Chapter 25. Possessed by the Wolf

The stronghold had long since fallen into sleep. Its walls no longer echoed with footsteps or laughter, and most of its windows stood dark. Yet Mira moved through it as though the halls themselves had summoned her—her bare feet whispering over cool stone, her silk robe trailing faintly behind. Her hair hung loose, damp from the bath that had failed to soothe her nerves. Something inside her had simply snapped.

She had to escape the psychological battlefield of her chamber. The silence from Ismeria—once a relief—had grown into something far worse: the eerie calm before a storm. She told no one where she was going. There had been no plan, no intention to disobey. Only a desperate, primal need to breathe—to escape the walls, the weight of a thousand expectations, the constant war raging inside her own skin.

She passed beneath the archway leading into the gardens. The night air met her like a balm, cool and alive with the scent of rain-soaked earth and moonflowers. She pause