Chapter Twenty Eight
Chapter Twenty Eight
The camp welcomed us with silence.
Not out of fear–but reverence.
Where once there had been suspicion in the eyes of the Stormborn warriors, there was now something else entirely. Awe. Respect. Loyalty that could not be bought or demanded–it had been earned. In blood. In fire.”
I stepped from my horse, the weight of Ayla warm against my chest. She stirred faintly, the mark on her skin still glowing with that subtle, golden shimmer. People parted before me like mist in the wind. They didn’t bow. They didn’t kneel. They simply… saw me.%
And they believed.
Marwen met me at the edge of the healer’s tent, face carved with relief. “She’s healing,” she whispered, placing a hand on Ayla’s back. “Whatever you did in that temple… it saved her.”
No. We saved her.
Keiran stood at the outskirts of the crowd, his shadow long beneath the setting sun. For the first time since the Hollow, I allowed myself to truly look at him–not as the Rogue King, not as a necessary ally–but as a man./
He was watching me too.”
Later, after Ayla was tucked into her cot and Marwen had ushered me away with a mother’s glare, I found him where the wind blew strongest–beneath the old ironwood tree overlooking the camp.
“I thought you’d vanish again,” I said quietly.
He didn’t turn, but his voice was steady. “I’ve done too much vanishing in my life. Thought maybe it was time I stayed.”
I stepped beside him. The wind carried the scent of pine and distant frost. The moon was rising–pale, watchful.
“What you did back there,” he murmured, “that fire… that power…”
“It wasn’t mine,” I said. “Not really.”}
“It is now.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. My fingers twitched at my sides, still remembering the hum of that divine energy. But that wasn’t what shook me most.
It was the way he looked at me.
Not like I was broken. Not like I was dangerous.
But like I was free.
“You once said I wore my chains too proudly,” I whispered.}
Keiran turned to me then, his eyes darker than night, but soft. “You did.”
“And now?“}
He reached for my hand. Slow. Gentle. Giving me every chance to pull away.
I didn’t.
“Now,” he said, “you’re fire wrapped in flesh. You’re the storm they tried to drown–and failed.”
My throat tightened. “I’m still afraid.”
“So am I.“0
A laugh bubbled from my lips, brittle and wet. “What a pair we make.“}
He smiled. “A rogue king and a reborn Luna. Sounds like a story the bards would ruin.”
“I’d like to see them try.”
He reached up, brushing a strand of hair from my cheek. His fingers lingered.
“I never planned to care,” he murmured.”
“Me either.”
And just like that, the space between us disappeared.”
His lips touched mine–not fierce, not desperate, but true. A question. A promise. The fire that had saved me now curled warm and steady beneath my skin, answering his touch with quiet certainty.”
When we parted, I rested my forehead against his chest, eyes fluttering closed.
“I don’t know what comes next,” I admitted.”
“You don’t have to,” he said. “Not alone.”
A sound approached behind us–paws crunching snow, steps heavy with urgency. One of the Stormborn scouts. “You should see this.”
We followed him back to the gathering circle.
They were everywhere.}
Wolves Men. Wornen. Elders. Entire packs.
Some wore the colors of rival clans. Others bore rogue markings. Old enemies. Forgotten allies. And in their eyes–the same thing I’d seen in the mirror not so long ago
Hope
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Some wore the colors of rival clans. Others bore rogue markings. Old enemies. Forgotten allies. And in their eyes–the same thing I’d seen in the mirror not so long ago.
Hope.
One stepped forward, a grizzled Alpha with a scar through his eye. “We heard what happened in the Hollow. Word travels fast when the Veil is involved.”
I glanced at Keiran. He gave me a nod.”
The Alpha continued. “We’ve lived too long in fear. Too long under the thumb of broken systems and blood–forged thrones. But this–what you’ve built here–is different.”
He dropped to one knee.
One by one, they followed. Wolves of every kind. Scarred, weary, hopeful.
“We don’t want war,” the Alpha said. “We want something new. And if the Stormborn will have us, we’d like to stand beside you. Not as soldiers. As family.”
I looked around at the faces–their pain, their hunger for peace, their quiet strength.
I looked at Ayla sleeping just behind the tent flap.
And I looked at Keiran.0
— ར བ ཎ ཙ ཇ ཡ
“We didn’t come this far just to survive,” I said. “We
I stepped forward, voice rising.
cam
If
“No more broken chains. No more thrones bought in blood.
A howl rose behind me.
Then another.
And another.}
The moon watched. The wind whispered. And beneath it all, the embers of the reckoning flame began to burn brighter–not to destroy.”
But to rebuild.}
to build. To heal. To change the way our world works.“}
you stand with us, you stand for something new. Something better.”
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