The quiet was worse than the chaos.
Luna stood in the forest just beyond the Northern Pack’s border, wind rustling gently through pine needles overhead. Snow blanketed the ground in a soft hush, as if the world was trying to convince her that everything was fine now. That nothing had followed them out of the Veilstone Ruins.
That her brother was truly gone.
That the voice she still heard in her dreams wasn’t real.
She exhaled.
Steam ghosted through the air.
And then it happened again.
That pull.
That subtle, gnawing sensation deep in her chest—like someone had tied a thread to her sternum and was gently tugging it downward. Not toward any physical place, but… inward.
Down.
Toward something sleeping beneath the surface of herself.
---
“Luna.”
She turned.
Knox stood behind her,
