Lysandra flopped backward and then said, “Someone bring me snacks. Preferably ones that don’t make me see the future.”
“You’re not supposed to see the future,” Caelan muttered.
“Tell that to my magical trauma!”
Poppy looked around the hall—the clan bustling, healers murmuring, foxfire lanterns glowing, Mingxi beside her—and felt something warm bloom inside her chest.
Family.
Chaos.
Safety.
All tangled together.
Mingxi squeezed her hand, sensing her emotion. “You’re safe,” he murmured.
She squeezed back. “For the first time,” she whispered, “I think I truly am.”
The Yaoguai-Lang’s ash had barely cooled when Shen Mingzhao called the Council. Mats lay in a wide circle inside the Ancestral Hall. Foxfire lanterns floated overhead, dimmed to a solemn glow. Elders arrived in their formal robes, whispering urgently to one another. Warriors lined the walls in unison, their expressions tight.
Poppy sat beside Mingxi on a cushioned bench near the center. She kept her hands folded in her lap, fighting the instinct to make herself small. But Mingxi’s tails remained looped protectively around her ankles—quiet reassurance.
Minghua sprawled on a pillow between them, kicking her legs back and forth like she was at a sleepover. Lysandra sat cross-legged on her own cushion, humming in two different keys, and Caelan hovered behind her like a frustrated babysitter.
When the last elder arrived, Shen Mingzhao raised a hand. “Begin.”
The room fell silent.
Mingxi stood to speak, but his father motioned for him to conserve his strength.
Mingzhao summarized the events in his calm, calculated cadence: the moonwell corrupted, the entity attempted to manifest, the Grimoireshattered, a Shadowling formed and pursued them, and the Yaoguai-Lang arrived in Huoyáo Jìng—targeting Mingxi specifically.
The hall pulsed with unease.
Elder Han rose. “You say the creature sought him. Not the oracle girl. Not the moon-touched human.”
“Correct,” Mingzhao said. “Why?”
Mingxi’s jaw clenched, and Poppy felt the tremor run through him.
Xu Yunlian answered softly, “Because his qi has changed. Sharpened. And because he carries moonlight residue.”
Poppy’s heart squeezed. She remembered him nearly collapsing after the Shadowling fight. He hadn’t gained tails for power. He’d gained them because he’d nearly broken saving her. The elders exchanged anxious glances.
Mingzhao continued, “We must alert the Western Council. This cannot be ignored.”
Voices overlapped immediately:
“Should we raise the boundary wards?”
“Summon the allied clans?”
“Seal the gorge?”
“What if more Yaoguai-Lang follow?”
Minghua, hand over her mouth, blew into a tiny wooden fox whistle and cut through the noise.
