Kaidan's POV
The battlefield stank of blood and smoke.
I strode through the ash-covered ruins of Ironpelt Hold, the last Hollowfang fortress.
Bodies littered the ground like discarded memories. My soldiers moved in silence, dragging out survivors, extinguishing flames, claiming what was theirs.
"Total submission," Thorne Kellen said beside me, armored in black leather streaked with blood. "You made them kneel faster than we expected."
"They had no spine," I muttered, surveying the cracked banners. "A Pack that follows sentiment instead of strength is a Pack already dead."
"You gave the order to spare the young," Thorne said, carefully. "But you didn't say why."
"I'm not interested in mercy," I said, stopping before a Hollowfang Alpha who knelt in chains. "I want them raised with one truth… Kaidan Veyr ends wars. Not with treaties. But with fear."
He knelt, eyeing the broken Alpha.
"Tell the others what happens when they delay allegiance," I said coldly.
"I… I will," the man stammered, blood in his teeth. "I swear it."
I stood, wiping my hand against his coat like the man was filth.
Thorne watched him. "You're not the same, Kaidan."
"I was never meant to be, change is the one thing that's constant," I replied. "And victory comes to those who abandon what weakens them."
"You mean love?"
My jaw ticked. "I mean memories."
But you still dream of her… don't you?
The thought left as soon as it came.
Later that night, I walked the halls of Frostspire, the Veyr family's ancestral fortress. Firelight flickered along the walls as I pushed open a carved wooden door.
My sister sat by the hearth. She wore a silk robe wrapped tight around her thin frame.
"You reek of smoke," Vanya said without looking at me.
"You always say that."
"You always come after a massacre."
I stepped inside, dragging a chair closer to the fire.
Vanya poured tea without asking. I didn't drink it.
"You didn't sleep again," she said quietly.
"I don't need sleep."
"You need answers."
I said nothing.
"You saw her again, didn't you?" Vanya asked, her voice barely a whisper now. "The fire. The mark. The same woman."
Kaidan's eyes darkened.
"She doesn't scream," I said. "She just looks at me. Like she knows me. And every time I wake up, I feel like I've failed her."
"Maybe you did."
I looked up sharply.
Vanya held my stare. "You feel it, don't you? That everything you're doing out there, all this violence, it's not about dominance. It's about finding her."
"She doesn't exist."
Vanya smiled faintly. "Then why do you bleed for her every night?"
I didn't answer.
But as I left her chambers, the wind howled across the spires.
And in my chest, the beast stirred again… whispering of a name long forgotten.
Lunaria…
Who the hell was Lunaria?
***
I stared out over the Frostspire battlements as the cold wind howled low.
What was I doing this for?
Power?
No.
Power came too easily. Fear was already mine. What I lacked was… meaning and purpose. And the dreams, whatever they were, kept pulling me toward something that might offer it.
"The Scrapfangs fled east."
Thorne's voice cut through the fog of my thoughts.
"Let them rot," I muttered, tightening the gauntlet on my wrist.
"They took the Crescent reliquary."
I paused. "What direction?"
Thorne unfolded the map between us. "Virellan Wastes."
I stilled. "That's suicide."
"My point exactly." He tapped the edge. "We retrieve the relics when their corpses surface… if they do."
"They're running toward something," I said.
"Running from you."
"No. I'd know the difference."
Thorne's brow furrowed. "What are you really chasing, Kaidan?"
"I'm not chasing."
"You've been… off," he said carefully. "Since Hollowfang. Since the dream came back."
I stared at the map. The blackened lands stared back.
"You ever feel something pulling you?" I asked.
"I follow orders. And gut instincts."
"No. Deeper than instinct. Like… your blood remembers something your mind doesn't."
Thorne didn't answer.
"I'm going."
"To the Wastes?"
"To whatever's waiting in them."
"That's madness," he snapped. "You'll be blind by nightfall. The winds twist memory out there. People forget who they are."
I met his gaze. "Maybe I need to forget."
"Kaidan."
"I'm a werewolf born of the Burn Moon, I'm a warrior by blood. I can handle it."
"You'll die."
"Then you'll burn what's left of me."
Thorne exhaled sharply. "You're doing this for her, aren't you?"
"There is no her."
"Then what the hell is in the Wastes that you're so desperate to find?"
I turned from him, my voice quiet.
"I don't know."
Silence.
Then Thorne spoke again, voice resigned. "You have three days. If you're not back…"
"Light the skies."
"Kaidan…"
"Gather me fifty other Bur
n werewolves," I commanded, turning from him.
Thorne's silence was answer enough.
The Wastes were calling. And my soul was already halfway there.
"We move at twilight."