Late at night, Meryn sneaks through the dark castle corridors to Stark's office, carrying her mother's hidden journals under her shirt. She finds the office empty and is drawn with uncanny certainty to a specific ancient, untitled, handwritten book on the library shelf. The book reveals a history of the "Sturmfrost Queens"—a matrilineal line of Bonded warriors who ruled Nocturna with direwolves at their sides for millennia before King Cyril's ancestor supposedly founded the kingdom. This directly contradicts everything Meryn was taught in school: that Nocturna was a scattered human civilization until the Faceless Goddess granted the Diren Blæd to Cyril's ancestor, enabling humans to bond with direwolves and fight the Siphons.

Inside the book, Meryn discovers illustrations of the twin-wolf crown—the exact same design her mother obsessively drew in her journals. She lays the drawings side by side and confirms they are identical. The book also contains an illustration matching the carving Meryn found behind a tapestry in the servant's passage: a queen riding a direwolf wearing the Sturmfrost crown. Meryn then realizes with shock that the flash of metal she glimpsed in the arena drain was also this crown.

Before she can process these revelations, Stark returns. Meryn confronts him, demanding to know if the book is real or fiction and where it came from. Stark deflects by congratulating her on her engagement to Killian and then refuses to explain anything, saying only "I can't tell you anything about that" in a carefully neutral tone. Meryn then reaches out to Anassa through their bond, but Anassa echoes Stark's exact refusal, saying she "also cannot tell" Meryn anything about it.

Meryn is furious and feels deeply betrayed that both her direwolf and Stark have apparently known about the Sturmfrost queens and the connection to her mother's visions all along yet kept it hidden. She declares she is taking the book. Stark does not stop her but warns her to be careful with it. Meryn curses him and storms out. When Anassa tentatively reaches out through the bond, Meryn shuts her out completely, slamming an iron wall between them. Meryn resolves that she can no longer trust Anassa or Stark and vows to uncover the truth on her own.