They came at sunrise. All forty of them.
The great hall was packed shoulder to shoulder Lycans who’d crossed half the kingdom to be here, Lycans who’d never once set foot in this hall before today. Senna stood at Aria’s right on the dais. Vael stood at Kael’s left. Cale had taken the door. Tarn stood at the back wall with the warriors, arms folded, watching. And at the front of the seated rows Maren’s older mate, hands folded in his lap, eyes fixed on the silver ring on the queen’s hand like it was the only still thing in the room.
Kael stood.
He didn’t raise his voice. Didn’t have to. The hall went quiet the way a forest goes quiet when something ancient moves through it not silence, exactly, but a held breath. The smell of rushes and candle tallow and forty bodies all waiting.
“My pe
