Chapter 37 Twenty Years of Preparation
The next morning, I called an emergency council meeting.
Every major figure in the Northern Kingdom attended. Alphas from allied packs. Betas who led our defences. Healers and scholars and warriors. They filled the great hall, confusion and concern written on their faces.
“Thank you for coming on such short notice,” I began, standing before them with Kael and Selene flanking me. “Last night, my daughter and I both experienced visions. Warnings about a threat that will emerge in approximately twenty years.”
Murmurs rippled through the crowd. Several wolves exchanged sceptical glances.
“What kind of threat?” Alpha Dominic West asked. He had never forgiven Selene for rejecting his marriage proposal years ago, and his voice dripped with doubt. “Another prophecy? More gods coming to test us?”
“Worse,” Selene said, stepping forward. “The Void Lords.”
The hall erupted. Some wolves had clearly heard the legends. Others demanded explanations. The noise level rose to chaos within seconds.
“SILENCE!” Kael’s alpha command crashed over the room like a physical force. Everyone stopped talking immediately. “Let her speak.”
Selene took a breath, her storm grey eyes scanning the assembled wolves. “The Void Lords are beings that existed before the gods. Entities of pure entropy and destruction. The gods imprisoned them aeons ago because they could not be killed. When I broke free from divine servitude twenty-one years ago, when I opened the door between worlds to save my father, I inadvertently let something notice. Let something see that the barriers between worlds could be weakened.”
“And they have been watching ever since,” I continued. “Waiting for the right moment. The right person. Someone with Shadow Queen power who they can manipulate or force to tear open their prison completely.”
“Who?” an older Beta demanded. “Who are they waiting for?”
I exchanged glances with Kael. We had discussed this. Debated whether to reveal everything or hold some details back. But secrets had nearly destroyed us before.
“My future granddaughter,” I said clearly. “A girl who will be born in approximately twenty years. She will carry Shadow Queen power through Selene’s bloodline and First Wolf abilities through mine. The Void Lords intend to use her as a doorway.”
The hall exploded again. This time with genuine fear.
“Then we prevent her birth,” someone shouted. “We make sure Marcus never has children with those bloodlines!”
“No.” Marcus’s voice rang out. He stood from where he had been sitting, barely fifteen but carrying himself with authority beyond his years. “You will not dictate who I love or whether I have children. That path leads to becoming exactly what we fought against.”
“The boy is right,” Elder Thaddeus said, his ancient voice cutting through the noise. “We do not prevent life out of fear. We prepare for life despite fear. That is what separates us from the gods who enslaved Selene. We choose. Always, we choose.”
“Then what is your plan?” Alpha Dominic challenged. “Wait twenty years and hope a child can fight beings that gods could only imprison?”
“No,” I said firmly. “We spent twenty years preparing her. Building defences. Gathering knowledge. Creating weapons and strategies and contingencies.” I gestured to Elder Thaddeus. “Our scholars will research everything about the Void Lords. Their nature. Their weaknesses. Anything that might be used against them.”
“Our warriors will train new techniques,” Lyra added, stepping forward. “Not just physical combat but mental discipline. Ways to resist corruption and manipulation. If the Void Lords try to control Marcus’s daughter, she will need an iron will.”
“Our healers will study Shadow Queen power,” Mora said. “Find ways to strengthen it without letting it consume its host. Selene has agreed to work with us, to help us understand what it means to carry such abilities safely.”
“And our allies,” Kael said, his voice carrying absolute authority, “will commit to supporting the Northern Kingdom when the time comes. This threat is not just ours. If the Void Lords escape, they will consume everything. Every pack. Every territory. Every living thing.”
“That is a large commitment to make based on visions,” Alpha Dominic said. “How do we know these visions are even real? That this is not some ploy to consolidate power?”
Before I could respond, the parasite stirred within Selene. The void swirled in her eyes as it took partial control.
“Because I have lived ten thousand years,” it said, its ancient voice resonating through the hall. “And I remember the Void Lords. I remember when they walked freely. I remember what they did to worlds before the gods imprisoned them.” The void in Selene’s eyes pulsed with something like fear. “Trust me when I say, if they escape, death will be merciful compared to what they will bring. Entropy does not just end life. It unravels existence itself. Unmakes reality. They will not kill you. They will make it so you never existed at all.”
The hall went deathly silent.
The void receded, leaving Selene pale and shaking.
“So yes,” she said in her own voice. “The threat is real. The timeline is real. And we have twenty years to prepare for something that terrifies beings older than gods themselves. The question is not whether you believe us. The question is whether you are brave enough to stand with us anyway.”
One by one, wolves began to kneel. First the Northern Kingdom pack members. Then allies from other territories. Even Alpha Dominic, after a long hesitation, dropped to one knee.
“We stand with you,” they said in unison. “Whatever comes. We stand together.”
Through the bond, I felt Kael’s relief. Felt Selene’s gratitude.
We had the first piece. Unity. Commitment. A kingdom and its allies are ready to face the impossible.
Now we just needed to figure out how to actually defeat beings that the gods had failed to kill.
That evening, I found myself back in the garden where the vision had shown me dying. The oak tree swayed gently in the breeze. Peaceful. Serene.
“You are thinking about the countdown,” Kael said, appearing beside me.
I looked at my palm where the mark pulsed. Twenty years, seven months, thirteen days now.
“I am thinking about how much I want to see her,” I admitted. “This granddaughter. This girl will carry so much weight. I want to meet her. Guide her. Help her.”
“But the visions show you dying before she is born.”
“Yes.” I leaned against him, drawing comfort from his solid presence. “Which means everything I want to teach her, I have to leave behind in other ways. In stories. In training methods. In the foundation we build now.”
“We will make sure she knows you,” Kael promised. “That even though you never met, you spent your final years preparing for her. Fighting for her. Loving her before she even existed.”
Through the bond with Selene, I felt her approaching. She joined us in the garden, sitting on the grass at our feet.
“I have been thinking about the training,” she said without preamble. “About what she will need to know. She will need to understand Shadow Queen power, obviously. How to walk between worlds without losing herself. But she will also need to understand choice. Free will. The thing that terrifies the Void Lords most.”
“Why would free will terrify them?” I asked.
“Because they are entropy. Pure causality. They exist to unmake things according to natural law. Dissolution. Decay. The inevitable end of all things.” Selene’s stormy grey eyes blazed. “But free will is anti-entropic. It is the ability to choose against the natural flow. To build instead of decay. To create instead of destroy. To love when logic says to hate.”
“So we teach her to choose,” Kael said slowly. “To embrace free will so completely that she becomes anathema to their very nature.”
“Exactly. But that is harder than it sounds.” Selene looked at me. “Mother, you know this. You survived father’s abuse because you refused to let him define you. Refused to accept that his cruelty was what you deserved. That refusal, that stubborn insistence on choosing yourself, saved you.”
“And you survived the gods the same way,” I said, understanding dawning. “By refusing to accept their definition of you. By insisting on choosing even when they tried to strip that ability away.”
“So our great niece will need to learn that same skill,” Selene continued. “But even more so. She will need such a strong sense of self that when the Void Lords try to unmake her, there is something so solid they cannot dissolve it.”
“How do you teach someone that?” Kael asked. “How do you give someone an unbreakable sense of self?”
“You cannot give it,” I said quietly. “She has to build it herself. Through experience. Through challenges. Through learning to choose in small ways before she faces the impossible choice.”
“Then we make sure her childhood is not easy,” Selene said. “Not cruel like yours, Mother. Not enslaved like mine. But not sheltered either. She needs to face difficulties. Make hard choices. Learn that she can survive challenges.”
“That will require convincing Marcus,” Kael said. “He will want to protect his daughter. Especially knowing what awaits her.”
“Then we start convincing him now,” I said. “We have twenty years. We use it to teach him how to be the father she needs. Protective but not smothering. Loving but not enabling. Present but not controlling.”
Through the bond with Selene, I felt her agreement.
This was going to be our life’s final work. Our greatest legacy. Preparing for a child we would never meet to face a threat we could barely comprehend.
The weeks turned into months.
Elder Thaddeus discovered ancient texts describing the Void Lords. He learned they could only fully manifest in our world through willing vessels. That forced possession lasted only minutes before the vessel’s body disintegrated from containing pure entropy.
“But a willing vessel?” he explained during one research session. “Someone who chooses to let them in? They could maintain that connection indefinitely. The vessel would become a permanent doorway.”
“So we make sure she never chooses that,” Lyra said. “We train her to resist. To refuse.”
“It is not that simple.” The parasite spoke through Selene. “The Void Lords are masters of manipulation. They will not simply ask. They will create situations where letting them in seems like the only option. The noble option. The loving option.”
“Like when I chose to become the gods’ instrument to save my parents,” Selene said, regaining control. “I thought I was making a heroic sacrifice. I had no idea I was playing into their hands.”
“Then we teach her to see through manipulation,” Mora suggested. “To question offers that seem too good. To understand that sometimes what looks like sacrifice is actually surrender.”
The months turned into years.
Marcus grew into a strong young man. At twenty, he met Elena, a gentle omega from the Eastern Territories. They courted for two years before mating.
I watched them fall in love and felt both joy and sorrow. Joy because they were genuine. Sorrow because I knew their daughter would face horrors neither could imagine.
“Should we tell them?” Kael asked one night after Marcus and Elena announced their mating ceremony date. “About what their future child will face?”
“Not yet,” I decided. “Let them have this joy. Let them start their life together without that shadow hanging over them. We will tell them when Elena becomes pregnant. When it becomes real rather than theoretical.”
The years continued to pass.
Selene travelled extensively, visiting every pack that would receive her. She taught wolves about freedom, about choice, about resisting control. But she also gathered information. Learned which packs would stand with us when the time came. Which ones were too weak or too corrupt to trust?
“Seventy per cent will help,” she reported after one long journey. “Twenty per cent are uncertain. Ten per cent will actively oppose us.”
“Why would anyone oppose stopping the Void Lords?” Marcus asked. He was twenty-three now, mated for a year, not yet expecting children.
“Because some wolves see entropy as natural,” Selene explained. “They believe all things should end. That fighting the inevitable is arrogance. They will welcome the Void Lords as agents of cosmic justice.”
“Then we mark those packs as enemies,” Lyra said grimly. “And prepare to defend against them as well as the Void Lords.”
At year five, Mora made a breakthrough in understanding Shadow Queen power.
“It is not just about walking between life and death,” she explained, showing us complex magical diagrams. “It is about existing in superposition. Being both mortal and immortal simultaneously. Both bound by reality and free from it. That paradox is what gives Shadow Queens their power.”
“And their vulnerability,” the parasite added through Selene. “Existing in superposition means they are always partially open to outside influence. Always vulnerable to beings that exist in similar states. Like the Void Lords.”
“So we need to teach her to control which state she exists in at any given moment,” I said, studying the diagrams. “To close herself off when necessary.”
“Precisely. But that level of control takes decades to develop. She will be vulnerable for years before she masters it.”
“Then we protect her during those years,” Kael said firmly. “Build physical defences. Magical wards. Whatever it takes.”
At year seven, I wrote my first letter to my future granddaughter.
Dear one,
You do not know me. By the time you read this, I will have been gone for years. But I want you to know that I loved you before you were born. That I spent the final years of my life preparing for you. Fighting for you.
You will face horrors I cannot fully imagine. Will carry burdens too heavy for anyone to bear alone. But remember this: you are not alone. You carry the strength of everyone who came before you. Your grandmother who survived abuse. Your aunt who survived divine enslavement. Your father who survived watching his sister being taken by the gods.
We survived because we chose to. Again and again, despite fear and pain and impossibility, we chose to keep going. You have that same choice. Always. No matter what the Void Lords promise or threaten or manipulate, you have the power to choose differently.
That is your greatest weapon. Not Shadow Queen power. Not First Wolf heritage. But the stubborn, defiant, absolutely human ability to say “no” when the universe demands “yes.”
Use it well.
With love you have not yet felt but which already surrounds you,
Your Grandmother Sera
I sealed it and gave it to Elder Thaddeus. “Make sure she receives this. When she is old enough to understand.”
At year ten, the mark on my palm reached the halfway point.
Ten years, seven months, thirteen days remaining.
I was fifty-two years old. Still healthy. Still strong. But I could feel time’s weight settling on me. Could feel my body beginning the slow process of ageing.
“You are thinking about death again,” Selene said. She had returned home for the winter, as she did every year.
“I am thinking about how much I want to finish this,” I admitted. “How much I want to see her safe before I go.”
“You will not. The visions are clear.” Selene’s voice held sorrow but also acceptance. “You will die peacefully, surrounded by love, before she even faces danger. That is your ending. The question is whether you can accept it.”
“I do not know,” I said honestly. “How do you accept leaving a fight unfinished? Leaving someone you love unprotected?”
“By trusting that what you built was strong enough,” Selene said. “By believing that the foundation matters more than being there for the final battle.”
Through our bond, I felt her certainty. She had made peace with this years ago. Now I needed to make peace with it too.
At year twelve, Elena became pregnant.
Marcus came to tell us with joy and terror mixed equally on his face.
“It is a girl,” he said, his voice shaking. “Mora confirmed it. A daughter. Our daughter.”
Through the bonds, I felt Kael’s surge of emotion. Felt Selene’s complex mixture of hope and dread.
This was it. The countdown was real. The threat was real. The girl we had been preparing for was finally becoming a reality.
“Congratulations,” I said, pulling Marcus into an embrace. “You are going to be a wonderful father.”
“I am terrified,” he admitted. “Knowing what she will face. Knowing I have to raise her for something I cannot fully protect her from.”
“Then love her fiercely,” I said. “Give her the strongest foundation possible. And trust that when her time comes, she will be ready. Because she will have us. All of us. Our strength. Our love. Our stubborn refusal to give up.”
“What if that is not enough?”
“Then she will do what we have always done,” Selene said, joining our embrace. “She will make it enough. She will find a way. Because that is what our family does. We find ways.”
Eight years, seven months remaining.
My granddaughter was growing in her mother’s womb.
And somewhere beyond, the Void Lords waited.
Patient.
Hungry.
Ready.