The sky over the Obsidian Flats was no longer dark. It was a bruised, pulsating grey, the atmosphere thick with the smell of approaching snow and ozone. The "Great Stasis" was beginning. The wind had died down to a deathly calm, and the very sand seemed to freeze in mid-air. In this eerie stillness, the sound of marching boots echoed across the black glass like a rhythmic heartbeat of doom.
Silas stood at the mouth of the canyon, his form a jagged silhouette against the dim light. He had traded his tunic for the heavy plates of the Shadow-Guard, but the metal groaned as his muscles expanded, fueled by the restless solar energy in his veins. Behind him, the army of the Nameless waited—a thousand eyes glowing with a mixture of terror and fanaticism.
"They aren't using the passes," Silas growled, his voice carrying through the mind-link. "The High Arbiter has used the Silver Bridge. They're coming through the veil itself."
A tear appeared in the sky, a jagged crack of pure, blinding moonlight. From the rift, a white-clad army descended, led by a man whose presence made the very earth shudder. He was not wearing the robes of a priest, but the battle-scarred hide of a Great Wolf.
Ava stepped forward from the tent, her hand resting on the hilt of a dagger she had forged from obsidian and her own blood. She looked at the leader of the approaching host, and her heart turned to ice.
"Father," she whispered.
Lord Kaelen of the Rogue Wastes did not look like a monster. He looked like a king. His silver hair was pulled back in a severe braid, and his eyes—the same grey as Ava's used to be—were as cold as the frost on a grave. He stopped ten paces from the canyon entrance, his gaze sweeping over the "monsters" Ava had gathered with a look of profound disgust.
"Ava," Kaelen said, his voice a smooth, cultured baritone that carried a lethal edge. "You have caused quite a disturbance for a girl who was supposed to die in the snow."
"I survived, Father," Ava said, her voice steady, though her hands were shaking beneath her cloak. "No thanks to the mercy you never had."
"I did you a favor," Kaelen snapped, taking a step forward. Silas moved to intercept him, his growl vibrating in the ground, but Kaelen didn't even glance at him. "I tried to prune a dying branch before it could infect the tree. And now look at you. You have sold your soul to a Blackwood butcher and stolen a power that will set the world on fire. Do you have any idea what the Council will do to the Northern Territories to get to you?"
"The Council is afraid," Ava countered, her amber eyes beginning to glow. "And so are you. You didn't come here to save the world, Kaelen. You came here because the Arbiter promised you my child as a sacrifice to keep your own seat at the table."
Kaelen's expression didn't change, but his aura flared—a crushing, suffocating weight of ancient lunar power. "The child is an abomination. It is a solar parasite that will drain the life from our kind. I will not have my bloodline remembered as the one that birthed the Eclipse."
He raised a hand, and the white wolves behind him shifted in unison. The air was suddenly filled with the sound of snapping bone and fur erupting through skin.
"Kill the outcasts," Kaelen commanded. "Bring me the girl. If the child survives the extraction, it belongs to the Arbiter. If not... at least the sun will stay dead."
The clash was a symphony of chaos.
The Nameless met the High Pack warriors in a collision that shattered the obsidian ground. Silas was a whirlwind of violence, his Solar Wolf form flickering in and out of existence as he fought with a desperation he had never known. He wasn't fighting for a pack or a throne; he was fighting to keep the man in the white hide away from his wife.
But Kaelen was a High Lord of the Wastes for a reason. He moved like a shadow, his claws slicing through Ava's defenders as if they were made of paper. He bypassed the front lines, his eyes fixed solely on Ava.
Ava didn't run. She stood her ground, the Silver Veil on her skin beginning to pulse with a violent, rhythmic light.
"You think you know power?" Ava screamed as Kaelen lunged at her.
She slammed her hand into the ground. A shockwave of pure solar heat erupted from the earth, turning the obsidian glass into molten lava. Kaelen was forced back, his boots charring, his face contorted in a snarl.
"The sun doesn't belong to you!" Kaelen roared, shifting into a massive, silver-white wolf.
He pounced, his weight slamming Ava into the black rock. His jaws snapped inches from her throat, his hot, metallic breath filling her lungs. Ava struggled, her hands gripping his fur, the gold light from her palms scorching his neck.
Through the chaos, she felt a sudden, icy calm from her womb.
"He is not your father, Mother," the unborn child's voice whispered, clearer than ever. "He is just a shadow afraid of the morning. Burn him."
Ava didn't use her hands. She used her spirit.
A pillar of fire erupted from her chest, a direct beam of solar energy that hit Kaelen point-blank. The silver wolf was thrown back across the canyon, his fur smoking, his ribs shattered. He shifted back into his human form, coughing up blood, his eyes wide with a sudden, agonizing realization.
"You... you aren't using the Solar Heart," Kaelen wheezed, struggling to sit up. "You are the Solar Heart."
"I am the daughter of the woman you murdered," Ava said, walking toward him, her steps leaving glowing footprints in the ash. "I am the Luna of the Blackwood. And I am the end of your legacy."
She raised her hand, the obsidian dagger glowing white-hot. But before she could strike, a massive, silver-tipped arrow whistled through the air, embedding itself in the ground between them.
The sky tore open again.
The High Arbiter himself stepped out of the rift, draped in armor made of frozen moonlight. He didn't look at Kaelen; he looked at Ava with a hunger that was purely predatory.
"Enough of this family squabble," the Arbiter said, his voice sounding like the grinding of glaciers. "The Lord of the Wastes has failed. Now, the Moon shall take what is hers."
He raised a silver staff, and the ground beneath Ava began to turn to ice. Silas tried to reach her, but he was pinned down by a dozen Ancient Hounds—beings of pure shadow that didn't die when he bit them.
"Ava!" Silas roared, his voice breaking.
The Arbiter pointed his staff at Ava's stomach. "The Solar Child will be born in the silver halls of the Council, or he will be born dead. The choice is yours, little star."