(Lucian’s POV)

The night had not ended when the attack faded. If anything, the air felt heavier, charged with something unseen, as though the shadows themselves carried Tobias’s laughter.

I stood amid the wreckage of the clearing, the stench of blood sharp in my nostrils, my claws still slick from the fight. Around me, my wolves nursed wounds, Kael clutching his side, Ronan spitting red into the grass, younger packmates trembling with exhaustion. The firelight of our torches flickered, but every flame bent strangely, tugged by a darkness that had no source.

It wasn’t just the battle that unsettled me. It was what I had felt and seen.

The soul in me,the wolf bound to my very soul was restless,disturbed. Growling and pacing as though something had trespassed into our bond. The moon above offered no comfort; it hung pale and watchful, silver light unable to push back the writhing shadows Tobias had left behind.

I tightened my fists, forcing breath through clenched teeth. “What was that?” I whispered to myself.

But I knew.

The wolves Tobias had summoned ,  they weren’t flesh and blood. They had risen out of darkness itself, fangs dripping with ink instead of saliva, eyes empty and hollow. When I struck them, they dissolved into smoke, only to reform again. They weren’t beasts. They were echoes made real through witchcraft.

And then there was his voice. My brother’s words had not come from his lips but from the shadows. A chorus of them had hissed his taunts, his threats, until the trees themselves seemed to mock me.

Tobias has grown stronger.

Stronger than I had allowed myself to believe.

I had underestimated him.

The thought cut deeper than any wound. Tobias had always been cunning, yes, but reckless. Rage had been his greatest weakness, his temper blinding him when I could see clearly. Yet tonight… tonight he had been patient. Strategic. His strike had not been meant to kill ,it had been meant to rattle us, to show me how powerless I truly was against the weapons he had gathered.

And now, he had a witch at his side.

I could still feel her magic lingering, a venomous thread woven through the shadows. No ordinary hedge witch could summon that kind of power. Whoever she was, Tobias had bound himself to something dangerous. A pact had been made.

The spirit inside me recoiled, low snarls echoing in my chest. Wolves and witches had never mixed oil and fire, sworn enemies. And yet Tobias had chosen to ally himself with one.

I exhaled hard, pushing down the storm rising inside me. My pack needed me steady, not broken.

“Alpha.”

Kael’s voice pulled me back. He had straightened, though pain bent his posture, and his eyes clear, loyal and searched mine. “What do we do now?”

For a moment, I didn’t have an answer. The weight of their stares pressed in on me every wolf waiting, wounded but trusting, for my command. I could not let them see my doubt.

“We survive,” I said, voice low but firm. “We heal, we rebuild, and we prepare. Tobias has shown his hand tonight. He will not catch us unready again.”

A murmur of agreement rippled through the pack, though exhaustion dulled it. They still trusted me. I had to be worthy of that trust.

I turned to leave, to see the fallen, but a presence blocked me.

“Asher.”

She stood apart from the others, her arms folded tight, her golden eyes sharp with anger. Blood streaked her cheek, not her own. Her chest rose and fell too quickly, every breath drawn through clenched teeth.

“What aren’t you telling me, Lucian?” she demanded.

Her words cut sharper than Tobias’s shadows.

I frowned. “Asher, now is not…”

“No,” she snapped, stepping closer, her voice vibrating with fury. “Don’t feed me that. Don’t tell me to wait. I fought at your side tonight, I bled for this pack, and I felt it too. That wasn’t just Tobias. There was more, something… darker. And you knew. You knew something like this was coming, didn’t you?”

Her accusation hit home. I swallowed, my throat tight. She wasn’t wrong.

I had felt the stirrings for weeks ,the unease in my spirit, the whispers of change in the wind, the sense that Tobias’s hunger would no longer be bound to tooth and claw alone. But I hadn’t spoken it aloud. Not to my wolves. Not even to Asher, my most trusted lieutenant.

Because saying it would make it real.

“Lucian,” she pressed, her eyes burning into mine. “What aren’t you telling me?”

I looked at her, at the raw loyalty in her expression even as anger twisted it, and for a moment, I almost confessed it all. The prophecy Cassandra Moonveil had once whispered. The dream I had buried. The shadow that had stalked me long before Tobias ever embraced it.

But the words died in my throat.

If I admitted my fear, if I revealed just how uncertain I truly was, would it strengthen her or break her? Would it anchor the pack or unravel it?

Asher’s jaw tightened. “Your silence is your answer, then.”

She turned on her heel, fury radiating from her every step, and stalked toward the trees. My spirit growled inside me, unsettled, but I let her go. She needed time.

Still, the guilt weighed heavily. I had kept her in the dark, and in doing so, I had pushed her away.

I looked up at the sky, at the indifferent moon.

“Tobias,” I muttered, clenching my fists. “What have you done?”

The shadows shifted at the edge of the clearing, curling like smoke, and for an instant, I swore I saw his face there smiling, mocking. My spirit snarled again, but the vision dissolved into the night.

I had underestimated him once. I would not do so again.

Still, unease gnawed at me. Because even as I stood, vowing to shield my pack, I couldn’t shake the echo of Tobias’s voice, carried on the dark:

You cannot stop me, brother. Not alone.

And the worst part was I believed him.