“Tell Lyra to return what she stole,” he said desperately. “The Council will bind the heir back to you. We can fix this.”
“You can’t fix a grave,” I said softly. “And I don’t want what was stolen back through blood and fear.”
The wind howled between us.
“Go home, Kael,” I said. “Before Blackfang decides you are not worth sparing.”
For a long moment, he stayed there, frozen between pride and loss.
Then he stood.
And turned away.
The wards sealed behind him with a thunderous finality.
I returned to the citadel as the Blackfang howls rose around me — not triumphant.
Protective.
For the first time since the Moon turned away, I understood something with aching clarity:
I was no longer running from my past.
I had outgrown it.
The night Kael turned away from Blackfang’s gates, the mountain exhaled.
I felt it beneath my bare feet as I stood alone on the highest balcony of the citadel — a deep, resonant shudder rippling through the Moon-root, carrying with it something like grim approval. Not joy. Not mercy.
Recognition.