As the crowd scatters after Sigrid begins feeding on the Prime’s soul, Perry and Amelie stay near the trees with Gideon, watching Ithan and Sabine. Sabine stares at the Fendyr sword’s shattered pieces, furious that Ithan broke the weapon she revered and resented Danika for possessing.

Behind Sabine, Sigrid turns on the Astronomer. The old male tries to plead that he saved her from the Under-King, but Sigrid attacks without hesitation, tears out his heart, and consumes the glimmering secondlight of his soul as he dies.

Ithan refocuses on Sabine and answers her challenge. When Sabine lunges, Ithan charges straight in, slides under her attack, grabs a long shard of the broken sword, and drives it into her, spilling her organs. As Sabine insists everything she did was “for the wolves,” Ithan rejects the claim as self-serving.

Ithan shifts back into wolf form and ends Sabine before she can speak again, killing her with a brutal bite. The bloodlust threatens to overwhelm Ithan until Perry’s trembling voice pulls Ithan back to awareness and to the reality of witnesses.

Perry drops to her knees and yields to Ithan as Prime, exposing her throat; Amelie follows, submitting as well to avoid being treated as a rival. Ithan accepts both submissions with ritual bites, and Amelie declares him aloud as “Prime of the Valbaran Wolves.” Howls rise from the Den, the city, and beyond, while Ithan mourns and triumphs together—and hears what seems like a male wolf’s answering cry from the Bone Quarter as Sigrid vanishes into the chaos.