Chapter 105

Emily’s POV

By the third night, the rot on Silas was worse than ever. I knew it the moment Cindy walked in.

“The Rogue King wants you,” she said. Her voice sounded empty, like she was just too tired to care anymore.

My stomach dropped. Tonight. This was the plan Declan and I had made. He told me to be ready for the next time the King called for me. This was it–our chance to kill him and run.

“How bad is he?” I whispered while we walked down the stairs from my room.

Cincy stopped for a second. She leaned in and whispered, “His skin is literally falling off.”

I should have been happy that he was dying, but I wasn’t. I was just terrified. If our plan didn’t work, I was dead.

The corridors felt endless. Every step toward Silas’s chambers made my chest tighter.

When the heavy doors finally swung open, the smell nearly knocked me backward.

Black veins mapped his throat and jaw, pulsing like drowning worms under his skin. His cheeks were hollowed out,

the bone sharp and skeletal.

Yet somehow…he was smiling.

“Little Queen,” he rasped. “Come fix me.”

I forced my feet to move, one careful step at a time.

Then I saw him.

Declan.

He was positioned by the far wall, a statue of controlled violence. Silas followed my line of sight and let out a

short, jagged laugh.

ľ

“My son insisted on joining us tonight,” he said coldly. “Apparently he no longer trusts servants to guard you

>roperly.”

Declan didn’t react. But our eyes met for one brief second.

Ready.

The blood rushed to my head.

Silas dropped into the massive chair by the fire. “Begin.”

I forced myself closer and placed both hands carefully near the cursed wound. moment I touched him, the agony ripped through me again. The rot didn’t want to leave; it wanted to eat me too.

JI.
pp

1:17 pm P PTM.

under his skin faded. Silas let out a long, ragged moan of relief.

“Yes…” he breathed. “Again.”

I looked at the silver dagger in his hand. Red ruby gleaming. Waiting. My pulse thundered louder.

Not yet. Not yet.

I kept healing him while sweat gathered along my spine.

Suddenly, Silas grabbed my wrist painfully hard. His fingers clamped around my wrist with a force that made the

bone groan.

“You’re hesitating.”

Panic surged through me. “I-”

His eyes narrowed. The relief was gone, replaced by a cold, sharp intelligence. He saw it. He saw the lie.

Then, the world exploded.

Declan moved before I could blink. He wasn’t just fast; he was a freight train of muscle and fury. He slammed into

his father. They hit the floor so the stone cracked beneath them.

The silver dagger flew across the room.

“NOW!” Declan roared.

Everything happened at once.

I crawled over and grabbed the thing that was holding me back–the blade. The pressure inside my body exploded

ree so violently I nearly screamed.

The Three Moon power rushed through every vein.

Silas roared in fury and grabbed Declan by the throat with one hand, lifting him completely off the ground.

Declan clawed at his wrist, choking.

“Emily!” he gasped.

Instinct took over. I stepped forward and unleashed my power.

“LET HIM GO!”

The command slammed into Silas like thunder.

For one impossible second, the Rogue King froze completely. His fingers loosened. Declan dropped violently to he floor gasping for air.

But Silas was already resisting.

1:17 pm P PTM

“No…” he snarled, the sound vibrating in his very bones. “You dare command me?”

-Darkness surged from him, his mental resistance felt like jagged glass scraping against the inside of my skull. He was a wall of ancient, stubborn power, and I was starting to crack.

He was too strong. Silas charged toward me.

I screamed.

“STOP!”

The force exploded outward from my body. Silas was thrown backward hard enough to smash through the stone pillars behind him.

The heavy doors groaned as more rogue guards poured in from the hallway. There were too many.

The entire plan was collapsing.

Declan staggered to his feet, blood running from the corner of his mouth.

“DO IT!” he roared at me. “NOW!”

Silas was already trying to rise again. I could feel his will grinding against mine, a predator refusing to be tamed.

I forced every ounce of power into him again.

“DON’T MOVE!“.

He locked into place. I didn’t wait. I ran to him. and slammed my hands against his chest.

Then, I did the one thing I was never supposed to do. I reversed the flow.

The connection was a jolt of pure horror. I was taking his life, not healing. Draining.

Silas screamed. A sound that wasn’t human, one that shook the entire castle.

Black rot poured beneath my skin like poison entering my veins. A thousand years of his madness, and his hunger crashed into my brain, threatening to drown me.

Too much. Goddess, it’s too much.

But I couldn’t stop.

Silas started to shrink under my hands. His skin pulled tight against his face, living mummy. For the first time, the

mad red glow in his eyes faded.

“No-” he wheezed.

Life poured out of him and into me like fire. It was so much that I started seeing spots.

When the Rogues moved in, I didn’t think. I just reacted.

“GET BACK

The shockwave blasted them across the chamber walls.

I looked down at Silas. He was barely a man now–just a breathing mummy, his flesh grey and shriveled.

I stumbled backward from him in horror. stumbled backward, my hands trembling violently.

I did that. I stole his life.

Silas twitched weakly on the floor, a pathetic heap of skin and bone. He was still breathing, but he no longer

looked like a king.

He looked like death refusing to die..

Behind me, the rogues were already rising again. More footsteps thundered through the corridors outside.

The room began to spin violently around me, the edges of my vision unraveling into darkness.

The power inside me was too much. Like my body could no longer contain it.

My knees buckled,

Suddenly, Declan’s arms caught me before I hit the floor. His grip tightened around me instantly, firm and

Jossessive.

“Emily, stay with me.”

I heard his voice, but it sounded like it was coming from miles away. My head fell against his chest, and everything inside me began to scorch. The madness and the heat were rising in a blinding, suffocating fog, consuming every rational thought I had left. The world turned to a haze, and before I could even process the shifting shadows, I was in my own room. Declan had carried me here, laying me down onto the cool linens, though they offered no relief from the fever raging beneath my skin.

He moved with a predatory efficiency. A strong hand slid between my legs. His middle fingerthrust deep inside ne, his thumb circling my clitoris with a rough, practiced skill that sent a jolt of pure shock through my system.

A low, magnetic voice whispered near my ear: “Baby, hold on.”

I bit my lip hard, trying to anchor myself in the pain to resist the pleasure, but my hips betrayed me, shaking with traitorous, involuntary rhythm. I was already soaking his fingers, trembling, trying not to moan–but the

sensation was too sharp, too insistent.

He went faster. Deeper.

The sensation was too much, and I finally snapped.

A broken sound escaped me, trapped against his palm. He didn’t give me a second to recover. He surged deeper, his teeth scraping my neck before he bit down, his hunger raw and absolute. He wanted every inch of me, and he was taking it.

1:17 pm P PTM.

Declan’s POV

Finally.

Moonlight poured through the stone windows, landing on the bed where Emily lay under heavy black furs. The

Luna Queen. Nathan Blackwood’s mate.

But she was mine now.

I stood by the bed and watched her. She looked small and soft, a total lie compared to the power she’d shown. The

silver collar on her neck glowed, keeping her wolf quiet and her mind fogged.

She’d realize what I did the second she woke up. I’d marked her while she was caught in a haze, stuck between my

father’s madness and the passion poison I’d been feeding her.

The mark was about one thing: possession.

A slow smile pulled at my mouth. Nathan Blackwood could never take her back now. Not with my mark on her skin. He was probably tearing his territory apart looking for her. Good. Let him. He could burn every kingdom he

wanted, but he’d still fail.

I looked back down at Emily. Her white hair was messy against her pale skin. Even like this, she looked proud.

I leaned down and pressed a quick kiss to her forehead. “Wake up, my wolf.”

A small sound came from her throat and her eyes snapped open.

First came the confusion. Then the pain. Then the realization. She looked at the silver collar first, panic crossing

her face. And finally she looked at me.

Emily scrambled back across the bed, even though her body was clearly weak.

“You marked me?”