Chapter 70

Serena POV

Nightshade felt wrong the moment Lucien left.

It wasn’t quiet. It wasn’t calm. It was hollow.

I stood on the battlements long after the war party disappeared into the tree line, the cold stone seeping through the soles of my boots as dawn stretched pale fingers across the sky. The warriors moved like shadows, disciplined and silent, Lucien at their head — tall, lethal, composed in a way that made my chest ache.

The bond stretched.

Not painfully. Not yet. But ...