CHAPTER 1. A TALE OF DESTRUCTION.

Alina.

The sky bled red the day the world I had come to love ended.

It wasn't a metaphor. The clouds literally cracked open like glass, and a crimson light poured through the seams, painting the trees, the ground, and the screaming faces of my people in hellish hues.

I should’ve run. Instead, I froze, barefoot in the village square, clutching a basket of herbs and soaked to the elbows in poultice paste. I watched the sky die.

One moment I was whipping up a new paste with the other healers, one that was more effective. I remember telling Malen to wait for me while I ventured off to find the finishing touch to our new remedy and now? I'm stuck staring at all hell breaking loose.

I tried to will my mind to move but I was stuck firmly to the ground in shock. My thoughts amok, I didn't know what to do or where to go first.

My home? Where everything I cherished was, pictures of my parents, trinkets, bits and pieces of my life. Or the healer's hut where I met people I can call friends.

In reality, they were both of value to me, hence why I was rooted in the middle of the square.

Then I heard it, the forest screamed.

It wasn’t wind, it wasn’t the howling of wolves either although it did sound eerily similar.. The trees wailed like women mourning their dead, and the ground shuddered beneath me. Birds took flight, animals stampeded, and children cried out for mothers already lost in the smoke.

I knew that feeling of darkness anywhere.

It was magic, wild and tainted. It wasn't from here, wasn't like the kind that we used.

I spun toward the healer’s hut, knowing without knowing that I wouldn’t find him there.

"Alina!"

I turned to see Malen stumbling toward me, a crimson gash across his temple, his brown eyes wild with terror. He wasn’t just a healer, he was my only real friend. Maybe more.

Malen was the one who took me in when I stumbled across the healers village years ago.

He made me the healer I am today and he never gave up hope on my magic. I shake myself out of my reverie — now isn't the time to relive flashbacks.

"What happened?" I ask as I grabbed his arm, dragging him behind the closest tree just as the sky cracked again, lightning black as oil seared into the earth.

"What is that?"

"They said it's impure magic. Forbidden to be used by the Underworld and all that reside there," he gasped. "Something came through. Something from the other side."

I felt the words like frost across my spine.

The Underworld. The place of shadows, magic, and monsters. It was a legend, only a ghost story, it couldn't have been real, and yet if it wasn't how else would we explain the chaos before us?

Malen would never lie to me, he had a weird sense of humour but I could feel he was telling the truth about this one. The urgency in his voice and the raw fear I saw in his eyes was enough confirmation.

I was scared too.

Black tendrils slashed people in half, screams of terror engulfed the village and lightning set huts on fire. It was horrific, but I didn't have time to grieve. A wave of heat slammed into us, flattening trees and swallowing screams. I stood, pulling Malen up with me.

"We have to get to the river," I said. "Follow me."

We ran, over burning brush, around fallen bodies, through chaos. I didn't dare look behind me.

But it followed. I could feel it. The thing from beyond.

When we reached the water's edge, I collapsed to my knees. The river should've offered safety, sanctuary. But it boiled, bubbles rising, steam rising higher.

Malen cried out and fell, convulsing. His body twisted unnaturally, veins glowing a violent purple. I screamed and reached for him. I wanted to save him at all costs.

He didn't deserve so much pain. It hurt me to see him like this.

I reached out for him

"No! No, please!" I grabbed his hand, and the moment I touched him, something snapped inside me.

A light burst from my chest. Pure white, hot and terrifying.

I could see it clearly, the magic in him, it was tainted and foreign. I reached for it with my white light and it recoiled.

It was a fierce battle of tag but the darkness was slippery beneath my touch, I tried to capture it but it wouldn't stay still. I decided to channel my light like a torch and brighten the whole place. It seared so bright my eyes burned but so did the foreign magic, and then, he stopped moving.

I was crying. I don’t remember when I started. I only knew he wasn’t breathing. His veins were slowly losing the purple colour and he had a smile on his face.

He looked at peace but I was torn once again.

"Please, come back. Please, not you too." I screamed into the raging night.

“I can't stand to lose another person I love.” I muttered into his cooling skin. Malen was gone.

I heard a branch crack behind me and I turned.

A figure stepped from the mist. Tall. Armored. A mask of shadow over his face, sword drawn and dripping with that same black lightning.

"She’s the one," he said to someone behind him.

Another wolf. Another soldier.

They surrounded me.

"You're coming with us, miss."

I didn’t bother to run. I couldn’t. Not with Malen’s body still warm beside me. I had given up hope on life anyway, what more could I lose?

I stood up, and for the first time in my life, I looked death in the face and didn’t blink.

"Tell your Alpha," I said, my voice cracking, "he can go to hell."

The lead wolf stepped closer. His eyes glowed silver through the mask.

"That’s exactly where we’re taking you."