THE LUNA HE THREW AWAY

The First Trial

Three days is nothing when you’re waiting for the world to end.

We didn’t sleep. Cass and Fen argued over maps and rumours. Jax made enough bread to feed an army, then burned half of it trying to stay awake. Kael never left my side. His touch was steady, but his eyes kept drifting north, like he could see the coming war on the horizon.

I held the black stone the Exile King gave me. It beat with a slow, cold beat. When I closed my eyes, I heard voices; old, broken, angry. They talked about blood and bargains, about Sovereigns who failed and worlds that burned. I wanted to drop it, but I couldn’t. The longer I held it, the more I felt something coiling inside, waiting. The old stories called these stones heartshards. Some said they were pieces of the world’s first binding, broken off when the earliest magic was sealed. Others whispered that only lost kings and traitor Sovereigns ever carried one, and that touching it meant sharing their fate. I remembered a rumour from a faded book: a black stone had passed from hand to hand in the darkest rebellions, carried by those desperate enough to change the rules. A shard of purpose, or a warning. Power slept inside it, and part of me wondered whose blood would wake it.

At dawn, Fen spoke. “We need to move. The Council’s gone to ground, but their loyalists aren’t. They’ll send Slayers, silver-blade assassins, trained to hunt the sovereign.”

Cass tossed a dagger to Kael. “We can’t defend the Hollow. Too open. We take the fight to them.”

Kael looked at me. “What do you want to do?”

I wanted to run. I wanted to hide. But something inside me- the Sovereign, the correction, the girl who’d watched her father die for refusing to kneel said no.

“We go to the Council Hall,” I said. “We break the laws written in blood. We make them see us.”

Jax swallowed hard. “Sounds suicidal.”

“Probably,” I said. “But better than waiting to be hunted.”

Fen nodded, approval hidden under his usual scowl. “You’ll need the anchor. And you’ll need your pack.”

Kael’s jaw flexed. “We’re your pack.”

It hurt how much I wanted that to be true.

We moved at dusk. The Hollow watched us leave. The forest pressed close, every shadow alive with secrets.

Halfway to the Council Hall, we were ambushed.

It was fast. Too fast. One minute we were running, the next the world exploded in silver and teeth. Slayers- five of them, faces masked, blades burning with runes.

Cass went down first, blade in her thigh. Jax yelped, ducking behind a tree. Fen was a blur, tattoos alive, his shadow swallowing two Slayers whole. Kael shifted, wolf and man at once, tearing through another.

The last Slayer came for me.

He was fast. Too fast. The blade kissed my shoulder, and I screamed, the Sovereign magic surging, angry and wild. I grabbed his wrist, the black stone pulsing in my hand.

“Not today,” I spat.

I poured everything into him- all the fear, all the fury, all the power I’d been holding back. For a second, the world froze. The Slayer’s eyes went wide. He dropped to his knees, gasping.

Kael finished him, quick and clean.

I fell to the ground, magic crackling in my veins, the world spinning.

Fen crouched next to me. “You’re burning yourself up.”

I looked at the stone, at Kael, at the blood on the leaves.

“I can’t stop,” I whispered. “If I do, we die.”

Kael pulled me into his lap, holding me tight. “Then I’ll hold you together.”

I wanted to believe him.

We made camp in the ruins of an old temple, stone walls half-swallowed by ivy. Cass patched her leg, cursing under her breath. Jax tried to make a fire, his hands shaking.

Kael sat with me, his arm around my shoulders, his presence the only thing keeping the magic from eating me alive.

“I can’t do this alone,” I whispered.

He pressed his forehead to mine. “You’re not alone.”

I almost kissed him. Almost.

A crash in the trees. Fen was on his feet, blade ready.

A figure stumbled into the firelight.

It was Marek. He was bleeding, wild-eyed, and desperate. For a moment, I saw something raw in his eyes, fiercer than fear. Marek would have let himself be torn apart before letting the Hollow fall, because this forest was the only home he had ever fought for, the only place he had ever been more than a thief or a shadow. He chose to follow the Exile King not just out of loyalty, but because the King had saved him once, pulling him from the Council and giving him a purpose. Marek believed the King could protect the Hollow and the lost, and he wanted to prove himself worthy of that trust, to finally belong to something bigger than his own survival. Whatever loyalty burned in him now, it was all for us, and for the king he chose to follow.

“They’re here,” he gasped. “The Council’s loyalists. They found the Exile King. They’re going to use him to break the Hollow. Unless you stop them, everything burns.”

I looked at Kael, at Fen, at Cass and Jax.

“Then we stop them,” I said.