Chapter 64
The docks just outside of Velenshire were nearly empty, though Cillian imagined they always were at this hour.
In daylight, the harbor had its own quiet rhythm: boats easing in and out, fishermen hauling lines, merchants exchanging goods in low, practical tones.
But at night, it became something else entirely.
The world seemed to retreat from it, leaving behind only the sea, the wind, and the long wooden pier groaning softly beneath the weight of the tide.
Cillian stood at the edge of it all, where the land ended and open water began. The horizon stretched wide and unbroken before him, the sea black beneath the moon, its surface catching fractured slivers of silver with every restless wave.
The wind was colder here. It carried salt through his hair and brushed against his skin with a persistence that made him think of changing seasons. Autumn had begun its slow descent over the southern lands, bringing with it a chill that settled deeper with each night.
Cillian did not move. He only waited.
Alaric had told him to come here. Insisted on it, really.
Not to the manor. Not to the fields. Not to the grove.
Here, at the edge of everything. And since every other piece of their plan had been set into motion, Cillian supposed he ought to listen.
He had learned enough by now to understand that Alaric saw the world differently.
Felt it differently. The knowledge still sat strangely with him, the realization that his friend had been something more all along.
A seer, chosen not by study or bloodline as witches were, but by the land itself.
It made sense now. The way Alaric always seemed to know where to go, even when no path revealed itself.
The way he found shelter where there should have been none.
Cillian had spent most of his life believing such things belonged to stories, but he knew better now.
Now he stood at the edge of the sea because Alaric had told him to, because Alaric had begged him to, and that was reason enough.
He was not alone. Alia stood beside him, quiet as ever, her presence grounding in a way he had come to rely on without noticing. She did not fidget. Did not speak to fill the silence. Did not offer empty reassurance.
She simply stood with him.
And somehow, that was exactly what he needed.
Cillian glanced at her only briefly, long enough to see how the moonlight softened her features and caught in the loose strands of hair stirred by the wind.
She appeared untouched by the tension pressing upon them all, though he knew better than to mistake composure for indifference.
Alia felt more than she allowed the world to see.
At least, he had begun to suspect as much.
“I come here when sleep will not,” she said softly, as though she had felt his attention settle on her.
Cillian looked back to the sea. “To the docks?”
She nodded. “The water helps. It quiets things.”
He understood that. There was something in the steady rise and fall of the tide, in its endless motion, that eased the disorder in his chest, if only a little.
What he did not understand was how a young woman could brave the night alone, walking all the way through Velenshire to its distant docks merely to borrow peace from the sea.
After a moment, he asked, “Do you miss your family?”
“Very much, Lord Cillian.”
“Cillian, if you please.”
She smiled faintly.
He turned his body toward her. “You read, do you not?”
Alia looked surprised by the question, and he found himself no less surprised to be the one filling the silence.
“I do,” she replied. “When I have a moment, I sometimes slip away to the Stonebridge library.”
“And what claims your interest?”
“Stories, when I wish to escape. But more often history. The land. The covens. The old magic.”
Cillian released a quiet breath. “Of course.”
He could not have said why that answer suited her so well. Only that it did. It felt, strangely, as though he had known her longer than he had any right to, as though their paths had crossed long before either of them understood it.
“I am glad you are here,” he said at last.
She did not answer immediately, but he saw her shoulders ease. “As am I.”
Silence settled between them again, not empty this time, but companionable. They stood side by side while the wind moved around them and the sea stretched endlessly before them. Somewhere far behind, beyond the hills and trees, the world was unraveling.
Time stretched, and the moon climbed higher.
The water darkened beneath it, until Cillian’s gaze sharpened on the horizon.
At first, there was only a shadow. A slight distortion against the endless black.
Then it became shape. Movement. The faint outline of something cutting across the water, growing clearer with every breath.
Sails. Rising one after another above the horizon as if the night itself had begun to give them up. Cillian’s breath slowed.
“They’re here,” Alia said.
***
Night fell without mercy over Velenshire, and Evelyne waited in the Shaw fields, her anger burning hotter than anything she had ever known. It anchored her. Kept her from collapsing beneath the weight of everything the night had taken.
Kaldrek had left in the middle of the attack, left when she needed him, when his pack needed him, and though she understood why, though she knew he had gone seeking power to protect them, it did nothing to quiet the fury clawing through her chest. Because now he was something else.
Someone else. Their bond was still there, but hollow in a way that made her stomach twist. It felt like the emptiness in Holden’s face when he returned from the grove, after every Ironwolf had felt their tie to their alpha go cold.
Kaldrek had been reckless since the mating bond settled between them.
Reckless and afraid. Terrified of losing her.
And that was the worst of it, because Evelyne understood him completely.
She would have done the same. That was why she could not hate him, no matter how badly she wanted to.
She was terrified too. Terrified beyond words, and now she could not even reach him.
The loss made her want to scream, to fight, to drag him back herself if she had to.
She did not care if she died tonight. Not anymore.
If she could get close enough, just once, she would make him feel what he had done.
That stubborn, reckless wolf. She wanted to strike him hard enough to knock sense into him, hard enough to make him wake and come back to her, so they could go on loving each other as if the world had not tried to tear them apart.
No.
She forced the thought away before grief could drag her under again. She had cried enough. And now anger would have to carry her, because it was the only thing she had left.
Near the grove, Charise and the covens prepared to defend the Solwyn Tree, the strongest well of their magic and their last line of defense.
Even that felt fragile now.
Alaric was with the guards, making certain every human had been cleared from the streets. With nightfall over Velenshire, the market should have been empty by now, as safe as they could make it before returning to the gathered forces.
Holden and Heidara readied the Ironwolf pack while Evelyne took her place at the front, the Oathroot wolves and Aurelia falling in behind her without question.
She could feel them now, not as separate bodies, but as a single pack.
Their instincts, their trust, their presence pressed against her own.
Her pack. She knew it in her bones. They had not left each other. They had not left her when everything went to hell. She would fight to the death for them, not because of duty or reason, but because something deeper than thought demanded it.
The night insects fell silent just as a sharp breeze swept through the fields.
The trees shivered as black mist slipped through the orchard.
There was no warning. No pause. One by one, the Noskari surged from the darkness like a breaking wave, their forms shifting between shadow and flesh as they crashed into the field with brutal force.
They overran everything in their path, and in the blink of an eye, chaos erupted.
Wolves were knocked down, thrown back, torn open.
Still, they rose. Rage drove them. Grief drove them.
The desperate need to take something back from the darkness drove them harder than pain ever could.
Evelyne threw herself into the battle, her claws tearing through one Noskari and then another as Ironwolf, Oathroot, Glaciermaw, Moonshade, and the other gathered packs crashed against the wall of gray-skinned demons.
Blood sprayed across grass and fur. Growls and shrieks split the night.
Somewhere beyond the chaos, witches guarded the grove, humans held the town, and Cillian waited at the edge of the sea. Evelyne could only trust that everyone was standing where they needed to stand.
The fight became a brutal rhythm. Slash. Shove. Breathe. Run. Every motion dragged fire through her lungs, and every breath tasted of smoke, blood, and earth. Then a shriek cut through the field. Evelyne skidded to a halt and whipped her head toward the sound.
Zade was down.
Kaura and Wren snapped at the creatures closing around him, but they were losing ground.
Several Oathroot wolves had been cut off with them, trapped inside a tightening circle of more than ten Noskari.
Evelyne saw it all at once. They were not simply attacking.
They were herding them. Isolating them. Picking them apart.
No.
She broke from the line without thinking and ran straight for them.
Aurelia changed course at once, falling in behind her as though the decision had passed between them without a word.
Evelyne wove through the battle, drawing closer to the Noskari surrounding her wolves.
When their black eyes turned toward her, she struck fast and pulled away before they could catch her.
Then she struck again. Each attack drew them a little farther from the others, breaking their formation piece by piece.
Mist swirled in front of her. It reached for her foreleg like a hand, but she twisted clear and kept moving. They would not outmaneuver her. Not here. Not with her pack on the ground.
She snarled loud enough to draw more of them toward her.
Then she darted between them, changing direction each time they thought they had found her rhythm.
Evelyne had always been good at games. At wit.
At making others look where she wanted them to look.
Now she used that same sharpness with teeth and claws.
She pulled the Noskari away from Oathroot, spreading them thin until the circle finally weakened.
The pack surged forward, reclaiming ground and tearing into the creatures she had displaced.
Aurelia moved with them, a storm of fur and fury.
But Evelyne was not done.
Zade was still on his back, and one of the Noskari had him pinned.
Its razor teeth were buried in his hind leg.
His cry of pain tore through her, awakening something primal and absolute.
She circled once, searching for an opening, then lunged.
Her teeth sank into the creature’s unguarded shoulder.
She shook her head viciously, ripping gray skin from its back and arm until the Noskari shrieked and staggered.
Another wolf slammed into it from the side and drove it to the ground.
Obren.
Evelyne gave him a nod before rushing to Zade. He was breathing. Hurt, but breathing. Relief hit her hard, but she did not move away. She planted herself over him instead, a barrier of bloodied fur and bared teeth. Every Noskari that came near the fallen wolf met her claws first.
Then Zade’s snout bumped her side.
She turned and found him standing.
For one breath, relief steadied her. Then something burned through her arm, up her neck, and deep into her chest. Evelyne staggered as the sensation took hold beneath her skin. It did not feel like pain. It felt like recognition. Like something inside her had opened and made room for all of them.
The connection snapped wider.
Deeper.
Suddenly, she felt them. Every Oathroot wolf. Every heartbeat. Every breath. Every flicker of instinct, trust, fear, pain, and fierce devotion. They were no longer separate presences near her. They were part of her awareness now, pressing close, and alive.
Howls rose into the night.
Evelyne looked around as the Oathroot wolves reacted one by one. Their bodies stilled. Their eyes turned toward her. The bond settled into place.
They were not scattered survivors anymore. Not borrowed allies. Not wolves held together by necessity alone.
They were a true pack.
Her pack.
Aurelia felt it too. Evelyne knew she did, because her sister went still as the mark burned beneath Evelyne’s fur and into her skin. The bond stretched wider, binding her not only to Zade, Kaura, Wren, and every Oathroot wolf, but to Aurelia as well.