CHAPTER 6

The forest changed as they approached Gray Hollow. Trees thinned into pale trunks like bones, and the air grew colder even though the rain had stopped. Mist curled along the ground, veiling roots and stones. Every step felt like walking into a dream that remembered its own nightmares.

Ava tightened her grip on the dagger Mara had given her. The carvings on the hilt pulsed faintly, matching her heartbeat. She could almost hear whispers under the wind — not words, just a low hum, like something calling her name from a long distance.

“Not far now,” Silas said quietly. His eyes flicked from shadow to shadow. “Stay close.”

Rowan trudged behind them, jaw tight, his hand never straying far from his gun. “This place is cursed,” he muttered. “I can feel it.”

Mara gave a dry laugh. “Everything’s cursed now.”

Caleb adjusted his satchel. “Gray Hollow was once a sanctuary for hunters and wolves alike, before the first Blood Moon split them apart. My notes say the old wardings still sleep beneath the stones.”

“Or they’re dead,” Rowan said.

Silas glanced back. “If they’re dead, we’ll make new ones.”

They crested a low ridge. The ruins spread below them like the ribs of a long-dead beast: collapsed arches, toppled columns, stones etched with moss and forgotten symbols. In the centre lay a sunken circle of cracked flagstones, overgrown with weeds.

Ava’s stomach fluttered. The place felt…familiar. She’d never been here before, but she knew the pattern of the stones the way she knew the lines of her own palm.

Mara frowned. “Something’s off.”

Caleb knelt beside a stone pillar, brushing moss aside. His face went pale. “Wards have been broken. Recently.”

Rowan cursed under his breath. “He’s been here.”

Silas crouched, fingertips grazing a scorched mark on the ground. “No. Not him. Someone else.”

Ava stepped closer. “Who?”

He didn’t answer. His jaw clenched as he scanned the trees. The hair on the back of Ava’s neck prickled. The mist seemed to gather, coiling around the circle like a living thing.

Then she heard it — a whisper, faint but clear, sliding under her skin. Sever or seal. The same words from the prophecy. She swayed, vision blurring. Images flashed behind her eyes: a wolf with silver eyes standing on the stones, blood dripping from its muzzle; the moon eclipsed in crimson; her own hands outstretched, glowing.

“Ava!” Silas’s voice cut through the haze. He caught her shoulders, steadying her. “What do you see?”

She blinked, heart racing. “Someone’s been here. Waiting. Watching.”

Rowan scanned the ruins, gun raised. “Show yourself!”

The mist shifted. For a heartbeat Ava thought she saw a figure — cloaked, standing at the far edge of the circle. Then it vanished.

Mara drew her knife. “We’re not alone.”

Silas’s eyes narrowed. “No. We’re not.”

Silas motioned for everyone to spread out. “Stay within sight of each other. Don’t step inside the circle yet.”

Mara nodded, circling left with her blade drawn. Caleb stayed close to the broken pillars, scribbling notes with a trembling hand. Rowan moved to Ava’s side, gun raised, scanning every wisp of mist like it might bite him.

“What did you see?” he whispered.

Ava shook her head. “I don’t know. A shape. A wolf. Blood. It felt like a memory but not mine.”

Rowan’s mouth tightened. “This place is wrong.”

“Or maybe it’s right,” Ava murmured. “Maybe it’s showing me what I need to see.”

They reached the edge of the sunken circle. Up close, the cracked flagstones were carved with interlocking crescents — the same symbol on Ava’s dagger. Some of the grooves still glimmered faintly as though the moonlight had been caught there.

Caleb crouched, brushing dust away. “These are old protective sigils. Some have been smeared with ash. Someone tried to erase them.”

“Why?” Mara asked.

“To weaken the wardings,” Caleb said. “To open the way for something.”

Ava’s hand throbbed around the dagger. She crouched beside him. “Can we fix them?”

“Maybe,” he said. “If we had time. But—”

A low growl cut him off. It came from the mist beyond the circle, deep and throaty, like stones grinding. Another answered it from the opposite side.

Mara straightened. “Company.”

Rowan stepped in front of Ava automatically. “Wolves?”

Silas’s eyes flicked gold. “Not just wolves.”

Shapes moved in the mist — large, hunched silhouettes, their eyes glinting red. Ava’s pulse spiked. “What are they?”

“Blood-bound,” Silas said. “Elias’s thralls. They’re half gone already.”

The first creature stepped into the open. It had the body of a man but the head of a wolf, its skin mottled and cracked like dried clay. It bared teeth slick with black saliva.

Caleb backed away, voice trembling. “We have to get back to the tunnels—”

“No time,” Silas said. “They’ll cut us off. We stand here.”

Mara planted her feet, knives gleaming. “Finally.”

Rowan chambered a round. “Stay behind me, Ava.”

But Ava stepped forward instead. The dagger in her hand burned cold. The carvings on the stones pulsed brighter, echoing the rhythm of her heart. The whispers in her head rose: Sever or seal.

She swallowed hard. “What does that mean?” she whispered to no one.

Silas’s voice was low, urgent. “It means choose.”

The thralls lunged.

The low growl rolled across the ruins like distant thunder. Ava’s breath caught; the mist had gone still, every wisp hanging as if listening. Her fingers tightened around the dagger until her knuckles ached.

Silas stepped in front of her, eyes glinting gold. “Stay behind me,” he said softly. “Mara, to the left. Rowan, right flank.”

No one argued. The ruins seemed to hold their breath.

Another growl, closer this time. Then a wet sniffing sound, claws scraping over stone. Shapes moved just beyond the veil of mist, their eyes glowing faintly red. Ava could hear their hearts — a sickly, unsteady rhythm that made her stomach twist.

“What are they?” she whispered.

Silas didn’t take his eyes off the mist. “Blood-bound. Wolves twisted by Elias’s ritual. They’ll keep coming until one of us is dead.”

Rowan’s jaw clenched. “Great.”

Caleb backed toward a fallen pillar, clutching his satchel. “The sigils… if we can re-ignite them—”

“Do it,” Silas said. “Mara, keep them off him.”

The first thrall burst out of the mist like a nightmare made flesh — a man-shaped body with a wolf’s skull stretching its face, skin cracked and blackened around the joints. Its claws hit the flagstones with a sound like glass breaking.

Silas met it head-on. He pivoted low, slammed his shoulder into its ribs, and flung it into a standing stone. The impact made the pillar shudder. The thing howled but clawed its way back up, black ichor dripping from its mouth.

Two more surged in from the sides. Mara spun like a dancer, knives flashing. One blade caught a creature across the throat; the other buried in its side. It howled but didn’t fall. Rowan fired twice, the gunshots echoing off the ruins. A thrall staggered but kept coming, jaws snapping.

Ava dropped to her knees beside the nearest crescent, pressing her palm flat against the groove. Cold shot up her arm like liquid ice. The stone glimmered faintly under her touch, as though a sleeping animal had opened one eye.

The whispers rose. Sever or seal. Clearer than before, a chorus beneath her skin. Draw the line. Choose.

A thrall lunged at her from the right. Rowan moved without thinking, shoving her aside and taking the blow across his shoulder. He hissed in pain but stayed upright, swinging the butt of his gun into the thing’s jaw. It reeled back, snarling.

“Ava!” Silas barked, voice like a whipcrack. “The sigils — wake them!”

“I’m trying!” she shouted back. The dagger in her hand vibrated violently, the carvings glowing, but she didn’t know what to do.

Caleb’s voice trembled. “You have to complete the pattern. Touch the blade to the centre!”

Another thrall leapt the circle. Mara met it mid-air, slamming both knives into its chest. It shrieked, black spittle flying, and clawed at her arm. Blood welled where its claws raked her, but she yanked free, eyes blazing.

Ava’s heart hammered. Her father’s warnings flickered through her head like flashes of lightning. Trust the hunter, not the wolf. Sever or seal. She saw him bent over his desk, scribbling the same crescents now glowing beneath her hand.

She slammed the dagger into the centre of the sigil.

Light exploded outward, racing along the grooves like water through a canal. A shockwave rolled through the ruins. The thralls froze mid-attack, heads jerking as if yanked on invisible strings. The mist recoiled from the circle, hissing like steam.

For a heartbeat everything was still.

Then a howl split the air — deeper, older, stronger than the others. The creatures convulsed. The sigils under Ava’s hands cracked, light bleeding out of them like sand from an hourglass. The voice in her head rose to a scream. Sever or seal!

“I don’t know what to do!” she cried, tears burning her eyes.

Silas dropped beside her, his hand covering hers on the dagger. His grip was warm, steady despite the chaos. “Trust yourself,” he said through clenched teeth. “Pick one.”

Ava squeezed her eyes shut. Images crashed through her mind: Rowan bleeding on the stones, Silas’s eyes molten gold, her father’s trembling hands. She drew a ragged breath and reached inward, past fear, past doubt, to the pulse that had always been there — the part of her they’d tried to bury.

She willed it outward. Not to destroy, but to push back.

Light burst from the dagger, brighter than moonlight, flooding the crescents and leaping to every carved stone. A dome of pale fire sprang up around the circle, forcing the thralls back. They clawed at it, howling, but could not cross. The sound was like nails on glass.

Caleb’s voice shook. “You sealed them.”

The mist writhed, retreating to the edges of the ruins. In its retreat Ava glimpsed a single figure standing beyond the circle — tall, cloaked, face hidden beneath a hood. Whoever it was raised a hand in a slow, deliberate salute. Then the mist swallowed them whole.

The dome flickered. Ava felt the power drain out of her like water from a broken jar. The dagger went cold. She slumped, trembling, and Silas caught her before she fell.

Rowan stared at the empty mist. “He knew we’d come here.”

Mara pressed a cloth to her bleeding arm, grimacing. “That wasn’t just Elias’s thralls. Someone else was steering them.”

Silas’s jaw tightened. He looked at the shattered sigils, then at the path beyond the ruins. “He’s not just hunting us. He’s herding us.”

Ava forced her eyes open. “What does that mean?”

Silas met her gaze, his own still faintly glowing. “It means Elias is ready for you.”

Somewhere far off, a horn sounded again — not a warning this time but a summons. The Blood Moon was rising faster. And in the ruins of Gray Hollow, Ava realised she’d just announced herself to every enemy her father had ever feared.

She tightened her grip on the dagger even as her arms shook. She wasn’t sure she could do what the prophecy demanded. But for the first time she’d felt the choice in her hands. Sever or seal. Hunter or prey.

The echoes of the horn faded. Night pressed in. They had until the next moonrise to decide their move — or Elias would decide it for them.