Selene stood surrounded.
The rogue wolves moved silently, circling her like predators around fresh prey. Some were in half-shift — claws extended, fangs glinting under the moonlight. They didn't growl. They didn't need to.
They were waiting for Nerya's command.
But Selene kept her blade raised, steady in her grip. Her heart thudded in her chest, but she didn't let it show.
She met Nerya's eyes.
"If you wanted me dead," Selene said, "you would've sent one of them. Not come yourself."
Nerya tilted her head slightly. "You still think this is about you?"
"You lured me here. After all this time. Why?"
Nerya took a step closer, her boots crunching over blackened stone. Her wolves held their ground, still as statues.
"I wanted you to see what you left behind," she said. "Not the ruins. Not the ashes. Me."
Selene's grip tightened.
"I didn't know you were alive, Nerya."
"Then you should have made sure."
The words landed like a slap.
Selene's voice softened. "I burned for what happened. I thought about that day every time I closed my eyes."
"I was that day," Nerya whispered. "You got to move on. I had to become something else to survive."
She stepped aside, revealing the altar behind her. Atop it lay a map. Torn, bloodstained, and burned along the edges. Selene recognized it instantly.
The Council's hidden fortifications.
Her throat tightened. "Where did you get that?"
Nerya didn't answer. Her fingers grazed the map, gently.
"I've spent years picking apart the pieces. Trading my blood for whispers. Spying on the Council that tried to kill me. And I found something. Something you need to see."
Selene didn't lower her blade, but she stepped forward cautiously.
Nerya unfurled another scroll beneath the map — an old military ledger. Names. Coordinates. Marks of the dead and the disappeared.
She pointed to a name halfway down.
Selene Greystone – Deceased.
Selene stared.
Her own name. Crossed out. Dated a year after the fire.
"I went digging," Nerya said. "The Council didn't just abandon us. They covered it up. Said you died in the fire along with me. Said we were traitors."
Selene's mouth went dry.
"That's not possible."
"It's written in their own records."
Selene took the scroll in trembling hands. The paper crackled under her grip.
All this time, she thought she'd left the Council. But the truth was worse — she'd been erased.
"Why would they lie?" she whispered.
Nerya's eyes glinted.
"Because the fire wasn't an accident."
Selene looked up.
Nerya's expression was unreadable. "They sent us in knowing we'd burn."
Selene sat on a broken pillar hours later, the scroll still in her hands.
The rogue wolves had retreated into the shadows, giving them space. Nerya hadn't attacked. Not yet. Maybe she was waiting to see what Selene would do.
Selene's thoughts ran wild.
She remembered the mission briefing — vague orders, no intel, a push to take the Hollow at dawn. She'd questioned it at the time, but she'd been loyal. She followed orders.
And it got her team killed.
Got Nerya…
Changed.
She looked up at the woman she once called sister. Nerya was standing at the edge of the ruin, watching the trees like a hawk.
"You're building something," Selene said quietly.
Nerya didn't look back. "I'm burning something."
"The Council?"
Nerya nodded. "And everything tied to them."
Selene rose. "And what about the packs? The innocents caught in the middle?"
"Collateral."
Selene flinched. "That's not you."
"It is now."
Selene stepped closer. "You can still walk away."
Nerya turned, eyes dark.
"I walked away once," she said. "It cost me everything."
Selene's blade was still sheathed at her side. But her body was tense, ready.
"I can't let you do this," she said.
"You can't stop me."
They stood in silence, years of friendship and betrayal stretched thin between them. Then Nerya whispered, "If you try… I won't show mercy again."
Selene met her gaze.
"I won't need it."
She left the Hollow before dawn.
No one followed.
But the moment she stepped back into the trees, she felt the weight on her shoulders grow heavier. She had proof now. Names. Dates. Orders.
The fire wasn't fate. It was planned.
The Council would pay for what they'd done. But Nerya… She wasn't sure which side her old friend truly belonged to anymore. Or if there was still a way to save her from herself.