Chapter 208 NOOSE

Chapter 208 NOOSE
Sargis pov
The pressure vanished like a noose cut loose. One moment, my veins felt as though molten fire was tearing through them, my skull splitting with that incessant screech the witches had cursed us with, and the next, silence. Breath crashed into my lungs so violently that it doubled me forward. My claws tore lines into the marble as the haze peeled back. My senses cleared in a rush, and every sound slammed into me at once, the clang of steel, the snarls of my wolves, and the wet gurgle of dying vampires. And standing before me, faltering for the first time, was Monohue.
His grin had slipped, if only for a heartbeat, the arrogant gleam in his silvery eyes dulled by surprise. "Well, well," I rasped, forcing the smirk that burned through the ache still humming in my bones. "Seems your little parlor tricks don't bite as hard without your witches shielding you."
The sneer came back instantly, fangs glinting as he tilted his head. "Do not mistake reprieve for victory, dog. What you just tasted was a glimpse of what's to come. We are the tide. You are the shore, worn thin, waiting to vanish."
I straightened, rolling my shoulders, letting the crack of bone and muscle carry through the chaos.
"Funny," I retorted, circling him, eyes locked on his. "For a tide, you seem to have stopped at my feet."
He laughed.
"Cocky to the very end. They said the Lycan King was dangerous, but I expected more than a bleeding beast clinging to bravado." His boots clicked over broken stone as he mirrored my circle. "You've ruled too long. And now you're blind and indulgent. Your throne is dust, and your wolves nothing more than lambs waiting to be slaughtered."
I let him talk because under the arrogance, I was watching every shift of his weight, the coil of muscle in his jaw, and the twitch of his hand.
"Is that what you tell yourself," I poked, "to make up for the centuries of hiding in shadows?"
His eyes flared, and in the next heartbeat, he moved.
Faster than I'd expected.
Claws and fangs, shadow-wrapped, slammed against me with enough force to rattle the marble beneath our feet. My body snapped with the impact, and my arms stretched to hold him back. The smirk never left my lips even as blood flooded my mouth.
He wasn't all talk.
Monohue was strong.
His strike came again like a storm. One moment, there was space, the next, his claws were tearing for my throat. I ducked, but his shadow lashed out behind the swipe, hooking me across the ribs like a whip.
I retaliated before thought could catch up, my fist shot upward, knuckles cracking against his jaw with a satisfying crunch. His head snapped back, spit and blood spraying, but his grin didn't falter. He licked his lips like it was wine.
" Is that all you've got?" he taunted.
I lunged, claws out, sinking them into his shoulder, tearing through leather and skin. He snarled but didn't falter, he twisted into the wound, his other hand coming up to rake across my chest. My roar shook the chandeliers overhead.
We slammed into each other again, claw meeting claw, fangs snapping so close I could taste his breath. Every strike was an earthquake, the stone beneath us fractured, and the walls groaned under the force. He drove me back a step, then I shoved forward, digging my strength from every ounce of fury that still burned hot for Narine and my people.
But Monohue didn't break.
He matched me.
Every punch I threw, he caught and twisted. Every kick I landed, he absorbed, answering with one that rattled bone. His shadows surged like living things, wrapping around his arms and chest, weaving into claws that struck with the force of steel. I tore them apart, ripping through black tendrils that hissed like smoke, but more always came.
His laughter grated on my ears. "This is your king? A beast clinging to instinct?" He slammed his forehead into mine. Pain detonated in my skull, stars bursting across my vision. "You will kneel before me before the night is done!"
I spat blood into his face. "Over my dead body."
We crashed into a column, the marble splitting like bone under our combined weight. His fangs snapped toward my throat, and I jammed my forearm between his teeth, hot blood spilling as they sank into me. With my other hand, I raked down his side, feeling ribs crack under my claws.
He howled, whether from rage or delight, I couldn't tell. Then he slammed his knee into my gut, driving the air from my lungs, doubling me for a fraction of a second. He seized it, hurling me across the hall. I smashed through a banquet table, splinters and shattered goblets raining down, and my body screamed with impact.
I staggered up, spitting crimson.
"You picked the wrong palace to crawl into."
His form rippled, shadows coiling higher. "No," he growled, spreading his arms wide. "This night was written in blood long before you drew your first breath. The age of Lycans dies now."
We charged.
The sound of claws ripping air, stone cracking, and the boom of flesh colliding with flesh shook the palace. Every blow tore skin, shattered bone, and spilled blood. We were titans locked in ruin, neither willing to yield.
But arrogance leaves trails.
I started to see the way his shoulders always twitched before he unleashed the shadows, the way his left foot dragged a fraction slower when he lunged. The tilt of his jaw and the widening of his pupils.
I met his next strike and caught it. His claws sank into my forearm, shredding skin, but I didn't let go. I yanked him forward and drove my head into his nose. The crack split the air, his blood spraying warm across my face.
He staggered. I pressed.
Every move I had studied in the space between pain and breath, I used. His swing to the ribs? I stepped into it, twisting under, driving my claw through his side until I felt cartilage give. His shadow strike? I ducked low, sweeping his legs from under him, sending him crashing to the fractured marble.
I was on him before he could rise. I hammered my fist against his face again and again, each blow heavier, faster, and fueled by the kind of fury that burns through marrow. He tried to block, but I wrenched his arm back until it snapped. His scream rattled the chandeliers overhead.
"You thought you could end Lycans?" I snarled. I hauled him up by the throat, his feet dangling off the ground, his shadows flailing uselessly around us.
His hands clawed at mine, blood bubbling from his mouth. Still, that damned smirk tried to twitch onto his face.
I squeezed harder. His body thrashed, his movements losing rhythm, and his arrogance crumbled under sheer, merciless force.
For the first time, I saw Fear.
With a roar that tore from the depths of my wolf, I slammed him back into the ground so hard the stone cratered beneath his skull. His scream broke into a choke.
I stood over him, chest heaving, and claws dripping red.
"You overestimated yourself, Monohue," I growled, fangs bared. "And you underestimated me."
I pressed my claws tighter to his throat, pinning him into the fractured stone.
I could feel her.
That unshakable pull through the bond, tugging at the marrow of my bones. She was close. Too close. The air itself seemed to change with her nearness.
I clenched my teeth so hard my jaw screamed, forcing down the guttural growl that rose in my throat. I wanted her safe, guarded, and untouched by this ruin. I wanted her shielded from the horrors of war and the stench of death.
"Stay back, Narine," I whispered under my breath, though she wasn't here yet. "Please, not this."
Monohue gurgled a laugh beneath my hand, dark eyes burning even through the blood streaking his face. "Ah," he rasped, lips twisting. "You feel her, don't you? She comes."
I stiffened.
His laugh started as a wheeze, then rolled until it spilled into the ruined room. "She runs to you, Sargis. Little Luna, with her heart wild with hope. Does she know? Does she know the beast you cradle inside that gilded chest?"
"Enough," I growled, tightening my grip.
But he only wheezed louder, tremors of mirth shuddering through his broken body. "About time," Monohue hissed, blood slicking his teeth. "The fates are kind. She will see what you are before she ever wears your crown."
"Shut your mouth."
His eyes glinted. "Phase two starts now."
My gut clenched.
"Witches!" Monohue roared, his voice cracking into the sky like lightning. "Now is the time, strike!"
A shiver rolled through the shadows. Wisps of smoke curled from the fissures in the ground, carrying whispers in a language older than the mountains.
And beneath it, footsteps were closing the last stretch of hall toward the broken doors.
"No," I breathed. "Narine... turn back. Please."
Monohue's grin widened. "She'll watch you die, Sargis."
I bared my fangs, ready to rip the sound from his throat, when the shattered archway behind me flared with pale gold light. The scent of moonfire and wild roses washed over the ruin, cutting through the reek of blood.
Narine stepped through the smoke.
For one suspended heartbeat, the world held its breath, and her wide eyes found mine across the wreckage.
All three of them.
The familiar two were the darkest shade of red I had ever seen, limned with threads of blue fire that danced like veins of lightning across a storm-torn sky. The third, set like a jewel in the center of her brow, pulsed with an eerie radiance. The entire socket was drowned in ink-black shadow, yet the iris burned molten. Neither flame nor light, yet somehow more primal than both.
The ruin around us seemed to contract. Broken walls that moments ago loomed now felt like mere stage props, unworthy to stand behind her. The spatters of blood on my claws looked suddenly vulgar, as though violence itself should lower its eyes in her presence.
Monohue went silent beneath my hand, his defiance faltering into a slack-jawed stare. Even the whispering witches stilled.
I swallowed hard, the weight of her presence pressing into my chest until it felt like a second heartbeat. "Gods," I heard myself murmur, barely aware the word had left my mouth.
She stood utterly still, yet the air bent around her, rippling like heat off sun-scorched stone. She looked untouchable and untethered to the ruin beneath her feet. The glow from her third eye spilled across her face, scattering over shattered masonry like moonfire on black water. She was... no, is..the embodiment of some ancient myth, breathtaking, and terrifyingly divine.
A shudder rolled through Monohue.
"So it's true," he croaked, staring up at her with equal parts wonder and hatred. "The little Luna is Aeryna reborn."