Valen did not look like a ruler anymore. He did not even look like a wolf. He knelt in the snow with his shoulders curved inward, his breath ragged, his aura flickering like a torch guttering in its final moments. The silver dust drifting from the broken moon clung to him, settling into his hair and clothing like a burial shroud.
He looked small.
He looked tired.
He looked human in the worst possible way.
The wind shifted around him. No longer cold. No longer hostile. Simply waiting. The world itself felt suspended, caught between endings and beginnings, unwilling to commit to either until I moved.
Ronan came to stand at my right side, still in his skin, though every muscle trembled as if his wolf strained beneath the surface. He kept his body angled toward Valen, ready to shield me e
