She told him everything she remembered, sitting on the edge of the bed with her hand over the burn, because he would not cross the threshold. The meadow. The lake. A woman with hair like poured moonlight and a voice she knew.
“She said her name was Selene,” Ariana finished. “She told me to beware blood and chains. I think someone stopped her.”
Kael shut his eyes. When he opened them, something in them had changed, a terrible, weary acceptance, the look of a man who has heard a footstep on the stair he has dreaded for years.
“Then she has begun to speak to you. The Moon, Ariana. Not a story. She does not warn people lightly.” His hand tightened on the doorframe. “Chains. She said chains.”
“Do you know what it means?”
“I know a little,” Kael said. “And what I know, I cannot say.”
She l
