Chapter 5 INTO THE WOLF'S DEN

The forest roared in silence.

Branches snapped. Leaves whispered warnings. Somewhere in the dark, something watched.

Aria rode hard, her heart matching the pounding of hooves beneath her. The cold air bit her cheeks, but she didn't stop. Couldn't.

Kael was out there. Alone. Surrounded.

And the bond between them burned like wildfire, warning her-

He's not safe.

---

She reached the northern ridge just as twilight began to slip into full night. The ruins of Moon Hollow rose before her-ancient stones cracked with age, half-swallowed by the earth. Trees had reclaimed much of the once-sacred village, but the air still pulsed with history... and blood.

She dismounted silently, tying her horse to a low branch, and unsheathed the dagger at her thigh.

No sounds. No movement.

But every instinct in her body screamed.

The shadows weren't just thick-they were wrong.

And then she felt it.

The bond.

Kael.

He was near-and in pain.

She bolted toward the ruins, boots silent on damp moss.

---

Kael hadn't expected an ambush.

Not here.

Not yet.

He'd caught the scent moments before they struck-metal and ash and something feral underneath.

Too late.

The first wolf lunged from the trees, snapping its jaws toward his flank. Kael whirled, slamming it into the ground with bone-shattering force. Another came from behind. Then a third.

They weren't rogues.

They were trained.

His claws tore flesh, his fangs crushed bone, but they kept coming-faster, smarter, like they'd studied him.

One clipped his hind leg. Another caught his side. Pain seared through him.

Then, above them all, a voice.

Smooth. Female. Mocking.

"Well, well. The Alpha King bleeds."

Kael staggered back, shifting mid-motion into his human form-bloodied, panting, naked but unbroken.

From the trees stepped a woman cloaked in shadow.

She wore bone armor laced with black leather, her skin moon-pale, her eyes feral gold. Scars traced her throat like a necklace.

And Kael knew her.

"Lira," he growled.

She smiled. "Still handsome. Even when you're losing."

"I killed your father."

"I know," she said sweetly. "And tonight, I kill you."

---

Aria arrived just in time to see Kael fall to one knee.

Three wolves circled him.

The woman who stood above them all radiated power.

Lira.

Aria felt her wolf push against her skin, snarling.

She didn't wait.

She ran.

Straight into the clearing.

A blade in each hand.

---

Lira's head snapped around at the sound of Aria's cry, just as the Stormveil warrior launched herself forward like a streak of silver flame.

The first wolf lunged-Aria ducked and drove her dagger under its ribs.

The second turned. Too slow. Her boot cracked its jaw sideways.

Kael looked up, eyes wide. "Aria-!"

"I told you," she snapped, panting, "you don't die without me."

Lira raised her hand-and Aria felt the magic before she saw it.

Dark energy erupted from the woman's fingers, slamming into her chest and throwing her back against the stones.

Pain exploded in her ribs. The taste of copper filled her mouth.

But she stood.

Slowly.

Bleeding.

Grinning.

"You'll have to hit harder than that, ghost."

---

The fight turned savage.

Kael shifted again, tearing into one wolf while Aria kept the others back with whirling steel and unrelenting fury.

Side by side, they fought.

No words.

Only instinct.

Only bond.

---

Lira watched from the shadows, seething.

"She's not just a Luna," she hissed. "She's his weakness."

She raised both arms now, chanting in a tongue long buried by time. The air cracked. The ground shuddered.

And the sky-wept blood.

---

Kael saw it too late.

The spell.

The red light.

The surge of power.

Lira screamed, "Let the bond be broken!"

Magic lanced through the clearing like a lightning strike, slamming directly into the space between Kael and Aria.

Kael roared.

Aria screamed.

And the bond between them-

snapped.

---

Silence.

Total.

Awful.

Empty.

Kael collapsed, gasping.

Aria dropped her blades.

The warmth that had always tethered them, even when they were apart-the heartbeat in her chest that wasn't fully hers-was gone.

Cut.

Severed.

And then came the pain.

The true pain.

Of being unbonded.

---

Lira stepped forward slowly, savoring the silence. "No more shared power. No more shared pain. No more unity."

Kael looked up at her, half-human, half-wolf. "You think this makes you strong?"

She smiled. "No. This does."

And she pulled something from her cloak.

A vial.

Silver. Glowing. Pulsing.

It hummed with ancient magic.

Kael's eyes widened in horror.

"That's not possible-"

Lira's smile turned cruel.

Aria, still trying to stand, whispered, "What is it?"

But Kael was already shifting again, desperate, eyes blazing.

"No!" he roared. "That's my mother's blood!"

---

Lira's laughter echoed through the trees as she uncorked the vial. "And now," she whispered, pouring it onto the stones beneath her feet, "I raise the last Alpha Queen."

The earth split.

A hand burst from the soil.

Clawed. Pale. Alive.

-