CHAPTER 154: ROYAL DECREE

"Let them whisper."

She blinked.

Lucas’s gaze was steady. "Let them wonder where you are. Let them imagine what the Moon Goddess does when she disappears from her throne. Let them fear it."

Her breath caught.

"You’re dangerous," she murmured.

He smirked. "You like that."

She didn’t deny it.

But still, after a few moments of silence, the weight of the world began to return. She felt it in her bones — the next challenge waiting, the threat still lingering beyond the walls, the quiet storm that always followed peace.

Lucas sensed the shift in her.

"Tell me," he said softly. "What’s weighing you?"

She hesitated, then met his eyes. "Marcella was just one root. There’s more beneath the surface. I can feel it."

Lucas nodded slowly. "Then we pull up the roots together."

Her heart clenched at that.

Together.

Not alone.

She pressed her forehead to his. "What if I lose control again?"

"Then I’ll be there," he said simply. "I’ll hold you until you remember who you are."

And just like that, the ache in her chest softened.

The moon faded from the window.

Morning light crept in.

But for a few more minutes, they stayed like that — wrapped in heat and promise, heartbeats steady, bodies tangled beneath royal silk.

The morning sun painted the palace in soft gold, bleeding through the high windows of the lunar dining hall. White stone floors gleamed. Moonflowers bloomed in the tall vases, enchanted to open only in her presence. The scent of fresh bread, roasted berries, honeyed citrus, and smoked meats drifted through the air.

Athena entered barefoot.

A silk robe tied loosely around her waist, her hair still damp from the bath. She looked divine—effortlessly so—but there was a softness to her today, a glow that hadn’t come from power or duty.

It came from sleep.

From peace.

From him.

Lucas stood already at the head of the table, dressed casually in slate gray, sword strapped across his back out of habit, not threat. He turned when she entered—and tried, valiantly, not to smirk.

Athena raised an eyebrow. "Say nothing."

"I haven’t said a word," he replied, pouring her tea.

Cassius sat at the other end, legs kicked up, sharp eyes watching them both over the rim of his mug. "You’re glowing, my queen," he said with an exaggerated bow of his head.

Athena rolled her eyes, but her smile betrayed her.

She took her seat.

Three royal guards stood silently by the door. The palace staff kept their heads bowed as they served quietly—still adjusting to the shift in power. There was no sign of Marcella. No poisoned presence. No veiled insults in the air.

Just fresh fruit. Warm sun. And peace.

Cassius bit into a tart, then asked, "So... will today be a day of brutal political cleanup, or can I pretend I’m just here for the pastries?"

Athena sipped her tea. "You can pretend until lunch."

Lucas chuckled under his breath. "Mercy in the morning. That’s new."

Athena cast him a sideways glance. "Don’t get used to it."

They ate.

Laughed.

Even Cassius, who rarely showed his teeth unless he was snarling, relaxed enough to speak with warmth. It felt like something... old. Like the days before betrayal. Before bloodlines and crowns and gods.

At one point, a young kitchen girl tripped while refilling the juice pitcher. The silver vessel clattered to the ground, splashing the floor.

She dropped to her knees, trembling. "F-Forgive me, my lady, please—"

Athena stood immediately.

"No harm done," she said gently, helping the girl up with her own hands. "Tripping isn’t a crime."

The girl looked up at her in awe.

Athena smiled, brushing her fingers across the girl’s knuckles before dismissing her with a soft nod.

When she sat back down, Cassius was watching her. Thoughtfully.

"What?"

He shook his head slowly. "You’re changing."

"No," she said softly, pouring more tea. "I’m just remembering who I was... before all this."

Lucas took her hand beneath the table.

She let him.

The food was almost gone. The sun was almost fully up.

But for the first time in what felt like years, Athena didn’t dread what came next.

The training yard was soaked in heat.

Not just from the rising sun, which blazed high above the palace walls—but from the two alphas circling each other like wolves about to tear into flesh.

Lucas stood bare-chested, sweat already gleaming across his collarbones, sword gripped lazily in one hand. Cassius, equally shirtless, cracked his neck once, then shifted his weight. His blade was slightly longer, sharper at the tip. He smirked.

"Going easy on me this morning?" he asked.

Lucas raised an eyebrow. "You’ll know if I am."

They didn’t bow. Didn’t speak again.

The fight began with no warning.

Steel met steel in a shower of sparks as their swords collided, both moving fast—too fast for the soldiers lining the edges to follow. Their bodies were a blur of tension and power, muscle meeting muscle, sweat flying as they pivoted, struck, ducked, reversed.

Athena watched from the stone steps of the yard, arms crossed loosely, robe fluttering in the breeze. Her silver hair was bound in a single braid, a cup of tea untouched beside her.

She said nothing.

Not yet.

Cassius lunged, blade slicing low. Lucas deflected it with a twist, spun, and struck back with the flat edge of his sword. Cassius ducked, dropped to one knee, and swept his leg out—Lucas stumbled, cursed, and rolled back.

They rose together.

"You’ve gotten better," Lucas said, breathing hard.

"I’m always better when she’s watching."

Lucas’s expression shifted. Just a little.

But Athena caught it.

And she knew exactly what Cassius was doing.

He wasn’t sparring for sport. He was testing the boundaries—of the bond, of the goddess, of the man who now held her.

Lucas surged forward, blade flashing. Their swords rang again, each blow sharper than the last. Cassius blocked every strike, grinning now, teeth gleaming.

"I wonder," he said through a grunt, "if she moaned your name the way she used to moan mine."

Lucas struck harder.

The air cracked as his blade sent Cassius stumbling backward. He lunged again—but Cassius was ready, parried, twisted Lucas’s sword to the side and shoved him, chest to chest.

Both men froze.

Breathing heavy.

Too close.

Athena stood slowly.

"That’s enough," she said quietly.

Neither man moved.

Lucas’s jaw clenched. Cassius smiled wider.

"I said—enough."

Her voice rippled across the yard like a command from the heavens.

They broke apart.

Lucas stepped back first, blade lowered, jaw tight. Cassius spun his sword once, then drove it into the sand at his feet.

Athena descended the stairs, slow and composed, like moonlight over ice.

When she reached them, she looked at neither.

"I asked you to train together," she said evenly. "Not to tear each other apart."

Cassius tilted his head. "We were training. You just happened to be the prize."

Lucas shot him a glare.

Athena turned sharply toward Cassius. "I am not a prize."

The smile slipped from his face.

"I am your Luna," she continued. "Your goddess. I do not belong to either of you. If you love me—truly—you don’t fight over me. You fight beside me."

Lucas lowered his eyes.

Cassius didn’t speak.

Athena stepped between them.

She placed a hand on Lucas’s chest, feeling his heart still hammering beneath her palm. "You’ve already claimed me. My bond is with you."

He met her eyes, softened.

Then she turned to Cassius.

"And you," she said gently, "have already proven your loyalty. You don’t need to bleed to remind me who you were to me."

Cassius swallowed hard. His throat bobbed.

"Then why does it still feel like I’m losing you?" he asked quietly.

Athena stepped closer, placed a hand to his cheek. "Because you are. Not completely. But enough."

He closed his eyes, breathed her in. "That’s the worst part. I’d die for you, and it still wouldn’t be enough."

"I never asked you to die for me," she whispered. "I asked you to live."

Lucas watched them, silent, his chest rising and falling.

Athena stepped back.

"I don’t need warriors fueled by jealousy," she said. "I need unity. The threat that’s coming won’t care about your pride."

She turned, walking back toward the steps.

But before she reached them, she paused.

"Both of you," she said without looking back, "meet me tonight in the war room. If you want to fight, you’ll do it where it counts."

Then she vanished into the palace, robe sweeping behind her like the wind.

Cassius wiped his brow and spat blood into the dirt.

Lucas turned his sword over in his hands, then looked at him.

"We’re not done," he said.

Cassius smirked. "We never are."

The garden was still.

High above, the moon watched in silence, haloed by a ring of pale mist. Its light shimmered across the silver leaves of the sacred trees and bathed the stone pathway in a faint glow. Moonflowers bloomed at her bare feet, opening only for her. The air was thick with the scent of night jasmine and the lingering musk of wolf.

Athena stood in the center of the garden, robes trailing behind her, head tilted toward the sky.

She didn’t know how long she’d been out there.

Only that her thoughts had become too loud inside the palace.

Too full of them.

Cassius.

Lucas.

Two wolves. Two men. Two heartbeats that echoed through her bones in opposite rhythms.

She closed her eyes.

Lucas’s scent still clung to her skin—cedar and dark spice, wild like storm-soaked earth. The bond between them thrummed just beneath her ribcage, steady and anchoring. Every time she breathed in, she felt him—his devotion, his need, his possessiveness and restraint.

And yet...

Cassius’s presence still haunted her. He hadn’t marked her, not fully, but his essence still lingered beneath her skin like a scar that refused to fade. His scent was fire and frost, old pine, and a touch of regret.

When he’d pressed his face to her palm earlier that day, her wolf had responded.

Not with desire.

With recognition.

She sank to her knees in the grass.

The bond with Lucas pulsed inside her. A thread of golden energy. Divine. Claimed. But the ghost of Cassius’s bond—never completed, never broken—still hovered near, like a second heartbeat behind her own.

She hated this.

Hated that she could save realms and face gods... and still feel like a girl split in two by love.

A soft rustle broke the silence. Not footsteps. A presence.

She didn’t turn.

"I told you not to follow me," she murmured.

"I didn’t," said a voice. "I just couldn’t sleep."

It was Lucas.

He stepped into the moonlight, golden eyes gleaming in the dark. His shirt was undone, boots absent, his chest bare and marked faintly by their earlier training. But there was something else in his posture—restraint, so tightly wound it ached to look at.

"I can feel your wolf," he said quietly.

Athena lowered her gaze. "I can’t turn it off."

He knelt beside her. "You don’t have to."

They sat like that, side by side, in silence.

The wind stirred the trees.

Finally, Athena whispered, "Lucas..."

He turned to her fully.

Her voice shook. "I need you to know something."

His jaw tensed. "You still love him."

She closed her eyes. "Part of me does. Not in the same way. Not with the same soul. But it’s there."

Lucas said nothing.

Not right away.

Then: "I know."

She looked at him then—really looked—and was surprised to find no accusation in his gaze. Only quiet pain.

"I hate that I know," he continued. "But I do. And the worst part is... my wolf doesn’t want to challenge him."

Athena blinked. "What?"

Lucas’s mouth twisted into something like a grim smile. "He doesn’t see Cassius as a rival. He sees him as a second part of the same moon."

Her breath caught.

"Do you think this is what the old prophecies meant?" she asked, voice barely audible. "When they said the Moon would be pulled by twin tides?"

"I don’t care what the prophecies say," Lucas said, eyes burning. "You’re mine. Whatever else comes, whatever Cassius feels or doesn’t, whatever you still carry... I won’t let go."

Athena turned to him, hand reaching for his jaw. She held him there, felt the heat and tension beneath his skin.

"I don’t want to hurt either of you," she whispered.

"You’re not hurting us," he said. "You’re leading us. And you don’t have to pretend you’re above this. You’re a goddess, yes. But you’re also a wolf. And wolves... feel."

The tears came then. Quiet. Furious. Sacred.

Athena leaned into his chest, burying her face there, and Lucas wrapped his arms around her.

They stayed lik

e that until the moon passed its highest point.

No passion.

No sparks.

Just warmth.

And a quiet understanding that their bond—however complicated—was far from done evolving.