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Stillness, sudden and sharp.

Then a voice from the trees. Feminine. Familiar. Too sweet.

“Give her to us.”

Luna stiffens.

Ambrose tilts his head. “You’ll have to be more specific.”

A laugh. It scrapes against the dark like a blade. “The bond isn’t permanent. Not if we take her now.”

The fury that rises in me isn’t hot. It’scold.Clinical. The kind of rage that doesn’t scream. Itbuilds.

Lucien speaks for the first time, his voice ruined with pain, but calm as the grave. “Try it.”

Silas barks a laugh, but there’s nothing soft in it. “Ladies,” he calls, arms open. “We’re not in the mood for a reunion. If you want to die tonight, at least put on a little lipstick first.”

They move. Figures from the dark. Four. Maybe five. Not all of them armed, but all of themintentional.I don’t wait. I launch forward, blades drawn, fury leashed only by the fact that Luna is still behind me, still breathing, still watching.

The first woman reaches for me. She doesn’t make it past my knives.

The woman I cut down doesn’t scream. She just hits the ground and smiles, blood pouring from her throat like it means nothing, like pain is irrelevant here. Because it is. Because death isn’t death in this place. It’s a state of being. And these women? These Sin Binders who once held us by the throat and between their legs—they’re not alive enough to die.

Another one takes her place before the body hits the dirt.

She’s faster. Blonde. I know her name—Lira. She used to bite when she kissed, used to pull Elias into her bed when he was too angry to be funny. She wore her bond to us like armor, and now she lunges for Luna with her mouth open, eyes rabid with the kind of hunger that has nothing to do with lust.

I drive my blade through her stomach. It doesn’t stop her. She claws at me, still smiling, whisperingshe’s not yoursin a voice too sweet, too familiar. I twist the knife, slam her back into the earth hard enough to rattle the roots, and when she falls, another takes her place.

The woods are bleeding women.

Dozens of them, faces I know, bodies we’ve touched, names we’ve forgotten and remembered and tried to bury. They comebarefoot, bloody, some wearing the silks they died in. They all have the same expression—that same fucking grin like they know something we don’t. Like the Hollow told them how this ends, and it ends with Luna broken andgone.

Lucien’s got one hand pressed to the arrow shaft as he forces himself upright. Not to defend himself—but to block the next wave from reaching her. He’s not even armed. He doesn’t care. He’s all instinct and Dominance and pure, silent hatred. And it’s beautiful. Terrifying.

Silas is laughing now, wild and wide-eyed, a dagger in each hand and blood smeared across his cheek like warpaint. He’s dodging between attacks like it’s a fucking dance, shouting things like“Not even a hello? Rude!”and“You didn’t scream like that when I was inside you, Delia!”as he cuts and spins and kicks another woman back into the trees.

Ambrose moves through them like a storm. Fluid. Deadly. Efficient. He doesn’t shout. Doesn’t break a sweat. He just keeps them from getting close. One touch from him drops a binder where she stands, even if she doesn’t stay down. He’s buying Luna seconds, minutes,breath.

Elias is right beside Caspian now, both of them back-to-back. Caspian’s eyes are empty in the way they get when he’s too calm—when the numbness slips over him like armor. And Elias? Elias is yelling something about syphilis and contracts and“this isn’t a harem, it’s a fucking siege!”as he punches one of his exes square in the face.

And in the center—Luna.

On her feet now, hands clenched at her sides, magic crackling low and angry beneath her skin. She hasn’t used it yet. Shewon’t—not unless she has to. Because she doesn’t want to hurt them. Not really.

She still thinks some of them can be saved.

I don’t.

I cut another one down, a redhead I used to let ride me just to shut her up. She hisses something about fate, about how Luna’s too soft to carry our power, about how we’ll forget her once the bond fades. I slam the heel of my boot into her jaw and break it sideways.

She giggles.

They keep coming. Bodies piling. Blood soaking the grass. But none of themstaydown. This isn’t a fight—it’s a fucking test. Of endurance. Of loyalty. Of what we’re willing todoto keep her.

And they’re trying to prove we’re not willing to do enough.

Luna’s eyes meet mine.