TO RUIN A KING

The fire had long since died, but Magdalene still sat by the embers as though warmth might return if she willed it hard enough.

Her cloak hung limp over her shoulders, blood drying stiff at the seams. Cassian had cleaned the wound and bound it tight, but pain wasn't what kept her from sleeping. It was the stillness. The way Maddox paced the edge of the ruin like a caged beast—silent, brooding, crownless.

He hadn't said a word in over an hour.

Cassian had drifted to a half-sleep, blade still in hand, boots still on. He never truly let his guard down. Magdalene envied that kind of control.

"You knew," she finally said, her voice low.

Maddox turned but didn't face her. Just stilled.

She didn't need him to answer. "You knew someone inside the Valeblood ranks was leaking information. You knew this attack wasn't random."

"I suspected," he replied. Quiet. Raw.

Her laugh was bitter. "And yet, you brought no guards. No warning. Just your bare damn throat."

Now he faced her. Moonlight pooled in his eyes, making them look like molten gold on the verge of freezing. "Because I didn't want to believe it."

A beat.

Then another.

"And because I knew if I did bring guards, you wouldn't have let me close."

She stared at him for a long, long time. He didn't flinch under her gaze. That, somehow, made it worse.

"You still don't get it, do you?" she asked. "This isn't about us. This isn't about what we were, or how much it hurt to lose it. People are dying, Maddox. My people. Your people."

His voice was hoarse. "I haven't forgotten that."

"No. You've just chosen not to feel it."

That struck deeper than she meant it to.

He stepped toward her slowly, kneeling near the dying fire. "Do you think I don't feel it? That I sleep at night without hearing the screams of wolves who trusted me?"

She didn't answer.

"I let you walk away that night at Black Hollow because I thought I was sparing you. I thought if I buried what we were deep enough, if I stayed away long enough, you'd forget the part of you that was tied to me."

He exhaled. "But I see now that was cowardice dressed as sacrifice."

Magdalene's fingers curled in the folds of her cloak. She hated how her pulse responded to his voice. Hated that her magic still stirred when he came too close. That her body remembered things her mind tried to forget.

"I can't fix what I broke," he said, softer now. "But I can burn for it, if you ask me to."

Her jaw tensed. "Don't offer me flames, Maddox. Not when I've already drowned in them."

The wind shifted, carrying the scent of pine and blood. Maddox's head snapped toward the treeline.

Cassian sat up instantly. "Something's wrong."

Magdalene rose, ignoring the way her shoulder throbbed. Her dagger was in her hand before her thoughts caught up.

Then she heard it.

Not footsteps. Not movement.

Breathing.

Heavy, ragged, animalistic breathing coming from the shadows beyond the archway. And not just one.

Three. Four. Maybe more.

Cassian pressed his back to hers, sword raised. "Company."

The figures stepped into view, slow and deliberate.

Wolves.

But not like Maddox's. These weren't the sleek, disciplined beasts of the Valeblood patrol. These were malformed, eyes gleaming with a red sheen, fur matted with dark, oily magic.

One opened its mouth and let out a snarl that sounded… wrong. Like the echoes of another voice—too deep, too ancient.

"What the hell are those?" Cassian whispered.

Maddox's expression turned grim. "Forgotten-bound. Twisted from the old blood."

"Impossible," Magdalene hissed. "The Forgotten don't have a physical hold here yet. Not unless—"

"—someone opened the gate," Maddox finished.

Her skin went cold.

The largest of the beasts lunged.

Cassian met it mid-air, his blade a flash of fire and steel. Maddox shifted instantly, bones snapping, fur erupting as he landed in front of two others.

Magdalene moved like wind over water—smooth, precise, brutal. Her blade danced through sinew and muscle, blood arcing across the stone.

But for every wolf that fell, two more emerged.

"We have to retreat," Cassian shouted, fending off a second wave. "They're not trying to kill us—they're herding us!"

Magdalene's heart seized.

He was right.

The wolves weren't striking to maim. They were pushing them.

South. Toward the ravine.

She turned, slashing at one's throat, and looked at Maddox mid-shift. "They're leading us somewhere."

His wolf eyes met hers, burning gold with understanding.

Then, from the cliffside, a new presence emerged.

She was draped in violet silk, face hidden behind a bone-carved mask, her arms bare and covered in glowing sigils. Her voice carried like mist—soft and cold and unforgiving.

"You trespass in lands older than your crown, King of Ash," she said. "And you, Daughter of Rivers… you wear your ancestor's defiance like perfume."

Magdalene's blade didn't lower. "Who are you?"

The woman tilted her head. "I am merely the messenger. The mouth through which the Forgotten will speak."

Cassian muttered a curse. "We need to move. Now."

But Magdalene didn't step back.

Because behind the masked woman… more figures began to appear.

Not wolves.

Not even human.

Just silhouettes. Watching. Listening.

Waiting.

And then—just as her magic began to bristle with raw instinct—the cliff behind them crumbled.

Cassian shouted.

Maddox roared.

Magdalene fell.

… and everything went dark.