Chapter 26 · Inside the Wolf's Black Moon

"Don't you dare die on me." Lyra pressed both hands against Caelan's chest as the silver warrant tightened around her throat.

The words burned across the metal strip hanging in the air above the execution platform.

LYRA VOSS. MURDERER OF CAELAN ROOK.

Below it, the court's black seal turned once. The chain around her neck pulled hard enough to cut her breath short.

Jace grabbed her arm. "Lyra, move!"

"I can't." She shoved his hand away and leaned over Caelan. "His heart stopped, but the contract didn't. That means he's not gone."

"The whole court just watched him die."

"Then the whole court is wrong."

Caelan lay beneath her, one hand still locked around the back of her coat. His skin had gone cold. Silver dust glittered along his jaw where the bullet had torn through him. The black veins of the lunar curse had reached his throat.

A bell struck somewhere beyond the platform.

The execution clock over Jace's cage jumped from twelve minutes to eleven.

Jace looked up. "They restarted mine."

Lyra's stomach clenched. "I know."

"So get up. We save him later."

"There might not be a later for either of us."

The death warrant snapped tighter.