Page 51 of Gua rdian of Blood and Shadow

A smile curved his lips. “So direct. I wonder… Are you as direct in all things?” He stepped closer, deliberately provocative. “And as stupid? The last High Queen, prophesied savior, and you walk straight into my stronghold with only a single guardian?” He clicked his tongue. “Your mother would be ashamed.”

At the mention of my mom, something flickered at the edge of my vision—a shimmer of smoky light that disappeared when I tried to focus on it.

“I came to make a deal, not to fight,” I said, moonlight pulsing beneath my skin as divine power stirred. “Assuming you’re interested in breaking the curse. If you’re not…” I turned partway, sending a meaningful glance back at the portal.

Something flashed in Veris’s eyes—surprise quickly masked. “Interesting.” He circled us slowly, like a wolf assessing his quarry. His guards, or commanders, or whatever they were, maintained their positions with mechanical precision. “You astound me, young queen, and that is something that rarely happens.”

Veris stopped directly before me, with only Javier between us. The family resemblance to Bastian faded up close, Veris’s cold calculation supplanting the physical similarities.

“I must admit,” Veris said, his voice dropping lower, “I’m curious about what my son sees in you. What made him betray his bloodline, his heritage?” His gaze traveled over me again, lingering in ways that made Javier’s muscles bunch beneath my fingers. “Though I can appreciate the physical appeal.” He rubbed his fingertips over his lips suggestively.

The crude implication made bile rise in my throat. This was a test, a deliberate provocation designed to reveal weaknesses he could exploit.

“Your son chose love over hatred,” I said steadily. “He chose building something new over clinging to ancient grievances. You could learn a thing or two from him, unless you’d rather let the curse continue to erode your power and destroy your people.”

Something flickered across Veris’s features at the mention of the curse—a tightening around his eyes that told me I’d struck a chord. Through the cracks in his control, I glimpsed genuine concern.

He laughed, masking his reaction, the sound devoid of humor but carrying tension. “Love. Such a human concept. Useful for manipulation, but hardly worth sacrificing power for.” His amber eyes hardened. “Though I shouldn’t be surprised. The boy’s mother was equally sentimental before, well…”

The silver shimmer in my peripheral vision grew stronger—a ghost attempting to manifest, fighting the suppression and expulsion wards.

“Come,” Veris said abruptly, turning away with casual confidence. “We have much to discuss, and I prefer more comfortable surroundings for important conversations.” He walked back toward the arched doorway, his guards parting before him.

Javier’s hand found mine, our fingers intertwining. “Proceed with caution, my Luna,” he whispered, barely audible. “Veris has always been duplicitous.”

As we followed the shifter king deeper into his stronghold, my mother’s moonstone ring heated on my finger, like she was sending me a warning from beyond the grave.

Each step deeper into the Sun Keep brought me closer to Gavin but also intensified that troubling sense of wrongness. The shadow taint grew stronger in the stone around us, no longer just faint traces in manganese veins but a subtle corruption permeating the walls themselves. So subtle that I might have missed it if I hadn’t been looking, if I hadn’t already felt it in Reiji’s magic.

I caught Javier’s eye, wondering if he sensed it too, but his expression remained carefully neutral, revealing nothing to our enemies. The air felt heavier here, each breath coating my lungs with something that wasn’t quite physical but wasn’t purely magical either. Something in-between.

I thumbed the back of the moonstone ring, seeking a connection to a woman whose choices I only partially understood. The curse had been a shield against something worse. I knew that. What if breaking it was exactly what the Shadow King wanted?

But as Gavin’s presence intensified through our bond, his pain echoing through me like a physical wound, I pushed those doubts away. The Shadow King was already breaking through. The time for caution was over. The ancient bargain of the curse had served its purpose—had bought us centuries—but that time was ending.

We continued deeper into the Sun Keep, moving through corridors and descending stairs that seemed to go on forever, the shadow taint growing stronger with each level. The stone beneath my feet felt almost alive, pulsing with corrupted power that reached hungry tendrils toward me.

My consorts’ blood within me responded, fueling my moonlight, pushing back against that reaching shadow.

For a moment, I saw it clearly—what breaking the curse would mean. The shifters unshackled but fully exposed to the Shadow King’s corruption. Their golden light of transformation struck through with shadow taint. How long would it take to set in? Would I notice it within Bastian right away?

The moonstone burned hotter against my skin, a silent plea from a mother who couldn’t speak. A warning I couldn’t fully understand.

But we had passed the point of caution. If the Shadow King was already breaking through, perhaps the only way forward was to tear down all the barriers between us and to face him directly. To confront the darkness that had been seeping into our world for centuries rather than continuing to patch the holes.

I clenched my hand into a fist, the moonstone’s heat spreading up my arm. The curse had to be broken, consequences be damned. Gavin had to be freed. The queens rescued. My harem whole.

And as I followed Veris into what felt like the very heart of darkness, I wondered if I was walking in my mom’s footsteps, making the same terrible choice she had made.

Was I sacrificing everything for a future I wouldn’t even live to see?

30

Verisledusdeeperinto his stronghold, each step carrying us farther from escape and closer to an endgame I supposed I had been running from in one way or another for thirty years, since fleeing from the Moon Sanctuary.

The corridor widened into a vast chamber that could only be described as a war room. A massive circular table dominated the center, carved with an intricate topographical map of the Olympic Peninsula—the location of the Sun Keep—with various places marked by small, engraved medallions of polished metal, gleaming like dark pewter with subtle silver undertones. Manganese, if I wasn’t mistaken, though it was impossible to sense any shadow taint within the small pieces of the metal when surrounded by the expansive manganese deposits in the earth.

Arched windows lined one wall, but instead of glass, they displayed a view of a rough rock wall, deep gray cut through by streaks of dull, metallic manganese that caught the light like veins of tarnished silver.

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