The wagon stopped just before dawn.
Rough hands dragged us out into a courtyard I recognized, the inner bailey of Blackwood Palace. The same stones I had first walked as a thief. The same walls that had once felt like a prison and later like the only place I belonged.
Now they belonged to Rowan.
He had wasted no time. The broken-chain banner already hung from the highest balcony. Guards wearing his mark stood at every door. The few of Darius’s wolves who remained knelt in chains along the far wall, bloodied and defeated.
Rowan stood on the steps like a man born to them.
“Welcome home,” he said.
Darius could barely stand. I took as much of his weight as the shared wounds allowed. Every step we were forced to take sent the same grinding pain through both of us. The bond had no mercy l
