Chapter 17 "Between Two Moons"
The moons hang heavy to night.
Twin mirror of silver and frost, watching the world like the eyes of gods that never sleeps.
I stand on the balcony of the silver keep,wind tearing through my hair,the scent of night and iron through the air.Below,the silverfang wolf sprowl through the courtyard__restless, uneasy.They can feel it too.
The pull.The shift.The thread that hums somewhere beyond the veil.
Her heartbeat.
It comes in weaves__soft at first,like the whispers of water against stone,then sharper, tugging at the core of me until my chest aches.For years i thought it was gone,the bond severed when the old gate collapsed .
But last night,I felt her.A pulse through the tether I thought time had buried.
Elera.
The name tastes like light. Like a memory of warmth I can’t fully remember but can’t stop chasing.
Kael stirs within me—my wolf, my shadow self. His voice rumbles through my bones, deep and ancient.
She’s calling, Aiden.
“I know,” I murmur. “But how? The gate’s been sealed for a generation.”
It’s opening. The moons never lie.
He’s right. The double moons never rise unless the veil between worlds thins. The last time it happened, blood filled these halls.
Behind me, the door creaks open. My second-in-command, Thorne, steps into the light, his silver armor catching the moonshine. He’s older than me, but his loyalty runs deeper than blood.
“You’ve felt it too,” he says. It’s not a question.
I nod. “The tether is waking.”
Thorne’s jaw tightens. “Then we have little time. The council will not want you near the gate.”
“They never do,” I reply bitterly.
He steps closer, lowering his voice. “If she’s the one they spoke of—the Moonbound—then her awakening could unbalance everything we’ve built. The rogues are already stirring in the north. If they sense the gate’s weakness—”
“They’ll come for her,” I finish for him. “And for me.”
The words fall heavy between us.
I turn back toward the horizon, where the twin moons hover like open eyes. I can feel her presence flickering just beyond the edge of the world, a light trying to find its way home. Every instinct in me screams to go to her. To cross whatever barrier dares to keep her away.
But the gate demands blood. And last time, it demanded hers.
A memory flashes—a field of white fire, Elera standing at its center, her eyes wide with terror and power. I remember shouting her name as the light swallowed her whole, ripping her from this world. That was the day the gate sealed. That was the day I swore never to love again.
And yet here I am, chasing a ghost through starlight.
Kael growls softly. You could open the gate again.
“It would destroy the balance,” I whisper.
Or restore it. You’ve always been afraid of what’s meant to be.
“I’m not afraid,” I lie.
Then prove it.
The chamber door bursts open again—this time with the sharp click of heels. Councilor Maera strides in, draped in black silk and moonstone jewelry. Her eyes are the color of cold rivers, calculating and unreadable.
“Your Majesty,” she says smoothly, bowing only slightly. “The council requests your presence. Urgently.”
“Let me guess,” I say. “They’ve felt the surge.”
“Of course they have. The whole realm has. The Moonveil is stirring.” She studies me for a beat too long. “You’ve felt her, haven’t you?”
I say nothing.
Her lips curve in something like pity. “You can’t let sentiment blind you again, Aiden. The last time you followed that bond, we nearly lost our realm.”
“And if that bond is what saves it this time?”
She narrows her eyes. “Or destroys it. The Moonbound was never meant to return. If she awakens fully, her power could collapse the veil entirely.”
I step closer. “Or it could heal it. We don’t know which. But I will not sit here while the world decides for me.”
“Then you’re defying the council?”
“I’m defying fate,” I say, and the words taste like freedom.
Her composure falters for a second—just a second—before she masks it again. “You’ll doom us all.”
I turn away. “No. I’ll bring her home.”
She leaves in silence, her perfume lingering like a warning.
Thorne exhales slowly. “You really mean to cross, don’t you?”
“If the gate opens again, yes.”
“Then you’ll need the Heartstone,” he says.
I stiffen. “It’s sealed.”
“So was she.”
The Heartstone. The ancient relic of the Silverfang line. Said to bridge souls across realms—once used to bind Aiden’s ancestors to their Lunas. It was buried with my father, forbidden to be touched again after the last war.
I meet Thorne’s gaze. “You’ll come with me?”
He smirks faintly. “Until the moons fall.”
Later that night, I stand alone in the crypt beneath the keep. The air is thick with the scent of stone and ancient ash. My footsteps echo off marble wolves that guard the tombs of our ancestors. At the far end, the sarcophagus of my father glimmers faintly under moonlight filtering through the stained glass ceiling.
I kneel beside it and press my palm to the cold stone. “Forgive me,” I whisper. “But you of all wolves should know—some bonds aren’t meant to die.”
A pulse answers beneath my hand. The stone shifts. Light spills through the cracks, warm and alive, coiling around my fingers. The Heartstone rises slowly from the tomb—an orb of molten silver, pulsing like a heartbeat.
It recognizes me. It recognizes her.
Kael howls within me, a deep echo that rattles the crypt. Take it. She’s waiting.
When my fingers close around it, a rush of power floods through me. My vision explodes with flashes—Elera’s face, her eyes wide with wonder, her lips forming my name. I see her standing in a forest not of this world, moonlight dripping through her hair like liquid silver.
She turns, as if hearing something, and for one impossible moment, her gaze meets mine through the veil.
A single tear slips down her cheek—and mine mirrors it.
The bond locks in place, burning through every vein. I hear her voice, faint but clear.
Aiden?
My heart stops. “Elera?”
The light around the Heartstone flares. You feel it too, she whispers, the same words that reached her in her world.
I fall to my knees, breath shuddering. “Where are you?”
Her voice trembles like wind through leaves. I don’t know. But I’m coming back.
And then—silence.
The stone dims. The connection fades, but the bond remains, pulsing steady and sure. She’s alive. She’s reaching for me.
I rise slowly, gripping the Heartstone against my chest.
The time for waiting is over.
When the moons align again, I’ll open the gate.
And this time—nothing will take her from me.