The days bled together in the Shadow Fang’s den. Time meant little in the perpetual darkness, where the sun never seemed to reach and the air was thick with damp earth, sweat, and despair. Lyra’s wrists were raw from the silver shackles that bound her to the stone wall. Her body ached, her skin marred with bruises, but worse than the physical pain was the suffocating hopelessness that gnawed at her spirit.
Still, she fought to keep her head high. She would not let them see her break.
The rogues taunted her, whispering that she was weak, that her pack had abandoned her. And though her heart longed for Lucian—his voice, his touch, the steady presence of his wolf—the bond between them felt faint, flickering like a candle struggling against the wind. She could no longer hear him through the
