LOGINEvelynn POVMireya stepped into the dim light as if she belonged there. As if this place had been waiting for her too.The silver of her eyes caught the faint gleam from the wet cave walls, turning them ghost-bright. Her robes brushed the stone without sound. No limp. No tremor. None of the fragile age she had worn like costume every time I’d seen her before.Interesting. So the bent old mystic routine had been theater. Noted.For one wild second, I almost preferred the Hollow Mother.“The dramatic entrances tonight are getting repetitive.” I said flatly.The Seer smiled. Warmly. That made it worse.“You always did meet fear with sarcasm.”“I usually save knives for betrayal.”Her gaze flicked to the dagger in my hand. “Then perhaps hold onto that one a little longer.”Behind me, the bond snapped tight enough to hurt. Maddox was close. Furious. Ready to tear through mountain and stone with his bare hands. Calder was colder - dangerously so. Jaxon felt like a drawn bow.They knew someo
Evelynn POVSomewhere deep in the cave something made a weird noise. The sound rolled through the chamber like stone grinding against stone.Every hair on my body rose.The Hollow Mother didn’t turn toward it. She only kept her black gaze fixed on me, smiling like whatever lived deeper in the dark was no threat to her at all.Of course it wasn’t. It belonged to her. Or worse... she belonged to it.The thought sent a chill straight through my spine.Behind me, the bond surged hard enough to make my knees threaten to buckle. - Maddox’s rage. Calder’s cold focus. Jaxon’s sharpened alarm ready to sprint here. - They felt my fear.Good. That was good. Soon I might need them. So I let them stay alert. But I didn't call them. I hadn’t dragged them into this cave just to hand them over to something old and starving. It need to be done in the right order, so we can stay alive. The cave pulsed beneath my boots. Subtle little nightmare. I tightened my grip on the meteor dagger. The metal humm
Evelynn POVShe was tall. Too thin. Like she was starving for a long time. Limbs were just slightly too long. She wore a very simple dress. I saw scars and dirty, tangled hair. Blond and so long they ended at her waist.I felt pity for her. One day she had to be beautiful.“Snap out. ” My wolf growled at me.Her head tilted at me. And I saw her eyes. And her eyes were endless black. Empty and full all at once.“Evelynn.”My name settled into the air like it belonged there. Like I belonged here.My grip tightened around the blade. “You don’t get to use my name.” I wanted to spit it in her face, but it sound weak. Like I was going to cry not to fight.She smiled. Soft. Knowing. Motherly. “I made you possible.”Cold slid down my spine. “No.” I said immediately. “You don’t get to rewrite that either.”Her head tilted further. Amused. “Still so defiant. So unwill to know more. Such a pity.” she murmured.My wolf anger rose drasticly. The bond with mates flickered - harder this time. Maddox
Evelynn POVThe moment I crossed the threshold, the world changed. Not visibly at first. The cabin still stood the same - crooked beams, splintered wood, dust thick in the air like the place hadn’t breathed in years.But the silence - the silence was wrong. Too complete. Too heavy. Like sound itself had been stripped out of this place… or devoured.Behind me, I felt them. All three of my mates - Maddox, Calder, Jaxon. Three steady presences at my back - distant enough to pretend I was doing this alone. Close enough to prove me I wasn’t.Something in me was already screaming to turn around. To run to them and never ever come back here. “You don’t get to be afraid now.” I muttered to myself.My wolf huffed with irony. "Yeah."I stepped deeper inside with only with sheer will.The floor creaked under my weight - too loud, too sharp. Each sound cutting through the stillness. My senses stretched instinctively. Everything was wrong. The air smelled of damp earth, rot… iron. And something
Evelynn POVBlood hit the ground before the first breath finished leaving my lungs.Jaxon moved like he’d been waiting his entire life for this moment. He was fast, brutal, laughing under his breath as his blades carved through the first creature’s throat. It didn’t fall clean. None of them did. The thing shrieked, voice splitting into layers, clawing forward even as black ichor poured from the wound.“Yeah.” Jaxon muttered, ducking under a swipe that would’ve taken his head off. “You’re definitely worse than the last batch.”Maddox didn’t waste words. He hit the second one head-on. No hesitation. No testing. Pure force. His shoulder slammed into its chest hard enough to send both of them crashing into the ground. The creature twisted beneath him, spine bending wrong, claws raking across his side - but Maddox didn’t even flinch. He just growled. Low. Deep. Lethal. And tore its head clean off.It didn’t die immediately. - Of course it didn’t. - It kept moving - limbs jerking, claws s
Evelynn POVThe road was too long even for wolves to run, so we went back for our bikes and drove for as long as we could. I rode between Maddox and Calder, my bike’s engine low beneath me, the headlamp cutting narrow tunnels through the dense black woods. At first it was only subtle things - the way the wind stopped carrying birdsong, the way the trees began growing too close together, their trunks warped inward like bent spines leaning toward a secret. Even the scent shifted. Pine and damp earth gave way to something older, heavier: wet bark, cold stone, and the faint metallic trace of ancient magic buried deep beneath the roots.By the time we crossed onto the oldest stretch of Thornborne land, silence had become its own presence.Not peaceful silence. Watching silence. The kind that pressed against your ears until every snapped twig sounded like a warning.Jaxon led ahead, weaving through the winding deer paths like he had been born to shadows. His taillight flashed red between t
Evelynn POVThe forest changed long before we crossed into Thornborne lands. At first, it was subtle.The air got heavier. Thicker. Like breathing through something unseen. The wind carried a different scent too - less pine, more rot. Damp earth turned sour, like something beneath it had been distu
Evelynn POVWe didn’t slow. Not for the wounded. Not for the dead. Not even for Elara.That thought should have broken something in me. Instead, it hardened.Because this - this was exactly what the Hollow Mother wanted. Chaos. Delay. Grief turning into hesitation. And hesitation got people killed.
Evelynn POVThe moment we stepped back outside, the world hit us again. Noise. Blood. Movement. War hadn’t paused for us.If anything - it had gotten worse.The courtyard was barely recognizable now. Bodies littered the ground, some still shifting, some very much not. The air was thick with the sce
Evelynn POVTwisted shapes clawing their way up from the break in the earth, limbs too long, movements jerking and wrong, like they weren’t built for this world.My stomach dropped.“They’re evolving.” I said.“Or she is.” Maddox replied grimly.One of them lunged. Too fast. Too unnatural. Calder m







