Behind me, the castle doors slammed shut. The war had begun.
But Kade had made one fatal mistake.
He thought he was fighting for an heir.
He didn’t realize he was fighting a Queen who had already won.
---
The boom echoed in my bones, down to the marrow where five years of fear lived.
Outside, the sky was tearing itself apart with Darius’s roar. A sound no wolf should be able to make. A sound that said _you came for what’s mine_.
I held Elias tighter, his small body trembling against the silk of my coronation gown. Gold thread. Stitched with moonflowers. A gown I never thought I’d wear. A title Kade stole from me when he chose Arianna. A crown Darius gave back without asking for anything but _us_.
I pressed my back to the wood, as if I could hold the war out with my spine al
