In the distance, an unholy roar echoed through the palace.

  The queen awakened.

  The thunder inside the palace was not natural thunder.

  It was ritual thunder — heavy, rhythmic, ancient — pulsing through the stone walls like a heartbeat from another world. The air itself shook as green light pulsed through the columned halls in waves.

  Sheryl moved with feral precision, her human form tense and coiled like a drawn bow. Her breathing was steady but tense, every inhale vibrating with the promise of the transformation she was trying to delay. Her jacket was torn, her jeans covered in dirt and sand, but her eyes were sharp, yellow-flecked, alive.

  She followed the scent — old, powerful, impossible to mistake. Karen’s scent twisted into something divine and monstrous—Lycara’s scent.

  She stepped into the massive chamber. It was circular, rising several stories high, with a ceiling that opened to the swirling sky, where the ritual tore the clouds apart. The floor was ancient stone etched with symbols from a civilization that never appeared in any textbook. Torches burned with green flame. The coliseum seats were empty — but it still felt like a thousand invisible watchers leaned over the edges, waiting.

  And in the center of it stood Lycara.

  Still human. Still terrifying.

  She wore nothing but the ripped remains of her black leather armor, clinging to her like ceremonial battle wear. Her high heels clicked against the stone as she paced with the confidence of a goddess preparing to execute a mortal. Her nails — long, black, predatory — tapped together with each step.

  Lycara smiled.

  “So. Sheryl Brown arrives at last.”

  Sheryl stepped forward, jaw tense.

  “You really think you’re going to win?” she said.

  “You’re delusional.”

  Lycara tilted her head, amused.

  “Delusional?”

  “You would rather align yourself with the human race — fragile things who fear you, who would hunt you, who cannot understand what you are.”

  “I understand perfectly,” Sheryl said.

  “I am a warrior. Just not of your kind.”

  Lycara’s expression cooled, like a candle flame snuffed by wind.

  “Too bad.”

  Her voice dropped — low, dangerous.

  “Let’s dance.”

  They moved at the same time.

  Two predators closing the distance, claws extended, teeth clenched.

  Midair impact.

  Lycara’s weight and strength sent Sheryl slamming into the stone, dust erupting around them. Sheryl rolled, slashing upward — her claws cut across Lycara’s cheek, drawing green-tinted blood that hit the floor.

  Lycara hissed and backhanded her with enough force to rattle the chamber walls. Sheryl skidded across the floor, boots scraping stone.

  Lycara stalked forward.

  “You can’t win this fight,” she said coldly.

  “Karen’s body is mine. Her will is mine. This world will be mine.”

  Sheryl pushed herself up, coughing, wiping blood from her lip.

  “Karen wasn’t yours then, and she’s not yours now.”

  She lunged. The two collided again — claws clashing, sparks flying, strength meeting strength. Lycara slammed Sheryl against a pillar, wrapped an invisible grip of green energy around her throat, and lifted her off the floor without touching her.

  Sheryl clawed at the air, fighting for breath.

  Lycara laughed softly.

  “Pathetic. Even with the Death Claw strain, you are still beneath me.”

  She flung Sheryl across the chamber as if throwing a doll. Sheryl hit the back wall hard, cracking stone.

  Then everything changed.

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  Sheryl’s vision blurred. The pressure of the moon rumbled in her bones. The ritual above the palace pulsed with green lightning, intensifying the transformation’s call. Her heartbeat doubled. Her muscles trembled.

  She growled.

  Her jacket tore open down the spine as her shoulders widened. Her boots snapped apart as her feet reshaped, talons piercing the floor. Her jeans split up the sides as her thighs thickened with unnatural power. Her shirt shredded as her torso expanded, her ribcage reshaping, muscles swelling beneath her skin.

  Lycara watched, grinning with delight.

  “Yes…” she whispered.

  “Transform. Let me see the real you.”

  Sheryl snarled, teeth elongating, lips pulling back as bloodlust and clarity fused. Her spine cracked into its new alignment. Black fur erupted across her arms, her chest, her legs. Her face pushed forward into a long, deadly snout, lined with silver-tipped fangs.

  Death Claw rose to her full height — eight and a half feet of muscle, fury, and ancestral power.

  Across the arena, Lycara accepted her own fate.

  Her eyes glowed pure emerald. Her chest heaved. Her leather armor split apart across her swelling torso. Her stiletto heels shattered as her feet burst through them. Black fur flooded out over her body like wildfire. Her palms cracked into clawed hands. Her neck elongated, skull reshaping into the divine beast she truly was.

  With a deafening roar, Lycara became the Werewolf Goddess.

  Two queens of different worlds.

  Two champions of opposing destinies.

  Standing in the center of a gladiator arena that no mortal eye would ever witness.

  Death Claw leaned forward, growling with a sound that shook dust from the rafters.

  Lycara answered with a roar that cracked stone.

  The showdown had begun.

  The two beasts dropped to all fours at the same time — Death Claw and the Werewolf Goddess — muscles rippling, claws carving trenches in the stone. Their growls were so deep they made dust cascade from the shattered palace arches.

  Then they charged.

  The collision shook the world.

  Lycara reared upright with divine strength and slapped Sheryl with a blow that cracked the stone floor beneath her. She lunged, jaws wide, and bit down near Sheryl’s neck — not killing, but dominating, asserting power. Their roars fused, echoing through the palace like thunder trapped inside a cavern.

  Sheryl twisted, broke Lycara’s hold, and threw her across the chamber. She launched after her, a blur of black-furred fury, and speared Lycara through an archway — the two Lycans exploding into a side room.

  Lycara skidded through rubble. Sheryl tore through it after her, but Lycara was gone.

  Then — WHAM.

  Lycara blindsided her from behind, the force sending both Lycans smashing through another wall, tumbling outside into the night air. They crashed down a slope and splashed into the dark lake that bordered the palace.

  Bubbles erupted. Water thrashed.

  Lycara forced Sheryl’s head under, shoving her snout deep into the lake. Sheryl clawed at the mud, kicked, thrashed — then sank her fangs into Lycara’s forearm. Lycara roared, releasing her. Sheryl erupted from the water and slashed Lycara across the muzzle. Lycara retaliated, carving a blazing line across Sheryl’s chest.

  They grappled again, half-submerged, Lycara’s hand wrapping around Sheryl’s throat.

  And tightening.

  Sheryl’s vision blurred.

  Then came the roar.

  A lion’s roar — thunderous, primal, ancient.

  Derek leapt into the clearing, his massive werelion form illuminated by the swirling green sky above.

  His roar shook the lake.

  Lycara staggered, shocked — divine senses rattled.

  Sheryl lunged out of the water, gasping. Derek roared again, even louder. Lycara winced, ears flattening, posture wavering.

  A third roar ripped through the swamp.

  This time, something happened.

  A glowing circle opened beneath Lycara’s fur — a faint, pulsing green emblem at the center of her chest. She froze, swaying, dazed, and open.

  Sheryl saw it.

  She didn’t hesitate.

  She sprinted through the shallows, claws digging into mud, celestial spike shimmering in her hand. Lycara barely turned her head before Sheryl drove the sacred spike deep into her back —

  Straight through the glowing source node.

  Lycara screamed.

  Not a roar. Not a battle cry.

  A howl of pain… and death.

  Her arms flailed as green mist burst violently from her chest. Her black fur evaporated into glowing particles. Her divine form convulsed and tore apart into streams of green vapor.

  And then—

  She vanished.

  The goddess dissolved into the night like smoke blown apart by the wind.

  What fell to the ground was simply Karen Stewart.

  Human. Mortal. Unconscious.

  Her clothes were the same ones she wore the night Lycara took her.

  Sheryl reverted instantly, collapsing to her knees, shaken with tears streaking down her cheeks.

  “Karen!”

  She scrambled forward, checking her pulse.

  “She’s alive,” she breathed.

  Derek shifted back too, panting, covered in mud and blood.

  “We’re getting her out of here,” he said.

  “Move!”

  Bayou Mounds trembled beneath them.

  The palace — Lycara’s conjured fortress — cracked and groaned. Towers leaned. Green fire erupted from its seams.

  As they carried Karen toward the road, Derek spotted a familiar body lying motionless near the entrance.

  Olivia.

  Human again. Pale. Barely breathing.

  “I’m not leaving without her,” Derek said, voice breaking.

  “She’s still alive,” Sheryl said.

  “Grab her.”

  They loaded both women into the back of the van.

  The ground buckled under them. The forest split open with massive fissures. Lycara’s illusion shattered like glass. The sky spiraled back into its natural colors.

  Derek floored the gas.

  The van fishtailed, rock and dirt exploding behind them. Five minutes of violent tremors battered the road. Sheryl kept her arms braced around Karen and Olivia, shielding their heads from bouncing off the metal interior.

  Then—

  Silence.

  A moment later, an explosion lit the night sky in a blinding mix of fire and emerald energy. The palace disintegrated in a massive blossom of light.

  Karen stirred weakly.

  “What… what have I done?”

  Her voice was thin, terrified, lost.

  Sheryl squeezed her hand.

  “Don’t worry about that now, cousin,” she whispered.

  “It’s over.”

  The van sped into the night, the burning ruins of Lycara’s kingdom fading behind them.

  The goddess was dead.

  Her reign of terror ended.