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Lisna snorted despite herself. Sulien's mouth twitched. Even Maxen's lips curved faintly.

"You do know how cubs are made, right?" Maxen asked dryly.

Blaidd huffed a breath that might almost have been a laugh, but then his expression sobered.

"It was hard," he continued. "Every instinct screamed at me to close the distance." His voice roughened. "But I knew exactly what I was doing, and I had no choice."

There had been no respite.

"As for Isolde's children," he added, eyes burning, "I didn't have the heart or the strength to send them away. They were already victims."

He looked at Lisna. "I swear to you, if I had known what they were doing to Fae—" His voice faltered for a second. "They would have been out on their arses."

The silence that followed was heavy with the reckoning that was to come.

Lisna stepped forward at last and rested her hand briefly on his arm. She could see he was already fading.

"We believe you," she said quietly. "Sleep now. We will find a way. But first, we need to deal with Rowena, or whatever she is. The three months she has been in the pack have been hell for Fae."

****

Fae—a few days ago

The drive to the airfield took most of the day. Sulien was quiet, but Fae could feel his eyes pass over her from time to time.

Fae sat in the passenger seat, hands folded in her lap, watching the land change from familiar pack roads to human territory—signposts in another language, fences painted white, buildings too square. Her wolf paced endlessly beneath her skin, unsettled by the strange smells and from leaving her pack behind.

By the time they reached the small airfield, her wolf was rumbling anxiously in her chest. Sulien had been quiet as he held her close as a brother would and whispered, "Goddess bless," in her ear.

Wolves did not like being in a small metal cylinder in the sky, but luckily, the flight was mercifully short.

Even so, her wolf hated it.

The moment the aircraft lifted, panic had surged. Breathing became a chore, nails bit into her palms as her wolf demanded her skin, desperate for ground.

The flight lasted three hours. Any longer, she knew, would have been a disaster.

When the plane touched down, relief left her weak and trembling.

From there, a wolf she didn't know met her and drove her to the seaport. The place smelled of salt, diesel, and wet wood. The ship was large, its deck stacked high with massive logs and bound timber, ropes creaking softly as the tide tugged at them. It wasn't meant for passengers, but coin and the right connections meant she had a bunk bed.

Her cabin was small, spare, and shared.

The other woman was slight, with dark hair and calm eyes, her features exotic. Her hair was dark, glossy, and swept back into a loose braid that rested over one shoulder. She spoke little at first, but there was an easy gentleness to her movements, a patience that made silence feel companionable rather than strained. She introduced herself as Miyuki. Strangely, they were headed to the same place: Fukamori.

The journey took ten days.

The sea did not cooperate. For the first few days, Fae took moonflower essence and slept through the worst of it, drifting in and out of dreams until the new moon arrived. When she woke properly, the roiling in her gut had both her and her wolf protesting bitterly. Feraal kept mostly quiet, offering only the occasional sarcastic remark in the back of her mind, but his curiosity and suspicion trickled into her brain. He wanted to know more about the woman sharing their small cabin.

As the seasickness worsened and the ship pitched endlessly beneath her feet, Fae wondered morosely what she had been thinking leaving her pack, leaving everything familiar. Wasn't life with Blaidd and his demon children, and Ro-the-ho better than this?

The thought passed as quickly as it came.

No, it wasn't better.

She set her jaw, swallowed the nausea, and clung to the certainty that had driven her this far. Whatever waited for her in Fukamori, she would reach it. She would brave the sea, the doubt, and the ache in her bones because turning back was no longer an option.

Respite came when they stopped at an island—an unexpected pause in the endless rhythm of sea and sky. The beach was pale and quiet, the sand warm beneath bare feet and as fine as sugar, the sun laying a gentle heat over their skin.