Page 3

THREE

SELENE

T he moon hung low and swollen in the sky, a pale twin to the fire simmering in Selene’s chest. Two moons, bleeding silver over the mountains, casting ghostlight across the ancient courtyard.

The stones beneath her feet were cold and slick with mist. Her shoes made soft, traitorous sounds as she was led toward the ritual platform—each step a tick on the clock counting down her freedom.

She hated that she looked calm. She’d spent years perfecting that mask—diplomat’s daughter, silver-tongued and smooth-faced—but beneath her skin, her pulse was a wild, galloping thing.

“Don’t falter,” Elias had told her when he’d dropped her off the day before, back when he still had the nerve to look her in the eye.

“You’re the key to peace.”

Peace. Right.

Because peace had always tasted like blood and bone and sacrifice.

Her cloak trailed behind her in a whisper of crimson velvet. She wore a ceremonial tunic beneath it, high-collared and sleeveless, made of a silvery-white weave that shimmered faintly under the moons. She hated how delicate it made her look. How foreign.

Shifters lined the edges of the courtyard like statues carved from myth—wolf-born warriors draped in fur and armor, their golden eyes flicking to her with expressions that ran the spectrum from curiosity to contempt.

And at the center of it all, as ancient and revered as anything in their world, rose the Stone of Binding.

A circular slab half-sunk into the earth, veined with cracks that glowed faintly beneath the moonlight.

The runes danced across its surface like they were breathing—alive, watching, waiting.

Selene had read about this stone in half-buried Council reports and diplomatic briefings.

She’d heard the legends whispered in the Council chambers when they thought she wasn’t listening.

How the stone had been used in the old days for mate rituals and magical pacts.

How the magic in it was real once—how it could burn destiny into your flesh, bind you to another in ways even death couldn’t undo.

But that was all ceremonial now.

Symbolic.

At least, that’s what they said.

Her father had tried to reassure her during those last days in the Capital. “The Stone won’t choose unless the prophecy sees fit,” he’d said, mouth tight. “And even then, it’s a flicker. A tradition. Nothing more.”

But Selene had read between his words.

She’d seen the way he refused to meet her gaze when she asked about Kael Fenrir, about the ancient writings, about the one who would bear the Mark beside the heir of Fenrir’s line.

And even though no one said it outright, she knew.

She knew why they’d sent her instead of another ambassador. Why they kept talking about symbolism like it was strategy. Why Kael looked at her like a storm barely holding itself back.

She wasn’t just here to stand in a room and smile.

She was here because something in her bloodline matched something in their legends .

She was the variable the prophecy had left unnamed.

And across from the stone—Kael.

He stood like a storm given shape, shadowed in the folds of his black ceremonial cloak. The moonlight painted sharp lines across the muscles of his jaw and the slope of his bare shoulders. Ash-blond hair slicked back, except for one lock that still fell across his brow.

Selene’s breath caught before she could stop it. He didn’t look like royalty. He looked like ruin.

“Lady Morwen,” a deep, gravelly voice announced from somewhere to her right—one of the shifter priests draped in silver-threaded black robes. “Step forward.”

Selene obeyed, her legs steady even though her heart was screaming.

She stepped onto the stone.

Magic hummed up through her soles, invasive and alive. It coiled around her bones like smoke, like memory, like warning.

Kael stepped forward too, his expression carved from ice. No greeting. No acknowledgment. Just silent, seething compliance.

The priest lifted a ceremonial dagger—bone-handled, ancient, notched from years of use.

“Blood for truth. Blood for fate,” he intoned. “The old ways demand offering. That the moons may bear witness. That the Mark may judge. With this blood, this sacrifice, you will join hands and join our fractions by peace instead of war.”

Selene held out her hand.

The priest moved to cut, just a shallow nick across the palm. Enough for a single drop. She gritted her teeth.

But something moved.

Not on the platform.

Inside her.

A crackle. A spark. A jolt of heat that surged from her core outward, making her vision blur.

The priest’s blade slipped.

She gasped as it bit too deep—slicing her palm wide open. Blood poured from her hand, hot and fast, splattering onto the Stone of Binding in a sharp, red burst.

Gasps echoed. The priest stumbled back. Kael flinched like he’d been struck.

And then the stone screamed.

A sound that wasn’t sound at all, just pressure, breaking the air. Light burst up through the runes, searing white and silver, wrapping around Selene’s legs and chest like chains made of flame.

“No—” she choked out, stumbling, her knees buckling beneath the magic’s weight.

Kael lunged toward her.

Too late.

The magic snapped.

Light shot across the stone, racing through the cracks, crawling across Kael’s feet, his chest, his throat. His body jerked as if something had grabbed him by the spine.

Then the pain hit.

Selene screamed.

Agony like fire and ice laced with thorns. It sank into her skin, her blood, her soul. The runes branded themselves into the flesh over her heart—a jagged crescent, a fang, a mark too ancient for human memory.

Kael was on his knees too, eyes gold, mouth open in a silent cry.

The light dimmed. The air cooled.

And stillness fell.

The court stared, stunned into silence. The priest was pale, shaking, his mouth open and forming no words.

Selene looked up through a curtain of raven hair, breath ragged, chest heaving.

Kael was staring at her—no longer icy. No longer indifferent.

He looked like he’d seen a ghost.

Or a prophecy come to life.

She clutched her hand to her chest, the blood still dripping. Her mark throbbed beneath her tunic like a second heartbeat.

“What the hell…” she whispered. “What did you do to me?”

Kael’s voice came slow and hoarse, like he’d swallowed fire.

“I didn’t do a damn thing.”

The priest finally found words, whispering them like a curse. “The Blood Mark… it has chosen.”

Selene’s head spun.

Kael turned away, rising to his feet with effort. His back was rigid, his breath still sharp.

“You will be taken to your quarters,” the priest said to her. “Until the court decides what this means.”

“I know what it means,” Selene muttered, half to herself. “It means I just became their favorite damn puppet.”

Kael didn’t look at her again. He walked away like he couldn’t bear it.

And for some reason, that hurt more than anything.