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Sora’s hands paused for a fraction of a second. I saw her reflection in the water—her ears twitched, and her markings glowed a soft, hesitant orange.

"It is an old word," Sora murmured, her voice barely audible over the bubbling spring. "It means... 'The Bloom that defies the Frost.' It is what we call the flowers that grow on the mountain peaks, where the air is too thin for life, yet they survive anyway."

She resumed her work, her touch more gentle than it had been before. I closed my eyes; the violet oil cooled my skin, but inside I burned. I was a bloom in a frost-land, and the gardener was a man who killed for my silence.

The work was nearly finished when the curtain moved again. This time, a male warrior burst in—Toren. He was breathless, his markings a frantic, pulsing orange.

"I apologise for the interruption," Toren blurted out, his eyes darting to the women and then quickly away from me as he realised my state. He kept his gaze fixed firmly on the stone floor. "But I must retrieve the body and return it to the nest immediately. Kaelen-Thul has called for an announcement."

Sora and Mara stood back, their hands dripping with violet oil. Toren stepped toward the dead male, but he paused. His head tilted, his nostrils flaring as he caught the air.

His eyes drifted past the body without a care until they landed directly on me.

His pupils dilated until they were nearly as black as Kaelen's had been, locking onto me with an intensity that made my skin crawl. He scented the air, his entire posture going rigid, his chest heaving as if he’d just discovered something impossible. I felt a surge of self-consciousness, wondering what these aliens with their hyper-senses were actually picking up.

Was it the heavy, floral musk of the Vra oil? Was it the lingering, smoky scent of Kaelen-Thul himself that seemed to be printed onto my very skin after he'd held me? Or was it something else—something deeper, like the chemical tang of my own fear and the lingering, confusing heat that had pooled between my legs when his tongue touched my temple? Whatever it was, the intensity of it clearly shocked him.

Toren turned to Sora and Mara, speaking a sharp, guttural sentence in their tongue. Whatever he said made both women bow their heads low, their markings dimming in submission.

"Stay here," Toren warned, his voice tight as he grabbed the dead warrior by the arm to haul him out. "Stay here for a while longer. Do not return to the huts until the drums sound. The atmosphere in the Great Tree is... unstable."

With a final, lingering look at the space I occupied—a look that held a new, wary weight—Toren vanished back into the mists, dragging the heavy weight of the dead man behind him.

Chapter 13

Kaelen-Thul

My tail lashed against the packed earth of the central platform, each strike echoing like a whip-crack through the humid air. The Zha-root was supposed to bring clarity—a thinning of the blood to hear the Great Tree’s ancient song. Instead, the silver haze had merged with a white-hot fury that I couldn't claw out of my chest.

I paced the perimeter of the main fire pit, my markings glowing a violent, erratic orange. I told myself my agitation was righteous. I told myself it was the betrayal—that my own warriors had defied the Elders’ decree and my own authority. But as I turned, the phantom sensation of silk-soft skin brushed against my palms again. I felt the heat of her waist, the way she had spun around to reveal those soft, pale curves that had no place in this world of thorns and bone.

Disharmony, I snarled internally, digging my claws into my palms until the skin nearly broke. She is a fracture in the Pulse.

The tribe began to gather, descending from the higher boughs in a rain of heavy thuds and rustling leaves. They sensed the shift in the atmosphere; the scent of blood-fury was thick on me, a heavy, metallic musk that warned even the boldest to keep their distance.

Once the platform was crowded with amber eyes and twitching ears, I let out a piercing, high-frequency shrill. The sound ripped through the chatter of the nest, slicing into the humidity until the only sound remaining was the crackle of the blue flames in the pit.

"One of our own has already sown the seeds of disharmony!" I roared, my voice vibrating through the wood beneath our feet. "The Elders decreed the star-woman is under my protection. My protection is the nest’s protection! Yet, there are those who think their hunger is louder than the law!"

I moved to a massive, broad leaf at the edge of the circle and ripped it aside with a snarl. The warrior I had bound in the hollowed root tumbled onto the floor, his eyes wide and bulging against the vines that bit into his skin.

Just then, Toren emerged from the shadows of the spring-path, his face grim and set as he hauled the limp, broken body of the second male. A collective gasp—a low, melodic trill of shock—rippled through the crowd.

"The star-woman—Ly-ra—will remain untouched!" I stepped over the bound male and loomed over the gathered crowd. My markings flared a lethal, blinding red. "This is the outcome for any who dare defy the Huntmaster. She is no immediate threat to us, and I will not accept a single shadow cast in her direction. If you have a grievance with her presence, you bring it to me. And you bring your steel."

In the distance, perched on a thick moss-covered branch, I spotted Vahn. He wasn't cowering like the others. He was watching with a lean, predatory stillness, a mocking sneer tugging at his mouth that made my hackles rise. My pupils contracted into needles as I locked onto him, my tail stilled in a lethal point.

I felt a hand on my shoulder—heavy and grounding.

"Calm your hearts, Kaelen," Toren whispered, his voice barely a breath. "You are terrifying the younglings. Do not lose the nest to save one ghost."

I closed my eyes, forcing a long, shuddering breath into my lungs. The heat in my blood didn't leave, but I forced the flaring of my markings to settle into a dull, pulsing copper.

"I did not wish to spill the blood of my brothers this sun," I said, my voice lower now, sounding like grinding stone. "But this is the outcome for those who choose to bring rot into our family. We are the Oru-Ka. We do not hunt what is not prey." I gestured to the bound male. "He is to be stripped of his markings and banished from the nest. Let the forest judge him."

A series of frantic whispers broke out. "Banishment?"

"The Vakra clan will find him..."