Chapter 14. The Ashen Bond

Neriah awoke before dawn, unrest already threading through her veins. The thin light leaking through the shutters painted her chamber in bands of bruised silver. She lay on her cot and watched dust turning in the cold air. Sleep had become a stranger in recent nights: every time her eyes closed, she slipped into dreams of burning forests and howling wolves, of voices chanting her name in languages she only half-understood.

The Council’s summons had come yesterday, delivered by a courser with hollow eyes and a trembling hand. Four words, pressed into black wax: “Moon Temple. Judgment. Dusk.”

She’d barely spoken since. Maybe she thought silence could stave off fate.

Now, wrapped in her old cloak with the frayed wolf’s-head clasp, she stood at her window, watching the world thaw. The camp was a patchwork of tents and smoldering fires, wolves moving like pale wraiths through the morning mist. She saw Kalen organizing the night watch, saw the blacksmith’s apprentices ha