Chapter 7. The Alpha’s Claim

Mira pushed the shop door closed, the familiar click of the latch offering no comfort. The memory of Kaelen’s grim face and the urgent political demand for her return, which she had accidentally overheard in the town square earlier, left her shaken. She desperately needed a strong sedative.

Her head pounded—not with a dull ache, but with a frantic, internal drumbeat that she now recognized as the sound of the Moonfire magic tearing at the binding.

The relief she felt near Kaelen had vanished the moment she left the camp, replaced by suffocating pressure and the terrifying knowledge that the pain was a beacon drawing Magnus’s hunters closer. She had to quiet it, now.

She gathered her basket, pulling her hood low. She was drawn to the familiar, dangerous quiet of the woods, compelled by the desperate, physical need to find the specific herbs that might grant her even a temporary reprieve.

The grove lay silver-drenched and still when she slipped into it, drawn b