Chapter 118

Chapter 118: Chapter 118

The clearing behind the hut had become Nyra’s training ground.

It was a small space, barely wide enough for the full range of combat drills, but she had made it work. The trees bore the scars of her practice gouges in the bark from her dagger, broken branches where her strikes had landed too hard. The grass was trampled flat from weeks of footwork drills. And at the center of it all, Nyra stood with her eyes closed, her hands raised, reaching for the power that had been sleeping inside her since the night of the showcase.

Corvin stood at the edge of the clearing, his arms crossed, his expression watchful. He had been coming here every day for weeks, bringing supplies and reports, but today was different. Today, Nyra had asked him to stay. To watch. To help her find what she had lost.

"Clear your mind," he said, his voice calm and steady. "The power isn’t something you can force. It’s part of you. Like breathing. Like your heartbeat."

"I know." Nyra’s voice was tight with frustration. "You’ve said that a hundred times."

"And you’ve ignored it a hundred times. Maybe the hundred and first will be different."

She opened her eyes and shot him a glare. "Your bedside manner needs work."

"I’m a potions master, not a healer. My bedside manner is perfectly adequate for my profession."

Nyra shook her head and closed her eyes again. She tried to do what he said to clear her mind, to let go of the frustration and the fear and the grief that had been weighing her down for so long. She thought of the silver light. She thought of the way it had felt to let it flow through her terrifying and exhilarating and utterly, completely right.

But nothing came.

"It’s not working." She dropped her hands. "Maybe I’ve lost it permanently. Maybe the awakening drained everything I had, and now I’m just... ordinary again."

"You were never ordinary. Even before your power awakened, you were never ordinary." Corvin stepped closer. "You survived assassins and poisonings and rogue attacks. You fooled an entire academy. You faced down the King of the Seven Packs and told him the truth. That is not ordinary, Nyra. That’s extraordinary."

"Then why can’t I do this?" Her voice cracked. "Why can’t I summon the one thing that makes me special? The one thing that could actually help me take back my throne?"

"Because you’re trying to summon it for the wrong reasons." Corvin’s voice was gentle but firm. "You’re treating it like a weapon. Something separate from yourself. But the Moonblood power isn’t a sword you can pick up and put down. It’s part of you. It always has been. You just have to remember what it feels like to let it in."

Nyra stared at him. "What do you mean?"

"Think about the night of the showcase. What were you feeling when the power erupted?"

She closed her eyes. The memories flooded back Soren falling, the arrow in his chest, his blood on her face. The voices in her head telling her to unleash. The grief and the fury and the desperate, clawing need to make the world stop hurting.

"Grief," she whispered. "Rage. Desperation. I thought I was losing everything."

"You weren’t trying to summon the power. You weren’t thinking about it at all. It just... came. Because you needed it." Corvin stepped back. "Stop trying to control it. Stop trying to force it. Just... feel. Let yourself feel everything you’ve been holding back. And see what happens."

Nyra looked at him for a long moment. Then she closed her eyes.

She thought about Soren. Not the way he had looked when he fell bloody and broken and dying but the way he had looked when he smiled at her. The way his dark eyes had softened when he called her "little moon." The way his arms had felt around her, strong and steady and safe.

She thought about Thorne. Her twin. Her other half. The way he had laughed at her jokes, even the bad ones. The way he had believed in her when no one else did. The way he had made her promise to take the throne, to avenge him, to be the queen he knew she could be.

She thought about her parents. Her mother, who had died too young. Her father, who had hidden her away because he was afraid of what the world would do to a daughter who couldn’t shift. She thought about how much she had wanted to make them proud. How much she still wanted it.

She thought about her uncle. The man who had poisoned her brother. The man who had sent assassins to kill her. The man who now sat on her throne, ruling her people, while she hid in a hut in the middle of nowhere.

The grief rose up inside her like a tide. The rage. The love. The longing. All of it, swirling together, filling her chest until she thought she might burst.

And then the silver light came.

It started as a flicker the same faint spark she had seen before. But this time, it didn’t fade. This time, it grew. The light spread from her fingertips up her arms, pulsing with the rhythm of her heartbeat. Her eyes opened, and they were blazing silver, burning with an inner fire that had no earthly source. Her hair lifted from her shoulders, floating around her face like a halo of moonlight.

Corvin stepped back, his whiskey-dark eyes wide with awe. "Nyra..."

"I feel it," she whispered. "I can feel it. It’s like—like the moon itself is inside me. Like I’m connected to something so much bigger than myself."

The light pulsed brighter, and the ground beneath her feet began to glow. The trees around the clearing swayed, their branches reaching toward her as if drawn by an invisible force. The air hummed with energy, and for a moment, Nyra was not just a woman standing in a forest clearing. She was the Daughter of the Moon. The heir of the old magic. The vessel of a power that had been waiting centuries to be released.

And then, as suddenly as it had come, the light faded.

Nyra sank to her knees, her chest heaving, her body trembling with exhaustion. But her face, her face was radiant with hope.

"I did it," she breathed. "I actually did it."

Corvin knelt beside her, his hand on her shoulder. "You did. And you’ll do it again. And again. Until it’s as natural as breathing."

She looked up at him, her silver eyes still faintly glowing. "Thank you, Corvin. For everything. For believing in me when I didn’t believe in myself."

"You don’t have to thank me. I told you before—" He paused, and something flickered in his expression. Something that looked almost like pain. "I’m not going anywhere."

She reached up and covered his hand with hers. "I know. And I’m grateful. More than I can say."

They stayed like that for a moment, the forest silent around them, the silver light still fading from Nyra’s skin. Then she stood, her legs unsteady but her spine straight.

"I’m ready," she said. "Whatever comes next I’m ready."

The Shadowmoon cafeteria was quieter than it had ever been.

Finn sat at their usual table near the windows, his tray of food untouched before him. Marek sat across from him, eating mechanically, his expression distant. Jasper was beside them, his book open but his eyes not moving across the page. Maureen sat beside Jasper, her presence a quiet comfort, though even she seemed subdued.

"It’s too quiet," Finn said finally. "It’s been too quiet for weeks."

"The academy is in mourning," Jasper said. "Quiet is expected."

"I know. But it’s not just the mourning. It’s—" Finn struggled for words. "Thorne. Nyra. Whatever her name is. She’s not here. She’s not here to shush us when we’re making too much noise. She’s not here to tell us to focus during training. She’s not here to roll her eyes at my jokes."

"You miss her," Marek said quietly.

"Of course I miss her. She’s our friend. She’s our roommate. She’s—" Finn’s voice caught. "She’s out there somewhere, alone, while we’re sitting here eating lunch like nothing happened."

"She’s not alone," Jasper said. "Corvin is with her. Wherever she is, he’s watching over her."

"How do you know that?"

"Because I know Corvin. And I know he would never abandon her." Jasper finally looked up from his book. "We all deal with grief differently. Corvin deals with it by taking action. By protecting the people he cares about. He’s been disappearing at night for weeks. He’s clearly in contact with her."

"And he hasn’t told us?" Finn’s voice rose with indignation. "We’re her friends too!"

"He’s protecting her. The fewer people who know where she is, the safer she is." Jasper paused. "It’s not a reflection of his trust in us. It’s a reflection of how dangerous the situation has become."

Finn slumped back in his chair. "I just want to know she’s okay."

"She’s okay," Marek said. "She has to be."

They sat in silence, the noise of the cafeteria flowing around them. Students from both academies mingled at the tables, their earlier tensions slowly giving way to the uneasy cooperation of the merger. But there was a heaviness in the air that hadn’t been there before the showcase. A sense that something had been lost that could never be recovered.

Then the doors swung open, and Selene walked in.

She moved through the cafeteria like a queen surveying her domain. Her Silvermoon uniform was immaculate. Her dark hair was arranged in an elaborate twist. Her amber eyes swept across the room with cold assessment, and every student she looked at quickly looked away.

She had moved into Soren’s suite three days ago. Everyone knew. And everyone was still processing what that meant.

"She acts like she owns the place," Finn muttered.

"She does own part of it now," Jasper said. "The board granted her request."

"The board is full of cowards."

Selene took a seat at the center of the cafeteria, her friends Celeste and Mira flanking her. She didn’t eat. She just sat there, her posture perfect, her expression serene, as if daring anyone to challenge her presence.

The remorse she had felt the day before had vanished. She had woken that morning and looked at herself in the mirror, and the guilt that had gnawed at her after reading Nyra’s letter had been replaced by something colder. Something harder. She had made mistakes. She had played a role in Soren’s death she could acknowledge that now, in the privacy of her own thoughts. But the real culprit was still Nyra Astrlyn. If Nyra had never come to the academy. If Nyra had never seduced Soren away from his duty. If Nyra had never existed Soren would still be alive.

If I could go back in time, Selene thought, her amber eyes fixed on the distant window, I would save Soren. And I would kill Nyra instead.

"Selene?" Mira’s voice broke through her thoughts. "Are you alright?"

"I’m fine," Selene said coolly. "Just thinking about the future."

"What about the future?"

Selene’s lips curved into a cold smile. "About how I’m going to win."