As soon as the veil closed behind them, the Grove changed.

There was a ripple in the air, no, it was more of a crack. Almost like the Dominion split in half and chose sides.

I didn’t wait for lengthy, unnecessary, idiotic speeches.

I launched forward, magic bursting from every vein. The world narrowed into three points of focus: them. Us. And vengeance.

Kael moved too, and he was like a blur heading toward the traitor Alphas. His shift happened mid-leap—one blink, one heartbeat, and the great black Draven wolf collided with Alpha Briar, sending them both crashing into the trees.

Corren lunged in, and met Kael’s teeth with a blade drawn too slowly. Steel clanged, and bones broke.

And Kael didn’t even bleed.

To the left, Caelum moved like the earth bent to meet his pace. His robes flared out, and his feet barely touched the ground. In his left palm, an orb of witchfire pulsed. He lifted his other hand, and the ground buckled under Sorcha and Arietta’s feet, forcing them to scatter.

They weren’t fast enough, though.

Darkness fell over the Grove as he summoned his powers. Lightning twined with starlight cracked across the dome of the trees and struck the high priestesses with enough force to flatten a lesser witch. Arietta screamed. Sorcha didn’t, but her shield barely held as her eyes widened.

She hadn’t expected that.

But I didn’t watch for long. I had my own reckoning. The remaining five priestesses were spread out, but I didn’t wait for them to circle.

I struck first.

My magic was still untamed, and I didn’t care about elegance. It tore through the space between us like a blade with no hilt. One priestess tried to shield it, but I shattered it.

Another raised both hands to summon roots, but I burned them before they could reach me. The fact that my magic reacted instinctively to attacks was an advantage. It allowed me to focus on the offence without worrying about my defence. The roots withered and turned to ash as soon as they emerged from the ground.

I felt their hesitancy and confusion. Whatever they thought of me before, they were wrong. I could see it in their eyes, worry, and doubt. They were beginning to understand that I was no longer the same. The Vale had changed me, and with each passing moment, I could feel my power growing stronger, and more unpredictable.

They would learn to fear me, because I was a storm wearing skin now.

Their chants broke against my rising power. They tried to form a triad circle, but I snapped it in half before it could fuse. I raised my hand, and flames erupted around them, forcing them to scatter.

I was no longer the prey.

The third priestess screamed as my magic grabbed her by the throat and flung her across the clearing. The fourth raised a blade laced with blood hexes. I caught it mid-air and turned it into ash with a flick of my wrist.

The fifth ran, and I let her.

Let her get just far enough to think she’d escape before I pulled the Grove to me. I let the vines hear my grief, and the roots rose and coiled and swallowed her whole.

My blood sang with fury and clarity.

Caelum caught my eye across the field. Silver pulsed from his hands, as he narrowed in on Sorcha, who was still holding her own but struggling.

Kael’s wolf form slammed Corren into a rock ledge, soaking the ground in his blood. Venric was on one knee, bleeding, his breath coming hard and uneven. Briar was missing. Maybe dead.

I turned back to the priestesses. Only three remained now.

We must show them the fury they caused and make them understand why the Goddess chose us.

Arietta hurled a spire of jade flame toward Caelum, and he lifted one palm and split it clean down the centre with a single word in the Old Tongue.

The magic obeyed him like it remembered who he was.

“You always were overconfident,” Arietta snarled, circling him now. I glanced at them. She sounded familiar with Caelum. “All that restraint pretending to be humility. But you’ve always wanted to be more than one of us.”

“I was more than one of you,” Caelum answered with his familiar aloofness. “You were just too consumed with status to see it.”

Arietta sneered, gathering another curse in her hand, but Caelum had already moved in. He vanished and then reappeared behind her, and whispered a word.

A ring of fire collapsed around her ankles, binding her to the earth. Sorcha screamed her name, breaking formation to strike, but Caelum turned to her with one hand raised.

“You should’ve stayed in the mountains and trained more, Sorcha,” he said. “But you wanted power. And now you’ve walked into my Grove to die.”

Sorcha drew a curved dagger covered in ancient sigils. “The Dominion will fall before it’s ruled by a halfbreed mongrel and a witch in priest’s robes.”

Caelum smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Then you’re not prepared for what comes next.”

His next spell ripped through the clearing in a wide arc of silver fire. Sorcha blocked it, barely. It singed the hem of her robes, and split her defensive ring.

Arietta struggled against her bindings, screaming curses that bent the air.

Caelum spoke again, this time louder. “Your rituals are outdated. Your grip on this world ended the moment the Vale took my brother’s blood. I will bury you all.”

I felt his rage, and it resonated with my own, and it took everything I had not to scream.

Across the way, Kael tore through the wolves like the Ultima he was. They thought they stood a chance against my Alpha just because these priestesses had protection sigils stitched into their fur.

It didn’t matter how powerful their hexes were, they were useless on Kael. That was one of his graces as a Draven Alpha. Like my brother, Kael was immune to the nonsense.

Venric tried parrying high, but he was too slow. Kael’s claw cut through his shoulder, dropping him to one knee.

Corren circled in, trying to flank him, but Kael pivoted, snarling—not just in voice, but in aura. The kind of presence that made lesser wolves bow without being asked.

“You swore loyalty to the Dominion,” Kael growled. “To the council. To me.”

Corren spat blood. “I swore to a world worth surviving in.”

“And you thought this was it?” Kael’s claw pointed at the High Priestesses behind him.

Venric tried to rise again, using Corren’s distraction to launch upward. But Kael didn’t even blink. He extended his claws in one fluid motion.

With one fast, brutal slash, Venric collapsed and Corren froze. For the first time, his eyes showed fear.

Kael moved forward. “I gave you a seat at my table,” he said. “And you traded it for scraps. Was it my seat they promised you, Corren? As if you have what it takes to be Ultima.”

“You’re not going to win this,” Corren said.

Kael smiled coldly. “Then you truly don’t know what I, the son of Draven, am capable of.”

It made me smirk. No, they didn’t. I’ve always known he played down his strength and ability. It was why these preys believed they stood a chance.

He moved like the wind, and his claws flashed before Corren fell. Kael stood over both of them, chest rising, eyes burning.

He was still in that liminal space between man and wolf—Alpha and, monster.

But when he looked across the Grove and saw me, still standing amid smoke and magic and destruction, he let out a low breath.