The white flames reflected in Silas's eyes, turning the molten gold to a blinding, ethereal silver. For a long moment, the world seemed to suspend its breath. The roar of the fire in the obsidian basin was the only sound, a hungry, crackling hiss that ate through the tension of the night.
Silas didn't look like a man who had just discovered his mate was a political landmine; he looked like a king who had finally found the missing half of his soul. His hand was a heavy, warm weight on my waist, pulling me so close that I could feel the erratic, thudding rhythm of his heart against my ribs. It was racing—not with the frantic pace of fear, but with a wild, dark exhilaration.
He leaned down, his lips brushing the shell of my ear, his breath hot against my skin. "White-Fire," he murmured, the name a low vibration that traveled through my marrow. "I knew you were made of starlight, Seraphina, but this? This is absolute perfection."
Across the terrace, the High Council was in shambles. The Elders were no longer the stoic, immovable statues of law; they were huddled in a frantic, whispering circle. To them, I was no longer a woman or even an Alpha—I was a ghost of a dead era, a living relic of the Celestial Alphas who had once ruled the north before the Eclipse War had turned the snow red with their blood.
"This changes... everything," Elder Hakan said, stepping forward. His voice, usually a booming authority, was thin and reedy. He looked at me with a reverence that felt like a cold shower. "If the blood of the Star-Walkers has returned, the treaties of the last twenty years are effectively void. Every border, every alliance... it was all predicated on the extinction of your line."
He turned his gaze to Silas, his eyes narrowing as he tried to regain some semblance of control. "High Alpha Thorne, you will release her. Immediately. She is a Sovereign of the First Line. She cannot be held as a debt-slave, nor can she remain in the house of a subordinate Alpha without Council supervision. She is a ward of the High Court now."
I felt Silas's body go rigid. The preening, prideful joy vanished, replaced by a cold, jagged wall of ice. His grip on my waist tightened until it was possessive, a silent declaration of war.
"Subordinate Alpha?" Silas's voice was a soft, lethal purr that made the wolves nearest us cower. He stepped in front of me, his massive frame shielding me from the Council's reach. "You seem to be under the impression that I am asking for your permission, Hakan. I found her in the dirt where you left her. I protected her while you looked the other way. I bled for her when the Silver-Moon was carving pieces out of her soul. She is not a 'ward.' She is mine."
"The law dictates—" Hakan began, his face flushing.
"The law is mine!"
The shout tore from my throat, reinforced by the silver light still dancing in my eyes. I stepped out from behind Silas, my bare feet silent on the stone. The white-silver flames in the basin leapt higher as I approached, as if responding to my proximity. I looked at the Council, then at the broken, shivering forms of Julian and Corvin being hauled toward the shadows by the guards.
"You want to talk about the law?" I pointed at the empty, unblemished nape of my neck. "The law says a woman belongs to the man who marks her. Julian was too arrogant to do it. And Silas..." I looked back at the man who had bought my freedom, my heart swelling at the memory of his restraint. "Silas was too noble to do it."
I walked toward the Council Elder, my aura flaring until he had to squint against the radiance. "I am the White-Fire. I am the Sovereign of the High Peaks. And my first decree as the last of my line is this: Silas Thorne did not steal a Luna. He saved a Queen. And a Queen chooses her own court. She chooses her own Mate."
Silas let out a jagged, uneven breath, his eyes fixed on me with a raw, naked hunger. He looked like a man who had been told he was going to the gallows, only to be handed a throne instead.
"But," I said, turning back to the room, "the Silver-Moon pack still owes a blood debt for the twenty years they stole from me. For the identity they erased."
I looked at Silas, a devious glint in my eyes, the silver wolf inside me pacing with a newfound hunger for retribution. "Silas, you said the penalty for kidnapping a Goddess is high. What is the penalty for Lineage Fraud under Shadow-Crest law?"
Silas stepped up beside me, his aura dark and menacing once more, a cruel, beautiful smile playing on his lips. "Total forfeiture," he said, the word sounding like a guillotine blade dropping. "Lands, titles, and blood-rights. The Silver-Moon estate would be dissolved. Their wolves would be unranked... unless a higher Alpha claims them."
He looked at me, a silent question in his eyes. He was waiting to see if I would take their land, if I would replace one cage with another.
"I don't want their lands," I said, my voice cold. "I want their truth. A 'dud' couldn't have survived the Eclipse War alone. I was an infant. Someone handed me to Corvin. Someone betrayed the High Peaks and the Star-Walkers."
The room went deathly silent. The celebration had turned into a funeral.