The silence after battle was always the worst.
Lena lay in Kael's arms, too weak to move, too drained to speak. Her body felt like stone, heavy and cold, drained of every drop of energy she had ever possessed. The light that had blazed so brightly within her was now a dim flicker, barely enough to keep her heart beating. Around her, the fortress slowly came back to life. Wolves searched for survivors among the rubble, their noses scenting the air for signs of life beneath fallen stones. Vampires tended the wounded, their cool hands gentle as they cleaned cuts and bound broken limbs. Hybrids moved through the chambers, freeing their captured kin from the remnants of Lilith's dark magic, cutting threads, opening cages, whispering words of comfort to strangers who had been imprisoned for yea
