She was the light of my life—mine and Kael Ashvale's. We adored her.

And I had never—never—posted her images looking for some mating arrangement.

Where did these wolves get off saying these things about my pup?

I captured everything and sent it into the Ashvale pack bond-link: "How did MY belongings end up in someone else's post?"

Silence.

A few seconds stretched into eternity.

Then Morwen Ashvale's voice-sending popped up: "These things are all yours, dear. Did you post them somewhere on the glamour-net and someone stole the images?"

A sigh, dripping with false concern. "Honestly, you can't be too careful these days. All sorts of rogues prowling the scry-net."

Before I could reply, Kael's message appeared:

"Beloved, you probably shared those images somewhere before. They just used glamour-weaving to composite them into their own pictures."

"I already warned the poster and told her to take it down. Just ignore it."

He followed up with a captured image of his private sending to the she-wolf: "Greetings. These images appear to be stolen from someone else and constitute a violation of territory rights. Remove them immediately, or we will bring this before the pack tribunal."

I clicked back to the original post.

Gone.

That was fast.

I stared at my scry-mirror, something cold settling in my stomach. Finally, I sent a single word into the pack bond-link: "Okay."

Then I dimmed the mirror and looked up at my pack escort.

"Rowan Greyfen. Take me to Phoenix Den Row."

Kael's explanation made sense. On the surface.

Glamour-weaving was everywhere now. Forging images wasn't hard.

But I knew—knew with absolute certainty—that I had never posted pictures of those market-dens anywhere on the scry-net.

And I had never, not once, captured images of Seren's moon-gold.

And truly—what were the chances of a coincidence this exact?

The territory claim seal matched the location. The etching on the moon-gold matched too, rune for rune.

The carriage slowed to a halt before the market-den row.

I pushed open the door and looked up at the three connected storefronts built into the stone facade.

The warded glass of what had once been a textile den lay shattered across the cobblestones. Inside, workers were stripping the place bare, clearly preparing it for some kind of bloom-seller's stall.