Chapter 145: Junhera

Bailey

The moon is only beginning to rise, a pale silver curve breaking through the edge of the sky, and I hate how beautiful it looks compared to what waits down here below. Beauty feels like a betrayal on nights like this.

I move with Rian and the alchemists in wolf form across the edge of the gathered forces, my satchel shifting against my shoulder with each step as I try not to think about the baby I have left behind at home.

But I think about him anyway. I never stop thinking about Jericho. He should be in my arms, warm and safe, not miles away where I can’t reach him.

I hated leaving him more than I hate anything else in existence. That pain lives in my chest like something permanent, even when I force myself to breathe through it, even when I remind myself that this is war and there was no other choice.

I know the Moon Goddess is watching over him. She will keep him safe until I return. I tell myself that over and over, like a vow I repeat until it becomes stronger than the fear.

She is watching over Rian too. She is watching over me. And She is watching all eight allied packs gathered beneath Her rising light. She’s guiding and protecting all who have come to stand against Junhera’s darkness.

Tonight is not just another battle. It is the night everything changes. The evil magic inside Junhera has reigned for too long, but it won’t last much longer. Tonight, we will ambush them. Tonight, we will destroy what has been growing in the darkness.

The moon rises higher, and the mind-link tightens as the Alphas begin to speak to each other.

Rian’s voice comes through, strong and commanding. “Silverhide warriors, alchemists, and healers, listen closely,” he commands through the link. “The south side warriors will move south with Silverpeak and Silverfang,” he continues. “The remaining warriors will move north with Stonebend and Veilglo.”

Around me, wolves begin to break into their assigned directions. The movement is organized, and I feel the weight of every breath as lives prepare to be risked, as warriors prepare to sacrifice themselves for the sake of peace.

“The remaining allied packs will hold position for reinforcement,” Rian adds. “So if we need it, backup will come.”

The line of reserves tightens behind us, ready for the call.

Then his attention turns to the magicians.

“Alchemists, Bailey included, you will move to the bluffs above and await further orders.”

Rian and I tell each other we love each other through a private link, and I turn to follow the women to the bluffs.

Saja moves beside me, followed by Marni, Eclipse, and Freida. They are all in wolf form, all carrying their satchels of supplies on their backs, all once students under Ava who are now working with me instead. Without another word, we begin to move out.

Our paws strike the ground as we break away from the main force. The satchels on our backs are filled with potions, tonics, and carefully prepared gemstones that may decide who lives through the coming battle.

Behind us, the healers remain in human form on horseback, already falling back behind the combat lines with their supplies secured.

The bluffs rise ahead in dark silhouettes against the widening moon. Rian’s final command follows us through the bond. “Stay hidden and await further orders. Use your magic, but do not move closer to the battlefield without my command.”

The five of us run together toward the high ground as war finally begins to tighten its grip on Junhera below.

The bluffs rise beneath my paws as we reach the top, wind pulling at my fur. I slow only when we are high enough to see everything in the valley below.

Junhera stretches out in the distance, its borders carved in shadow and corrupted magic. Even from here, the air feels wrong, heavy, charged with something that doesn’t belong to the natural world.

We shift back in quick succession, bone and muscle reshaping as our wolf forms give way to human bodies. Cold air bites at my skin the moment I stand upright, and I quickly pull my clothes on from the satchel. The alchemists do the same beside me, their hands moving with urgency as we dress.

“We have clear sightlines from here,” Saja says as she pulls moonstones from her satchel. They’re sky blue, glowing and pulsing with magic. “If they breach early, we may not get a second chance to react.”

Marni nods as she grabs prisms made of jasper and rubies from her bag. “We must stay together, no matter what. No one can be a hero alone, all right?”

Eclipse is already unpacking vials of thunder storm tonic. “If they bring cursed magic into the open, I will not be able to stop myself.”

Freida crouches near the ridge line and peers down. “They’re moving out.”

Below us, movement ripples through the valley. The allied packs are no longer still. Silverfang, Silverhide, Silverpeak, Stonebend and Veilglo begin to surge forward as one living force, pouring into Junhera’s outer edge.

The three reserve packs hold back in formation, exactly as Rian ordered, their presence steady and ready behind the first wave.

We watch from above as the first of Junhera’s patrols is ambushed, the movement below snapping into violence in an instant as Silverhide and the allied packs hit hard. My heart beats fast as I scan the moving chaos. Somewhere in that flood of warriors is my mate Rian, though I can’t see him in the press of bodies and shadows.

“Moon Goddess,” I whisper under my breath, pressing my hand briefly to my chest. “Keep him alive.”

As they press further into the woods, more patrols are alerted, trying to stop us from advancing toward their stronghold and failing each time. We are gaining ground and moving away from the starting line at a much faster rate than I’d predicted.

Stonebend rips through a few dozen Junhera wolves stationed in a patrol line, while Veilglo sweeps in behind them to finish the last of the resistance, the forest filling with the sound of howling wolves as the fight spreads.

Suddenly, the valley changes again. It is no longer just movement. It is a clear military response as Junhera’s forces stop reacting like scattered prey and start moving like someone who remembers war.

“Their central line is stabilizing now,” Eclipse says sharply. “They’ve called their army.”

Saja turns her moonstones in her palms, calibrating the glow. “Then we break their sight.”

She presses the stones together, and the light shifts from soft blue to a hard, cutting silver. It spills down the ridge like dripping starlight and lands across Junhera’s advancing ranks. Where it touches, enemy soldiers are thrown into full sensory disruption, stumbling and breaking formation as their sight fails under the overwhelming radiance.

Marni uses her Jasper prisms, snapping them open in a chain, and the valley fractures as Junhera’s wolves are forced out of their forms mid-charge, bones and muscle snapping back into human shape against their will. They are still moving when it happens—staggering out of the shift in shock, unarmed and disoriented in the open ground.

Silverhide and the allied packs slam into them in a surge of fangs and motion, tearing through them at close range. Throats are ripped out, bodies are dragged down, and strikes land before they can even fully register what’s become of them.

Junhera’s reinforcements begin to misread their own positions, charging into echoes of their own units instead of the real lines. Confusion spreads under the power of the jasper, slowing their push long enough for our allied packs to surge again.

That’s when I lift both hands and call the moonlight down. Silver light gathers in my palms, dense and heavy, as I shape my weapon of choice. My power responds like it has been waiting for my direction, and the light condenses and solidifies. Thick silver bullets form between my fingers, carved from moonlight.

I aim and release the first volley. The silver rounds cut through the air in clean arcs, striking into Junhera’s new front line. They find their marks, and the cursed bodies they strike drop as if the black magic inside them has been severed at its root.

Still, parts of the Junhera line adapt fast enough that the first real injuries start cutting through our line. I see Silverhide break formation as one of ours is hit hard in the side and dragged backward by two enemy wolves, blood trailing across the ground as they retreat into cover. Another allied wolf goes down mid-surge, pinned under a counter strike long enough that it takes three of ours to pull him free before he is finished off.

Below us, healers finally break from cover. I see them clearly, moving fast, pulling wounded warriors back behind the treeline. Two carry a Silverhide wolf while another stabilizes a bleeding wound on the battlefield with a quick tourniquet. They move our wounded into the trees for healing herbs and spells.

Eclipse responds to Junhera next. A controlled burst of storm tonic detonates over the enemy advance, and the air turns violent—wind shears downward in sudden pressure drops, driving rain and force straight into Junhera’s front lines.

Their formation staggers as visibility collapses and movement becomes unstable under the storm’s impact. It’s raining so heavily on them that they struggle to breathe and are forced to retreat back toward their castle.

I keep using my silver bullets as Freida grabs her whistle. “They’re redirecting heavier units south. Something big is coming through that corridor.”

As Junhera’s forces break Silverpeak’s line, a gap opens in the allied formation, and the flank suddenly splits as a full coordinated wave of enemy forces pushes out from the forest, moving directly toward the opening that has formed in order to sweep sideways up the line.

“Should we get closer?” I ask.

Saja’s voice sounds worried. “We were told to stay here, and Alpha Gray hasn’t given us further command.”

Just then, Freida raises the whistle and blows. The sound is like air being forced through bone, then it splits into layers. The noise presses into the bodies of every one of us. If I didn’t know what it was or where it was coming from, I’d lose my mind.

The sound is maddening, like millions of shrieking warriors and a wall of howling wolves all layered together, each pitch clashing against the next, vibrating with an unimaginably unbearable rage.

Junhera’s advance breaks immediately. Wolves falter mid-charge and stop moving forward. Some stagger, then start backing away as the sound hits them again and again. Even some of our younger reserves are starting to roll around in the grass, even though they know where the sound is coming from. Freida knows the power is strong enough to affect all of us if she plays the whistle for much longer.

Junhera’s line loses shape as more of them turn and retreat, dropping momentum and ground at once. Within moments, the front collapses into a full withdrawal, Junhera’s forces pulling back from the field.

Freida stops playing, and Eclipse pulls in the storm as all eight packs surge forward, following the enemy home.