The warmth of the Sun-Drenched Isles felt like a distant dream as the war party crossed the border into the Frozen Tundra. Here, the wind didn't just blow; it bit. The air was so cold it turned breath into crystalline shards before it even left the lungs.
Lyraki rode at the front, his massive frame draped in the thick furs of a polar bear. Every few minutes, his gaze would drift back to Elara. She looked different now. Since the encounter with her mother's spirit, her violet eyes seemed to hold a permanent glow, and her skin had a faint, pearlescent sheen. She wasn't just a human-passing omega anymore; she was a beacon.
"The Shard of Sorrow is kept in the Temple of the Weeping Moon," Lyraki explained, his voice muffled by the howling gale. "It's guarded by the Frost-Walkers—Lycans who chose to exile themselves from the crown centuries ago. They believe that pain is the only truth."
Elara shivered, but not from the cold. The "Whisper" in her mind was picking up a new frequency a low, rhythmic sobbing that seemed to come from the earth itself. "I can hear it, Lyraki. It's not just one person's sorrow. It's everyone who ever lost someone to the Void."
"Can you project against it?" Lyraki asked, his hand instinctively reaching for hers.
"I don't know," she admitted. "But if I can't, the sadness will drown us before we even reach the gates."
The Temple of the Weeping Moon was a fortress made of solid ice, carved into the side of a glacier. As they approached the gates, four massive Frost-Walkers stepped forward. Their fur was white as snow, and their eyes were a hollow, weeping silver.
"None may enter the House of Sorrow unless they have sacrificed their heart," the lead Walker intoned.
"I am Lyraki, King of the Moonfang," Lyraki roared, his crimson eyes flashing. "Move aside, or I will melt this glacier with the blood of your kin."
"The King's fire cannot melt the ice of the soul," the Walker replied. He turned his gaze to Elara. "But the Seer... she carries the weight. To pass, she must enter the Hall of Regret alone. If she survives her own heart, the shard is hers."
Lyraki growled, his claws extending, but Elara placed a hand on his arm. "I have to do this. The prophecy said the 'Chosen One' must face the catastrophe. This is it."
"Elara, no," Lyraki whispered, his voice cracking with a vulnerability he only showed her. "If you lose yourself in there, I can't reach you."
"You already reached me," she said, leaning up to kiss him. "Your mark is on my neck. Your soul is my anchor. I won't stay in the dark."
She stepped into the temple, the ice doors groaning shut behind her. Inside, the walls were mirrors. But they didn't show her reflection; they showed her failures. She saw the Redwood Pack burning. She saw her mother's lonely death. She saw Lyraki turning into a beast and tearing her apart.
The Shard of Sorrow sat on a pedestal of frozen tears, pulsing with a gray, suffocating light. To take it, she had to walk through the "Mirage of the Lost."