The sky over Bloodroot Pass bled gold and black as Everpine's warriors gathered beneath the cliffs, their fur bristling, claws sharpened, and runes drawn beneath their eyes. Aria stood at the center, the wind tossing her hair like a crown of flame. Her mark pulsed at her collarbone—a full moon surrounded by ancient lines of light, glowing against her bare skin.
Across the field, the Hollowed approached.
They were once wolves—now husks. Their eyes glowed with unnatural fire, their limbs moving in jerks and snaps like puppets of shadow. At their center stood Bastian, or what was left of him, his body veiled in smoke, his mouth split in a permanent sneer.
"Sacred Luna," he croaked. "Come die with your light."
Aria didn't flinch. "Come try."
She raised her hands.
The sky cracked open.
Moonlight poured through storm clouds, drawn not by time but by will. Her will. The battlefield was bathed in silver fire as Selene's magic answered her call.
"Now!" she cried.
Wolves shifted mid-run—fur exploding from skin, claws tearing into cursed flesh. Aria's magic surged forward, slicing through darkness like wind through wheat. Kael was at her side, a beast of fury and precision, cutting down the corrupted with steel and fang.
She saw Wren fall—then rise again, her hands burning with lunar flame. Nessa loosed arrows that burst on impact, raining silvery ash across the field.
Then she met Bastian.
He was no longer human.
No longer wolf.
Just a vessel.
"You could've been mine," he snarled.
"I was never yours," Aria said—and thrust her hand into his chest.
Her mark flared.
His body convulsed—and shattered in a scream that wasn't his.
The Hollow shrieked as it was torn from his corpse, burning as Selene's light consumed the vessel.
And then… silence.
Smoke.
Victory.