Rafael's Eclipse

Prologue

X Y R A N I A  V A L T A I R

two years ago

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"Your father is going to be proud of you, kid."

Larcan's gruff and familiar voice broke through the haze clouding my mind. I looked up, my gaze locking onto his. His eyes softened, and there was something in his expression I wasn't used to — pride.

He was smiling at me, a sight so rare from my father's lead warrior that it almost threw me off balance.

"I am proud of you." His hand came down on my shoulder. I winced, a small grimace flickering across my face, but I didn't move away.

I tried to answer, to say something in response to his words, but no sound came out. My throat felt tight and constricted, as if the weight of everything that had just happened sat heavily on my chest, squeezing the air from my lungs.

If Larcan noticed my silence, he didn't show it.

He looked at me one last time, his eyes lingering just long enough for me to feel the pressure of his gaze before he turned around and started walking back toward the pack house.

I stood there, frozen, as his figure disappeared into the dense trees.

The second he was out of sight, my attention drew back to the forest floor below me.

Everything tilted sideways, my vision tunneling in on the lifeless form lying among the fallen leaves.

I felt myself choking up again.

Breathe.

The ground seemed to shift beneath my feet, and I stumbled, my legs buckling as I slumped to my knees. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to force the air into my lungs. Somehow the very act of breathing had become impossible.

My body wouldn't listen to me.

Breathe.

But the order fell flat, swallowed up by the quiet stillness of the forest. I felt my hands shake, the trembling spreading through my limbs as I leaned forward, my fingers reaching out hesitantly. They brushed against the boy's arm, his skin cold under my fingertips, the warmth of life already long gone.

A boy.

Just a boy.

I knew he was dead. I had known since I decided to dig the arrow deeper, twisting it with the force of my wielding. The sound of it—bone and flesh giving way—echoed in my mind like a cruel reminder.

Yet, despite knowing the truth, despite the finality of what I'd done, my fingers moved on their own. They found his pulse point and pressed hard against it.

Hoping.

Praying that maybe... somehow...

There was no pulse. No faint thrum of life beneath my fingertips. Nothing.

I had killed him.

But the thought that he might have been innocent gnawed at me, refusing to let go. What if he'd crossed into our territory by accident, fleeing from the other rogues—the ones our warriors had already cut down?

I could have stopped, held back just long enough to ask, to understand who he was and why he'd come. But I didn't.

I could have saved him.

Instead, I had chosen to kill, without question, exactly as I'd been trained to do.

"Please forgive me," I whispered, the words barely escaping my lips, vanishing into the cold air. They were feeble and meaningless. No amount of apology could undo what had been done.