The North Tower was wrapped in the quiet chill of late afternoon when the heavy iron door shuddered violently on its hinges.

Valeriana did not flinch. She sat behind her broad oak desk, her posture perfectly straight, a cup of chamomile tea resting in her hands. Beside t

The Great Hall of the Bloodwood Pack was a cavern of whispering shadows and tense, suffocating air. The morning sun bled through the high stained-glass windows, casting fractured red and gold light across the stone floor.

Hundreds of pack members crowded the edges o

The silence in the Great Hall was absolute, heavy with the scent of ozone and the lingering shockwave of raw magic. Valeriana Cross did not look back at the man groveling on the floor. She did not spare a single glance for Lyla Fawn, who was still whimpering in the