••{EROS'S POV}••
For two months, I dreamt of this moment.
Every night since Garrick rode north, I saw it the same way.
The gates opening. The banners drifting in the wind. His horse crossing the threshold of the palace with victory in its stride.
In my dreams, he dismounts with purpose. He kneels before me and says the words I ache to hear.
"The Lycans will stand with us."
Every night, I wake from those dreams with my heart racing, clinging to them like a drowning man clings to driftwood.
And now he stands before me in the flesh.
The courtyard stretches wide and sunlit. The banners of Astragarde ripple above us. The guards line the stone edges. Rayn stands at my right. Jesenya at my left. Teramon slightly behind me, steady and watchful.
Garrick rides toward us.
For a single, fragile heartbeat, hope surges so fiercely inside me that it almost hurts. My chest feels too tight to contain it.
