EMBER’S POV
She leans in, and this is where the dread starts to build in her voice.
“You have to understand what that meant, Ember. Esmerelda watched it happen from the inside, and it terrified even her. Isolde bluffed all she could, parading Elara as the chosen one, but the people are as clever as their queen, and they refused to be fooled for too long. A Caelora without the Silver Wolf is a wounded thing, and every hungry house in the East could smell it. The queen with no god. The throne with no teeth. Isolde grew more frightened every season the wolf stayed lost, and a frightened Isolde is a monstrous one, because that woman answers fear with blood. Executions. Purges. Anyone who whispered that the Silver Maiden might be gone for good simply vanished. The whole court began walking on
