Aria's POV
I stared at the message on my phone, my new power humming beneath my skin like a live wire. The question burned in my mind, demanding answers I wasn't sure I wanted.
"Elena." My voice cut through the vehicle's silence. "What really happened to my grandmother?"
My mother's shoulders stiffened. In the driver's seat, Cade's eyes flicked to the rearview mirror, watching us. Dominic, sitting beside me, went very still.
"Your grandmother died of old age," Elena said without turning around. "You know that."
"The message says otherwise." I held up my phone so she could see it in the mirror. "Someone claims you made a deal with the Council. That the Blackwood line was targeted for a reason. That you promised them something in exchange for keeping me alive."
The car swerved slightly before Elena steadied it. "Who sent that?"
"Does it matter if it's true?"
Rowan leaned forward from the back row, her power stirring. "Grandma told me the Council killed most blood witches indiscriminately during the purge. But she said a few families were hunted specifically. Targeted. The Blackwoods were one of them." Her voice hardened. "She never told me why."
"Because she didn't want you to know what we'd done." Elena's grip on the steering wheel tightened until her knuckles went white. "What we had to do to survive."
"What did you do?" I demanded.
For a long moment, Elena didn't answer. The only sound was the engine and our breathing.
Then she pulled the car over to the side of the road and turned to face us.
"The Blackwood line wasn't just any blood witch family," she said quietly. "We were the royal line. The strongest, the oldest, the most powerful. During the purge, the Council knew that if they left even one of us alive, we could rebuild. Could organize the scattered blood witches into an army."
"So they hunted you," Rowan said.
"They hunted all of us. Your grandmother, my mother, managed to hide most of the family. But the Council had a weapon we couldn't fight—a tracker who could sense blood witch signatures from hundreds of miles away." Elena's face was carved from ice. "They found us. Cornered us. Offered a choice."
My stomach dropped. "What choice?"
"They would spare one Blackwood child. Just one. To carry on the bloodline under their supervision." Elena's eyes met mine. "In exchange, my mother had to give them something they wanted more than genocide."
"What could possibly be worth that?" Dominic asked.
"The location of the Blood Archive." Elena's words fell like stones. "An ancient repository containing every blood witch spell, technique, and secret accumulated over thousands of years. The Council wanted it destroyed so no one could ever learn our magic again."
Rowan gasped. "Grandma gave them the Archive?"
"She gave them a location," Elena corrected. "A decoy Archive filled with minor spells and common knowledge. The real Archive is still hidden, protected by blood magic so powerful that only a true Blackwood sovereign can access it." She looked at me. "Only you, Aria. Now that you've drunk the ancestral essence, you're the only living blood witch strong enough to open it."
The weight of that revelation pressed down on me. "That's why you kept me suppressed. You were protecting the Archive's location."
"I was protecting you from becoming a target," Elena said. "If the Council discovered a Blackwood sovereign existed, they'd stop at nothing to capture you and force you to open the Archive. Then they'd kill you and destroy everything our ancestors died to preserve."
"But I've already been discovered," I said slowly. "Which means the Council is going to come for the Archive anyway."
"Not if we get to it first." Elena started the car again. "The Archive contains weapons, Aria. Ancient blood magic powerful enough to fight the Council, to free every blood witch from hiding, to end the purge permanently." Her smile was sharp. "That's why we're really going to Blood Moon. Not just to save your friend. To use the chaos as a distraction while we access the Archive entrance hidden beneath their territory."
"Wait." Cade's voice was dangerous. "There's an ancient blood witch vault under my territory and nobody told me?"
"It's under what used to be sacred ground, before the rogues took over," Elena said. "The entrance is in the old temple ruins everyone thinks are just abandoned buildings."
"This is insane." I pressed my hands to my temples, trying to process everything. "You're saying we're going to walk into a Council trap, save Zara, and break into an ancient magical vault? All at the same time?"
"I'm saying we're going to use the Council's trap against them," Elena corrected. "They expect you to surrender or fight. They don't expect you to have a completely different objective."
"And what about my father?" I held up the phone again. "The message shows him in a Council cell."
Elena's expression flickered—something that might have been guilt. "Marcus made his own choices. He gambled, he lost, and when the debt collectors came, he chose to sell you instead of facing his consequences. I don't owe him protection."
"But you knew they'd take him too," I said, reading between the lines. "You knew the Council would grab anyone connected to me."
"I knew." Elena's voice was flat. "And I chose to save you instead of him. If you want to rescue your father after we secure the Archive, that's your choice. But he's not the priority."
The casual way she dismissed my father's life made my skin crawl. Even after everything he'd done, he was still my father. Still the man who'd taught me to read, who'd carried me on his shoulders when I was small.
Before I'd learned he'd poison me for two decades and sell me to slavers.
"One crisis at a time," Dominic said quietly, his hand finding mine. Through the mate bond, I felt his support, his strength. "We save Zara first. Then we deal with everything else."
I squeezed his hand, grateful for the anchor he provided.
We drove in tense silence for another ten minutes before Blood Moon territory came into view. Even from a distance, I could see the Council forces—vehicles, soldiers, weapons that gleamed with silver and magical wards.
And in the center of it all, Zara hung from chains like bait in a trap.
"There are at least thirty enforcers," Cade observed. "Plus whatever backup they have waiting. We're outnumbered five to one."
"Good thing we don't need to fight them all," Elena said. She pulled out a map marked with symbols I didn't recognize. "The Archive entrance is here, beneath the old temple. We need someone to create a distraction big enough to pull most of the enforcers away from the square."
"I'll do it," Dominic said immediately. "I'll challenge my father publicly. Alpha against Alpha. The Council won't be able to resist watching."
"That's suicide," I protested. "Your father is older, more experienced—"
"And I'm younger, faster, and I have something he doesn't." Dominic's eyes glowed with his wolf. "Rage. He's using your friend as bait. He's hunting my mate. I'm going to make him pay for that."
"I'll back him up," Cade said. "Blood Moon wolves against Silver Crest. It'll be chaos."
"Perfect." Elena traced routes on the map. "While they're distracted, Aria, Rowan, and I go for the Archive. We get in, grab what we need, and get out before anyone realizes we were there."
"What about Zara?" I demanded.
"We'll grab her on the way out," Elena said. "Once we have the Archive's weapons, saving one wolf from a few guards will be easy."
It was a terrible plan. Too many things could go wrong. But it was the only plan we had.
We parked a mile out and approached on foot. My new power let me sense every wolf in the territory—the Council enforcers alert and ready, the Blood Moon wolves tense and angry at the invasion, and Zara's heartbeat weak but still fighting.
"Remember," Elena whispered as we split up. "The Archive entrance will only open for you, Aria. You'll need to use your blood as a key."
"How do you know all this if you've never been inside?"
"Because my mother told me everything before she died." Elena's expression was unreadable. "Including what's waiting inside. The Archive isn't just a library, Aria. It's alive. And it's been waiting for a sovereign to claim it for three hundred years."
"What does that mean?"
"It means once you go in, you might not come out the same person." She gripped my shoulder. "The Archive will test you. Judge you. Decide if you're worthy of the power it contains. If you fail—"
"I won't fail," I said with more confidence than I felt.
Elena studied me for a long moment, then nodded. "You have your grandmother's fire. Maybe that'll be enough."
We moved into position. In the square, Dominic stepped out of the shadows, his voice carrying across the territory.
"Father! I challenge you for leadership of Silver Crest!"
The reaction was instant chaos. Enforcers rushed toward the commotion. Alpha Thorne roared in fury. Cade's wolves emerged from hiding, turning the challenge into a full-scale brawl.
"Now," Elena hissed.
We ran for the temple ruins, my blood singing with power and fear. The entrance was hidden beneath rubble and weeds—a door carved with symbols that glowed when I approached.
"Your blood," Elena urged. "Quickly!"
I cut my palm and pressed it to the door. The symbols flared brilliant red, and the door swung open, revealing stairs descending into darkness.
"Ladies first," Rowan said nervously.
We descended into the Archive, leaving the battle behind.
The stairs seemed to go on forever, spiraling down into the earth. The walls were covered in writing I couldn't read, but my new power recognized them—every blood witch who'd ever lived had left their mark here.
Finally, we reached the bottom.
The Archive was massive—a cathedral-sized chamber filled with books, scrolls, artifacts, and things I couldn't name. Power pulsed through the air like a heartbeat.
And in the center of it all stood a figure.
A woman made of blood and shadow, ancient and terrible and beautiful. Her eyes—my eyes—fixed on me with recognition.
"Welcome home, daughter of the Blackwood line," she said in a voice like thunder. "I am the Archive. I am every blood witch who came before you. And I have been waiting a very long time for you to claim your birthright."
She moved closer, her form shifting and flowing.
"But first, you must prove yourself worthy. You must face the truth of what you are. What you were always meant to become."
The Archive's hand touched my forehead.
And suddenly I was drowning in visions—blood witches being burned alive, children torn from their mothers' arms, my grandmother making the deal that saved Elena, my mother poisoning my food every morning with tears in her eyes, and something else.
Something that made my blood run cold.
A vision of myself, older, standing over a burning world. Blood witches ruled with iron fists. Packs knelt in terror. And I stood at the center of it all, drunk on power, humanity burned away.
"This is your destiny," the Archive whispered. "This is what you will become if you claim the power I offer. A sovereign. A queen. A monster."
"No," I gasped. "I won't—"
"You already have." The Archive showed me another vision—Dominic, Cade, Rowan, even Elena, all lying dead at my feet. "You will sacrifice everyone you love in pursuit of revenge and power. You will become exactly what the Council feared. And you will destroy everything."
"That's not true!"
"Isn't it?" The Archive's smile was sad. "You've already enjoyed hurting those who hurt you. Already felt the pleasure of making wolves kneel. Already tasted the darkness and found it sweet." She leaned closer. "I offer you ultimate power, Aria Blackwood. The strength to destroy the Council, to free your kind, to reshape the world. All you have to do is accept what you're becoming. Accept the monster."
Behind me, I heard Rowan scream.
I turned to see Elena holding my cousin by the throat, her eyes glowing with power I'd never seen before.
"I'm sorry, Aria," my mother said. "But the Council was right. Blood sovereigns are too dangerous to exist. I've been working with them all along, keeping you alive just long enough to lead them to the Archive." She smiled, and it was worse than anything the Bloodhunters had shown me. "And now that you've opened it for me, you're no longer necessary."
She crushed Rowan's throat.
My cousin dropped, gasping.
And my mother—the woman who'd given birth to me, who'd claimed she was protecting me—turned her stolen power on me.
"Goodbye, daughter. Thank you for your sacrifice."