Chapter 4 Taken by the night.

The palace lights glowed softly beneath the moon, but Princess Lyra felt no warmth in them.

She stood before her mother in silence, her fingers clenched tightly into her gown as the Queen spoke with finality.

"You have avoided this long enough, Lyra," the Queen said. "The council has agreed. Lord Arven will be your husband."

Lyra's heart sank.

Lord Arven was handsome, polished, and ambitious-but there was something cold behind his smile. Something calculating. She had seen it every time he bowed, every time he praised her beauty while his eyes lingered on the throne.

"I don't love him," Lyra said quietly.

"Love grows," the Queen replied. "Duty comes first."

That night, Lyra sat alone in the sitting chamber, staring at the door as dread coiled tightly in her chest. The marble pulsed uneasily, reacting to her fear.

A knock came.

Before she could answer, the door opened.

Lord Arven stepped inside.

"You dismissed your maids early," he said smoothly, closing the door behind him. "I thought we should... get to know each other better."

Lyra stood up at once. "You shouldn't be here."

He smiled, slow and deliberate. "Soon, everything here will belong to me too. Including you."

Her pulse spiked.

As he stepped closer, the air thickened. Lyra backed away instinctively, heart racing. "Stop. I said stop!"

He reached for her.

Panic exploded inside her chest.

Lyra turned and ran.

She burst through the corridors barefoot, her breath tearing from her lungs as she screamed, "Help! Somebody help me!"

The palace guards were too far. The night swallowed her cries as she fled into the open grounds, dress snagging against stone and grass.

Behind her, footsteps followed.

"Lyra!" Lord Arven shouted. "You can't run from this!"

Tears streamed down her face as she ran blindly into the darkness. The marble burned now-hot, urgent, screaming for something she didn't understand.

Then the air shifted.

The night went unnaturally still.

A shadow stepped out of the darkness.

Golden eyes flared.

Lord Arven froze.

"What-" he began.

He never finished.

The Wolf King struck with terrifying precision, his fist connecting with Arven's jaw and sending him crumpling to the ground, unconscious before he could scream.

Lyra stumbled back, breath hitching, staring at the cloaked figure before her.

"You came," she whispered.

The Wolf King turned to her, his eyes blazing-not with anger, but with something dangerously restrained.

"You should not have been left unprotected," he said coldly.

"I didn't ask for this," Lyra cried. "I didn't ask for any of it!"

The marble flared violently between them.

Before she could react, his hand rose-and darkness swallowed her whole.

Lyra awoke to silence.

Not palace silence-but something deeper. Wilder.

She lay on soft earth beneath towering trees, the sky unfamiliar above her. Strange stars shimmered faintly, and the air hummed with magic.

She sat up slowly, panic rising. "Where... where am I?"

This was not her world.

The marble pulsed gently now, as if calming her.

She was alone.

Footsteps approached, light and cautious.

A young woman stepped into view, her eyes bright and feline, her movements graceful and alert. Her ears-ears-twitched atop her head before she bowed deeply.

"Welcome, Princess," the girl said softly. "I am Nyra. I have been assigned to you."

Lyra stared. "Assigned... to me?"

Nyra smiled faintly. "Yes. By His Majesty."

"Where is he?" Lyra demanded.

Nyra hesitated. "The Wolf King returned to the palace. He believed you would be safer here... for now."

Lyra's chest tightened. He had brought her to his world-and left her.

"He knocked me out," she said bitterly. "And abandoned me in a forest."

Nyra's expression softened. "He did not abandon you. He protected you. And he fears you more than you know."

Lyra scoffed weakly. "That makes no sense."

Nyra crouched beside her, voice lowering. "The marble inside you has changed him. Wolf marbles do not bind easily. And they do not forgive weakness."

Lyra looked down at her hands, trembling. "Then why bring me here?"

Nyra's tail flicked behind her. "Because your world is no longer safe for you. And because fate has already crossed a line that cannot be undone."

Lyra swallowed hard, staring at the alien sky above.

She had been taken from her home.

From her kingdom.

From her life.

And somehow, deep inside, she knew-

This was only the beginning.