are flashes of places and street names.

I recognize the inn where Stark and I stayed, glance up briefly at the window of that tiny room we shared. My lips twist as I remember lying alongside him, fervently denying to myself the heat of attraction I so clearly already felt.

Cratos shifts and stamps a little as we pass.

“Do you remember…”

“Yes,” Stark confirms instantly. “I should have taken better advantage of our tiny room and shared bed. I certainly wasted enough hours thinking about it, when I should have been sleeping.”

I can’t see his face because of our rift, but regardless, I can feel his eyes on me.

My blood heats.

“Not now,” Anassa chides. “Plenty of time for mating after you get the Tear and kill Killian.”

“Anassa!” I gasp in mock outrage. “Stop listening in.”

“Stop broadcasting your desire so strongly that I can’t tune it out,” she retorts.

Fair enough.

We pass closed shop fronts, windows dark. The flats above them are illuminated as often as not, late-night candles burning against the engulfing night.

The city square opens up ahead, and Anassa and I both draw in a breath, our bodies in sync as we gaze at the statue of the Faceless Goddess at its center.

“It’s almost like I could feel something here last time,” I muse to her as I slip off her back, focusing my energy to maintain the shadowy cloak around both of us now that we aren’t one single unit.

“The Sturmfrost in you knew,” Anassa responds simply, settling back on her haunches as I take the last few steps toward the statue. Just like last time, Stark and Cratos hang back, letting me approach alone.

This time, no snow obscures the shape of her, and the glow from the lantern posts spread around the outside of the square lights up every tiny detail of her etched robes, her delicate hands.

Like last time, her larger-than-life hands hold a scattering of flowers and coins, offerings from the people of Linsfall to the mysterious, faceless deity.

I reach up, touching two fingers to the smooth planes of her face.

Now, I can imagine the features that should be there, the golden skin.

What magic stripped away her face, her name, her story? Why was her identity lost to time?

Anassa huffs. “Perhaps the answers will be held in the final Tear,” she suggests, gently nudging me back toward what I’m here for.

My fingers drift down, and I place my hand in her stone one. But as with last time, the stone is anything but cool. A steady, welcoming warmth emanates from her cupped hands despite the persistent chill of the air.

“It must be here, in her hands,” I say to Stark. “But I can’t see an opening, a latch… how am I meant to…”

Stark and Cratos move closer. “We can take a look if you think it would help?”

Do I have to smash the statue? Is it inside? It seems an insult to the Faceless Goddess—taking a chisel to this gorgeous monument that has stood here for who knows how long.

And now that I’m standing here, something is holding me back. Almost as if the goddess herself is warning me away.

I fight to identify the feeling: Is this some kind of magic I don’t understand?

And should I listen? Or is it just one final obstacle to obtaining this Tear?

Before I can work through it, Anassa’s keen senses pick up on something. “Remount immediately,” she says. “Someone’s coming.”

I whirl around, taking two big steps to quickly remount Anassa, and then pull the rifting magic ever tighter to all our forms.

In another second, I hear what Anassa’s sensitive direwolf ears heard first: the light sound of supple leather boots against cobblestone.

A stooped, cloaked figure emerges from another lane across the square, hurrying directly toward the statue.

I hold my breath as the person sinks to their knees, folding forward to press their forehead against the goddess’s stone feet, and the whispers of prayers reach us, too soft for even Anassa to make out the words.

As the figure rises, the hood of their cloak slips slightly, allowing us a glimpse of a wrinkled face.

My mouth drops open. “Is that—”

“Yes,” Stark confirms.

It’s the Mother Priestess.

“She’s almost definitely under Killian’s sway,” I say automatically, my eyes glued to her figure. “Whether by choice or by force, using that nasty Tear to influence her. Right?”

We both pause. We know what must happen next regardless.

Anassa’s the one to voice it. “Either way, she is likely to be here for the same reason we are: to take the Tear. We can’t let her do that.”

As if in direct response to Anassa’s words, the priestess reaches under her robes and draws out a tool—a hammer, glinting in the lamplight.

The time for thinking is done.

“Mother Priestess,” I call, dropping the rift around us and silently asking Anassa to step forward. “I command you to stop this instant.”

She spins around, the hand holding the hammer dropping to her side as she regards me in shock. Her weathered face wrinkles in surprise, eyes flicking between me and Anassa.

“My queen!” She sinks to her knees, bowing her head. Her voice echoes strangely around the square, the emptiness of the space seeming to bounce the sound back at us: queen, queen.

The shadows and light flicker across the older woman’s face as she watches me approach. Stark and Cratos stay close at my back, still shrouded in shadow.

“Why are you here? Did Killian send you? How did he know to come here?”

The priestess nods slowly. “King Killian sent me here.” Her eyes are unfocused and vague.

“If she’s under Killian’s influence, from the ring…,” I say to Stark and Anassa uneasily. “Do you think there’s any way for me to break it?”

Stark and Cratos edge closer to us. “We shouldn’t risk trying. She’s obviously here for the Tear, too. She’s not on our side, Meryn. If she gets in our way… we’ll have to incapacitate her.”

I see the sense in his words, but a part of me still hesitates, looking down at this frail woman.

After all the terrible things I’ve done, now I need to attack this old lady?

And how will the people of Nocturna react to me hurting—or worse—the head of the goddess’s sacred order? That’ll hardly win people back over to my side…

I take another step toward her, holding out a hand reassuringly. “Mother Priestess, it’s me, Meryn. Killian is controlling your mind. You need to wake up. Please, I don’t want to hurt you.”

The Mother Priestess’s face seems to light from the inside at my words, eyes kindling with a feverish intensity. “Foolish child,” she says, her voice full of reverence. “I’m afraid you misunderstand me completely.”

“To me,” Anassa barks urgently through our bond, but I’m already moving, vaulting up to her back, eyes fixed on the priestess as I move.

The woman’s face emanates an ecstatic joy that sets my teeth on edge. Her eyes are those of a true believer, glassy and fervent.

“King Killian has no need to use his magic on me. We’ve been waiting so long for this. For someone to come who knows the power of what we’ve shrouded in secrecy, someone who was ready to do whatever it takes to claim the Tears and use them to remake our world.”

Her voice gets louder as she continues, turning my veins to ice.

“His Highness—no, His Holiness—will claim this destiny. He will be a living god on earth.”

Before I can react, she spins with remarkable agility back toward the statue, raising the hammer once more.

Even as Anassa and I start forward, the Mother Priestess swings the tool down with surprising force.

And the goddess’s hands shatter, exploding across the square.

53

MERYN

Shards of rock fly in every direction. I spot the distinctive opalescent glow of the Tear and stretch my hand toward its path downward. Anassa moves adeptly beneath me, both of us ignoring the sharp pieces of stone that pelt us as we lurch forward.

But Anassa and I are too late. The Mother Priestess’s hand was already outstretched to grab the Tear as it fell, and her fingers close around the gem.

The vicious shards of rock rain down on her arm, opening up cuts that stream blood. But the pain doesn’t seem to register for the priestess; her face is radiant with victory.

In another moment, Anassa slams into her. The weight of my wolf throws the priestess down onto the cobblestones, both hands cupped reverently around the Tear, which she clutches to her chest.

Anassa and I growl in tandem as she extends a powerful foreleg to pin the woman to the ground.

I’ve dropped the rift completely in the scramble, and Cratos and Stark become fully visible. They circle behind the priestess so she has nowhere to escape.

Before I can dismount to wrest the prize from her grasp, though, there’s a violent flash from her hands.

The light from the gem has changed. No longer soft and warm, but sharp, harshly piercing the darkness of the night—like the world itself was shattered into light and dark by the priestess’s hammer.

I gaze up at the suddenly illuminated city square, eyes smarting from the sudden blaze.

“Meryn,” Stark calls urgently, and I look down at the old woman again.

The Mother Priestess’s hands have begun to smoke.

My stomach turns as I stare at the priestess. I lean forward, trying to understand what I’m seeing.

Something rocks the world right underneath us, and I’m almost thrown to the ground. Anassa braces herself, and I clench my thighs painfully to keep my seat.

“What on earth—”

Another tremor shakes the square.

It takes a moment before the priestess’s ecstatic joy slips from her face, replaced by confusion, and then something close to panic.

“What is happening?” she cries, and clutches the Tear tighter, even as the skin of her hands starts to steam and smoke. “I was the bearer of a Tear for so long! Only the worthy can touch the most sacred of the Goddess Tears, this I know. But who could be worthier than the leader of the goddess’s most devoted temple?”

Her voice rises with every word until the final few emerge as more shriek than speech.

And then the keening sound goes on and on.

Stark and I watch in horrified fascination as her hands begin to melt, fingertips turning into mangled stubs of flesh as her screams grow louder.

Another violent shake nearly unseats me, and my shadows rise in response to my distress and panic. There’s a loud grinding sound and a sharp crack!

For a second, my disoriented brain thinks that Stark and I and our wolves are rising up into the air. And then I realize no, the goddess statue—what’s left of it—is sinking into a twisted, murky darkness that’s appeared in the center of the square.

The priestess herself is quickly slipping into it, still clutching the Tear to herself with stubs of fingers, her screams mangled in her agony.

I try to focus my shadows enough to grasp her and keep her from falling, but they don’t obey, just whipping across the square in frantic waves.

“STARK!” I call urgently through our bond. He’s already responding, tendrils of his own shadebending power wrapping around the woman’s torso and wrenching her high into the air.

“Sorry about this,” I hear him say aloud to Cratos as he hauls the woman over to his direwolf until she’s slung over his back in front of him.

I urge Anassa next to Cratos and reach over to pry the Tear from the priestess’s hands. The shining gem burns hot in my hand. For the brief moment that I touch it, there’s the pull of magic through it, stretching down into the square and causing the storm in the earth beneath us.

Hastily, I wrap the Tear in my sleeve before yanking my pack open and dropping it inside. Hiding it away makes no difference, though.

The land continues to shake and move, the quakes increasing with every breath.

Anassa’s front paws keep slipping forward as more and more cobblestones come loose from their foundation, tumbling down into the endless black pit forming where the statue once stood.

“We need to get out of here!” I cry to Stark and Anassa.

“Do we bring the priestess with us?” Stark sounds steely calm in my mind, reflecting the intense focus he’s using to keep his shadebending steady.

I might not be happy with her right now, but if she’s going to give us any information, she needs to stay on Cratos’s back.

“Yes—in case she knows about Killian’s plans,” I call, bracing myself as our wolves scramble and jump. Maybe he’s figured out that there are only seven at this point, and that I’ve found one on my own, or maybe he’s still searching for something that doesn’t exist. If she can give us any insight, it would help.

My heart is in my throat as Anassa struggles to stay out of the yawning pit opening up before us, stone after stone falling away under her feet.

We’re jolted back and forth, Anassa and Cratos careening in random directions, avoiding the spreading destruction. It moves faster now, ripples moving through the square and a violent wind starting to pick up.

Finally getting solid purchase beneath her paws, Anassa springs from the melting ground to a patch of solid cobblestone. Cratos is close behind us. We don’t waste another moment before racing away from the square.

The path of destruction follows behind us.

“It isn’t stopping,” I say grimly to Stark. “Even though nobody is wielding the Tear anymore, somehow the magic is still going.”

We pause halfway down the next block, wheeling around to take in the scene of destruction. Nearly the entire city square is now an inky black pit, and it just keeps spreading outward.

“We need to get as many people as we can out of here,” Stark tells me. “Let’s split up. Meryn, call for reinforcements?”

I open up communication with Noemi and Venna. “We have the Tear,” I tell them, “But now we have bigger problems. The magic did something to Linsfall, and it’s collapsing or—I don’t know, but something’s destroying the city. We need to get people out. Can you help us?”

Venna’s response is swift. “Coming now!” I sense them both spring into motion. They must have been waiting on my word in case they were needed.

Now what? I rise up on Anassa’s back to see as far as I can. The ripples of destruction are approaching our resting spot fast. Next to the square, a stone tower of a small temple shakes and leans, then crashes violently into the ground.

Dust rises up from the stones and bricks and wood smashing around us, and for a moment, it’s so thick that we can’t see anything but gray.

I cough, and my eyes stream from the gritty air. “When the air clears—you turn left, I’ll go right?”

I feel Stark’s mental nod and then his farewell, like a brush of ghostly lips against my cheek. “Be safe, my queen.” Our minds separate so that we can focus on our tasks.

I wipe my eyes on my shirt, tears mixing with grit on my face, and then point Anassa down the broad avenue. We skitter around the corner to the right, racing at top speed.

The city is groaning and screaming as if it’s a living being. Patches of ground are thrown into the air as buildings and streets tilt and crack and sink into some dark oblivion.

My heart twists as I contemplate how many people may have already lost their lives to this madness.

The quiet of the hour has been smashed as thoroughly as the city’s heart. Screams and sobs erupt from every corner as Linsfall’s residents flee their beds. Some race toward the gates while others stand in the street staring at the buckling horizon in muted horror.

I somehow find my voice. “Linsfall! Awake and evacuate!” Desperation lends me power, and my words ring out across the rumbling of the earth beneath us.

In the distance, I hear Stark’s booming yell as he does the same. I hold on to that sound, even as the crashing gets too loud and I can no longer make out the sound of his voice.

Anassa adds a bracing howl to the chaos, and more and more people stream out of homes, stumbling in their nightclothes, carrying babies and valuables, blinking and crying and swearing.

“To the gates!” Anassa and I point ourselves along the most direct route to the main gates. Families and guards and barmaids and everyone in between race in terror toward the narrow exits spaced out along Linsfall’s outer walls.

The foot traffic clogs the roads like a bottle with a stopper, panicked pushing and shouting creating utter pandemonium.

“Keep fucking moving!” I yell, my voice cracking.

Anassa and I reach the gates, and this time, my shadebending does what I need it to do, slamming into the broad doors and smashing them off their hinges.

People stream out to the valley beyond, sobbing and yelling.

But it’s not enough—even with the gates wide open, people are jamming the way out. They’re not moving fast enough.

“Stark!” I call for help.

A dark streak hurtles toward us from the other side of the crowd, and I watch in astonishment as Stark and Cratos approach faster than I’ve ever seen them move before. It’s only a heartbeat before they reach the crowded gateway.

Cratos gathers himself on his hind legs for a jump, and then the two of them bound clear over the press of people, the Mother Priestess still slumped on Cratos’s back. They land deftly by my side.

“The gates are creating a bottleneck!” I yell to Stark. “We need to open up the walls!”

It’s instinctive between us now: this mental pull and snap until we are sharing a single mind. My power balloons between us like a dark cloud of lightning.

My brute force and Stark’s skillful focus weave together as shadows race from all around us. More and more of them pull over a spot in the walls without a guard tower, until a whole section of the stone wall is completely wreathed in darkness.

Stark and I both scream with effort as we push the entire chunk of wall up in the air.

We can’t simply drop it—too many would lose their lives. Instead, our shadebending power lifts it higher, higher, and then swings it out over the land beyond until we’re confident we can let it go without crushing anyone.

After a stunned beat, people start streaming through the hole, the city emptying out much faster than before.

Trickles of sweat run down my forehead and into my eyes, and I swipe at them with gritty hands.

Noemi and Venna arrive just then, and Stark hands off the Mother Priestess to Noemi to guard while we get back to work. The two of them are going to stay stationed at the gates to make sure people get out safely.

“What now?” Stark looks to me, and I take a deep breath, thinking.

“Stay linked—I need your precision,” I say decisively. I can feel his intake of breath, the twitch of his muscles as he nods. “But let’s split up again and save as many as we can. Anassa, while I’m seeing double, can you guide us?”

Anassa takes off.

There’s no sting of parting this time; our minds are so close, we are each other—seeing what the other sees, feeling what they feel.

Anassa and I race along side streets toward the edge of the destruction. More and more people emerge—from taverns, and brothels, and tenements, and a long row of stately homes with shaded garden beds.

We stop short, throwing our weight backward, as the walls of a run-down pub start to collapse outward. I throw up my hands, and at my thought, Stark is there; together we manipulate the shadows around me until they’re supporting the building, keeping it from falling.

The walls groan but stay up. The tavern’s faded sign leaves its hinges, splintering as it crashes into the street. I grunt, the weight of the wall pressing against our magic. Frantic people stream out the doors and race away.

After nobody new emerges, we let go, and the building collapses into the street with a deafening sound.

Stark’s vision eclipses mine, and I see the scene before him as clear as it’s through my own eyes: flames licking at houses as the collapsing streets create a mess of timber and torch fires, cooking stoves and furniture.

A bearded man with bloodshot eyes lurches toward Stark, words slurred but urgent all the same. “My s-s-s-son, please, p-p-please, he’s at home in bed alone, and he’s on the third story of our—our—our house,” he begs, clutching at Cratos’s fur.

Stark’s arm snakes down to grab the man and haul him bodily onto Cratos.

“I’ll help him. Can you go south, help the people there?” Stark says, nodding toward the far side of the city, where the other city gates sit.

“I’m on it.”

Anassa and I sprint toward the city’s southern limits.

Stark was right to send me here—a frantic mass of people are gathered at the smaller southern city gates, but an overturned cart is blocking the doors from opening wider than the span of two people shoulder to shoulder.

“Make way!” I scream, and heads whip around to look at me. The sight of Anassa barreling toward them gets everyone’s attention, and people scramble out of my way.

Without the mental link with Stark, I reach for Daemos impelling instead of my shadows, going for power instead of precision. With a shout and a swipe of my arm, I blast the cart away from the doors.

Right away, guards and citizens are back at the doors, pulling them wide so that the escape route is clear.

It feels like hours later when the shaking finally stops. We get as many people out as we can. My mind is so tired from magic use and exertion that I can barely form words.

Outside the city, Anassa trudges up a short slope, weariness clear in her every movement, so that we can get a vantage point on the ridge of a hill. I project an image of our view to Stark so that he knows where to find us, and then I drop our connection again, slumping over Anassa’s back and letting myself half jump, half fall to the ground.

Anassa curls her body around me, her panting breaths making her sides quake even as they warm me against the cold.

I gaze down the hill blearily.

Linsfall is a wreck.

The collapsing buildings are like a jumble of broken teeth, painful and ugly. Some of the timbered buildings are still on fire. Flames lick over the piles of rubble as we gaze at the ruins. And there at the city’s center, at least five city blocks wide, sits the massive hole that erupted where the goddess statue once stood.

Up until now, it’s been possible to focus only on what the people around me need immediately. On injuries and rescues and calming panic.

I almost let myself forget about the event that started all this.

I reach for my pack, slip my hand inside. For better or worse, the new Tear is still there.

The Tear for destruction, I think to myself and shiver.

Fucking hell.

“The priestess?” I send through the bond to Stark now.

“I’ve retrieved her from Noemi. We’re coming to you.” His response washes through me, and with it a flash of his location: I glance up to see him coming out of what’s left of the city gates, the old woman’s frail figure still in front of him on Cratos.

They streak across the landscape until they reach us, and Stark dismounts with far more grace than I could muster.

The old woman comes down next, still bound by tendrils of Stark’s shadow magic.

My voice is steely as I step up to look her in the eye.

“Mother Priestess. Time to start fucking talking.”

54

MERYN

The night sky carries a dull glow as Linsfall burns. There are shouts of suffering and children crying. And the Mother Priestess, wrapped tight in bands of shadow, smiles at me with flame reflected in her eyes.

It’s a beautiful smile. A gentle smile. And that alone turns my bones to ice. Then she says, “What more is there to say? King Killian’s armies are on their way. He’ll have the Tear in his possession before long, even if I’ve failed him.”

My magic immediately responds, whipping through my veins. I advance on her. “Is Killian coming? Here?”

Her eyes are wild, her face savage. She starts to laugh, the sound manic and bone-chilling. Stark grabs her by the shoulder and shakes. “Answer your queen!”

“You’re not my queen, usurper!” she crows. “You were never deserving! I won’t tell you a thing!”

I look at her, and all I can see is the human embodiment of all of Killian’s manipulations. I look at her and see him.

I see the way he smiled at me after throwing me into my own dungeons.

My vision goes shadowy at the corners. I don’t even try to stop it. My magic surges. Cut it out, is all I can think. Cut him out.

A dark blade cleaves through her wrists.

The magic moves silently and nearly too quick to see. She gasps and looks down at the stumps where her mangled hands were a moment ago. They’re on the ground now, their withered shapes nearly unrecognizable as hands after the Tear’s burn.

Blood pours down like rain onto the frozen ground.

Then her shock and confusion turn to outright pain.

The Mother Priestess opens her mouth to scream. I hear the sharp intake of her breath, and then I break her neck before she has a chance to voice her suffering.

Her body slumps and slips to the ground. It thuds heavily, her skirts falling in a heap around her as blood still leaks from her wrists.

Stark watches me with steady eyes. I’m too angry to question my own actions or weigh the consequences.

“Do you think she was telling the truth? That an army is on its way?” I ask him.

Stark narrows his eyes, glancing down at the body. “I don’t know. Do you…” He pauses, looking like he’s wrestling with himself, then continues. “Do you have the strength to use your foresight?”

I take several deep breaths. “I don’t know,” I reply, but I move to stand next to Anassa so that I can lean against her side and try. “It should be simple to see what’s coming in the next few hours, at least. That’s not as much of a push.”

Closing my eyes, exhaustion swirls. I have to focus on my foresight magic for nearly a full minute before I fall into the snatches of vision.

I see:

Me and Stark, reuniting with Venna and Noemi, Linsfall burning behind us.

And then—yes, a squadron of Bonded riding hard and arriving at Linsfall. Enemies? Friends? I push further into the vision and see a face: Jonah.

There’s no way to tell exactly how quickly this future will come to pass. In the vision, though, it’s still pitch-black night, and the fires of Linsfall still rage.

Gasping, I pull back from the magic.

I fist my hand in Anassa’s coat, holding on to keep from sagging to the ground.

“She wasn’t lying,” I say, my voice choked with weariness. “Jonah and a squadron of Bonded are on their way here.”

“Too many for us to fight?” Stark’s eyes are lethal.

I hesitate. “We could probably take them, you and I. If we were fresh. But what if some of them aren’t truly our enemies? What if they’re under Killian’s influence? I don’t want to kill any more of our own if we don’t need to.”

Stark’s eyes flash, but he mounts up. “Let’s get back to our companions.”

We find Noemi and Venna helping at the makeshift camp that’s formed outside the ruined Linsfall walls. A few Linsfall residents have begun to warily reenter the city now that the quaking has stopped, but most seem to prefer to wait longer until they’re absolutely sure the danger has passed.

Drawing our friends aside, I quickly explain that we need to get moving, that our enemies are coming here and fast.

“But what about these people?” Noemi responds with a pulse of anxiety.

“Noemi,” Stark scolds for resisting my order. She glares at him, but Ephyse’s ears tuck back as Cratos approaches.

I survey the crowd gathered around us. They’re scared, injured, confused. Their home is in ruins. Burning.

My insides alternate between scalding heat and sickening cold. “I have to believe that Killian’s Bonded won’t hurt them,” I say, communicating over the bonds with the group to avoid the chance of being overheard. “Their battle isn’t with the commoners of Linsfall. He likely wants them on his side.”

Venna hesitates. “You have the last Tear?”

“I do.”

“And… it caused all this?” Venna gestures helplessly around her.

I swallow. “I don’t know for sure. But, yes, I believe so.”

That seems to decide it for her. “We must not let that power fall into enemy hands. We should find somewhere safe to regroup.”

I’m grateful, then, that I’m not the only one who thinks we need to leave—no matter how in need these people are. Venna, a friend with more compassion than me, supports this decision.

“Agreed,” I say. “United with Lucien, we’ll have six Tears on our side. Even with Killian sapping my magic and Alistair’s strength, we should have the power to take him down. Then we can come back here and rebuild. But we should choose the time and place of that fight.”

Stark grudgingly agrees. “We need a plan, not to make a desperate last stand after a long night of tiring ourselves out.”

“Let’s go. Right now,” I order, and the rest of us mount up. We did what we could, but we’re out of time.

We start to fall into traveling formation, but before we can move, a trembling voice calls out from the crowd. “You’re abandoning us, Your Highness?”

My throat closes up, and I can’t so much as turn to seek out the source of the question. The wail of a child shrieks over my skin, rending me open.

“I’m so sorry to leave you like this,” I tell them. There’s no way to know whether my voice carries across the crowd.

Whether any of them will even hear my apology.

I force myself to look at the sea of faces before and behind me, doing everything I can not to remember the faces of the lost, those I’ve sent into the unknown and those taken from me.

“I will never abandon you. I promise. Whether you believe I’m your rightful ruler or that Killian Valtiere is, I have sworn my life to you, the people of Nocturna. At this moment, I’m being pursued, and the safest thing I can do for you is leave. As soon as I have troops under my command, we will return to Linsfall to help rebuild. Until then, I know you can count on one another.” Then I urge Anassa forward.

There are no more questions as we ride toward the camp where Elias and Lucien wait.

We move at speed in perfect formation. Stark is at my side, leading with me. Noemi rides on my other side for protection. Venna rides behind us, ready to alert us quickly if we’re being followed.

There’s smoke in my lungs as we pound over the frozen dirt. The hilt of my dagger is cold in my grip, radiating pain up my arm.

I’m so wrung out that I don’t know if I could conjure a whisper of magic. But my daggers have never failed me.

We race through the woods and out toward our campsite without incident, our wolves pushing hard to get us away from danger as quickly as they can.

The fire of our camp is visible on the next hill. And then a shiver of awareness draws my attention to our bonds. Venna sensed something.

I don’t have time to fully perceive it before a high-pitched hiss of air touches one of my ears and then the other. Then a thud, a whimper cut short.

Blinding pain ruptures through my connection.

I choke and nearly fall off Anassa; the hand I’m gripping her with has an impulse to snap to my throat, to stop the bleeding.

“Stop!” I scream at Anassa, both aloud and echoing over our bond, and her paws scrape deep grooves in the ground as she fights her momentum.

I whirl around.

Venna’s wolf Skaia is on the ground. A massive arrow is punched clear through her throat.

She’s bleeding so much. She’s—

She’s dying.

And Venna—

She’s on the ground next to Skaia, on her back, hands closed around her throat, writhing in agony.

My heart skips, my vision blurry. For a second, I can only stare at her. Her face and Izabel’s meld in my vision, and it’s both of them in front of me, twisting in pain. Dying. Because of me.

I’m frozen in time, as if everything happening is in the past, a wrenching memory. My mind detaches, fragments.

Noemi has leaped to the ground, racing toward Venna.

“Stop them, Meryn!” she screams, her voice strangled.

“Behind us, Meryn.” Anassa’s voice breaks through my anguish. “At the tree line.”

Anassa wheels around. My eyes struggle, then focus on the edge of the forest to the west. A wall of Killian’s Bonded on wolfback waits there for orders, their wolves’ eyes flashing from the darkness between the trees.

Jonah has stepped out of the shadows. He holds a bow and is swiftly nocking another arrow. I can see his wide smile even from here, his white teeth flashing like fangs.

Another flash hits me, this one born of pure anger.

I will not let him take anyone else from me. I will not.

My shadow power rises, vengeance incarnate. But at the same time, I’m tired, so tired. My body strains tight as a bowstring, tight enough to snap.

“Meryn. It’s too much.” Anassa’s voice tears through my mind.

No. I will not let it break me.

Without giving myself time to doubt the decision, I thrust my hand into the pack at my side, pulling out the Tear that wreaks destruction.

The moment my skin makes contact, power rushes in my veins. My exhaustion is gone. My power surges high. It fills me, rushes through me and into the Tear.

I raise the gem above my head, and once again, that eerie light shines. Like a cold white sunrise.

Jonah falters. His raised bow lowers, and the whites of his eyes flash. Phylax magic lights up the canopy. The other Bonded erect massive shields because they know I’m coming for them.

Not my people. Not mine.

Magic ruptures from my chest with force that blows my hair back.

I’m ready to destroy.

The image of Linsfall caving in on itself rises in my mind.

I point my hand at the line of traitor Bonded and give a shout.

A massive cavern of darkness opens, a fissure in the land between us and them.

Wolves and riders are swallowed. Screams echo and fall, endlessly down. Trees tumble into the darkness, roots cracking and breaking. My power creates a maelstrom of wind, and the enemy line is dashed into the ground, many of them slipping into that slash of blackness.

I watch as the enemies disappear, that gap widening, widening.

Then comes the sound of Venna’s dying breaths.

Venna. I let my hand fall.

Anassa sprints to her side. Tumbling from her back, I hit the ground hard. I catch myself on my hands and use them to pull myself forward and find my feet. A desperate cry scrapes from my throat.

The others are already gathered around Venna. Noemi holds the hand that isn’t still clutching her throat, scratching the skin to bleeding.

There’s a sound like a wind whistling and a streak of color over the ground between here and our camp—and then Lucien is here, too, bending over Venna as well. His face is grim. Elias is in the background, his face set in an equally dire expression.

Venna’s eyes are bloodshot. Her face is going pale and ghostly. She’s making sounds like she’s trying to breathe but can’t get the air past the wound in her wolf’s throat.

Her wolf is gurgling, her eyes unseeing.

“Skaia is holding on,” Anassa whispers. “For her.”

For her goodbye. Agony tears through me, my every nerve in pain.

“M—” Venna tries, eyes tracking me.

I collapse next to her, tears burning on my cheeks as I hold her face. “Don’t talk. It’s okay. Hey. It’s okay.”

Her lips move, but no sound emerges. My body runs cold and hot and I start to shake.

“No. Venna, no,” I say, beg, cry. Not you, too.

We didn’t have enough time. We were just starting to forge a deep friendship all our own. Venna, who has no trouble calling me out. Venna, wry and smart. Venna, who already faced the worst thing she could and stunned me with her courage to keep moving on.

Why?

Her hand leaves her throat. A tear spills from her eye. She won’t stop looking at me. Reaching, I realize. I take her hand and sob.

“Stay with us,” I say over the bond in desperation. “Don’t leave me.”

A gentle emotion drifts through our fraying bond. Small, quiet.

Love.

“Meryn.” Lucien’s voice. I push it aside, going deeper into the bond, searching for Venna’s spark there, where it’s fading so fast. Following it down into the darkness.

I can’t let her go—

A hand slams into my shoulder. I tumble backward, losing the connection to Venna. Lucien’s startling strength knocks me flat.

“Let me,” his voice comes urgent.

I watch, shocked, as his hands close around Venna’s throat. He touches her chest, then, right above her heart.

Then he lifts his wrist to his mouth and rips into it with his fangs. A chunk of his flesh comes away, and his blood bursts from the wound and spatters over her chest. I watch, drifting away from myself. I watch Lucien hold his bloody wrist to her mouth.

My breath catches in my throat as I realize what he’s offering her.

“Drink,” he orders.

But she turns her head to the side, resisting with her last strength, fear in her eyes.

“Venna, please,” I beg her. But I don’t know what I’m asking for. To drink? Or to stay strong and refuse, even as it costs her her life?

What would I choose if given the chance? Death? Or—

Venna turns her head and looks at her wolf. She looks to her for counsel.

Skaia’s eyes are closed, her breath fading. She can’t help Venna now.

They’ll both be gone in seconds.

No. I want so badly for her to stay. Venna deserves a long, full life. It’s not my choice to make though, and my pulse starts to pound behind my eyes. Choose, Venna, choose.

Lucien’s face contorts. Briefly, he sits back, his wrist leaving her lips. But then something comes over him. Something acute and wild. Something real. Something almost human.

Venna sees it, too, and I watch as something stubborn comes back into her gaze. With her last strength, she grasps his wrist feebly, brings it to her mouth.

Blood coats her cheeks, her lips, and she drinks.

Venna’s wolf gives one last, low sound. A groan swallowed by death. Skaia’s back foot twitches, and she goes still.

There’s a wrenching gap inside me.

It isn’t just her wolf gone from the pack.

Venna’s beyond me now.

She’s right here, alive, color returning to her cheeks, but I can’t feel her in the bonds.

My ears are ringing. Everything is numb.

“Meryn.” It’s Stark.

I let out a sob and lean back. I can’t hold myself up, and he’s there. I lean against his leg, cheek to his thigh, clinging to his ankle.

She’s alive.

She’s a Siphon.

But she’s alive.

Stark’s fingertips trace slow circles on the back of my neck. “We don’t have time, Meryn,” his voice tells me, cutting through the fog. “There might be more of them coming. They might find a way across… what you did. We need to get out of here, get her to safety.”

My vision focuses. I swallow. There are tears on my face, but I can see clearly.

“Back on your wolves,” I bark. The order for myself as much as for any of them.

Stark and Noemi move quickly. Lucien remains sitting beside Venna, a stony expression on his face, blood still dripping from his wrist where it’s resting on his raised knee.

Venna is on her back, eyes staring up at the smoky sky. Blood is smeared across her chin.

I take her hand. “Up. Get up. Now.” The words come out gentle, pleading.

“My… She…” Venna rasps. Her eyes turn from the sky toward Skaia.

She lets out a cry that will haunt me for the rest of my life and I almost slide back onto the ground with her.

What if it were Anassa lying there? What if she’d been cut from me and I’d been severed from my entire pack by a single arrow?

What if I were no longer Bonded?

My instinct to use pack authority to get her on her feet is like salt ground into a raw wound. It won’t work any longer. Not on Venna.

Venna rolls over weakly, reaching for Skaia, just barely touching her tail. My vision focuses on fur matted with blood.

It’s cruel how lively her gray fur looks, dancing in the wind but tethered to a corpse.

I take Venna’s outstretched hand and pull her away from her wolf. She screams as if I’m killing her. I drape the arm over my shoulder and use my legs to pull us up.

My world feels as if it’s coming apart at the edges, and even still, I have to keep us moving.

She made her choice. I need to do my part and honor that by making sure we stay alive.

Stark is there, pulling with me. Venna sags. Her legs are limp. She’s mumbling.

Anassa bows before Skaia. She stares at the direwolf’s body as Stark helps me put Venna on Anassa’s back.

I take a step back to sign my next words. “You will never be alone, Venna,” I tell her, fumbling over the words in sign language, but doing my best. “I swear it.”

I jump up behind my friend, my family, and close my arms around her. She slumps—asleep, or passed out. It’s a blessing, I think; she doesn’t have to see us ride away from her wolf. She won’t have to carry that vision with her for the rest of eternity.

“Move. Fast!” Stark bellows, taking off on Cratos, Elias seated behind him.

Lucien’s head whips around as he rides past us on Noemi’s wolf. He only looks forward again once we catch up. We ride, and we ride fast under cover of magic.

Venna’s wolf is left to the crows.

55

MERYN

The wolves keep moving despite our despair and exhaustion. Despite their aching loss at one of their own.

Away from Linsfall. Away from whatever Phylax traitors have survived, and away from the ragged wound I opened in the earth, scarring the landscape.

Away, with the Goddess Tear of destruction in my pack radiating warmth against my chest and the space where Venna’s bond once was trying and failing and trying and failing to flow.

And my heart is breaking, and breaking, and breaking. The ache of the punishing ride is the only thing that keeps me grounded at all.

After a solid hour with my thighs burning and my lungs on fire, I shout to Lucien, “How long do we have until she turns?”

Venna has remained asleep, but I remember all too well how it went with Saela. She was perfectly fine. She seemed like herself when I met her in Stark’s office at Sturmfrost.

Then all at once, she was tearing out a throat and writhing like an animal caught in a trap.

Oh goddess. Venna.

“Lucien,” I demand.

Newly turned Siphons are at their most dangerous, I remember. The craving is uncontrollable. For a while, Venna won’t even know me. She’ll look at me and only see the map of my veins beneath my skin.

I know it will feel like she’s dead, too, or irrevocably changed, even if only for a little while. And I don’t know whether I can endure it.

“Hours,” Lucien calls back to me. “About six, give or take.”

I nod and turn inward. Thoughts pummel the inside of my skull. Six hours. How much ground could we cover? How will we manage the initial transformation?

The realization ripples through my mind and Anassa’s simultaneously.

“We will need to split up,” Anassa says.

We can’t manage Venna’s transformation while moving, but we can’t all halt everything to help her through it.

That would take days. Days we don’t have with Killian’s forces closing in.

I don’t announce my decision yet. I keep us riding hard. The wolves must sense the urgency, because they run until their heads hang low, alternating between powerful bursts of speed and a steadier, more sustainable pace. And then they keep running. Without complaint. Without a single snarl or snap of sharp teeth.

They’re mourning, too. The burn in their muscles might be just as welcome a distraction for them as it is for me.

Eventually, we can’t keep going. I’m not entirely certain where we are, but I know Stark and Cratos, who have traveled most of our nation, will piece it together.

Right now, I have other concerns.

I ease up on Anassa, leaning back with Venna slumped unconscious in my arms. Anassa slows to a lope and then to a heavy-footed, panting trudge. She hangs her head, sides heaving.

My eyes move over the landscape. The trees have thinned out slightly, but the canopy is still thick enough for cover and the sun hasn’t yet risen. And though I’m exhausted, I still manage to keep a veil of magic draped around us.

I’m under no illusion that it could ever be enough to shield us fully from harm, however. Anything could happen at any moment. My sense of safety has been shattered—again—on the tip of an arrow.

But I need to do this, and I need to do it now. I need to gather whatever intelligence I can in case it could give us some kind of edge, some solution to all this.

The others stop alongside Anassa. Noemi leans all the way forward on Ephyse and wraps her arms around her wide neck, shutting her eyes, shaking from exertion. Cratos approaches Anassa and touches his nose to hers. They stay there like that, both still panting.

I look down at Venna. It seems like she’s sleeping, but it isn’t peaceful. She’s in the grip of dark dreams, and there’s nothing I can do to protect her from them.

“Ven,” I whisper, fighting back the tears.

I cup her head where it’s resting against my shoulder and turn to kiss her hair.

Then I guide a couple of strays locks from her brow, giving my heart a few rapid beats to grieve, to revel in the molten anger that this has happened.

When I lay her down over Anassa’s shoulders, my direwolf sends me a promise. She’ll take care of Venna while I do what I need to do.

I stroke her side as I dismount, legs shaking slightly from the long ride. Then I move to Stark, gripping his ankle where it rests against Cratos’s side. He looks down at me, sweat on his brow, hand sunk in Cratos’s fur.

Elias rides behind him; even his nearly perfect Siphon face looks creased with weariness.

“Maybe four more hours, before…” he tells me, and he glances toward Venna.

“I’m not going to wait. I need all the information I can get,” I reply.

“Wait?” Elias asks. He slips down from Cratos’s back.

“She means the Tear,” Lucien says from behind Noemi. He lifts himself up and soars down from wolfback in a flutter of robes. “I agree it is wise to learn as much as we can about these objects before facing Alistair, as he’s armed with one of them. You need me for this, I assume?”

My answer is to retrieve the Tear.

It’s still stained with the Mother Priestess’s blood.

I lift it to examine it in what dappled moonlight makes it through the shivering leaves above. As my sweat cools, cold sets in. Or maybe it’s lingering shock. Yet my hand is warm around the stone.

The opal is so painfully beautiful. I wish it didn’t exist. The power it holds is terrible. And I hate that I’ve already used it for my own purposes.

My eyes dart to Stark. “Watch over me?” I whisper over our bond.

“Always.”

I cradle the Tear in my palms and hold it out toward Lucien so that he can press his hands over mine.

Being washed away to another time is familiar at this point. Anticipation mounts in me. A hunger to know.

I’m sinking, into the earth, below the ground, falling through darkness. And then…

I’m in a barren, cold forest. The scene is remarkably clear. There’s packed dirt beneath my shoes. I can make out the sharp scent of grass and the contrastingly sweet smells of cedar and sap. The air is brisk, but the light before me is warm.

Lumina’s light. She’s ahead of me, walking slowly. Her feet are bare, peeking out from beneath the hem of a flowing gown made of simple pale linen and adorned only with a single line of pearl-like studs.

She glows from within, as before, but her expression is unreadable.

Lumina stops walking and turns toward me. Nearly no light reaches us, yet she defies the shadows. She may as well be standing in a green field on a summer’s day, grass waving around her to match the fluttering of her hair.

I watch as she holds out her hands with her palms together, closes her eyes, and takes a deep breath.

As she exhales, she breathes out a wave of power. It’s frightening, awe-inspiring, beautiful, impossible. It’s like the first cry of a newborn, her mother’s pain still lingering.

As the wave moves, it consumes the forest. No, it doesn’t consume. It transforms.

In Lumina’s expression, there’s now grief, relief, joy. All of it all at once. She keeps her eyes closed as the woods start to become.

The dirt beneath my feet turns to packed, geometric stone, hardening with every passing second. The tall trees bend, branches growing in strict lines, at unnatural right angles, and then petrifying into the shapes of buildings. Roots become stone steps. Twigs grow up and cross one another and turn into windowpanes.

I spin, mouth agape, as the forest turns into a city before my eyes. Even the smells change, replaced by fresh smoke like the hearths are already burning. With a jolt, I realize I recognize the pattern of these streets. I’ve been here. Hours ago.

It’s Linsfall.

It looks slightly different. The buildings aren’t as modern, all with straw-thatched roofs and none reaching more than a single story. But the layout of the roads is familiar in their annoying habit of narrowing and widening unpredictably. And the buildings hold an echo of their future iterations.

When I turn back to look at Lumina, she’s standing in the very center of a city square I recognize.

She stands precisely where the statue of the Faceless Goddess stood.

After a minute, the groaning of the trees vanishes. A minute after that, the deep crackling of stone forming goes silent, too. Only then does Lumina open her eyes.

She surveys everything before her with a beneficent smile.

And then she weeps. She smiles and weeps like she’s glad to finally witness this place she held inside her so long, but like she also misses holding it so impossibly close to her.

Just as I witnessed in the tower’s Tear, her tears roll down to her pointed chin and fall into her hands. They gather and become an opal, new light glistening over the goddess’s features.

A door opens. Another. Suddenly, people are emerging from all the buildings around us.

People, when there were no people anywhere before the goddess’s magic swept through. My heart is racing.

She just… created them?

They’re dressed in simple clothes. I might mistake them for commoners from today’s Linsfall, though the styles are a bit strange and bulky. They all stare at her with wide eyes.

Lumina holds her hands out to them, welcoming, her head slightly cocked to the side.

A shock explodes from the base of my skull and down my spine when I realize it’s an exact mirror of the position the statue stands in.

Stood, I suppose.

“Welcome, my children,” she says. A woman reaches Lumina’s side first, and the goddess places the opal in her hands tenderly.

The woman regards it with reverence and wonder.

“This is your world now,” Lumina says. “Cherish it. Protect it against those who would do it harm.”

“Who are you?” the woman asks in a strange accent.

“Lumina, goddess of creation. And I… wish I could know you,” she whispers. But the emotion that briefly grips her doesn’t remain in her voice. “Guard over this Tear, and let nobody take it from you.”

Her voice grows powerful, and the people tremble. I tremble, too, hearing her.

“I will always come when you summon. Be good to one another, and be well.”

She turns, and suddenly she’s gone. I don’t miss it in a blink. She just suddenly isn’t.

The people look around, confused, suddenly alive and suddenly alone.

And the woman holding the Tear holds it to the light, just as I did in the forest. “Goddess,” she says reverently.

I’m thrown back into my body then.

My teeth grind, and I have to try very hard to remember how to breathe. After I find a rhythm, I open my eyes. Lucien’s eyes are still closed, his breathing also returning.

I turn to Stark, who has dismounted Cratos and is standing with his arms crossed and his jaw tight. Noemi stands behind him, also looking at me with questions in her eyes.

“I saw the goddess,” I say slowly. “And what I think was the creation of Linsfall and of this Tear. I can’t tell if it came before the things that happened at the Tower, though, or after.”

I pause and think back over what I’ve seen, whether there’s anything new we can learn from this vision.

Lucien is alert again now, too, pacing back and forth with his brows furrowed.

“Lucien, did you pick up on anything that might help us?”

He glances up. “Architecture in Nocturna was always uglier than that in Astreona?”

I sigh. “Okay, but how about anything about the power of the Tears, or how we defeat Killian?”

Lucien shakes his head. “I’m not sure what we know now, to be honest. The goddess created a city and some people… and then left? What does that mean for the Tears? And why could those people touch the gem, but not the Mother Priestess?” Stark and I shared the story of what happened to her hands during our journey.

I sink down to the ground, leaning my back against a tree stump. “Okay, well, unfortunately the great and all-knowing Siphon king didn’t pick up any more intel than I did on that little vision journey.”

“Where does that leave us?” Noemi’s voice is quiet but firm. “Even if we don’t entirely understand them, we do know these Tears bestow great power on you and on Killian. He’s been able to win the entire country to his side. Will the power of the new ones we’ve found be enough for you and Lucien to fight him?”

We’ve had this conversation before, multiple times while we’ve been on the road. Ultimately, we continued to hope that collecting more Tears would not just give us more power but also help us understand Killian’s own Tear and how to turn it against him.

I hesitate. If it weren’t for the damn engagement bracelet, it would be easier to tell Noemi that yes, with the Tears of creation and destruction, I could take on anyone or anything.

But will Killian be able to access their power through me? What if he can turn it right back around to destroy us?

I was counting on having Lucien by my side for this battle, another strong magic wielder with Tears amplifying his abilities. And most important, one who is not compromised by an unbreakable link to our enemy.

With Venna about to need constant care, though, I don’t see how we can all continue forward.

And without Lucien and his two Tears…

“I think we have enough firepower now,” I say finally, trying to sound confident. “And we stopped him from getting his hands on the destruction Tear. But Killian can turn his entire army on us, including even people who were formerly our supporters. I don’t want to kill all of Nocturna just to save it.”

I rub my neck, wincing at the pain throughout my body after the night we’ve had.

“At the same time, I don’t see that we can put things off any further. Killian could go after our final allies in Blumenfall at any time. Plus, we don’t really have a better plan beyond just, get the Tears and hope that’s enough…”

My mind turns to dark despair. I can’t abandon the rest of my people to Killian’s rule. But does it do us any good for me to blindly throw myself at our enemy, not knowing how many we’ll be up against?

“Then we need a better plan,” Stark says simply. His eyes haven’t left me. His faith that I can solve this kindles something in my chest. I sit up a little straighter.

“You’re right. What do we have that can help us? What are his weaknesses?”

We all quiet, thinking about that.

“His thirst for power?” Noemi suggests.

She’s not wrong. If Killian had wanted to, he could have found a way to get around his family’s sick legacy, to avoid becoming Alistair’s vessel. He didn’t. He accepted it, because he wanted the power it would bring him. It’s his second greatest weakness. And…

And I think I know the first.

It’s clear to me now. There is a way forward. There is a way to seize my peace again. There’s a way to turn this cursed connection between us, this agony that haunts me, into a weapon I can turn on him.

It hurts, yes. It’s going to hurt. But women in pain give men confidence.

And it only takes one mistake.

“Meryn!”

I jolt. Stark does, too. Noemi looks confused and glances between us. It’s Egith’s voice, urgent and breathy.

“Killian and his forces are approaching Blumenfall.”

My entire body goes rigid.

56

MERYN

Fuck.

“He wasn’t with Jonah and the group that attacked us? We’re sure?” I ask urgently.

Egith shares information she’s observed with her own eyes with Stark and me through the bond. A huge mass of forces, Bonded and soldiers alike. And leading them all—yes, it’s unmistakably Killian.

Stark shakes his head. “The group pursuing us was only a small contingent of his larger forces.”

“Killian?” Noemi asks. Her dark eyes are round and wide. “Is he coming for the rest of the Bonded?”

“It looks like it. Egith has eyes on troop movements,” I say.

The numbers of our loyal followers are low already. I can’t abandon the rest of them to Killian and Alistair’s mixture of violence and magical enslavement.

And they’re inside a fiefdom. Commoners’ lives are going to be at risk if Killian attacks the Bonded there.

“Is he going after them simply to wipe them out? Take the rest of your army?” Noemi speculates, voice tight.

“No,” I say. “Or not only that, although I’m sure that’s part of his goal. Alistair’s trying to provoke me. And you know what, fuck it. It’s working. I’m provoked. And I am done hiding from him. Done running from him.”

The others watch me with a mix of fear and resolute drive on their faces.

My voice rises. “I’m done with him! He has one Tear, and I have four. They’re making me powerful. He can tap into my shadebending magic, but I’d wager the Tears live outside that power—and with this ability to create and destroy, I can take him. And I have another thing he doesn’t.”

“Knowledge of Lumina?” Noemi says, looking uncertain.

“Sheer, incandescent rage,” I correct her. I start pacing, looking at Anassa. “How long will it take us to reach Blumenfall?”

“About five hours at full speed,” she replies.

I nod, calculating.

“But we need to rest first, Meryn,” she adds sternly. Her tail whips. It’s something she mostly does when she’s expressing annoyance. “You have not slept. No one has. Linsfall was difficult, emotionally and physically. And…”

“And?” I snap.

“You stink of unwashed human,” Anassa snarls. “Eat. Sleep. Wash.”

I grit my teeth. “Oh, I’ll sleep, all right.”

She bares her teeth at me to scold me for being stubborn, but I just bare mine back before turning my stare on Lucien. He’s standing with his eternally calm expression on his face, like he’s sitting at a vaguely entertaining party he attended only so he could have an excuse to drink.

But when he sees me staring at him, his brow lifts and his eyes focus.

“I have found you to be a very confusing person,” I tell him, too tired for subtlety.

He smiles. “Thank you.”

“I really, really did not mean that as a compliment. But… I think I can trust you. I can, right?” I ask.

He takes a deep breath and saunters toward me. “The only thing in this world I truly want—the only thing that has remained eternally beyond my reach—is the swift”—he pauses—“or drawn-out and gruesome, death of my brother.” His voice is almost careless as he finishes, but his eyes tell another story. “I want him wiped out of existence. You do not stand in the way of that goal, Sturmfrost.”

I roll my eyes. “It was a yes-or-no question.”

He smiles, and it’s somehow both reassuring and predatory. “Yes, you can trust me.”

“Then…” My heart aches. I close my eyes and say, “Take Venna back to Astreona. Please. Protect her.”

Venna is still unconscious atop Anassa. Her arm is hanging down over my wolf’s side. Her face is pale and starting to get sweaty.

The constant half smirk drops off Lucien’s face. “And Alistair?”

My head drops, and I sigh. “Lucien, I know you don’t want me going after him alone. You’ve made that perfectly clear. To be honest, it’s not my first choice, either. But Venna needs to be kept safe, and we cannot take her with us where we’re going. You know that, right?”

His eyes dart between Venna and the bag strapped around me, the one that holds my crown, the necklace, and the two other Tears.

My cheeks burn. “You’re not seriously going to risk her because you’re worried about our power imbalance right now, are you?”

“Normally, I love a good power imbalance…” he starts.

“Lucien.”

Lucien sighs, looking wearier than I’ve ever seen. “No, I suppose I’m not. But you better finish the job.”

“I promise,” I tell him. “And I’ll make sure to give Alistair your regards while I twist the knife, okay? How are you going to get back to the boat?”

“We’ll travel on foot. Inconvenient not to have a horse for our packs, but as you know, speed is among a Siphon’s arsenal. We’ll find safe places to rest and recover between stretches of travel. I’ll carry her until she wakes and can move on her own.”

I press my lips together. “Try to make it as easy as possible for her. Please. And… don’t let her kill anyone.”

It would break her, doing something like that. Senseless murder. Driven by desperation and inhuman hunger.

She can’t take any more loss.

Lucien lets out a vaguely offended sound and rolls his eyes. “I’ve eased new Siphons through their transitions many times. She will be fine.”

I lower my voice and step very close to him. Close enough that his spine straightens.

“I don’t know if she’s going to be fine,” I whisper.

She’s been through immeasurable trauma, her very nature has changed, and she’s lost her wolf on top of it all. Skaia, the one constant, steadying presence in her life. A part of her, just as Izabel was.

Even though she ultimately chose this transformation, I’m terrified she’ll wake and regret that she’s still alive.

That she’ll be convinced there’s nothing left of herself that deserves to keep on living.

Lucien’s pale brows draw together. “Meryn,” he says seriously. My lips part. I’m not sure I’ve ever heard him use my first name like that. “I’ll protect her.”

I swallow. Then I force out, “Okay. You should go, then.” And I back away.

But he puts a hand on my arm, stopping me. His expression is still intense. The air between us is heavy. He doesn’t let go of me.

“If the Tears really are our chance to take down Alistair… Killian. Well. I want you to be as strong as absolutely possible when you take on that piece of shit.”

I watch in stunned paralysis as the hand that gripped me reaches up and lifts the opal necklace from around his neck, then withdraws his crown from his pack.

And King Lucien Brightbane stands before me with both of those Tears in his hands, offering them to me. Offering me his faith.

My voice catches up to my shock. “Are you sure? You told me just a few days ago that you didn’t trust me.”

Lucien’s gaze is cool. “If you can put your trust in me, I can extend you the same courtesy, I suppose. I have something precious to you in my possession, and now you have something precious to me.”

He waits patiently at first.

Then, impatiently, he says, “I trust that you will return them.”

“I will. I swear it,” I say. As I take the Tears, the additional power flares in me immediately, dark as midnight and blinding as the noonday sun. I swallow, waiting for the dizzying moment to pass.

“Well, then,” he says.

He stares at his crown in my hands for a moment, then lifts his head and strides toward Anassa’s side. In one fluid movement, he launches himself up and catches himself on her fur. He says something under his breath that I can’t make out and then eases Venna from her resting spot and settles her against his chest.

Her head falls against his shoulder awkwardly, at first, but he rearranges it carefully until her face is hidden against his neck. He even braces her skull with his hand as he dismounts Anassa, preventing the jolt of his impact with the ground from reaching her.

He carries her with reverence. That’s the only word for it. It’s like he’s bearing the responsibility of guarding something valuable and breakable. Priceless, even.

“Something precious to you,” he said, “and something precious to me.” Which means that in his mind, his crown is as important as Venna’s safety.

“Elias,” Lucien orders. Elias moves quickly to his side.

Both the Siphons give me one last parting look, and Lucien inclines his head in a move that, for once, I take as a sign of respect.

And then they’re gone, running through the woods in a blur of disorienting Siphon speed.

I force my shoulder muscles to relax. When I do, I realize my jaw and brow are tight, too, but those I can’t get to release so easily.

“We rest here. Noemi, Ephyse is best at hunting small creatures. We need to eat. Can you ask for his help? Cratos, you find us a stream for fresh water,” I order.

“And bathing,” Anassa reminds me, and I smack her leg.

I’m thankful, though. The touch of humor eases the knot of sorrow and tension and exhaustion within me, just a little bit.

She always knows what I need.

Before we break to start the various tasks required to form a camp, we take one last moment to draw close. To focus on the bonds still flowing among us.

The three wolves form a protective circle around us, and I press my face into Anassa’s fur. I center my mind on her persistent warmth. Even in the dead of winter, it will always be there. It will.

“Am I making a huge mistake, going to him?” I ask her. “Am I just giving him exactly what he wants, especially since I have all the Tears?”

She lowers her head and hooks her muzzle around me protectively. “No, you are not. Killian is powerful, but so are you. He does not know what power you bring with you. He will not be ready.”

I let the certainty in her voice steel my nerves. My voice is blade-sharp. “I won’t give him a chance to adjust. He’ll be dead before he understands what hit him.”

“Precisely. Rest so that you may finally have your vengeance.”

My exhaustion starts to claim me. I settle against Anassa’s side, comforted by the way her breathing lifts me and lays me down to rest.

Stark’s eyes catch mine from where he’s starting to make a fire. He quirks a brow. I know immediately that he’s asking whether I want him to join me.

But I just shake my head. This is how we’re going to manage it—how we’re going to get close enough to kill that fucker without having to carve my way through my own troops.

“I need to talk to him one last time.”

57

MERYN

Sleep—or is it?

I open my eyes to unnatural darkness.

It’s vast. It’s alive. It’s immediately in my lungs and seeping into my pores. But I know this feeling. I can face it. I can master it.

Killian doesn’t know what I know about this place: that my ancestor-god Nocturn sometimes speaks to me here. I have to assume he’s the one responsible for its existence.

It has nothing to do with Killian—he’s only a pest, an infestation.

Soon to be eliminated.

I turn, scanning. My eyes sting as I strain myself trying to see into the swirling vat of shadow. I don’t see Killian or sense his presence.

Does he know that I’ve come? Does he have to be asleep at the same time for this to work? How long will I have to wait? The longer he doesn’t appear, the stronger the creeping paranoia tingling along my spine grows.

I can’t see anything, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t here, watching me.

I shut my eyes, the difference between closed and open negligible, and visualize armor around me. Armor he could never get through, smelt and forged from the same shadows surrounding me.

My shadows.

When I open my eyes, a glint of eerie blue makes me wince. Killian.

I let my head drop toward my chest. I’ve done this before. A hundred times and a hundred times after that.

Women in pain.

I pull my pain to the surface. I call on the emotion I’ve been resisting for months because it would have been too debilitating to live with.

And it’s healing, almost, to let it out like this. To wield it. To own it, be it.

To be weak in a way that is powerful.

I let my eyes grow glassy with tears, and then I look up at him and gasp. “Oh, thank the goddess. Killian!”

He steps toward me out of the shadows, wariness playing across his features. “Kitten.”

Swallowing down my disgust, I move toward him, arms outstretched. “I’ve been trying to get back to you ever since we last talked. I’m so sorry it took me this long.”

Killian holds up a hand, halting me before I reach him. He raises an eyebrow. “My forces told me you were in Nocturna. That you went to Linsfall and took the Tear we located there. I thought I made myself very clear. You were meant to stay put in Astreona until I summoned you.”

Tears slide down my cheeks. “I didn’t want to take it.” You hideous fuckturd. “After what happened at the border, Lucien insisted that we come here to hunt you and Alistair down. I figured out where the Tear was, and I took it so I could bring it to you! We shouldn’t trust anyone else with these.”

His brows lift in surprise. “Oh. But you attacked my troops.”

I shake my head. “Only because Lucien was still with me. I couldn’t let him know what I was planning.”

Killian purses his lips, moving closer to me, putting his hands on my arms in a way that I’m sure is meant to be comforting. “And Lucien? Where did he go?”

Twisting my face into a parody of menace, I say, “I killed him, just like you told me to. I cut off his head while he was sleeping. His crown is yours.”

Finally, a disgusting smile creeps across Killian’s face. “Good girl. So you have both the crowns, the Tear from Linsfall, and your necklace. The Mother Priestess told me about that last one.”

Fucking bitch. Of course she did. I’m not going to tell him about the Tear from the tower, but if he already knows about my necklace… “And Lucien’s. He had a necklace, too. It was easy to remove it once he no longer had a neck.”

“And what do the necklaces and the Tear from Linsfall do?” There’s a greedy glint in his gaze now. “Will they help us defeat Alistair?”

I shake my head, playing dumb. Eyes wide, I lean against him, trying not to recoil at his touch. “I have no idea. They don’t do anything for me. But I’m sure they’ll reveal their powers to you.”

He reaches up, tucking my hair behind my ear. I hum at his touch to cover up the gagging sound I almost make.

“What about your wolf’s mate and his rider?” Killian’s voice is a low, grubby caress.

My stomach twists at the question. I know what I need to say here. We planned it all out. And yet my tongue is heavy and unwilling.

I push through anyway. This is the only way. Locking eyes with him, I put a vicious tone into my voice. “Take them. Anassa will understand. That we need to eliminate them for you to seize your rule. We’ll bind them with shadows and bring them to you. Let Tormun deal with him.”

Finally, Killian’s smile reaches his eyes—it’s a horrible, soulless look. He lifts a hand and brings his thumb to my lips, rubbing it roughly over my mouth. Energy gathers. Chaotic. Terrifying. Dreadful.

I know what’s going to happen before it does, and I steel myself for it, every muscle in my body screaming out at the wrongness.

Killian kisses me. It hurts—he’s left his fangs out, and one pierces my lip, drawing blood.

I’m stuck, sinking into myself, trying hard to cover myself in that armor I visualized.

It’s brief but lasts forever. Finally, he pulls away.

His gaze is hard as he stares into my eyes. His breath is on my bleeding lip.

“I love you,” he tells me.

“I love you, too,” I lie, my mouth sour. “I can’t wait to be at your side.”

“You’ll come to me?” he asks. “I’m outside Blumenfall.”

I nod, my head heavy and dizzy. “I’ll be there in the morning. And then we’ll find a way to remove Alistair from your body and we can start our lives together.”

All the words he wants to hear, flowing freely from my tongue, even as they sink a dagger into my gut. Please, please, please let everything go right tomorrow.

Killian’s answering grin makes very real pain light up all through my body. My nerves fire as though I’m being slowly stabbed.

“I’ll see you in the morning, then, kitten,” Killian says.

The shadows rise to blot out my vision, drenching us in darkness.

I wake to moonlight and cinders clinging to their heat.

Anassa’s tail is draped over my legs. Her slow breaths ground me, but I can’t find my own. Still perched against Anassa, I turn my head.

Stark is already awake and watching me.

His expression is muted, but his eyes are slightly too wide where they’re shadowed by his brow. He isn’t calm.

I lift my arm and reach for him. His body snaps into motion, and he’s up and striding across the camp with his hands in fists.

It was… it was awful. It hurt. It still hurts. The wound on my lip didn’t follow me back, but I swear it still stings.

I can barely breathe.

Stark kneels in front of me and lets me sink my fingers into his hair and pull. He bows his head as I bring it close.

A single instant of touching him brings me back into myself. His hand comes up and closes around my wrist tightly. He’s asking if I’m all right.

“What I said to him. I wouldn’t—I…” I can’t believe I said what I did. “You… I’d never—”

“Shh.” It’s so soothing. “I know.”

Then, in one fell swoop, he lifts me up and throws me over his shoulder.

“Stark, what on earth?” I hiss, looking around the dark camp. Noemi is still curled up against Ephyse’s side, asleep. Anassa and Cratos are asleep as well.

In several long strides, Stark is moving us away from the fire and away from the campsite. “Cratos found a hot spring earlier. You heard Anassa’s orders. You stink.”

My face heats. I slap at his back, but I know my hands probably feel like an annoying gnat to him rather than anything meaningful. “Let me down, you brute!”

We’re moving deeper into the forest now, his arm clenched firmly around my upper thighs as I squirm in his tight hold. “It’s time for a bath. I’m going to scrub you, your royal filthiness.”

He’s right; I need to clean up, but something about the way he’s ordering me around has me wanting to fight against his authority.

Within a few minutes, we’re at the hot spring—a gorgeous pool of steaming water in a secluded clearing. I have to admit, it looks inviting.

Stark drops me unceremoniously at the side of it. “Strip,” he demands. His dark eyes are blazing, and heat—entirely unrelated to the springs—whispers through me, curling low in my gut.

Suddenly, this feels like it has nothing to do with my need to wash—and entirely to do with the fact that we may be facing our deaths tomorrow.

We have one night, these few precious hours, until we confront uncertainty.

And I want nothing more than for Stark to take me roughly, to make me forget all my fears and drown out all my insecurities until all I can sense or feel is this. Him.

Us.

So I step toward him, tilting my chin in defiance. “And if I don’t?” My tone is hard, but I know he can hear the flirtation underneath it.

His lips curl. “You’ll get a spanking.”

I take another step toward him, our chests almost touching. “Make me.” Then I reach out through our bonds and send consent his way. “I want you to make me. Please.”

He shivers slightly as it reaches him, then he stares at me with open need. “Just tell me to stop if you want it to stop at any point.”

Stark puts one foot up on the boulder next to him. Then he grabs my wrist and pulls me harshly toward him, bending me over his knee. In one swift move, he yanks down both my trousers and my panties.

My bare ass and cunt are exposed to the cold air, and I tremble from anticipation.

“You like to be treated like a filthy princess, don’t you?” he growls, his hand coming down to palm my ass cheeks.

“Yes, Alpha,” I whimper as his calloused hand caresses me. I do. I love the way he treats me: debauchery and worship all at once.

The air shifts as Stark pulls his hand back and then swipes it against my backside in a sharp sting.

A moan tears out of me. I can tell how careful he’s being with his touch; I know Stark at his worst, his most violent. This is a strong man playacting at being rough, and the thought makes wet heat build instantly between my thighs.

Stark caresses the spot he slapped on my cheek, then slides his fingers down, feeling how slick I am for him. As I watch, he brings his thick fingers to his mouth and licks them clean.

“Again,” I beg. He’s growing hard underneath me, against my torso, and I wriggle against him.

Stark lifts his hand and brings it down on my other ass cheek. I let out another moan, and he groans in response to it.

“Are you ready to be a good girl?” he asks tightly. He scowls down at me, but all I can feel is his desire throbbing against my stomach.

“No,” I tell him petulantly, and he swats at my ass again. I twist against his grip, and he does it again.

Then he holds me in place with one arm while using the other to yank my boots off my feet, tossing them to the ground. Socks go next, and he pulls my trousers and panties all the way off so that I’m entirely bare from my torso down. He lightly slaps my ass one more time, then shifts the arm that’s holding me down. He yanks my jacket off, firmly tugs my shirt over my head. Last to go is my breast binding, which he rips straight through.

By the time he’s finished tearing my clothes off, I’m quivering with need. I want to turn in his arms and straddle him, sink onto him and never let him go.

But I also want to see how much further I can push him.

He scoops me up and stands, then takes several large strides over to the edge of the hot springs. Then he sets me down.

“Get in,” he growls. “Now.”

Before he can so much as blink, I turn and sprint away from him. My heart pounds in my ears as my feet crunch over the frozen fallen leaves around us. Stark curses loudly, and I hear him quickly ripping off his own clothes. I smile to myself, and keep running.

This is thrilling and exactly what I need—the perfect distraction from whatever tomorrow holds. One last night to safely lose control.

Then comes the sound of his huge body moving in pursuit through the dark forest. Anticipation races from my head to my toes.

I’m fast, but he’s faster—his legs are longer, thickly muscled. It doesn’t take long for him to catch up to me. His fingers brush mine, but I keep moving. I can hear him lunge, and his warm hand wraps around my ankle.

I fall face-first toward the ground. Even then, he’s faster than me. He somehow turns me and maneuvers a hand behind my head so I don’t smash it onto the hardpacked forest floor. We go tumbling onto the ground together.

I’m pinned beneath him, his tattooed, scarred chest tight against mine, and we’re both panting hard.

His rigid cock throbs against my stomach, and the sensation makes my nipples pebble.

“You dirty, feral creature,” he snarls at me. He reaches a hand down between us and strokes between my folds, then lets out a harsh breath when he realizes how wet I am already. “You love disobeying me, don’t you?”

I try to rub against his hand, to seek reprieve from this consuming need burning me up from the inside out, but he won’t let me have it. Instead, he moves his hand to my hair, pulling it just enough.

“Say it,” he demands.

“I love disobeying you, Alpha,” I moan. “Make me listen.”

He shifts and suddenly the head of his cock presses tightly against my entrance. I moan again and send him mental consent.

Stark slides into me roughly, seating himself to the hilt. I gasp at the sudden stretch, the expansive fill of him. He always feels like almost too much, but it’s perfect, erasing every coherent thought I might have, removing any worry.

We lock eyes then, and his demanding gaze softens slightly. He leans and kisses me, his soft lips a beautiful contrast to the stubble that grazes my face. I respond with fervor, wrapping my arms around his neck, drawing him somehow closer.

He slides his cock out of me almost entirely and slams back into me fully. I whine against his mouth and he does it again. Then he shifts backward, pulling me onto his lap. My arms are still around his neck, and his come around my back, holding me closely to him. I wrap my legs around his middle.

And then he gets his feet beneath him and stands. I whip my head around, looking at the forest. “What—”

“Eyes on me,” he commands. I obey him, and his stern gaze makes my toes curl. “You wouldn’t go in that hot spring on your own, princess. So I’m making you listen, just like you asked.”

He starts to stride back in the direction we came from, carrying me like I weigh nothing.

As we move, he fucks me, thrusting in and out me with an unbelievable level of control. Each step shifts us and makes us bounce in a different way, and I try not to squirm too much in his arms because oh fuck. It’s pushing me rapidly toward a peak.

Finally, we near the hot springs again. Stark bends down to grab a packet of soap out of his clothes, keeping me pressed against him still. He doesn’t bother setting me down this time; he’s not about to let me bolt again.

Instead, he walks straight into the hot springs with me.

The steaming water burns against my cold skin. Between the bite of it and the stretch of Stark inside of me still, I’m becoming overly sensitized. Still, he doesn’t let me go. He moves us over to a rock outcropping, setting me down on the flattest part of it.

He pulls out of me slowly, and I moan at the indecent feeling of it in the wet heat of the water.

“Can I trust you not to run?” he asks, voice rumbling.

Sparking at the challenge, I shift away from him, ready to move.

Stark swipes his hands through the air, calling his shadebending power as Sovereign Alpha. The shadows come quickly to him, wrapping around my arms and ankles and binding me to the rock. I fight uselessly against it, but the shadows don’t give.

It’s strange being on the receiving end of this power. The shadows have weight to them but also feel like nothing—as if I’m being held in place by something invisible, even though I can see the darkness of them.

“Seriously, how are you so good at that?” I grumble.

A line forms between his brow, and I wonder at his reaction, wanting to press more. But he doesn’t give me the chance. He shakes it off and steps forward with the soap.

“Time you clean you up, princess.”

He reaches down to work the soap into a lather between us, then without words, he bathes me. Despite my restrained position, his touch is gentle and sends sparks dancing across my skin as he scrubs my entire body. He eases off his shadows just enough that he can help me duck my hair into the warm water, and lathers that clean, too.

Finally, the last of the suds are rinsed from my skin. Stark gives me a heavy look.

“Tomorrow,” he starts.

“I don’t want to talk about tomorrow,” I tell him, my throat tight around the words.

The truth is, I’m afraid.

Afraid we won’t succeed, and what it will mean for Nocturna. Afraid that we will succeed, but that the cost might be either of our lives.

“Fuck me like we have forever,” I beg him.

Stark lets his shadows dissipate, and I open my knees slowly, deliberately in invitation. He steps up between them, pressing close.

He kisses me, his lips hard and unyielding at first but softening the more I push myself into him. As he licks his tongue into my mouth, I wrap my arms around his broad back, pulling him closer, closer.

The soft sounds of the water around us, the breeze in the pine branches, and the calls of birds hunting in the cold night air blend together like a harmony. I shiver at the chill of the breeze on my wet skin and the relentless heat of Stark’s body against mine.

Throwing my head back, I gaze up at the sky. Stark’s lips and teeth trail down my neck, the scruff of his cheeks and chin setting my sensitive skin alight.

Our bodies press closer together, and closer still, until I barely know where I end and Stark begins. The hard heat of his cock slips and slides against me, teasing me without giving me the fullness I crave.

I moan, a small, desperate sound, and he tangles his fingers in my wet hair, tilting my face toward his. He looks me directly in the eye as he finally pushes inside me again.

It feels so right, so good, I almost forget to breathe. When he pulls out and pushes back inside, starting up a steady rhythm, he does it slowly. There’s nothing desperate or punishing in it anymore. Instead, it’s reverent.

I savor every brush of his skin against mine, every second of completion as he fills me again and again, deeper and deeper. His breath goes rough against my neck as he approaches his peak, and I savor that, too.

Just before he comes, Stark reaches his hand down to strum my clit with his fingers, and that’s all I need.

I’m falling, tumbling into my orgasm. His pace picks up, every thrust sending me to new heights, and I dig my fingers into his shoulders so that I feel his entire body clench and shudder as he also hits his peak.

There’s a sea of shadow dancing around us, I realize, my pleasure and emotion spilling out of me in dark waves that swell to caress us both. As we regain our breath, clinging together, the tendrils of power begin to dissipate and fade away.

Stark wraps his arms around me, staying inside me as the final shocks of pleasure roll through me like ripples in the steaming pool around us. His arms wrap around my back, chasing out the cold that threatens to catch us now that our movements have stilled.

We stay like that for a long moment, my face pressed into the crook of his neck, head tucked under his chin.

Finally, reluctantly, we dry ourselves as best as we can and pull our clothes back on. The two of us head back to camp quietly, lying down together in front of the fire. Sleep comes easily.

I’m not sure how much longer I rest, but when I open my eyes, the sun is rising. It casts long shadows through the trees and bathes everything in a golden glow.

I’m still curled against Stark, sheltered by his strength. He looks so beautiful in its light. His eyes are still closed. He looks younger when he’s sleeping. Like he’s who he was before all the pain came. Or like he’s who he could be, given time to heal.

With me, maybe. With me.

“Meryn,” Anassa says softly. There’s affection and understanding in her voice.

I shut my eyes, wishing I could deny the rising sun. Wishing I could summon enough shadow from my blood to turn the sky dark again and flood it with stars.

But even I have limits.

“Anassa,” I reply.

And she says the words I knew were coming.

“It is time.”

58

MERYN

The atmosphere at the campsite is heavy, expectant. Even the weather has taken a turn to echo our feelings. The air is damp and still, clinging to strands of hair, making leather straps rub uncomfortably against skin and fur. Too humid to be comfortable, but too cold to shed any layers: that uncomfortable in-between.

Anassa and I have been conferring with Stark and Cratos about the plan since sunrise. We’re confident, but I still want to do one more thing before I set things in motion.

Taking a seat near the fading coals of our campfire, I close my eyes and clear my head, looking for that place in my mind where my power of foresight lives.

My mind is blank for a long moment before images start to come. Images of me astride Anassa, heading into Killian’s camp. Me delivering Stark to him, as promised. Me facing down Killian, Goddess Tears blazing, shadows swirling… and then the images stop.

My eyes flutter open, and I grunt in frustration and shut them again. I seek out the foresight. Anassa, with me on her back. Walking into Killian’s camp, Stark trussed up behind me. Killian stepping out, both of us drawing on my power, facing off… and then back.

“What is happening?” I ask Anassa. “Why isn’t it showing me what’s next? Or any alternate paths?”

She sniffs, “Maybe there are no alternate paths—and yet still, the outcome is uncertain.”

“Great.” I sigh. “That is absolutely zero help.”

I hear my direwolf’s amusement in her response. “Would anything you could have seen change your mind about attempting this?”

“No, probably not,” I admit ruefully.

“There you go. That’s why there is only one path laid before you.” Anassa rises and yawns, stretching massive forelegs and then back legs. “We go to meet our enemy.”

Time to move.

I wave Noemi over from where she’s already awake and nearly ready, checking packs and securing everything on wolfback for travel.

“We may be riding straight into trouble, but we aren’t going to do it without a plan,” I say wryly, and I see assent in everyone’s faces: Noemi’s mouth quirks in the shadow of a grin. Stark regards me steadily—waiting for my word to act.

“What are you thinking?” Noemi says, dropping into a seat by the remains of the fire. I shift and rub my lower back, then resettle, tucking my legs under me. Stark remains standing, alert and ready.

“I was able to make a connection with Killian last night, via our magic.” I huff, sounding eerily like Anassa as I do—her eyes glimmer in amusement as she watches us.

“We need to get close enough to him to take him down. He believes that I’m still coming to him eagerly, that I want to be with him and let him have the Tears. But I had to make it convincing.”

I nod toward Stark and Cratos, wincing internally at what I’m about to say. “I’ve told him that I’ll bring him Stark, all tied up for the taking.”

Cratos and Anassa both give a low growl at this but then settle. Noemi frowns, using a long stick to spread out the remains of the campfire, moving the last of the night’s embers around until they’ve burned themselves out.

“We can use shadows to bind both Stark and Cratos and dramatically drag them in behind me.” I laugh a little. “Little does Killian know, Stark himself is the one who helps me wield the shadows with precision. He can undo his own bonds as soon as the time is right.”

Anassa has moved closer to Cratos, and the two of them nuzzle, their private conversation buzzing in my head, beyond my reach through the bond. I know it pains Anassa to support this plan, even though it’s all a ploy—to see her mate, such a wild creature, humiliated like that, trussed up like prey.

I feel the same way about doing this to Stark.

Pressing my lips together for a moment, I refocus on our plan and carry on.

The idea is simple: I’ll hide Noemi from view using my rift magic, and she’ll go in ahead of us to find Tormun.

We’ll “deliver” Stark to Tormun, as promised.

Then once I’ve made it close enough to Killian to strike, Stark and Noemi can give up the ruse and ambush Tormun, making sure that he and the Phylax Bonded with him don’t interfere.

Stark jumps in. “Tormun may be under Killian’s influence, whether via the Tear ring or even a thrall bracelet like the one that Meryn wears. But nevertheless, we’ll do whatever is necessary to neutralize the threat.”

All three of our wolves growl in vicious, slavering agreement, and the hair rises on my arms. Sometimes I forget that our wolves were just as betrayed by their comrades as we were.

I rise to stand, worrying at the hilt of one of my knives. “I hope… that is, we’re relatively confident that with Tormun removed, the rest of Phylax can be made to see reason. We’re trying to avoid a bloodbath. The Bonded forces are depleted enough as it is.”

“And Killian? Alistair?” Noemi manages to imply a world of violence with just those simple words.

I hold out a hand to her, hoisting her up off the ground, and keep my hand clasped around her arm as I promise: “I will do my very best to make sure you have a chance to address him before we end him. You deserve that much.”

After that, there isn’t much to say. My stomach clenches with nerves as I cinch up the leather straps binding my packs to Anassa, but as soon as I mount, it settles.

Whatever happens, we’re in this together. Until the end.

The ride passes in a blur. We’re too focused on our goal, on what’s coming next, to pay attention to much else.

Egith’s provided specific details about the location of Killian’s camp, as he made no attempt to hide their approach. Our wolves are as filled with anticipation at the clash ahead as we are. I ask Anassa through the bond if we should slow down, make sure we’re conserving energy.

“The pup doesn’t teach the Alpha to run,” she snips back at me. I laugh and let it lie.

I glance to my left and right; for a moment, everything but admiration for my companions leaves my head. Both of them death on wolfback in their own way.

But Stark especially…

On Cratos, he almost doesn’t look human. It’s as if the two of them are heroes of legend. Or some dark god of vengeance, aimed straight at their prey.

I muse on my own confident seat on Anassa. It’s been less than a year since she and I first met. Now, I’m more comfortable on her back than anywhere else.

My mind is centered in a way that it hasn’t been in a very long time. I know this feeling: It’s the one I used to get before a fight against an opponent I’d faced in the ring before.

Someone whose moves I knew already. Someone I knew I could beat.

“This is right,” Anassa murmurs in my mind, sensing my mood. “This has gone on too long. One way or another, it’s time for this to end… before the Bonded are destroyed. Before all of Nocturna is.”

I pull us up a good distance before we reach the fiefdom of Blumenfall, and we all make a quick meal of cold provisions before Noemi departs to scout ahead for Killian’s camp.

Stark and I are discussing the best way to truss him and Cratos up and make it look realistic without causing any injury when she returns with news.

“It wasn’t hard to find,” Noemi says, voice disgusted. “They haven’t been subtle about anything, that’s for sure. It seems that Tormun has grown quite comfortable as Killian’s lead general. His tent is enormous, in bright Phylax colors.”

“Compensating much?” I quip, and Noemi laughs. “You’re confident you can get to him unnoticed?”

She nods. “Under the cover of your magic? It shouldn’t be a problem.”

Stark and I exchange glances.

“Well, then. I think we’re ready.”

A crackling energy fills the small clearing where we’re gathered as we each soak in the moment. Stark and I mount up, and Cratos and Anassa flick their tails and paw at the ground.

Then, with brutal efficiency, Noemi turns Ephyse toward the camp and says, “Let’s end this.”

It takes almost no time at all on wolfback to reach the war camp.

We pause to ensure that Noemi’s veil of shadow is complete. I take the wolf crown out of my pack and place it on my head for additional power because I’ll need to use several types of magic at once.

I focus on the channel of power that shields Noemi and Ephyse from view, memorizing the feel of it so that I can maintain it at a distance.

When we’re certain she’s as near invisible as possible, Noemi curves off to the side of the camp’s perimeter, having identified a vulnerable point in the defenses where she plans to sneak in. With my Kryptos magic shrouding her, she and Ephyse are nothing but a slip of a shadow, a play of the light.

I smile with satisfaction. I’ve gotten much better at that.

“You ready?” I look to Stark.

His stubbled jaw is clenched tight, eyes ablaze. “Never more so.”

We let our minds meet, then. It takes only the blink of an eye, and then he’s with me and I’m with him. Our hearts beat together, our lungs breathe together.

I bite my lower lip, and I know he can feel its softness as if it’s his own teeth biting down. Just the thought makes my heart skip a beat.

We lock eyes as we call up our shadows together, Stark guiding the power into dark ropes of magic that loop around him and Cratos again and again, until they’re bound tightly.

We ease both their bodies to the forest floor, using the magic to cocoon them and lift them slightly off the ground. We’re hoping to avoid slamming them into every rock and root between here and our enemy’s camp.

Just as with Noemi, I spend time sitting with the magic, eyes closed. Lingering with the threads of it, the weave of the shadows as they settle in place. When I’m certain I have the feel of it, Stark and I separate minds once more, easing apart.

Before we get moving, I can’t resist sliding down Anassa’s side and kneeling beside Stark’s body, taking his face in my hands for one more kiss.

There’s shadow between our mouths, a showy gag made of magic that Stark and I so carefully put in place to be obvious but not restrictive. It buzzes and pulses against both our lips. I swipe my tongue along Stark’s lower lip, and he uses a tendril of his own magic to bring my head closer to his, crushing our mouths together.

I groan at the sensation of the press of our shared power and his hot mouth.

He raises an eyebrow, managing to look nonchalant even in this vulnerable position. “I think you like me all bound up like this.”

I snort. “Don’t die, and we can give it a try later.”

We make a dramatic sight, me riding cavalierly straight into the camp of my enemy on my shining silver-white wolf. Thick, wild tendrils of shadow pulse behind me, anchored to the magical restraints around Stark and Cratos. The deep black of the shadows creates a disorienting texture against the ink-black fur of Cratos’s coat.

I half expect a challenge from the human soldiers posted on watch, but they just gasp and back away when they see us coming, leaving plenty of space for me to march in with my vicious cargo.

Killian must have told them to expect me.

The paths between the tents are wide and well trod, already traversed by wolves and their riders. As we move farther into the mess of tents, we start to spot the Bonded and their direwolves; they’re camped in groups of two and three, tents spaced out enough that their wolves can sleep in the open air beside them.

Anassa’s ears go back, teeth half bared in a snarl, as she passes the wolves of Phylax pack, wolves she’s known for decades who’ve now spent more than a month supporting a Siphon pretender.

I study the Phylax Bonded and notice that many don’t meet my eyes. Shame over what they’ve done? Fear of the Mad Bitch of Sturmfrost, who can rip them apart with a mere gesture?

Or is it Killian’s influence over them that keeps them from meeting my gaze?

I turn my face ahead.

Across my body is a satchel I’ve strapped tight to me, its prominent position an obvious signal that I’ve brought the Tears with me. My crown is on my head, and the two Tear necklaces are securely around my neck, tucked beneath my tunic and coat.

Lucien’s crown and the Tears from the tower and the statue in Linsfall are wedged into the pack, and the buzz of energy from their combined power sets my teeth on edge. I’m waiting until they’re needed to pull them out, but my hand doesn’t stray far from the pack’s drawstrings.

My bag with the shards of the Dire Blade is with me, too, mostly because I wasn’t sure what else to do with it. Maybe I can get out the useless hilt and clobber Killian over the head with it, I muse darkly.

“Noemi,” I reach out mentally, mind stretching down the familiar pathway. “Are you in place?”

There’s a strange blankness in my mind where she should be, and I swallow, focus on keeping my face an impassive mask. “Stark, Noemi isn’t responding.”

His body tenses in the shadowy restraints. “What do you mean, she isn’t responding? Is she injured?”

“Let me try again.” I steady my breathing and reach out again, forcefully this time. “NOEMI.”

For another minute of painful waiting, there’s nothing, just that blankness. And then…

“Meryn, I’m here,” comes her familiar voice in my head, and I let out a small sigh of relief. “Everything is going according to plan,” she confirms, and I thank her and relay the message to Stark.

Up ahead, a Phylax man on a wolf scrambles to the side to make room for me and Anassa to pass. I make eye contact with him and pull up short, tired of drawing this out.

“Where is he?” My voice is emotionless, deadly.

The Phylax raises a shaky finger, pointing it toward the rear of the war camp, and continues to back away, staring down now at my cargo.

The infamously brutal Stark Therion, trussed up with his wolf like a piece of meat.

Anassa leans over to snap at his direwolf, and the two of them nearly jump out of their skins to get farther away from us.

We don’t have to walk far. After Anassa takes only a few more steps, a pool of shadow starts gathering on the path ahead.

Into it steps Killian, cloaked in my shadow, my power.

His dark golden hair shines bright, perfectly coiffed, as if we’re in the middle of a ball, not a war camp. His face looks healthy, rested. That unnatural beauty every Siphon possesses, mixed with the shadowy power gathering around him, gives him an otherworldly look.

But still, something about his face is off. I narrow my eyes, looking closer. Little twitches, like he’s focusing hard on something or tensing muscles in his jaw.

I wonder…

When I see him in the shadow realm, Alistair isn’t there.

In the waking world, are they locked in a constant struggle? I file that away as something I can use.

Killian smiles brightly, as if we see each other every day, and raises a hand in greeting. “Beloved, you’ve made it.”

I swallow bile as I manage a small smile back at him. “Killian.”

I’ve seen him in that dreamworld more times than I’d like, but it’s different seeing him in person. It hasn’t been all that long since our last meeting, when I tried to kill him and he disappeared by stealing my power.

And yet everything has changed.

“I see you brought our Phylax Alpha the treat he was promised.” Killian’s voice is lazy, silky smooth. He approaches us with easy confidence, walking past me to look down at Stark and Cratos behind me, bound and gagged on the ground.

I resist the urge to spit in his face.

Twisting in my seat, I keep my voice cool as I twitch my fingers, levitating Stark and Cratos another foot off the ground. “Where should I take this?”

Killian leans over and lightly brushes Stark’s cheek with a fingertip, smirking. Disgust and anger roil in my gut. If he tries to hurt Stark…

Killian stands before I launch myself at him, and I sit back, taking a deep breath.

He waves toward a huge tent, gaudy and ridiculous among the utilitarian look of the rest of the war camp. Just as Noemi said. “You can drop it off over there. But come right back, kitten. We have a lot of catching up to do.”

He pauses, pursing his lips. “And I’ll need proof that you’ve brought the rest of the Tears with you, as promised.”

“Or?” I say, expression blank as my heart hammers in my chest in anticipation of violence.

Killian tilts his head and drawls, “Or we sack the city immediately and kill every last Bonded turned traitor to my throne.”

59

MERYN

My ability to lie and pretend is stretched to its absolute maximum as I take in Killian’s threat.

I’m sure he can see a tidal wave of emotions crashing across my face. All I can do is hope that they line up with what he was expecting. He always did love to play with my emotions.

I finally school my features into an imitation of fear as I respond, maintaining my facade, hoping he’s convinced.

“Of course. As you wish.”

Anassa’s disgust is a low growl in the back of my mind as we drag Stark and Cratos over to Tormun’s tent. Dozens of eyes are on us as we pass by humans and wolves.

One of the pairs along the way is distinctly Daemos, her wolf pitch black. I study her as we pass, noting her averted gaze at the sight of her Alpha being so humiliated.

Fucking traitor.

I bite my tongue so hard I taste blood.

The minutes are like hours as I drag Stark and Cratos behind. When we finally arrive at Tormun’s tent, their bodies slam painfully into the dirt in front of the entrance flaps in a show of uncaring cruelty.

“I’m so sorry,” I say through the bond.

Stark chuckles in his head, low and throaty. “This is nothing. Won’t even leave a bruise. Want to tell Anassa to give me a bite or two while you’re at it, actually leave a mark?”

“Shut up,” I respond affectionately. “And don’t underestimate these assholes. Be safe.”

“Same to you, my queen,” he thinks back at me.

I straighten, make a show of twisting my mouth in disgust as I gaze down at their trussed-up bodies. Then Anassa and I turn back to where Killian waits.

Behind me, I hear Tormun emerge from his tent and grunt out a laugh that sends goose bumps rippling over my skin. There’s something off about it that fills me with a deep unease.

“You’ve always thought too highly of yourself, Stark Therion,” he taunts, and one of the Bonded looking on has the nerve to laugh along. I close my eyes briefly against the sound of Tormun spitting, presumably in Stark’s face, then the dull thump of a body being kicked.

Anassa slows beneath me, every inch of her itching to turn and tear Tormun apart.

“Well, that ends today,” Tormun concludes. The sounds of bodies being dragged are unmistakable. Anassa and I force ourselves to stare straight ahead, moving forward resolutely, away from Stark and Tormun.

This was the plan.

Stick to the plan.

“Now,” I think urgently to Noemi and Stark. “Tormun has Stark, and they’re headed into his tent. Once he’s inside, wait until you think the odds are as good as they’re going to get, then turn the tables on him.”

“On it. You can drop the Kryptos power now. Don’t worry, Meryn,” Noemi assures me. “We’ll take care of him.”

I marvel at Noemi’s strength, going up against her own pack’s Alpha. But there’s no time to think about it before Anassa and I find ourselves back in front of Killian. I strain, holding on to a thread of my connection to both Stark and Noemi while turning my attention back outward, ready to receive any urgent messages from them.

Killian looks every inch the monarch: his lean and muscular frame clothed elegantly but simply in rich fabrics, his hands and face clean, freshly shaved. His expression is impassive, and to anyone who didn’t know him better, he’d seem the picture of control.

But I know him too well.

I know his tells, even after all the nights I’ve spent trying to forget everything about him.

How his jaw is tight with annoyance—probably directed at me, at my advantage sitting high on Anassa. How the fingers on his right hand twitch, eager and impatient.

And that other thing, the strange spasms around his eyes. A slight tightening and then loosening of the cords of his neck.

For all his bravado, having Alistair riding along in his head is wearing on him. I wonder just how often he loses control of the ancient Siphon, how often Alistair is in charge.

Killian gestures behind him, to the flaps of his own ostentatious tent. “Join me, darling. We can have lunch while we discuss our next steps.”

I shake my head. I’m not eager to go inside, as tent walls would hinder my and Anassa’s motion. Out in the open, we have more options. “I already ate.”

Killian’s face twists. For a moment, I think I can see Alistair winning the battle for control, but then his features settle. “Well? The Tears?” he says finally, and the shadows around us twitch erratically—his doing, not mine.

Stark has removed his shadowy “restraints” already. He and Noemi must be moving against Tormun—good. I let my control over my emotions, my magic, slacken, that tight focus in my head letting go.

Time to do things my way.

My anger and anticipation surge, spurring my own shadows into movement. They build and mingle with Killian’s.

The feel of his shadows—my stolen shadows—interwoven with mine makes me queasy. The magic is both familiar and yet so wrong. I focus on his face to ignore the pulsing dance of power all around us. It expands overhead like a massive net, until we’re in a strange twilight world, sunlight filtering through between strands of pure blackness.

Fucking vile.

Our magics swarm and tangle together, forming an intangible tent around us, blocking out the onlookers.

“The Tears should be only for us,” I say as I send even more shadow into the walls around us, hoping to distract Killian, to keep him literally in the dark as Stark and Noemi execute the first part of our plan. “They’re too powerful. I don’t want to discuss them where anyone else can see or hear us.”

“Of course, kitten,” he says smoothly. “Don’t worry, once you give them to me, they’ll be safe.”

Anassa’s muscles tense more than I thought possible beneath me. Her anger is bound up in our bond like a tether connecting her heart and mine. I send a pulse of reassurance down it.

Then I slowly pull the two necklaces out from under my clothes, displaying them both in my palm while keeping the chains looped around my neck.

“There are the two of these, made into necklaces,” I start. I want to draw this out as much as possible. The objective is for Tormun’s threat to be neutralized and the Phylax pack back under my command before I attack Killian—to control for as many variables as possible. “These are both heirlooms of the royal lines—mine and the Astreonans’, too.”

“The priestess said as much,” Killian says impatiently. “I can see you’re wearing the wolf crown, of course. And the rest?”

I pull the leather pack from my hip and slowly withdraw Lucien’s crown. “The crown of the Siphon king. It must look familiar to Alistair?”

In a split second, Killian’s face does that uncanny transformation fully, as Alistair takes over. His eyes roll back, face going totally slack. Then there’s someone else there, behind his features.

He strides toward us, arm outstretched. “Give it to me,” he hisses, even his voice a slightly different tenor than Killian’s own. Anassa and I move back warily.

“Bring back Killian,” I order, voice shaking with disgust and just a tinge of fear.

This is the Siphon who orchestrated the downfall of my family and invented the shackle at my wrist that gives Killian control of my powers. This is the ancient being that even Killian fears to go up against without the full power of the Goddess Tears in his arsenal.

I don’t want him involved in this conversation. I know how to handle Killian; I don’t know how to handle him.

Killian’s face is pulled into a sneer by the parasitic Siphon inside him. “We’ll have lots of time to talk later, little Sturmfrost girl. I look forward to it.”

Another uneasy transition and then Killian is back, breathing heavily for a moment before he pulls himself together as if nothing has happened. “Ready to show me your latest prize, too?”

I reach into my pack again to withdraw the Tear from the statue, but before I get ahold of it, a blast comes through the connection to Stark in my head.

Pain. Shock. More pain.

I have to grit my teeth to keep from doubling over.

“What’s happening?” I call desperately to them both, tensing at the attention it’s taking to maintain this mental connection while maintaining the shadow barrier around me and Killian.

My magic rises in response to my need, the surge of power flowing through me like a shocking plunge into icy water. I embrace the sharp prickle of the crown on my head and the Tears at my neck and on Lucien’s crown in my hand, as they serve as conduit to more and more.

“Tormun somehow knew what we were planning,” Stark sends back with mounting anger and bloodlust, making my heart beat faster. “He had a squadron of Phylax ready to trap me with their shielding power.”

Fuck. I reach for him. Our minds pull even closer together, and I feel it as he summons a massive amount of impelling power, slamming it against the walls the Phylax traitors have built around him.

“They’re weakening already—they underestimate the power of a Sovereign Alpha. But I think I’m going to be busy here for a while,” he tells me grimly as he sends another bone-rattling blast of power out against the magical cage around him.

Distantly I can hear the noises around him—two dozen or more Phylax riders, grunting as they maintain their barrier against his strength.

Tormun’s taunts, promises of violence to come.

The harsh sound of Stark’s breathing as he gathers his power for another blow against his magical prison.

“Noemi?” I call to her. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she answers to my relief. “I got away before they ambushed Valstark. I’m trying to find a way to help him.”

I share the update with Stark and then open my eyes, realizing they fluttered closed.

The magic encasing us makes the world look eerily like the shadow realm of my dreams, and for a half second I’m disoriented. I gulp. I don’t know how long my attention has been off Killian.

My heart is beating wildly. This is all going fucking sideways.

I blink again, and Killian comes into focus.

He’s looking at me knowingly. When he sees my attention has returned, he begins to laugh.

The sound makes my blood run cold, a chill that reaches down to my bones.

“Talking to your pet Alpha?” he croons, then laughs harder. “Don’t worry; we’ll keep him alive. Tormun has plans for him.”

I growl, gathering my rage to me like a blanket, readying my shadow powers for a strike.

“The game is up,” Anassa says to me, her muscles coiled for action.

“I think you’re right,” I reply. My own muscles tighten as I pull more and more power in.

“You think Alistair and I couldn’t see through your little Kryptos tricks, Meryn? Please.” His eyes get a manic glint. “As soon as I saw my father’s little whore skulking around my camp, I knew you’d come here to betray me.”

He cocks his head. “I’m disappointed you saw it fit to feed me lie after lie. But don’t worry, kitten. I know just what to do with a smart mouth like yours,” he says, his voice laced with a perverted affection.

My stomach roils. Foul fucking asshole.

“Now hand over those Tears before I tell my people to execute that pathetic excuse for a Sovereign Alpha.”

My fury pools in my body, deep and potent like a lake of black flame. I’m ready to burn this fucker to the ground.

“Don’t you dare touch him, you piece of shit!”

The words are barely out of my mouth when my power rears up like a massive stallion, coiling and then crashing down on Killian’s head.

His shadows have also returned to his hands, though, and he easily swats my blow away, creating a shield for himself with my stolen power.

Shadows collide and rebound, shooting outward until the wall we’ve formed around us disperses. Killian’s people yell and run as the shadows flatten tents and knock over structures.

Enraged, I draw more and more power. I tighten my fist over the Astreonan crown, and the two crowns, both such powerful amplifiers, double and rebound the magic.

I’ve never used my shadebending with both crowns at my disposal. I’m drunk on the power, its heady rush filling me so completely my vision goes black.

With a savage thrust of my hand, I throw the power toward Killian like a deadly thunderbolt.

But he stretches out his arms, welcoming the shadow spear like a lover. The massive black spear pulls itself apart as it reaches him, flowing around his arms, down his torso. The excess power pours into the ground at his feet.

“Shit. No matter how much I pull, it’s just making his own power greater.” Anassa’s ears are back, her paws firmly planted. She holds me steady while the wild ropes of shadow buffet us both, the clashing magic creating a strange wind.

“So do something different!” she orders, and I do.

The Tears for creation and destruction. They frighten me, their power so large and unknowable. But if ever there was a time to use them both, it’s now.

Killian is tossing daggers of shadow at us, and Anassa deftly avoids two of them before I manage to get a Phylax shield across us. The shield affords me a precious minute to figure out my next move.

I thrust my free hand into my pack and grasp the two final Tears tightly. The sharp points of each dig into my palm, and I let the pain ground me.

Creation first? The gemstone heats in my hand as I imagine what might work, trying to funnel the power toward Killian.

Those shimmering-white threads of magic erupt from me again, reaching where Killian stands and burrowing down into the ground like flowing roots.

Around him, a massive thornbush shoots up. It reaches toward the sky and multiplies until it eclipses Killian and he’s completely trapped inside it.

He laughs, the sound wild. It sets my teeth on edge.

In a whirl of darkness, he vanishes from inside the thorns and reappears outside of them.

“That power will be an interesting addition to my collection.” He smiles wide, fangs extending. They glimmer in the strange light, daylight slashed into ribbons by the shadow power that still swirls around us.

“Destruction, then!” Anassa shouts in my mind. My magic rises to answer her.

With a wordless yell, I unleash the full force at my enemy, and the yawning emptiness the Tear creates seems to explode into being. A hellish black abyss opens beneath Killian and he’s sucked down into it, disappearing from view.

I use the small pause in fighting to check in on Stark, and flashes of his vision come through as I slam my consciousness toward his:

The Phylax wall is in tatters. Stark and Cratos fight with blade and magic both. Slashes of shadebending power cut through two Phylax wolves as Cratos rips a rider to shreds. Stark parries attacks from three other riders, spinning to sink a dagger deep in the guts of one before bearing down with his sword on another. There’s no sign of Noemi, though.

“MERYN!”

Anassa calls me back to myself, and dread courses through me.

From the widening black gash in the ground, Killian is rising slowly. A cloud of shadow power buoys him aloft, and in his hands are two swords of shadow, shadebending made physical.

I need to buy myself time to figure out what can possibly reach him.

I open my mouth, not even sure what I’m going to say until the words come out.

“What does Alistair think of your relying on my Sturmfrost magic, Killian? How you hit back with magic you stole from me instead of using power of your own?”

His face twists with rage, and for a moment, I think I’ve miscalculated as the shadow holding him in the air rushes forward, pulling Killian toward me at frightening speed.

“You know—” he cries, but then his face twists and strains, and he falls to his knees on the dark platform beneath him.

Magic swirls around crazily as I watch him fight that battle in his head, holding back the ancient Siphon inside him. His fists clench as he struggles for control.

I grip the creation and destruction Tears tight, ready to lash out again while he’s distracted, but a familiar voice stops me short.

“Meryn, help!”

Anassa and I swing around toward the direction of the sound, and Noemi and Ephyse are there, the dusty wreckage of a tent around them. Ephyse is on the ground, leg twisted at a strange angle, and Noemi is bent over him, groaning.

In a heartbeat, I’m off Anassa and racing over.

“What happened? What can I do?”

I flash back on Venna’s wolf, Skaia, in the woods, and desperation spikes inside me.

Not again.

“Anassa, can you help them?”

Anassa lopes around to Ephyse’s other side, looking for the wound, and I put a hand to Noemi’s shoulder. “Noemi, stay with me,” I plead.

She turns her tearstained face toward me, and something strange flashes in her eyes. “Meryn,” she says, and her voice comes out strangled.

She reaches up toward me, and I lean closer.

I don’t realize what’s happened at first, just that my magic is dampened, less.

I look down at Noemi, and she’s holding something in her hands, something shining with a familiar glow.

Golden chains, two of them. Each with an opal gem pendant.

The Tear necklaces.

“Noemi, what—” I start in confusion.

And then my world goes fuzzy.

Distantly, I feel Anassa collapse, the dizziness hitting her, too.

I try to draw a deep breath, but my body and my mind seem oddly disconnected.

I think I black out for a moment.

Opening my eyes, the world swirls around me before coming into focus.

I gaze around blankly. Where am I?

Tents—I’m in a camp of some sort. Noemi is with me, and Killian.

Killian, my betrothed.

I look at him blearily as he walks toward me.

“Good job, Noemi,” he says to the girl next to me, leaning down to pat her head like she’s a favorite dog. She looks at him in fear and then slowly raises her arm toward him, lifting the two necklaces she holds.

Her fingers are white, clenched tight around their chains. Killian strokes her hand and looks into her eyes. Slowly, slowly, she opens her fist so that Killian can take the two glowing jewels from her.

“Killian. Where are we? What’s happening?” My voice sounds strange to me.

“My beloved. You’re okay now. I’m here.” Killian turns to me and smiles gently. “Just hand me that crown you’re holding, will you?”

Crown? I look down, and there’s a strange crown in my grip. The Astreonan crown, I remember suddenly. But why does Killian want it?

“Meryn, don’t!”

Anassa’s voice rings in my head, and I spin around to my direwolf, confused. “Anassa?”

She’s prone on the ground, her eyes closed tight, ears back. She shakes her head, once, twice, as if trying to dislodge an attacker.

“Fight this, Meryn! You can fight this!” Her mental voice is twisted, agonized.

From behind me, Killian steps toward my wolf. He lifts his arm. His fingers are wrapped around the hilt of a sword made of glistening shadow that pulses when I look at it.

“Your wolf has been compromised, Meryn.” He gives me a look of pure sorrow and then, without warning, plunges the blade into Anassa’s side.

Pain.

It explodes in me, like a starburst of radiating fire.

My wolf howls in distress, and I fall across her side, pressing my hand to the blood that escapes her body.

My heart is bursting.

“Killian, what are you doing?” My voice is full of agony, the same agony that burns through my direwolf’s body. Why is he harming Anassa? What does he mean, she’s been compromised?

“Give me the Tears, Meryn,” he commands me. His eyes are so blue. He stretches out his free hand. “Give me the Tears, and I can fix her.”

Life drains from me as Anassa’s blood gushes relentlessly to the ground.

She can’t die. I don’t know what’s happening, but I know that. She can’t die.

“Okay,” I nod, lightheaded. “Here you go. Help her.”

I pass him the two gems clenched tightly in my hand. My palm is speckled in blood from where their points dug into me.

“Good girl,” he says approvingly. “Now the crowns.”

My body is heavy, numb. Why is he doing this? What is happening here? I feel the moment that Anassa passes out from blood loss. It’s like a punch to the gut. I don’t understand.

Why won’t Killian stop this?

But something in me compels me to reach my hand out to Killian, hand him the sunburst crown of Astreona.

Killian reverently places the sunburst crown on his own head, and I watch in confusion as his face—ripples. Like something inside him is fighting to the surface.

I cast about in my mind. Something feels wrong. Something is wrong, I know it.

But what?

And there in my mind, beyond the dizzy blankness that envelops me, I sense something.

It’s darkness, shadow. But also light and warmth.

There’s someone else there. A bridge from me to another. That person is just beyond my reach, but I can sense they are calling to me.

Killian’s talking to me again. “Meryn, now your crown. There’s a good girl. Just hand me the crown, and we’ll get Anassa fixed up.”

Unable to resist, I reach up toward my head, pulling down the crown and offering it to him.

My consciousness is fixed on that spot of warm darkness at the back of my head. There’s a person on the other side. I don’t know who. If I move closer to that bridge, that link…

The blankness presses in tight on me, holding me back.

No.

I don’t know what’s going on, but I know I need that connection. That person. I push with everything I have, fighting toward that connection.

Something snaps.

And just for a split second, his mind rushes into mine.

Stark’s mind.

As Killian takes the final Tear from me, everything clears, just for a moment. Stark. The Tears. Killian and Alistair. I remember it all.

Stark’s voice is velvet and violence, a caress that sets me on fire. “You are the power of shadow and life combined. Your strength can scorch the earth. Do not forget yourself. You are Meryn fucking Sturmfrost, and you will not let a weak man win.”

Everything inside me comes together. The hurt, the rage, the pain. The fear, the suffering.

My pleasure and love with Stark, and the warped, vile coercion of Killian’s “love.”

My friends, my pack, my kingdom.

My wolf, her lifeblood slipping out of her even now.

My whole life, condensed down to a shining point, its power as deep and as potent as a thousand Goddess Tears.

It pulls together, binding tight, so tight. And then I unleash it.

With one smooth stroke, I unsheathe the long dagger at my hip. Then I slice the blade right through Killian’s wrist, sending the hand wearing the Goddess Tear ring skittering off to the side.

He shouts in pain, staring down at his mutilated arm in disbelief.

As the magic of the Tear fades, the cobwebs clear from my mind.

Noemi gasps at my side as her brain clears as well. Her eyes instantly harden, and she pulls her own dagger.

“Get him,” I tell her, my voice laced with violence.

She doesn’t need to be told twice. “This is for what Cyril and Alistair did to me.” She drives her dagger straight into his crotch. Killian collapses to the ground, his bloodcurdling screams echoing in the shocked, silent camp.

Noemi moves away, and I step toward him. “Tell Alistair that Lucien sends his regards,” I tell him cooly.

Killian opens his eyes, his face pulled into a pleading mask. “Kitten,” he gasps. “You and I both know that you’re not capable of killing me. You never were.”

“I am really fucking sick of you telling me who I am, Killian,” I choke out. “But I know just what to do with that smart mouth of yours.”

And with one smooth stroke, I shove my long dagger directly into his mouth, watching his eyes widen, and he gags on the cold metal and the river of blood that follows.

Then I yank the dagger back. All the fury and outrage of my entire life is contained in the sweep of my arm as I slice the weapon through Killian’s neck.

Beheading him.

60

MERYN

Killian’s headless body tips to the side, then collapses to the ground. A strange, blueish smoke pours from his bleeding neck, and for a moment, I see that glint of blue eyes again, Alistair’s eerie gaze.

Then it’s gone.

I inhale deep and latch on to my shadows with all my might, reining in their chaos, and quickly disperse the magic all around us before just letting go, falling to my knees in the blood-soaked dirt.

I let myself sink to the ground, empty, exhausted.

It’s so bright and sunny out, suddenly. The sky above me is clear and blue, as if everything that just transpired was only a dream.

I stare at it, dazed, and for a long moment, my mind is blessedly empty of pain and the clamor of voices and the buzz and pull of magic. The color is so pure, the blue so vibrant. It’s as though it is washing me clean.

Then the pain crashes back into me. Anassa.

I pull myself to her side, frantically checking her over.

She’s weakened, but alive. Her chest rises and falls with breath. Weeping, I throw myself across her side. “You’re not rid of me yet,” I whisper.

I pull off my jacket and press it to her wound, stanching it, though it’s thankfully already slowed to a trickle.

The howls of direwolves all over the camp bring me back to the moment. Stark and Cratos exert their control back over them, taking advantage of the chaos caused by Killian’s death and the coercion Tear’s power ending.

The wrist that holds my engagement bracelet tingles, and I lift my arm and watch wonderingly as the metal loosens, the ruby lightening from its shadow-soaked red to the unvarnished shine of a normal, lifeless gem.

As if it’s been there all along, a seam in the metal appears, just the faintest black line in the metalwork, with a simple clasp holding it shut. Feeling like I could weep, I tentatively touch the clasp, then use my nail to flick it open, watching as the bracelet opens. It dangles balanced on my wrist for a final breath.

And falls into the dirt next to me.

Such a small movement. Such a tiny piece of metal. My whole body is lighter.

The space beside me warms, and I shiver. He doesn’t need to speak. My body recognizes him.

I turn, and Stark has crouched down beside me. I throw myself into his arms, and he pulls me close. He crushes me so tightly that I end up in his lap, my face hidden in his neck and his pulse leaping against my lips.

Cratos has gone directly to Anassa’s side, bending down to wash her face with his tongue. “Stark, can Cratos tell—”

“She’s going to be okay,” Stark confirms. “The wound is serious, though. She needs rest and time to recover.”

I breathe out, another weight dropping from my shoulders.

His arms around me are an anchor. This is real. I’m actually finally free of Killian for good.

Neither of us needs words. Whenever comes next… I’m free.

Tears trickle down my face. They drip from my chin onto Stark’s shoulder, and I squeeze my eyes tighter shut, blocking out everything but the press of him against me, his chest so warm and solid, his embrace—his love—stronger than anything I’ve ever known.

“Meryn,” Noemi says in an uneven voice.

I pull away from Stark and look up at her. She’s smiling, but there’s a lingering pain in her eyes. When I hold my hand out to her, relief chases it away. I pull her to me and hold her, too, in the hopes that it’ll lend her some of the strength Stark just gave me.

“I’m so sorry,” she says with a sniff. She holds up between us the ring she pulled from Killian’s finger.

I accept it and hold it up in this brand-new sun. The opal glows so innocently. It shouldn’t be so beautiful. “You don’t need to apologize, Noemi. He controlled me, too, didn’t he? Nothing you did was your fault.”

Noemi gulps, tears filling her eyes, but eventually nods. “What are you going to do with the ring? With all of it?” she asks.

I close it in my fist tightly before shoving it into the bag that held the other Tears. Wearily, I step over to Killian’s body, retrieving the Tears he took from me from where they fell around him.

Shaking my head, I tell her, “No one should have the power of commanding worship. To be able to manipulate so many? Bend minds to your will? There’s nobody in the world who should have that power.”

“But the rest?” She lifts a hand to gesture at the rest of the gemstones.

Exhaustion overtakes me as I contemplate what needs to be done. “I have to get Lucien’s two Tears back to him in Astreona. And the others… there’s a part of me that wants to take the three we’ve discovered and destroy them or bury them somewhere they’ll never be found.”

Noemi is nodding along, but Stark’s expression is tight. Shadowed, even.

“You don’t agree?” I ask him.

“I agree with whatever you decide. You’re in charge.”

That answer sits sour in my stomach, but I don’t have time to draw him out from behind his walls. Killian’s war camp is coming back to life. Those caught in his magic’s tide are blinking back to themselves, staggering into the light, asking for answers.

As Stark helps me to my feet, I ask them the question even though I already know the answer. “Tormun?”

“He was under Killian’s control,” Stark replies. “But regardless, he wasn’t going to be subdued. Cratos and I did what needed to be done.”

So he’s dead, then. The Phylax pack is without an Alpha.

A rumbling noise upends Killian’s camp further. I would recognize this sound anywhere. Dozens of wolves riding together, paws pounding and riders’ minds raging with hope.

Bonded are riding down the hillsides from the direction of Blumenfall. Egith is at the head of their march, her shoulders back and her head high. I let out a small crow of victory and stumble forward.

They stand before us moments later, and I reach a hand up to her wolf, Sofos. “Anassa has been injured,” I say, though the words are unnecessary—Sofos will have already sensed it.

Egith swings down off her wolf’s back, and Sofos races to Anassa’s side.

“I’m so glad you’re safe. That you’re all safe,” I say to Egith, voice cracking with weariness.

“Thank you for getting here in time,” she tells me. “For stopping him.” She takes a deep breath. “Blumenfall has been steadfast and loyal to you and to all the Bonded, but there was no way we would’ve been able to hold off his attack. Come back into the city with us. We’ll bring Anassa immediately to be tended, and we can get you set up at Lord Blumenfall’s manor.”

I lift the corner of my mouth. “Thank you, Alpha.”

Egith bows her head. Several of the riders with her work with their wolves to bind Anassa’s wound tightly. Anassa’s own healing magic is already at work, and her labored breathing begins to ease a little.

Looking around, I realize I need to say something to the people here, the ones from Killian’s camp. As much as I want to run away to Blumenfall, tend to my direwolf, and fall into a light coma, I have to make sure these people know that I’m not the same.

I’m not like him.

So I step forward, out of the fray of wolves and riders newly arrived. I speak loudly, and I speak plainly.

“I know many of you were under an influence that you could not resist, and I understand. You will not be punished, for you had no free will. But we will have a lot of rebuilding to do together, and it will take a while for all of us to earn one another’s trust again. I know that.”

The Phylax riders closest to me are shifting uncomfortably, glancing among one another. But they’re listening.

“From here on out, we will be stronger than ever before. If you do not believe you could ever trust me, and you do not want to be a part of the pack we are building here, leave now. I will not come after you,” I tell them.

When I turn back to Egith, I see that the loyal wolves and riders have fashioned a rough stretcher out of tent fabric and poles and loaded Anassa onto it. Cratos and Ephyse and two wolves I don’t know by name carry the ends of the poles in their teeth. The sight of them bolsters my courage.

I give Egith a tight smile. “Lead the way.”

A couple of hours later, I’m standing by the hearth of the huge suite of rooms Blumenfall’s welcoming nobles gave Stark and me. Their gratitude looks like a sparkling chandelier, a wardrobe full of fresh finery, and an enormous bed that’s giving me ideas.

They even provided a massive pallet of blankets and furs to make Anassa more comfortable while she recovers.

I look at my direwolf fondly, watching her sleep. The castle’s medic confirmed that her wound was clean and healing well. Her back legs kick a little in dream. Cratos is stretched around her, keeping her warm and safe.

I stoke the fire and watch the sparks explode from the wood. Something about the simplicity of bringing this fire to life is helping me calm down after everything.

A knock jars me from my trance, and I stand to go answer. When I open it, I freeze. “Oh.”

Ruby is standing in front of me. “Am I disturbing—?”

She doesn’t even get the question out before I step aside to let her in.

“I’m glad you survived,” I tell her as she enters. “I think both Lucien and my father would have my head if you didn’t, and I’m pretty fond of having a head.”

Ruby smiles wryly. She clearly doesn’t feel entirely in her element, being here in my chambers. “Fredrich was well when you left him?”

I move toward my little fire and cross my arms. She watches me closely. “He was. He misses you very much, but he’s taking care of my sister now. Have you been in communication with him?” I believe they’re able to reach each other mentally through their sire bond, and my shoulders tense as I wait to hear news of my sister.

She joins me before the flames, and they light her eyes beautifully.

“I have. He says Saela is adjusting well to her time in Brightbane. They’ve been touring around the city—he’s trying to feed her curiosity as much as possible. He’d like… well, he’d like to enroll her into a school, with your blessing. At least for now, until you make a permanent decision about her living situation.”

Tears prick my eyes. A school. I thought that future was gone for Saela. In Nocturna, it would be; even with the war over, I don’t see a classroom full of Nocturnans welcoming a Siphon into their midst.

But in Astreona…

“That sounds fine,” I say through the tightness in my throat. I don’t want to think about her permanent living situation, not yet—it’s too painful to contemplate. “When you go back to Astreona, what will happen?”

Ruby stares into the flames’ light, and tension increasingly tightens her brow. When she speaks, she sounds certain of every word.

“I would not want to get in the way of their relationship. If I need to give them space, I will. However, if she would like to get to know me, I would also like that very much.”

Her words make something seize in my chest, and I look away before she can see the glimmer of my eyes clearly reflected in the firelight.

“You and my father…” There’s a lump in my throat. It’s still hard to think of him with another woman. “It’s been tough to accept that he’s alive after all this time. But I’m glad he’s here. I’m glad he and Saela can have a relationship. Thank you for saving him.”

She steps closer to me, opening her arms, and I lift my hand. “I may be grateful, but you and I are not in a hugging place yet.”

Ruby laughs and inclines her head. “Yet?” Awkward silence lingers between us before she takes pity on me. “We’ll speak more later, all right?”

I nod my assent, and then she’s shutting the door behind her and leaving me in gently crackling silence. With a sigh, I head toward the adjoining bathing chamber. What I find waiting for me there assuages my headache and soothes the stress from my muscles.

Stark leans against the edge of the massive tub with a tiny upward curl to his mouth. He lifts up a fluffy sponge, and his eyes move over me. “A bath, my queen?”

I smile and approach him. “Did you draw this yourself, Alpha?”

He straightens up. “Figured it would be well deserved. You’re not going to make me chase you down to clean you this time, are you?”

I guide his hands to my hips, and he leans over me. Immediately, he’s smoothing his touch around to my back, slipping a hand under my shirt and following my spine with his fingers. I sigh and lean into his chest. “I’ve used up my fighting energy for the day. I’m all yours, Stark.”

His amused breath tickles my neck before he kisses me there. The sponge caresses my lower back, dry but soft and full of promise. Stark’s stubble scratches my palm as I guide his mouth to mine. His fingers start to unfasten my clothes even as he kisses me in a slow slide.

I’m exhausted, but I’m lighter than I’ve been since I took the throne, or maybe even since my sister was taken. Yes, the future yawns wide as a sea. But I’m no longer anchored by a darkness on my wrist.

I can move. I can breathe.

Tonight, I can drift away into the feeling of Stark’s hips meeting mine, his hand cupping my breast, his teeth trapping my lip.

Tonight, I can soak up the light and chart a new course.

Tonight, I have him, and when he lifts me up effortlessly and steps into the bath with me, none of the rest matters.

61

STARK

It’s with a rude, wrenching twist that I’m pulled out of sated, peaceful sleep and into a world of shadows.

Into what Meryn knows as the shadow realm.

I haven’t told her about my new access to this realm—and everything that comes with it. It’s been tearing me apart.

But there’s been no time for me to figure out what, exactly, needs to stay secret because of our family’s oaths, and what was just Siegrid being a tight-lipped, withholding narcissist. I do know she kept secrets from her wolf, Genicos.

She encouraged me to take similar care with Cratos, even before she knew of Cratos’s mate bond.

I will share what I can with Meryn, when the moment is right. And in the meanwhile, I comfort myself in knowing that my allegiance to my family’s oaths ultimately serves her.

The realm is more violent than usual. I’ve been here only a handful of times since inheriting my powers and responsibilities. It’s been a rough awakening—realizing the true extent of the bargain my family made for power all those years ago.

The dark god has never shown himself to Meryn directly, only whispering in her ear. He hasn’t even done that since Killian started tapping her powers. The bracelet allowed Killian access into this realm, so the god has kept himself hidden.

Perhaps that will change now that Killian is gone.

Perhaps Meryn, too, will soon face the nightmare god himself, the source of her cataclysmic shadow powers: her other god-ancestor, Nocturn.

As if thinking his name conjures him up, the god himself steps out of the shadows. Whether he was there all along or comes and goes, I can’t say.

His alabaster skin and black-blue hair seem to glow with blue fire. He looks more in focus tonight, somehow. Sharper-edged, almost realer than reality itself. Stronger, the buzz of his magical aura sharper than ever, setting my teeth on edge.

The change makes me uneasy.

As he draws nearer to me, I lock my muscles in place to stop myself from retreating. The feelings that twist in my gut are harsh in their unfamiliarity.

Dread. Fear.

“So even the mighty Sovereign Alpha can fear something,” comes Nocturn’s voice, the sound like snarling wolves and choking avalanches.

With effort, I keep my face placid, staring him down, even though I know it’s useless.

He can see right into my mind and take what’s hidden at will.

In the blink of an eye, Nocturn’s blue-fire shadows are at my throat, squeezing, their strength lifting me from the murky ground. My feet dangle desperately, and I gasp for breath.

Can I use my own magic here, or will it be useless since it stems from him? Would he kill me? And what would happen if I die here, in this shadow realm? Will my body remain in the real world, living on, separated from my mind?

Striking before I can think, with every ounce of strength in my body, I try to blast his shadows away.

The hurricane force of my power—power that is so strong now it could level a small fortress in the waking world—only loosens his grip for a moment, and that enrages him further.

“You dare to use my gifts against me?” slithers his voice. The sound comes from my mind as well as the world around me, compounding in my head until I feel I’m going mad.

Nocturn’s shadows engulf me, wrapping around me until my arms are locked in place by my body, then twisting until my limbs are contorted and pulled at strange angles.

Tendons scream and muscles tear.

Through my constricted throat, I give a strangled shout, but the sound is cut off by the layers of shadow around us, my voice as impotent as my magic here.

“I gave you a command, and you disobeyed me, wretch!” Nocturn is closer now, and the strange blue shadow that comes off him is almost blinding, a paradox of shadow and light. “The Tears must be put together!”

I know I have no chance of escaping his magic until he’s ready to let me go, but still my body fights the pain, the constraints—decades of training too ingrained to let me surrender.

Nocturn laughs as he watches me struggle and writhe. The sound of it is harsh and unnerving, metal screeching on metal.

“Why?” I gasp out, and Nocturn allows the shadows on my throat to ease enough for me to speak to him. “Why me, why now? Why have you not freed yourself before this, in all these millennia?”

The noose around my neck grows tight again, and tears squeeze from the corners of my eyes as I fight for breath.

Nocturn grows in front of me, doubling in size, tripling, more. He crouches down over me until I’m as small as the tiniest insect looking up at a massive giant above.

“Do you not think I’ve tried?! She had me so tightly imprisoned. It is only now, with her Tears nearly reunited, that I can come to your family like this, show myself fully, and not just issue wretched whispers in the night.”

His voice swells until my eardrums might burst. “The closer the Tears are, the closer I come to freedom. It calls to me, singing in the night. Would you deny me my freedom?!”

I know he can read my thoughts, but I’m unable to hide my immediate reaction to this:

Abso-fucking-lutely, I would stop this monster from being unleashed.

My family may be indebted to him; he may be the dark source of our power and strength. But I know with all my being there is a very good reason Nocturn has been bound away from our world, trapped all these years.

I will not be the one to unleash this madness on our world. The moment I’m away from this place, I’m going to help Meryn do what she said: separate all the tears and hide them away forever.

As soon as I think the words, I’m shoving them away, back into the furthest corner of my mind, where even I am barely aware of them.

But it isn’t fast enough. He hears my thoughts. Hears my disobedience.

And Nocturn’s rage multiplies a thousandfold.

The entire realm around us seems to shake and twist, the world tearing itself apart as if Nocturn’s moods can shred it like paper. Nocturn flickers between his massive stature and the form I’m used to and something else, something like a twisting gale of shadow, a frightening eternal void.

“If you won’t do it, I’ll do it myself!” The words come from nowhere and everywhere.

Suddenly, the binds around me fall away. The relief of being out of his painful vise lasts for only half a moment. Then the uncanny pool of dark energy pulls itself into a wave of shadow and flies straight toward me.

The shadow slams into me, through me, and I’m falling, endlessly falling through nothingness, dark power all around me and above me and below me, and—

I wake.

My eyes struggle to focus for a moment, the impossible pain of Nocturn’s torture still visited on my limbs.

I can hear Meryn slumbering beside me, sleeping peacefully for once; for tonight, the shadow world haunts me and not her.

I try to lift my hand, to reach over to caress her cheek—and find I cannot.

My body doesn’t listen to my commands.

The dark force of my magic inside me stretches and grows, and with dread, I realize it’s far more than the residual effects of the dreamworld, far more than the magic my family has been granted.

I move, watch unable to stop myself as I get out of bed, walk toward Meryn’s bags.

Nocturn himself is animating me.

I can distantly sense his presence, hear his screeching laugh as I futilely resist, trying to take back my body, my movements. To no avail.

My hands open the bag on top, the one holding the shards of the Dire Blade. Nocturn finds the hilt of the blade first, and as he pulls it out, a huge rush of energy cascades inside my body.

The pieces rise from the bag in a swirl of shadow as power courses through me and into the hilt. The shards fuse to one another, reforming and reshaping the sword. Where there are gaps—missing pieces—shadow plunges and then disappears, revealing new metal.

Shock rattles me to the core, piercing through me in a blaze of heat. The heat intensifies, until I realize it’s Nocturn’s power—burning me up, and to him, nothing at all.

The shadows fade, and in my hand is the reforged Dire Blade—shining and entirely whole.

Nocturn idly tosses the sword to the floor, reaching back toward Meryn’s bags and opening the next. Jewels glint in the firelight, and he reaches my hand in, carefully pulling each precious Tear out and placing them on the floor.

With an ease and strength I cannot comprehend, my hands easily wrench the opals from their bindings: first the Tears from the two crowns, then the necklaces, then finally the one from Killian’s ring.

Each of them sears my skin as I grasp it, but my shell of a body pays no mind, handling them as if they were nothing but rocks.

I know what’s coming as I watch myself arrange the Tears on the floor in that same star pattern we saw in Meryn’s mother’s journal: six pointing outward in a circle, and one directly in the center.

I know what I’m doing, but I’m powerless to do anything but watch.

The moment the final Tear is placed, Nocturn’s shadow drains from me, and I reach out a hand desperately to scatter the gems—

But, of course, it’s too late.

Reality seems to fracture, sliding apart for a terrifying moment, revealing layers of matter and shadow and light.

Then the world pulls back together, and all the air in our rooms turns to lightning and fire, my breath burning my throat.

There’s a massive, echoing BOOM somewhere to the west of us, and from the window I watch with dread as the sky turns colors I’ve never seen before and couldn’t name, shot through at the center with a green streak so bright it’s blinding.

Then to the east, another BOOM, earth-shattering in its impact, so loud that it feels like my ears are caving in. For a sickening moment, the earth and sky invert, before it queasily rights itself again.

I push my hands over my smarting ears, but it doesn’t block out the final enormous BOOM somewhere distant, beyond the horizon.

As my hearing and vision settle, I turn from where I’m crouched on the floor at the sound of Meryn’s voice. “Stark? What are you doing? What… what was that?”

She gets out of bed before I can stop her, gazing down curiously at the pattern the Tears form on the floor.

“I don’t understand. What’s going on?” The trust in her voice breaks my heart and steals my breath.

“Meryn—” My tongue is like ash in my mouth. “My family. There’s something I haven’t told you. I never lied. We were sworn to protect you. It was our most sacred mission. Or so I thought…”

The dawning understanding in her face is like a vision of my own doom as I push out the final, poisonous words.

“But all this time, we were just playthings of the gods. Meryn…”

The truth is like a death sentence.

“My family is not sworn to the Sturmfrosts. We are sworn—to Nocturn. The dark god has returned.”

Join NOVL Nation:

theNOVL.com/enewsletter

Booked all week.

theNOVL.com

Instagram.com/TheNovl

TikTok.com/@TheNovl

X.com/theNOVL

Facebook.com/TheNovl

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thank you, first and foremost, to all our readers—those who have come into our series recently and those who have been with us from the beginning, especially our Dire Bound ARC readers. You were immensely patient as this book moved to traditional publishing, and we hope that you loved reading this as much as we loved writing it for you.

To our heroes at Requited: Thank you for being our dream publishing partners. Ruqayyah Daud, our wonderful editor—this book would not be half of what it is without you. Thank you for cheering us through all the necessary revisions and giving us such thoughtful notes, and thanks to Dael Ki for joining the adventure. Huge thanks as well to Lisa Yoskowitz, Jackie Engel, and Megan Tingley! We’re immensely grateful for the rest of the team at Little, Brown and Hachette—our brilliant production and design teams: Jen Graham, Marisa Finkelstein, Jonathan Lopes, Sasha Illingworth, Patrick Hulse, Tuesday Hadden, and Sasha Vinogradova; our hardworking publicity and marketing teams: Cheryl Lew, Mary McCue, Stef Hoffman, Savannah Kennelly, and Emilie Polster; our genius sales team, who have done such a remarkable job getting our books in front of readers: Danielle Cantarella, Mackenzie Bronk, Molly McLaughlin, Stephanie Licciardi, Allison Stegeland, Dan Kosack, Mary Urban, Cristal Sanchez, Agustina Casal, Marissa Baker, Lauren Monaco, Chrissy Heleine, and Nicky Devaney; and to the audio team, who brings an incredible new version of this story to life: Melanie Schmidt, Lara Ziccardi, Avery Caris, and Gabriel Michael.

We’re able to spend our time writing and not obsessing over business because of the brilliant women we have on our side at WME. Caitlin Mahony, agent of our dreams, thank you for holding our hands and having our backs—we’re so lucky to work with you. Hugs and thank-yous also to Suzy Ball, Frankie Yackle, and Mary Pender.

This book was a huge labor of love and a lot trickier to write than we’d anticipated. Our incredible beta readers saw an earlier, much messier version and helped us pinpoint what wasn’t working, resulting in some massive changes. We cannot thank you all enough for giving us your time and your brains. In no particular order: Sam, Rebecca Williams, Bryn McDaniels, Cambria, Aryana Schneider, Amanda Powell, Taylor Jaye, Amanda Bundren, Michelle Wynne-Feigin, J.B. Lee, Kiyeereads, Gina Sheets, Courtney Pomietto, Jorinde Pels, Rachel Zimmerman, Jade, Ashley Kreib. And an extended thank-you to our original Dire Bound beta reader team.

We still carry so much gratitude for the influencers who have drawn attention to Dire Bound—thank you for everything you do for the book community and the ways you lift up both authors and readers. This is a small and certainly incomplete list, but a special shout-out to Janessa (@meemoreads), Lauren (@bookhuddle), Bailee (@bailees_bookshelf), Amanda (@amandathebookworm), Shaelin (@shaelinslibrary), Kaila (@kaila.books), Jaimee (@thtgrlreads), Emmy (@whatemmyreads), Laura (@_laurareads_), Laura (@elitereading), Nash (@nash..reads), Emily (@emfunnsbooks), Sue (@suegainz), Tammi (@bookishbytammi), Luke (@lukesxlibrary), Tia (@tias.bookshelf_), Rae (@rae.in_wonderland), V (@bookmarked.byv), Alexandra (@fictionfeedsalex), Nicole (@njoybookstoday), and Katherine, Lindsey and Kelly from the Banter & Bookmarks podcast (@banterandbookmarks).

Over the past two years, we’ve had the great fortune of getting to know so many authors in the romantasy space, including those in the crossover/hybrid space that is developing between the indie and trad world. To our author friends who have given us guidance and support: thank you, from the bottoms of our hearts. Indie authors are genius businesspeople, and we feel so lucky to be part of this incredible community.

From Eliza: Thank you again to my parents, Vicky and Duffy, my brother, Ian, my grandmother Carole and grandfather Maury, and thank you as well to my in-laws, Marc and Mary. I’m blessed to have such a supportive family—but let’s all continue to pretend that you never read the spicy scenes. My friends have been a huge support system this year, and I’m particularly grateful to those of you who have politely nodded along to unhinged rants and appropriately oohed and ahhed at the updates about our books. Drew, you are the glue of our family (I wish I had a sexier analogy than that, but I haven’t had enough coffee and it’s true) and the MMC of my dreams. I wouldn’t have made it through the past year without you, in so many ways. Sorry that I’m as chaotic and messy as Meryn and that you immediately clocked that self-insert when reading Fury Bound. C&S: Everything is for you, always.

From Annie: Thank you to my family, who have been my cheerleaders and emotional support for every step of this journey. To my mom: Thanks for being the best proofreader and loudest fan around! Dad, thanks for the endless chats about business details and for being as excited as I am about every new milestone. Sophie, Andy, Peter, Anterra: You all are the best and I love you. Jason, thank you for holding my hand through every step of this wild and crazy journey. Nina, Ellie, Candace, Tara, Joan, Trevor, Rashmi, Amy, Elena, Christine, Hannah Y., Danielle, Hannah R., Zenab, Beth, Tiffany, Denise, Megan, Julianne, Helen, Katharine, and everyone else in our wonderful extended “found family” friend group: You’ve all kept me sane, and I can’t thank you enough. Elle and V: Thanks for the writing dates and the companionship this past year. I’m so glad to have your friendship! And to anyone else still reading this, thank you. Readers are the best of people, and I’m so grateful that you picked up this book.

Discover Your Next Great Read

Get sneak peeks, book recommendations, and news about your favorite authors.

Tap here to learn more.

BY SABLE SORENSEN

THE WOLVES OF RUIN

- Dire Bound

- Fury Bound

A GUIDE TO THE BONDED PACKS OF NOCTURNA

STRATEGOS (stra-TEE-gos)

The tacticians and leaders of the Bonded packs, masters of strategy and battlefield command. Their communication magic is stronger than that of the other packs, enabling them to strategize and discuss tactics in battle; they are also gifted with flashes of magical foresight, brief glimpses of possible immediate futures. Strategos wolves all have silver and/or white coloring, and their riders have a silver streak in their hair.

DAEMOS (DAY-mos)

The warriors of the Bonded packs, known for their brutality and physical prowess in battle. Their magic can make them stronger, faster, and more deadly in battle, and it can even be wielded as a weapon against enemies by some (this is known as “impelling”). Daemos wolves all have dark coloring; some are a deep black in color, and their riders have a bloodred streak in their hair.

KRYPTOS (KRIP-tos)

The shadow walkers and spies of the Bonded packs, specializing in stealth and intelligence gathering. Able to wield concealment magic that bends light and shadow to aid in stealth, known as “rifting”; at certain times of day or in certain conditions, wolf and rider can become nearly invisible. Kryptos wolves have a deeper gray or speckled coat, and their riders have a deep blue streak in their hair.

PHYLAX (FY-lax)

The guardians of the Bonded packs, focused on defense and protection. Capable of defensive magic, known as “shielding,” which can vary from small temporary barriers to large protective domes when the pack works together. Wolves in Phylax have tan and brown coloring, and their riders have a tawny streak in their hair.

GLOSSARY OF TERMS

Alpha: The highest-ranking member of each pack, chosen by the direwolves.

Ascent: The first of the Bonding Trials; a dangerous climb up Mount Wolfsbane, where potential Bonded must prove themselves worthy of bonding with a direwolf.

Astreona (as-tree-OH-na): The kingdom of the Siphons.

Beta: Second-in-command of a pack; handles day-to-day operations.

Bonded: A human who has successfully bonded with a direwolf, forming a telepathic connection, and has completed their training.

Bonded City: The wealthy, secluded city behind the castle where the Bonded and their families reside.

Bonding Trials: The four-month period of Rawbond training, composed of different Trials to test a Rawbond’s connection to their direwolf and their suitability for their pack.

Council Palast: The advisory council to the ruler of Nocturna.

Dire Blade: The ancient sword wielded by Nocturnan royals that allows for control over the direwolves.

Emberwine: A spiced alcohol popular in Nocturna, often served warm.

The Faceless Goddess: Ancient deity whose true name and appearance have been lost to time.

Foresight: Glimpses of the immediate future, usually only accessible when mentally linked to a group of Strategos pack members. Queen Meryn can access foresight on her own and see further into the future, although the visions become many when the future is uncertain.

Forging: The first two months of the Bonding Trials, focused on pack unity.

Gamma: Third in rank of a pack; typically two or three chosen in each pack.

Impelling: A magical blast of force that can drive enemies back like the gale of a hurricane. This power is held only by the Daemos pack and the Sturmfrost Queen.

Mate: The fated partner of a direwolf; increasingly rare to find.

Mount Wolfsbane: Highest peak in the mountain range north of Sturmfrost, where the direwolves and Bonded form their bonds.

Nabbers: What commoners call the kidnappers who take children from the streets, presumed to be Siphons or those in league with Siphons.

Nocturna (nok-TUR-na): The kingdom where Dire Bound takes place.

Proving: The second two months of the Bonding Trials, focused on interpack coordination.

Rawbond: A newly Bonded trainee who hasn’t completed their training.

Rifting: Magically manipulating the shadows and light already around you to go unseen. This power is held only by the Kryptos pack and the Sturmfrost Queen.

Shadebending: Using shadow magic to manipulate the physical world around you. This power is held only by the Sovereign Alpha and the Sturmfrost Queen.

Shielding: Creating a magical barrier to ward off blows, or to shore up or support something or someone. This power is held only by the Phylax pack and the Sturmfrost Queen.

Siphons: Vampire-like immortal beings who feed on human life force and wield blood magic.

Sovereign Alpha: The highest-ranking of all Bonded, who can communicate with all packs’ wolves.

Sturmfrost (STURM-frost): The royal city of Nocturna, and Meryn’s home.

Sturmfrost Queens: The historical lineage of matriarchal rulers in Nocturna, collectively referred to by this term.

CHARACTER GUIDE

Alistair Brightbane (AL-iss-tare)

Siphon usurper from whom the Valtiere line is descended; inhabits the minds of first Cyril and then Killian Valtiere

Agmatta (ag-MA-ta)

The female direwolf bonded to Nevah Rivenson

Anassa (ah-NAS-sa)

The female direwolf bonded to Meryn Sturmfrost

Asteio (Ah-STAY-oh)

The female direwolf bonded to Izabel Brooks

Cratos (KRAY-tos)

The male direwolf bonded to Stark Therion

Cyril Valtiere (SEE-rull VAL-tee-air)

Former King of Nocturna; Killian’s father

Egith Hartsfeld (EE-gith)

Beta of Strategos pack

Ephyse (EFF-iss)

The male direwolf bonded to Noemi

Filikos (FIL-ee-kos)

The male direwolf bonded to Tomison Thorne

Hannelore Woodword (HAN-nuh-lore)

Alpha of Kryptos pack

Henrey Smythe (HEN-ree SMITH)

Former Rawbond in Phylax pack; only other Rawbond not to come from a Bonded family in Meryn’s year

Genicos (JEN-eh-kos)

The male direwolf bonded to Sovereign Alpha Siegrid Therion

Igor (EE-gor)

Meryn’s neighbor and pit-fighting trainer

Izabel Brooks (IZ-ah-bell)

Meryn’s closest friend among the Bonded; a fellow member of Strategos pack

Jonah (JOE-nuh)

Member of Daemos pack; enemy of Meryn’s

Killian Valtiere (KILL-ee-an VAL-tee-air)

Former Crown Prince of Nocturna, and former fiancé of Meryn Sturmfrost

Lucien Brightbane (LOO-shen BRYTE-bane)

Siphon king of Astreona

Matron Alienor (AH-lee-nor)

Castle Matron of the Sturmfrost castle, in charge of facilities, staff, and more

Meryn Sturmfrost, formerly Cooper (MARE-in)

Street fighter, daughter, sister—and reluctant recruit to the Bonded turned queen of Nocturna and Alpha of Strategos Pack

Mother Priestess

The head of the religion that worships the Faceless Goddess

Nevah Rivenson (NEH-vuh)

One of Meryn’s fellow members of Strategos pack

Noemi (No-EH-mee)

Member of Phylax pack and daughter of Lord Eisenfall; close with Stark

Ruby Navarro (ROO-bee)

General of the Siphon army

Saela Sturmfrost, formerly Cooper (SAY-la)

Meryn’s younger sister

Siegrid Therion (SEE-grid THAY-ree-un)

Sovereign Alpha of Nocturna and mother to Stark Therion

Skaia (SKY-uh)

The female direwolf bonded to Venna Brooks

Stark (Valstark) Therion (Stark THAY-ree-un)

Alpha of Daemos pack

Tomison Thorne (TOME-iss-un)

One of Meryn’s fellow members of Strategos pack

Tormun Belrose (TOR-mun)

Alpha of Phylax pack

Venna Brooks (VEN-na)

Izabel’s twin sister; a member of Kryptos pack

FURY BOUND
PLAYLIST

“Anxiety”—Doechii

“vampire”—Olivia Rodrigo

“How Villains Are Made”—Madalen Duke

“fix you”—Christina Perri

“Castle”—Halsey

“Look What You Made Me Do”—Taylor Swift

“PSYCHO KILLER”—AG, Raye Zaragoza

“Power is Power”—SZA, The Weeknd, Travis Scott

“Become the Beast”—Karliene

“Shameless”—Camila Cabello

“Bite Marks”—TEYA, League of Legends Music

“Everybody Wants To Rule the World”—Lorde

“Dangerous Woman”—Ariana Grande

“tower of memories”—ivri

“Meet Me in the Woods”—Lord Huron

“Don’t Blame Me”—Taylor Swift

“Power & Control”—MARINA

“Seven Devils”—Florence + The Machine

DISCOVER WHAT’S NEXT IN RUIN BOUND

COMING SOON

Table of Contents

- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Map
- 1 Meryn
- 2 Meryn
- 3 Meryn
- 4 Stark
- 5 Meryn
- 6 Meryn
- 7 Meryn
- 8 Stark
- 9 Meryn
- 10 Meryn
- 11 Meryn
- 12 Stark
- 13 Meryn
- 14 Stark
- 15 Meryn
- 16 Meryn
- 17 Meryn
- 18 Meryn
- 19 Stark
- 20 Meryn
- 21 Stark
- 22 Meryn
- 23 Meryn
- 24 Meryn
- 25 Meryn
- 26 Meryn
- 27 Stark
- 28 Meryn
- 29 Meryn
- 30 Meryn
- 31 Stark
- 32 Meryn
- 33 Meryn
- 34 Meryn
- 35 Stark
- 36 Meryn
- 37 Meryn
- 38 Meryn
- 39 Stark
- 40 Meryn
- 41 Meryn
- 42 Meryn
- 43 Meryn
- 44 Meryn
- 45 Meryn
- 46 Meryn
- 47 Stark
- 48 Meryn
- 49 Meryn
- 50 Meryn
- 51 Meryn
- 52 Meryn
- 53 Meryn
- 54 Meryn
- 55 Meryn
- 56 Meryn
- 57 Meryn
- 58 Meryn
- 59 Meryn
- 60 Meryn
- 61 Stark
- Acknowledgments
- Discover More
- By Sable Sorensen
- A Guide to the Bonded Packs of Nocturna
- Glossary of Terms
- Character Guide
- "Fury Bound" Playlist