The pain started on the third night.

I woke to my bones moving under my skin. Not breaking—moving, like something inside me was trying to stand up for the first time and my skeleton had to make room. I tried to sit up. My spine arched backward instead, vertebrae popping one after another like a string of firecrackers.

I bit down on a scream. It came out anyway.

Maren Sollis, the Lycan healer, was at my side in seconds. Her hands hovered over me without touching. "The wolfsbane is clearing your system," she said, her voice fast and clinical. "Your wolf is coming back. This is going to be violent."

Violent was an understatement.

My ribs cracked outward. I felt each one snap and reform, wider, stronger, making space for lungs I did not know I needed. My muscles tore—I felt them tear, felt the fibers rip apart and knit back together in new configurations. My jaw dislocated. My teeth lengthened. My hands were not hands anymore.

And then—her.

Not the dull, distant presence I had carried for three years. Not the whimpering thing that collapsed under the rejection vow. This was a voice like thunder rolling through my skull, deep and resonant and utterly unafraid.

*Selene,* she said. *My name is Selene.*

I tried to answer. My throat would not make human sounds anymore.

The shift took me all at once. My body exploded outward—fur, claws, a frame so massive I felt the stone floor crack beneath me. I was on four legs. I was enormous. I was—

I looked down at my paws. They were silver-white, blazing like someone had taken moonlight and made it solid. My fur shimmered with every breath.

*We are not broken,* Selene said quietly. *We never were.*

The door to the healer's quarters blew open. I had not touched it. The force of the shift had done that.

I stepped into the corridor. My shoulders barely fit through the frame. I had to duck my head to clear the top.

And then I saw them.

Caelan's Lycan guard—twelve wolves in full tactical gear, armed and battle-ready—dropped to one knee. All of them. Simultaneously. Their heads bowed. Their eyes down.

I froze.

I looked behind me. There was no one there. Just the empty healer's room and the cracked stone floor.

I looked back at the guards. They had not moved.

My wolf—Selene—was utterly calm. She understood something I did not.

Footsteps. Slow, deliberate. I turned.

Caelan Ashford stood at the end of the corridor. He was the only one still on his feet. His pale gray eyes met mine—silver-gold now, shifted—and he did not look away. He did not flinch. He just watched me look behind myself, watched me fail to find what I was looking for, and waited.

Then he spoke.

"They are kneeling for you."

His voice was quiet. Certain. Like he was stating a fact about the weather.

I shifted back. It hurt less this time. My body folded back into human form, my bones settling into their smaller frame. I was on my knees on the cold stone floor, naked except for the thin blanket someone draped over my shoulders before I even registered they had moved.

I looked up at Caelan. My voice came out hoarse. "Why?"

"Because your wolf is royal blood," he said simply. "Alpha-blood. My guard recognizes it. Their wolves know what you are before their minds do."

I stared at him. Royal blood. The words did not make sense.

*He is not lying,* Selene said inside me. Her voice was steady now, no longer howling. *We are what we were always meant to be.*

I pulled the blanket tighter. My hands were shaking. "I don't understand."

Caelan took three steps forward and stopped, keeping the distance deliberate. "You will," he said. "When you are ready."

Behind him, the guard remained kneeling. Waiting.

I looked at them. Twelve Lycan warriors on their knees for a rogue who had collapsed in the dirt three days ago. For a she-wolf whose own mate had rejected her in front of the entire Summit.

For me.

I pressed my palm flat against the stone floor. It was still warm where my wolf had cracked it.

***

Back at Ironveil, something was breaking.

I did not know this yet. But I would.

Landon Ward stood in the center of the training grounds, watching his warriors spar, and every movement they made was wrong. Slower. Weaker. Off-balance.

They had fought a border skirmish two nights ago—a small conflict, the kind Ironveil used to end in minutes. It had taken them an hour. They had retreated.

Retreated.

No one said the word out loud. But every warrior in the pack knew it.

Landon's Beta, Silas Vance, stood beside him with his arms crossed, watching the same sparring match. His face was carefully neutral.

"They are off their rhythm," Silas said quietly.

Landon's jaw tightened. "They are fine."

"They are not fine." Silas turned slightly, just enough to meet Landon's eyes. "They have not been fine since the Summit."

Landon's hand went to his neck. The mark was gone—severed clean by the rejection vow. But he rubbed the spot anyway, like something was supposed to be there and was not.

"Ariana will compose something new," Landon said.

Silas did not respond immediately. When he did, his voice was very even. "Has she?"

Landon's eyes narrowed. "She is working on it."

"Alpha." Silas's tone was still neutral, but something underneath it was not. "The hymns that made us unbeatable—the ones we credited to her inspiration—they stopped working the moment Leila Carpenter walked out of that hall."

Landon turned on him. His voice dropped into the Alpha tone. "Do not say her name."

Silas's wolf buckled under the command. He bowed his head. But his eyes stayed sharp.

Landon turned back to the sparring ring. His hand was still on his neck, rubbing the empty space where the mark used to be.

Inside him, his wolf stirred weakly. It had been stirring weakly for three days now. Every morning it was a little harder to shift. Every night the phantom scent was a little stronger—Leila's real scent, the one he had ignored for three years, now haunting him at random.

He told himself it would pass.

It did not pass.