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LET ME OUT.

LET ME OUT.

Tanya’s voice slithered against my ear, oblivious, still wrapped in her pathetic delusion of control.

“Stop struggling you fucking stray. You don't have the power to brake free. After we kill you and Andros, that human brat’s next. Roran said so himself.”

Everything stopped.

Everything snapped.

That word—brat.

That smirk.

Dain.

The last fragile thread of restraint unravelled.

And my wolf screamed.

LET ME OUT, YOU FUCKING COWARD!

LET ME OUT.

The rune ignited, exploding through my spine like a violent lightning strike. I arched in her grip with a ragged, inhuman scream as the magic shattered inside me. No gentle break. No fading glow. It was violent—a death scream of the seal I had begged for over and over, finally torn to pieces.

Andros’s voice tore through the bond like a howl.“Lexa?! Talk to me—what’s happening?!”

I couldn’t answer.

I could see him—bloodied, feral, cutting down traitors through the smoke-choked halls of the citadel like a god of war—but I couldn’t answer. Because there was nothing human left in me to speak.

My skin split.

My bones broke and reformed.

Fur erupted. Fangs tore through my gums. My limbs stretched, my throat howled.

I didn’t break free from Tanya. I obliterated her.

My jaws clamped around her arm as I shifted, dragging her down like prey, her scream twisting into a wet gurgle as I ripped through her shoulder. Blood sprayed the ground. She tried to run, to scream again, but I was already slashing, already tearing. Her dagger clattered from her hand as I tore into her gut, her side, her face.

She wasn’t a threat.

She wasn’t anything anymore.

She was meat.

Savage, brutal, primal—I didn’t just kill her. I unmade her. For every bruise. For every mockery. For every threat against my boy. For every sick word she spat about Andros.

The courtyard was painted in her blood before her body hit the stone.

And when I lifted my head—dripping, heaving, free—I turned toward Roran with murder in my eyes cause I was done running.

Roran stepped forward through the smoke, boots splashing carelessly in the blood pooling from Tanya’s shredded remains. His eyes flicked to her corpse with nothing more than mild annoyance, as if she'd been nothing more than a pawn, a discarded tool whose use had run out.

A cold, mocking smile twisted his lips as he fixed his gaze on me, slowly shaking his head.